Peggy Holloway - Judith McCain 05 - Monroe Beach (4 page)

I called Dr. Anna before we left the restaurant
. She told us to come on over. I had first met Dr. Anna Stevens, or Dr. Anna as her patients called her, when Julia was admitted to Ocean Sands Psychiatric Hospital, owned by Dr. Anna. Julia had suffered a breakdown when we were both 16 years old.

Dr. Anna is a wonderful person and the best psychiatrist I’ve ever met.
It was because of her, that I ended up becoming a psychologist. She was getting up in years, but was still going strong. I couldn’t wait to see her.

She was pacing outside Ocean Sands when we drove up
, and waved me over to park in front of the door. When we got out of my rental car, I ran over and gave her a big hug.

“I’m so glad to see you,
Dr. Anna,” I said. “This is my friend Delilah, and you already know Sarah.”

As
Delilah shook hands with Dr. Anna, she looked into her eyes, “What happened to him?”

Dr. Anna gasped and looked away.
“I’m sorry,” Delilah said. “I need to learn to keep my mouth shut.”

“No, that’s all right.
I teach my patients to be honest with themselves. I will talk to you about this later. I guess, after all these years, it’s time. Thank you, Delilah.”

Dr. Anna turned to Sarah, “Can I have a hug, you wonderful, multi-layered girl?”

After they hugged, Dr. Anna held her at arm’s length and said, “You look good. I think between the four of us we can figure this thing out. Judith called early this morning and explained what was going on.” Dr. Anna then turned to Delilah, “Did you have any insight?”

“I see a little,”
Delilah said.

“Oh, my goodness, where are my manners?
I waited out here so I could take y’all down to the cottage I rented for you. It’s the largest one,” she said over her shoulder, as she led the way to the group of bungalows on the grounds of Ocean Sands.

I was having both good and bad memories as we followed her.
Mimi and I had stayed here when Julia was a patient at Ocean Sands, after her breakdown. We were sixteen years old and I had just found both Mimi and my twin sister, Julia. Mimi and I had some nice long talks on the porch here, and she became friends with Dr. Anna. Julia and I had come a long way since then.

The cottage was one of the few two-story cottages I had noticed when I was here before.
The bottom floor had a huge bedroom with a King-sized bed, bathroom, and a laundry room.

The top floor had glas
s all the way around and a porch surrounding it. It had a living room-dining room- kitchen area, two bedrooms. and two baths. One of the bedrooms had a king-sized bed. The other had two full-sized beds.

The cottage was decorated in typical Florida style with patterns of seashells, lighthouses
, and pelicans on the bedspreads and so on. I let the other two pick which bedroom they wanted and I ended up with the one downstairs. It had more privacy but not the view.

“Dr. Anna, why don’t you stay here,” I said, “We ha
ve enough room.”

“You know what, Judith, I think I will.
That way we can visit longer and I won’t have to fight traffic going home. It’ll be handy to do my rounds tonight and in the morning.”

There was a small clothing store on the grounds that had been built since I was here.
It had a few clothes and toiletries for someone who decided to stay here, who had loved ones in the psychiatric center. Dr. Anna asked Sarah to accompany her and they set off to shop for Dr. Anna.

Delilah
and I made ourselves comfortable on her bed, propped up watching the ocean. She shook her head, “I tell you, Judith, that chil have a rough time head uh her. I’m plum worried bout her, me.”

“I am too
Delilah. She went through so much growing up and then just as she was getting her life together, she moved to Monroe Beach and became terrorized. Then she had very little time with Robert, and now this. It pisses me off no end.”

“
It pisses me off too, me.”

She was still and quiet for so long I was beginning to
think she had dozed off. But then she spoke. What she said rattled me so badly I almost wished she hadn’t told me.

“I saw this as soon as I took her hand,” she began, “She has had so many lives
, she is an ancient soul. She has been a prostitute, a thief, and a murderer. She spent several of her lives as a man. She was a pedophile in one life. This was the life where she was supposed to redeem herself.”

“Are you saying that she isn’t redeeming herself, when you say she is supposed to?”

“No, I’m saying this life is her last chance. If she fails, she will cease to exist.”

We heard Mimi and Sarah coming in downstairs.
They came upstairs giggling, like a couple of teenagers. “We almost bought out the store,” Dr. Anna said. “Vera, your Mimi, would be proud of us, Judith.”

“Dr. Anna is going to stay in the room with me.
I love this. I feel so much better knowing I have all y’all here to help me. Thank you so much,” Sarah said as she beamed at us.

Dr. Anna looked at her watch, “I have a couple more sessions to do and then some rounds
. Then I’ll be done for the day. I’ll see y’all back here at about seven thirty. What do y’all want to do about supper?”

“I wanted to cook,”
Delilah said.

This was a surprise.
I would have thought she would welcome the chance to eat out, since she cooked all the meals at Dave’s, “Are you sure, Delilah?” I asked her.

“I don’t like hospital food,” she said.

Dr. Anna said as she was leaving, “Tell her about the restaurant here. I think she will change her mind.”

They had
a gourmet restaurant on the hospital grounds, and we ended up eating there. Delilah thought it was delicious.

CHAPTER 5

Dr. Anna arranged to be off for a few days so we could work with Sarah together.
She had another doctor fill in for her and had some of the therapists take her groups.

We established a routine.
Although Delilah had enjoyed the gourmet meal at the cafeteria, she said she still wanted to do the cooking. We tried to talk her out of it, telling her that she should take the time off and treat this like a vacation, but she said cooking was part of her relaxation.

