“Haven’t we been through this before?”
Hey Richard, you ever think that maybe the good doctor might be humoring you?
No, he’s genuine. I trust him.
“Yes, we have, Richard.”
“So isn’t there anything new you’d like to discuss?”
“Perhaps there is...but first I’d like to run through some other specifics. Is that okay with you?”
Richard nodded. “Sorry.”
Delaney took a sip of water. “Your injuries, they look fresh.”
“They are. From this morning in fact.”
“How did you obtain them?”
“I’m not too sure, actually. You know my relationship with Pamela hasn’t been so good of late.”
“Why?”
Richard shuddered at the doctor’s meaningless query, the simplicity of the probe perplexing, frustrating. Was Delaney playing games? Surely he knew the answer to ‘why’ without having to ask
again
. “I’ve told you this before. Because I won’t let her sleep in bed with me.”
“Because you think you might go on another sleepwalk, and hurt her. Is that correct?”
“Yes.” Richard pulled his sights away from the grease stain and pinned Delaney. His eyes were starting to tear, and he had to blink a few times to clear them. “We fought last night. For hours.”
“Fought?”
“Yeah, we fought.”
Richard, tell him everything you remember.
Delaney nodded for him to continue.
“She came over at seven, we had dinner. We argued for hours. It got heated. Again she insisted as to why I won’t let her sleep over. I refused to admit my reasons. The usual fare.”
“So…why didn’t you just tell her?”
“Are you kidding? Tell her that I nearly killed my ex-wife in my sleep? She’ll never speak to me again! Besides, outside of you, I’ve never told anyone the God’s-honest truth about what happened with Samantha.”
“Two things you must realize,” Delaney said. “One, and I’ve told you this before, but…it might be better if you simply tell Pamela the truth. It sounds to me, based on the effort she’s putting in to make your relationship work, that she really does love you. With that in mind, I can understand her frustration with you for not being truthful with her. Secondly, and I’m sure you’ll understand me here, but by
not
telling her the truth of the matter, you end up with exactly what you fear as far as your relationship is concerned: rejection. She’s not speaking to you now, Richard. Perhaps if you
had
told her, she might’ve understood your reasons for not wanting her to sleep over, and would have offered compassion instead of a struggle. My guess is that she would have been understanding.”
“Doc, there’s something else.”
Delaney nodded, eyes pointing to Richard’s swelled lip. “Go ahead.”
Richard felt his
heartrate
increase, a nerve-induced precursor to confession. “Pamela…she attacked me. But you have to believe me when I tell you that I really don’t remember all the details. It’s all very much a blur.” He didn’t wish to talk about Pam coming at him with the knife.
Delaney’s eyes narrowed--an indication of intense interest. He remained silent, allowing Richard to continue.
“All I can recall is waking up from another sleepwalking dream. I was in bed.
I heard her calling my name. At first I wasn’t sure if I was still dreaming. When I opened my eyes, Pam was in the room with me, standing by the bathroom door.
I answered her, and we began to talk.”
“About what?”
“I really don’t remember. Mostly about the night before, I guess.” He held up his hand, palm facing Delaney. “Wait a sec...I remember...we discussed how she got inside the condo.”
“Okay...go on.”
“I thought it strange that Pam would come unannounced. She said she tried to call but that my phone was off the hook. She then came over and let herself in with my key.”
“Was it unlike her to arrive unexpectedly?”
“Yeah, she never did that. She said she tried to call first, and I could have very well taken the phone off the hook while sleepwalking. I’ve done that before. But I really don’t remember ever giving her a key to my place. As far as I know, I only have one key.”
“Do you suppose she lied about the key?”
Richard shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. Either that, or she made a copy without me knowing.”
Delaney checked the tape, then stopped it, turned it over, and re-pressed record. “What else? What happened after your conversation with her?”
“Well...she kinda changed.
That
I remember. All of a sudden, she really didn’t look like Pam.”
“How so?”
“It was really weird. As far as I could tell she’d only been in my room for a few minutes. We were having as normal a conversation as possible, given the circumstances. She still seemed upset about our break up. And then her eyes, they got all funny. The blue of her eyes turned black. She started to cry a little and turned away from me. When I got out of bed and tried to comfort her, she just went ballistic. Turned around and punched me. Upped and socked me a good one right in the mouth.”
“She punched you?”
“Yeah.”
Delaney scribbled furiously in his notebook. “Was anything said that would cause her to behave this irrationally?”
“No, nothing.”
“Did you hit her back?”
“No! I mean...I don’t know…I can’t remember much after that,” he lied. He thought of the butcher block, cleaning it in the sink, the blood on its wooden surface…
Delaney took a few moments to jot more notes, and Richard took this time to find a bit of comfort in the grease stain. “Richard, do you mind if I stray from the subject for a moment?”
“No, of course not.”
“I’d like to ask you a few questions. All I need you to do is answer them as truthfully as possible. Will you do that for me?”
Richard nodded.
Delaney again checked the tape recorder, then set it back down. “Okay Richard...what is your full name?”
Richard looked at the doctor, grinning incredulously.
“Just answer the question. I’ll explain later.”
“Okay...Richard
Sparke
.”
“Where do you live?”
“46C Crowley Road, Fairview Commons.”
“What do you do for a living?”
“Uh--I’m on disability. I used to be a school teacher at Michael P. Slater Elementary School.”
“So you derive your income solely from disability?”
Richard paused, searching his mind for an answer. His conscience was silent, uncooperative. “Uh--I guess so.”
Delaney scribbled as he asked the questions. “When were you born?”
