His conversation with the police had been deeply troubling. Owen Messinger breathed a heavy sigh as he replaced the phone receiver in its cradle.
All the hours of therapy over the last years hadn’t made Leslie Patterson healthy. The police believed she had staged her own abduction, an obvious cry for help. Leslie was still a very sick young woman.
Owen got up from his desk and went over to the bookcase, where he pulled out the bright yellow binder from the shelf. Yellow was Leslie’s color. The green, red, blue, orange, and purple binders contained the files of the other young women he was treating for eating disorders, self-inflicted wounding, and other impulsive behaviors. Each book contained pages of the therapist’s progress notes on both the illness and therapy for his patients.
Taking a seat on the couch that Leslie had sat upon so many times, Owen opened the yellow binder and began flipping through the pages. The entries went back eight years. Leslie had been a high school sophomore when her mother first noticed the razor marks on her daughter’s legs. Not the minor nicks inflicted by an inexperienced adolescent shaving her legs but angry slits executed with the sharp edge of the blade.
In his unique brand of shorthand, Owen had scribbled down his impressions:
—L.P.’S EATING DISORDER = EXTREME WEIGHT LOSS.
—L.P. TALKS OF EATING 3 × A DAY. CLOSER ANALYSIS SHOWS AMOUNT OF FOOD ACTUALLY CONSUMED VERY LIMITED.
—L.P. HAS ENGAGED IN EXCESSIVE STRENUOUS EXERCISE AS A WEIGHT CONTROL MEASURE.
—L.P. HAS PERSISTENT PREOCCUPATION WITH BODY IMAGE. SEES HERSELF AS OVERWEIGHT.
—L.P. DENIES SEEING HERSELF AS EMACIATED THOUGH SHE IS SEVERELY UNDER RECOMMENDED WEIGHT LEVELS.
—L.P. IS TRYING TO RELIEVE STRESS BY CUTTING. UNEXPRESSED OR UNRESOLVED ANGER.
Owen realized that the notes he had made back then weren’t all that different from what he would write about his patient today. Only now he knew for certain that Leslie had expanded her arsenal of cutting tools from razor blades to safety pins and shards of broken glass. And that she wasn’t responding at all to the new therapy.
The intercom buzzed, and his assistant’s voice came over the speaker.
“Anna Caprie is here, Dr. Messinger.”
“All right, Christine. I’ll be just a minute.”
He closed the yellow binder and slid it back into its place on the shelf. As he pulled out Anna Caprie’s green book, he hesitated for a moment, wondering if he should continue with his innovative therapy. But he quickly dismissed the thought as he went back to his desk and pulled a package of razor blades from the drawer.