The blood hammered so loudly in Linda’s ears that for a moment she couldn’t hear, could only see Owen’s face, which was like thunder.
Owen slammed down the phone. “That wasn’t about Emily. That was Dean Lorimer. About Bruce.”
“Bruce?”
“There’s been an incident at school. Last night Bruce assaulted Jorge Avila and beat him up. There were witnesses. They say Jorge hit Bruce, too, but in self-defense; Bruce started it. Because of what’s going on with Emily, they waited until this morning to notify us. They want us to come to the school as soon as we can.”
“Good Lord. That’s not like Bruce. He’s the least violent boy I know.”
Throwing back the covers, Owen said, “Not anymore.”
Hastily they dressed and hurried to the dining room to grab Styrofoam cups of coffee, which they drank as they drove to Hedden Academy.
When they arrived at Tuttle Hall Mrs. Echevera immediately announced them to Bob Lorimer. They entered his inner sanctum to find Bruce waiting, slumped in a chair, all elbows and knees and ears. His right eye was black and swollen; his upper lip was cut and puffy. He looked exhausted.
Lorimer reached across the desk to shake the McFarlands’ hands with great solemnity, part of a ritual, Owen suspected, meant to indicate to Bruce that the three adults were allies. They all sat.
Owen looked at his son and asked, “What happened?”
Bruce stared at the floor. His parents stared at him.
Over the past four years Bruce had gone through many radical physical transformations, the most dramatic during his second year at Hedden, when he grew his hair past his shoulders and let it fall over his forehead so that it veiled his face. Owen and Linda hadn’t made an issue of it and neither had the school, because he was proving to be an exemplary student. This summer while outwardly Bruce resembled his friends more than ever before with his J.F.K. Jr. haircut and clothes, he seemed somehow lost in those clothes. Part of this was from his adherence to the current style: at Hedden the boys were not allowed to wear blue jeans, although, oddly enough, the girls were, and except during sports were required to tuck their polo or button-down cotton shirts into their khakis or flannels or trousers, so for all the boys it was a symbol of rebellion to wear their shirttails out. This led to their buying shirts of larger sizes so that when the shirttails were out, they were aggressively out, like flags or banners of independence hanging nearly to their knees. Also they wore their pants low on their hips so that the hems dragged on the ground, to be eventually ripped and worn and ragged, which coordinated with their scuffed, ripped, and withered leather loafers; Bruce bought a new pair of Top-Siders at the beginning of the year and tried his best to make them look old immediately. He was proudest of them when they were not merely worn but ravaged, so that the sole was a lacework of holes that flopped loose from the upper part of the shoe with every step. All the boys wore their shoes that way; one could hear them coming down the halls by the flapping.
This morning Bruce wore a blue button-down oxford cloth shirt tucked into his khakis. With his bruised face he looked like a boxer in banker’s drag.
Staring at Bruce, Lorimer said, “Last night around ten o’clock, Bruce went to Jorge Avila’s room, grabbed him up from his desk, shook him, called him a few insulting names, and punched him in the nose.” He shot a look at the McFarlands. “I have this from Jorge’s roommate, who witnessed the entire thing.” Looking back at Bruce, he continued, “Jorge tried to defend himself without actually entering into a brawl, but Bruce was persistent, and the two young men ended up exchanging several blows.”
“Is Jorge okay?” Linda asked.
Lorimer replied, “He’s all right. Bruised here and there.”
“Bruce, what’s going on?” Owen demanded, his voice not unkind.
Bruce didn’t reply.
Lorimer said, “I’m sure you’re aware of the rules set down in the school handbook about altercations of this nature. Of course over the four years they’re here, young men do occasionally engage in this kind of dispute, and we try to overlook it, especially if the men can shake hands and apologize. But if it happens too often, we will find it necessary to suspend the instigator. Mr. Phillips, the dorm parent, heard the brawl, separated the young men, reported the incident to me. This morning I had both Bruce and Jorge in my office, and they apologized to each other and shook hands. But I’m not satisfied. I would like to know what caused Bruce to start the fight.”