Richard hesitated, his mind a blank. Finally he answered, “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know your own birthday?”
“No. I...I can’t seem to remember.”
“Where is your mother, Julia
Sparke
?”
“She’s dead.”
“When did she die?”
After a few silent moments, he replied, “I don’t know.”
Delaney nodded. “Who is Samantha?”
That was twice today her name came up in conversation. It unnerved him.
“Please, Richard,” Delaney added after a pause, “this is important.”
“Samantha is my ex-wife.”
“And Debra?”
“Debra is the daughter I had with Samantha. She’s dead.”
“Can you recall how she died?”
“Sudden infant death syndrome.”
“Where is she buried?”
A pause. “I-I don’t know.”
“How long were you married to Samantha?”
“A year. We dated a bit before that--I remember that quite clearly.”
Delaney placed the pen in the crook of the notebook, then closed it. “Would you like some water, Richard?” Richard nodded. Delaney rose and refilled his cup, then filled a new cup for Richard. He handed it to Richard then sat back down. “You mentioned you had another dream last night?”
“Yeah, an intense one too.”
“Do you remember much about it?”
“Everything.”
“I’m curious Richard, why is it that you have no difficulty recalling your dreams, yet you can’t seem to remember the simpler details of your waking life? For most of us it’s the other way around.”
Richard looked at Delaney. The doctor’s eyes drilled him, freezing his tangled thoughts. Richard called for his conscience, but it had effectively hidden itself away--damn it for not stepping up to the plate when it was most needed! “Doctor, I have no answer. I really don’t know.”
“How’s yours?”
Leonard
Moldofsky
took another bite of his turkey hero. A bit of mayo jutted from the side and smeared on his fingers. “Not bad. Cookie’s makes a hell of a sandwich. You know, that
stuff’ll
give you a heart-attack,” he added, referring to Hughes’ Italian special--salami, prosciutto, pepperoni, and provolone.
“My heart’s young. I can handle it.”
The afternoon sun’s rays shifted around the village buildings, sending yellow light across the windshield of the sedan as the two cops ate. Slow-moving traffic provided all the scenery on the right, vehicles waiting in line at the Main Street/Park Avenue traffic light. To the left people marched to and from their lunchtime locales, their minds seemingly preoccupied with workday events. Leonard washed down the last bite of his hero with a sip of coffee, then put on a pair of sunglasses and watched the building. “What time you got?”
“One-fifty. How long you think he’ll be in there for?”
“He went in at one-fifteen. Assuming the doctor sees him right away, since he was fifteen minutes late, he’ll probably be out a little after two. Shrink sessions usually run forty-five minutes, give or take. Depends on how well things go, I suppose.”
“Well, my guess is that he’ll be in there for a while, especially after whatever went down at his place this morning.”
Leonard nodded. “You could be right there. Whatever it is, he’s
fessing
up to it right now.”
“So what do we do after he comes out? Doctor ain’t gonna breach the patient’s privilege of confidentiality.”
“Not unless we obtain a warrant. But we can do that later.”
“So then what’s our next move?” Kevin crunched his sandwich wrapper into a ball and put it into the white paper bag it came in.
“That all depends.”
“On what?”
Leonard pulled the cell phone from his belt, dialed information and got the number for Dr Marcus Delaney, Main Street, Fairview. He punched in the number. A receptionist answered.
“Dr Delaney’s office.”
“Yes, this is Leonard
Moldofsky
of the Fairview Police Department. May I speak with Dr Delaney?”
“Is he expecting your call?”
“No. I have something I’d like to ask him.”
“Are you a client, sir?”
Leonard smiled, rolled his eyes. ”No, I’m not a client.” That earned him a grin from Kevin.
“I’m sorry sir, but Dr Delaney is with a client. Unless this is an emergency--”
“No, that’s all right. No emergency. Tell me, when will the doctor be available to speak?”
“Just a moment.” Leonard heard some papers being shuffled. “He will be free after his current appointment, around three or so. He has a half-hour break scheduled. He should be able to return your call at that time.”
“That would be fine.” Leonard left his cell-phone number and disconnected. “Looks as if
Sparke
will be in there for at least another hour. Delaney must’ve scheduled him for two sessions.”
“This
Sparke’s
a real basket case, huh?”
Leonard laughed. “Yeah. I told you, he’s not all he appears to be.”
“So it looks like we have some time to kill, then. What do we do?”
Leonard pondered the situation for a moment. “I think it’s safe to say that
Sparke
won’t be going anywhere for at least another hour. I’d like to continue tailing him, see where he heads next.”
“Sounds good. So...should we hit the Hospital?”
Leonard nodded. “And his girl’s place.”
Kevin took out the notepad he used to take information while at Richard’s condo. “Pamela Bergin. 338 Culver Place. Washington Building. Not too far from here.”
Leonard radioed in their location, then started the car. He placed the portable dome-light on the dash. The red and white beacon alerted a wave of oncoming traffic. As he pulled out, the cars in front stopped to let the sedan through, much to the impatience of a few horn-honkers further back. “Let’s check out the hospital first. If she’s not there, we’ll hit her apartment.”
“The dream you had last night, Richard. Tell me about it.”
An odd feeling of depersonalization struck Richard at Delaney’s consent to discuss his more intimate fear, a free-floating anxiety that clouded his awareness, making everything seem as if he were experiencing the current session from beyond the confines of his own person. His head swam in eddies of dizziness, his body seeming to lift from the soft surface of the couch. He grasped the cushions, taking deep breaths in effort to control the mounting anticipation.