‘Who you here to see?’ asked the guard behind the bulletproof window as he examined her driver’s license and badge. Behind him, maybe a half-dozen other uniforms milled about in the small room, eating donuts and drinking coffee. Saturday morning cartoons played on a small portable TV. On the foldout table next to the metal detector, another officer went through her purse looking for weapons.
‘Cirto. Andrew Cirto,’ she said.
‘Cirto, huh? That’s a first. You a detective?’ he asked with a thick New York accent, fingering her badge. Under where it read State Attorney’s Office, a red enamel sun rose over a green palm tree and blue water. Even she’d thought it looked fake the first time she’d seen it.
‘No. I’m a prosecutor. In Miami.’
‘Oh. You seeing him for a case you got? You know, he’s been locked up as long as I been here.’
She shook her head and cleared her throat. ‘It’s personal.’ She looked around the empty screening/waiting room. On a table in the corner, a fake silver Christmas tree flashed on and off. She knew from friends in Corrections that visiting day in prison could get pretty busy. Obviously, from the looks of it, that was not the case here at Kirby. Not even on Christmas Eve.
‘Well, they got to call up to the ward and bring him down to the visiting room. It may take a while. Have a seat.’
‘Okay,’ she nodded, turning away. Then she thought of something and turned back. ‘Do they tell him who’s here to see him?’
‘I think so.’
‘Make sure they tell him it’s Ju-Ju,’ she said quietly, taking a seat on a ripped vinyl bench close to the door. She glanced down at the stack of worn People magazines on the chipped end table.
She closed her eyes and attempted to gather her thoughts. She tried to imagine the conversation she wanted to have with Andrew, but couldn’t even get that far. Past ‘hello’, she wasn’t sure what was going to happen.
Maybe a half-hour later the door to the waiting room opened. A slight, balding man in a dark suit and white doctor’s coat came in. His dark eyes were buried in a deep frown. He didn’t look happy. ‘Ms Valenciano?’
‘Yes,’ she said, rising to meet him.
‘I’m Dr Harry Mynks, the Director of Psychiatric Services here. I’m one of Andrew Cirto’s doctors.’
She nodded. There was an awkward pause.
‘The SHTA told me that someone was here to see Andrew,’ he continued coldly. ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t recognize the name Valenciano.’
‘I didn’t know you were supposed to,’ she said, shifting uncomfortably. ‘What’s that, an SHTA?’
‘That’s one of our Secure Hospital Treatment Assistants. An aid on the ward. He called me to say that Andrew has a visitor.’ He paused, again waiting for her to say something. ‘I’ve been the director here at Kirby for eight years, Ms Valenciano,’ he continued when she didn’t, pulling down on his bony chin, ‘and, well, to be honest with you, that’s never happened before. In fact, since I’m quite familiar with Andrew’s records, I can tell you that in all his years at this facility, he’s never had a single visitor. That’s why I took an interest in meeting you. I wanted to speak with you before you actually met with him today.’ He nodded at the uniform in the booth, who then buzzed the door. ‘Can you accompany me to my office for a moment, so we can go over a few things?’ Dr Mynks asked, holding the door open for her.
Julia swallowed hard and nodded, following him into a deserted hallway that looked a lot like the basement of the science lab in her high school, windowless and clinical. The metal in her worn heels clicked softly on the shiny cement floor and she shifted her weight to the balls of her feet. She’d meant to get them reheeled.
‘These are just administrative offices,’ he said, watching her as she looked about. ‘The wards are on the upper floors. Visitors are not permitted up there. I have to ask,’ he said when they’d arrived at his office door. He held it open and motioned her in. ‘All the way from the Miami State Attorney’s Office. Who are you?’
Julia looked around the sparsely furnished room, her eyes hoping to land on anything besides Dr Mynks’s disarming stare. A degree from Johns Hopkins hung behind the desk. As did one from Cornell. She took a breath. ‘I’m his sister,’ she said after a moment, finally taking a seat. ‘Andrew is my older brother.’