They waited. Bruce stared at the floor, his face adamantine. Linda knew that look well; she’d seen it on Owen’s face often. Both men could be monumentally stubborn.
“Does it have anything to do with Emily?” Linda asked. Glancing at Lorimer, she explained, “Emily had a crush on Jorge.”
Bruce wouldn’t reply.
His voice lowering to a growl, Owen said, “Answer your stepmother, Bruce.”
“No.” Bruce spoke to the floor.
For a few long moments they all sat in an uncomfortable silence. Then Lorimer stood. “Very well. We don’t have any thumbscrews at this institution; we aren’t going to try to force Bruce to tell us what set him off. But I will tell Bruce, here in the presence of his parents, that if anything like this happens again, he will go directly before the disciplinary board, and my recommendation will be suspension. Which, I might remind you, would not look good on college applications. I won’t put up with violence and recalcitrance in any of my students. Bruce, you’re excused. Go to your class. Mrs. Echevera will give you a late slip.”
Bruce rose, and without looking at his parents, slouched from the room.
Lorimer shook his head. “I have no idea what’s going on,” he admitted. “I don’t need to tell you that this behavior isn’t typical of Bruce.”
“It must involve Emily,” Linda said.
“Perhaps. But maybe not. We’ve had many sets of siblings pass through Hedden Academy, Mrs. McFarland, and you’d be surprised at how separate their lives and their intrigues and dramas can be.” Pulling off his glasses and taking his handkerchief from his pocket, he polished them, put them back on, and said with a smile, as if he now could see the world more brightly, “How’s Emily?”
Owen equivocated. “We’re taking it day by day.”
“Well, good luck.” Lorimer rose and they were politely dismissed.
The Basingstoke Café had always been a favorite place for breakfast for all four of them. The food was excellent, and over the years they had come to appreciate the high-backed booths that let them talk in privacy. Now Linda and Owen sat across from each other in a booth next to a window box of artificial geraniums, over plates of food they knew was delicious but scarcely had the heart to eat.
“I don’t understand what’s going on with either one of them,” Owen said.
“I’m sure Bruce beating up Jorge had something to do with Emily. It would be too much of a coincidence otherwise.”
“Whatever his reason, his behavior was way out of bounds. The school might be indulgent but I’m in no mood to be. He’s not going to New York.”
“Owen. Wait a moment. Let’s talk this over.”
“What’s to talk over? Bruce beat someone up. He’s got to learn that his behavior has consequences.”
“All right, I agree, but let it be different consequences. Owen, this trip means so much to him.”
“He should have thought of that before he got into a fight.”
Linda looked down at her plate and counted to ten. Then she said, “Eat something. We both need to eat something.”
Whit Archibald was a fairly new friend of Bruce’s. Over the past three summers quite a few of Bruce’s gang from Hedden had come to stay on the McFarland farm in the summer, riding the old horses and hiking up the mountains and swimming in the pond. When Linda and Owen had met Whit at Parents’ Weekend in October, they’d been a bit surprised. A tall, handsome, poised young man, Whit could have posed for Ralph Lauren ads, and he seemed so much more sophisticated than Bruce that Owen and Linda were a bit baffled that Whit would want Bruce as his guest over Thanksgiving.
There was no doubt that Bruce wanted to go. “Let it be my Christmas present,” he’d urged.
“It would have to be,” Owen had replied. “Roundtrip plane fare to New York, money for cabs, we’re talking three hundred dollars.”
“His parents will pay for theater tickets—”
“No. We’ll give you money and you’ll pay for your own.”
“Great! Then I can go!”
Linda said, “I’m afraid you’ll get up to something wicked in the city.”
Bruce laughed. “Linda, we’ll be with his parents every minute. Oh, it’ll be so cool! Thanks, you guys. You’re the best.”