I found a Publix Supermarket not fa
r from Ocean Sands and drove Delilah there the second morning, while Dr. Anna met with Sarah.

We had all agreed to treat this time together like four women friends enjoying each other’s company.
By creating a relaxed atmosphere, we hoped Sarah would gain some insight into what was happening with her. We would handle things as they came up.

Delilah
got up first and cooked. We had a long relaxed breakfast, sitting around talking over coffee afterwards. Then we all pitched in cleaning up the kitchen. Afterwards we hit the beach. We walked and talked. Delilah usually fixed a salad for lunch. We took naps in the afternoons and then sat on the porch overlooking the beach until Delilah called us in to supper.

We walked on the beach after supper and then called home.
Robert told Sarah that Simon, an FBI agent from Atlanta, had come in to help with the investigation. Simon had helped bring the psychopath, Twoon to justice. Robert missed Sarah but was glad she was getting some help.

Wade Russell called me every night.
I didn’t know how I felt about him. We had gone out a few times, but I was still grieving Ben. Wade was the detective who helped us catch Jupiter.

Even though he said he wasn’t going to put pressure on me, I felt like that
was exactly what he was doing, and was glad to be away from him for awhile.

I was also in constant con
tact with Mimi, Tracy, Mark, little Brad, and Julia. I expected Julia to tell me she had eloped the first time she called, she was so excited. But when I asked she said, “No, it’s better than that. You’re going to be an aunt! I’m three months along. My darling old fashioned professor thinks we have to get married now. Isn’t that silly?”

“Why don’t you want to get married now, Julia?”

“I don’t know, really. Maybe I should talk to Dr. Anna?”

“Find another therapist, Julia, Dr. Anna has a full plate right now.”

“Yeah, right. How is Sarah?”

“She’s better than when I first saw her
, but it’s a real puzzle.”

“Tell her to hang in there.
By the way, what can I do for morning sickness? I’m puking my brains out here.”

I laughed, “I’ve never been pregnant, Julia.
But I’ll ask Delilah. She knows about home remedies.” I was laughing when I hung up.

Delilah
called Dave but he told her to not worry about him and to enjoy the time with the girls, as he put it.

I hea
rd her talking to him one night. “What you eating while I’m down here, Dave? You got anybody to cook fo you?

“Now don’t you go sassing me.
I know you is a growed up man but I can still take you over my knee, me.”

I couldn’t help but smile.
Delilah had been Dave’s wet nurse and had helped raise him. Even though he was in his 40s, she still thought of him as her little boy.

Dr. Anna didn’t call anyone
and, for the first time since I had known her, I began to wonder about what her life was like outside Ocean Sands. Julia and I had always depended on her since we were sixteen and had never given a thought to her needs. I felt ashamed when I thought about this.

I found her on the porch one night sitting on the swing watching the waves.
Everyone had gone to bed and I had gone outside to get a breath of sea air before retiring.

I had walked outside and heard someone cough above me.
This bungalow had both an upstairs porch and a downstairs one and I stepped off the porch and looked up and saw Dr. Anna. I went up the outside stairs. She jumped when she saw me.

“God, Judith.
You scared the hell out of me. What are you doing up?”

“I was on my way to bed and heard you cough and came up to check on you.
You listen to people’s problem all day and sometimes into the night. Julia and I have called you at all hours and you’ve always been there for us, giving selflessly of your time. Who’s there for you, Dr. Anna?”

She laughed, “It hasn’t been that selflessly, Judith.
You and Julia have paid me a lot of money.”

“Come on, Dr. Anna.
It’s not about the money and you know it. And you’re evading the question.”

When she turned and looked at me, I was surprised to see tears running down her cheeks.
I got up and put my arms around her. She wept like a baby on my shoulder. It broke my heart. I felt ashamed that I had never considered the fact that she might need a shoulder from time to time herself.

When she sat back up
, the front of my robe was drenched. “Thank you, Judith. That helped a lot.”

“You don’t want to talk about it?”

“I trained you well, Judith. Let’s talk about it tomorrow. It’s getting late and we both need to conserve our emotional strength for Sarah.”

CHAPTER 6

That night, for the first time in years, I had the dream I had had most of my life as a child, teenager, and young adult.
I had the dream about the murder of my parents when I was three years old and the kidnapping of Julia and me.

But no, it was a little different.
Standing in the background of that daisy bedroom, over by the window, was the shadow of a man. I had never seen him before and I tried to focus in on him but he remained in shadow.

I woke up in a sweat and had no one to comfort me.
Ben would have been so much comfort to me now but that psychopath, Jupiter had killed him. I was glad I had the whole bottom floor to myself. I got up and paced the whole floor for hours.

If it hadn’t been for
Delilah’s wonderful breakfast smells coming from upstairs, I would have had a hard time getting up the next morning.

I saw that I wasn’t the only one with hollow eyes from not sleeping.
Dr. Anna was hunched over her coffee cup staring at the table top. Sarah was jumpy and kept looking from one of us to the other.

Delilah
stood at the stove dishing up bacon, eggs, and biscuits fresh from the oven. She put a plate in from of each of us and when she was done she sat down with a heavy sigh.

“Who wants to go first?” she asked.
When no one said anything she said, “Okay, I’ll go first. He invaded my dreams last night and from the look on your faces, he invaded yours too.

“I’ve always had a rich dream life and I’ve seen the future from time to time in my dreams.
Sometimes I dream about people I never met before, but that I meet later.”