‘Oh,’ he replied, sitting himself behind the desk.
‘I just want to see him again. I didn’t know he was here. I just found out. I thought he was … well, I thought he was dead,’ she said carefully. ‘I just want to see him again, Dr Mynks.’ She probably didn’t have to tell him anything, but there you go – he was a psychiatrist and although it wasn’t a couch, she was sitting in his office.
‘Andrew murdered your—’
She nodded and cut him off with a deliberate wave of her hand. ‘Yes. I, ah – I know he was sick now. I didn’t know that before.’ She shifted in her seat.
‘Oh,’ he said again, but she could tell he didn’t believe her. Then he paused. ‘He’s better, Ms Valenciano. Since I’ve been director here, he’s been a model patient. Are you familiar with his history?’
‘I know he has schizophrenia. I’ve read the court file.’
‘And you didn’t know that before? Were you living with him when he was first diagnosed?’
‘I was very young at the time. What medication is he on?’
He shook his head. ‘I can’t discuss that with you. HIPA privacy rules.’
She waited a moment. ‘I’ve read the plea transcript. I know he’s paranoid, Dr Mynks. I know from those transcripts what he thought that night. What he was thinking …’ She cleared her throat. ‘About the CIA. About my father. I know what the voices told him to do to them.’ She took a deep breath.
‘The murders were very brutal.’
‘I’d rather not discuss that.’
There was a long and difficult pause. ‘I don’t know how much you know about the disease itself, but schizophrenia doesn’t go away, Ms Valenciano. So I don’t know what you’re expecting to find today. With paranoids, some hold on to the same delusion or auditory hallucination their whole lives, others may develop different delusions, or perhaps hear new or different voices. Medication can do wonders for some patients – completely quieting the voices they hear, or dulling those voices to whispers. In others, we unfortunately have limited success. There are some that will always exist in a foreign world that no one, and no medicine, can ever reach. I can tell you that your brother is one of the lucky ones. But since he hasn’t seen you in so long, without divulging any privileged information, I have to suggest that you show him your hands before you sit down. Palms up. Let him inspect them carefully, so that he does not become agitated.’
She stared at him. A wave of goosebumps suddenly erupted down her back.
‘He needs to look at your hands to make sure they have no implants,’ he explained. ‘To make sure that you are not a robot or a CIA spy. Medication successfully helps your brother learn to live with his illness. To him, though, his delusion and the people in it can still seem as real as you or me. Without medication, I’m sure he’d bet his life on it.’ He hesitated for a deliberate second. ‘And yours.’
I saved them, Ju-Ju. I saved them.
‘I know there are privacy rules,’ she said finally, and paused again. She looked down at her hands, rubbing them slowly together, thinking of what Dr Mynks had just said. ‘But, well, how is he now?’
‘You can see for yourself in just a moment. He’s in the visiting room upstairs, waiting.’
‘Does he know I’m here? Does he know it’s me?’
‘Yes. Yes, he does.’
She tried to read Dr Mynks’s face, but he gave nothing away. She still didn’t think he liked her.
‘Thank you for speaking with me,’ he said, rising. ‘I was just curious to meet you. You know, fourteen years in here and no one. Not even a phone call. Now, with just weeks before his release, he gets his first visitor. It couldn’t just be coincidence, I thought. I wanted to make sure you weren’t with the press, trying to stir up some reaction in the community. From what I understand, his case did receive a fair deal of coverage in the news at the time.’
‘Release?’ she asked, startled.
‘Yes,’ Dr Mynks said, turning back to face her as he opened the door. He studied her with that same suspicious frown. ‘Andrew just had his two-year review. The Forensic Committee met last month and reviewed the report of the ward psychiatrist, the staff psychologist and the OMH social worker, and this time recommended that he be released to a less-secure, civil psychiatric facility. He’s being sent to Rockland Psychiatric within the next ninety days or so, as soon as there’s a bed available for him. The hope, of course, is that from there, he can eventually be released back into society.’