Now Linda took a deep breath. “Owen, there are several other ways to impress consequences on Bruce. But I don’t think we should take this trip away from him. He’s worked hard; he’s been an exemplary student for three and a half years now. Guys get in fights all the time. Remember your own adolescence, remember some of the stuff you told me you got up to, and I’m sure you didn’t tell me everything. Think of what some of his friends have done … pot, drinking, smoking in the bathrooms, hotel parties … Bruce hasn’t done any of that. I think he deserves some credit. Some points.”
“You’re always too lenient,” Owen said.
“You’re always too harsh,” Linda countered. “Make him muck out the stalls when he’s home for Christmas. Or cut a cord of wood. Something useful. Owen, I feel strongly about this.”
“All right,” Owen said. “Fine.” After a moment’s thought, he added, “I have to bring him his dress coat.”
“Let’s do it tomorrow. We have to be back at the hospital tomorrow evening for Family Group with Emily. If we get Bruce his clothes by late tomorrow morning, that should be time enough. Their vacation doesn’t start until noon.”
“We might as well go home. There’s nothing left we can do for Emily today.”
“Wait, Owen. I think there is something we can do.”
“What?”
“Talk to the people at the Methodist church. Find out if she confided in anyone there.”
“Good idea.”
“You could do that. While I talk to Jorge Avila.”
“Why don’t we both talk to him?”
“Because you would intimidate him.”
“I doubt it.”
“Come on. You know he’d react differently if he spoke to me alone. If I enlisted his help in a nonthreatening way. He might be willing to tell me anything he knows about Emily. But with you standing there glowering …”
“I won’t glower.”
“Please. We’ll save time, too, if we do it separately.”
“All right,” Owen conceded. He wasn’t pleased, but he could see Linda’s point. He was beginning to experience a bit of the old stag/young stag tension with Bruce; he’d only get Jorge’s back up if he questioned the young man about Emily. To say nothing of how his own blood would rise.
They had weighed her and tapped her and cuffed her and taken more blood, as if through scientific analysis they could discover a suicide-provoking microbe that they’d extinguish with the proper antibiotic. Now Emily sat in yet another office, facing Dr. Brinton, the ward psychiatrist. A bald man with a bulging cranium, he looked almost extraterrestrial and the eyes behind his glasses were not kind. Why had they chosen this creep to interview her? He had little tiny bloodless lips. Couldn’t they see how spooky he was? Who would ever tell him anything?
He asked, “Have you often had thoughts of suicide?”
Perhaps if she answered some questions, he’d let her out of the room and away from him. Probably that was why they’d chosen him. She could lie. How would he know? Although if anyone had the power to read minds, this zombie did.
“No.”
“Have you ever harmed yourself before?”
“No.”
“Want to tell me about those scratches on your face?”
Emily didn’t reply.
His chair squeaked as he leaned back. “Do you have friends at Hedden?”
“Of course.”
“Close friends?”
Emily nodded.
“Do you confide in them?”
She nodded again.
“If they ask you—and know they will—why you attempted suicide, what will you tell them?”
Emily looked down at her hands. The room seemed to swell with silence. “Maybe I won’t see them again.”
“Don’t you want to see them again?”
“I guess they’re not really close friends.”
What right did he have to say something like that? She was trying to ignore his words, but they got to her, they were stirring her up inside.
“So. No close friends at Hedden.” He wrote something down.
Angry, she snapped, “I didn’t say that.”
“How about your relationship with your parents and your brother?”
“Stepbrother.”
“Are you close to them?”
She didn’t answer.
“You and Bruce get along okay? Parents treat you both fairly?”
This time she let the silence swell. The silence had no power, and Dr. Brinton had no power. Nothing mattered.
“Emily, I’d like you to look at the picture and tell me what you see.”
He was holding up a black-and-white abstract of a bunch of blobs. Did he think she was totally uneducated? That she didn’t know about Rorshachs?
“Julie Andrews in the Sound of Music.”
“And in this picture?”
“ ‘The Brady Bunch.’ ”
He displayed no impatience with her answers but continued through a set of ten, and when he was through, he swiveled in his chair to place the set on the table behind him. Then he turned back to face her.
“I’d say we’ve got a little issue avoidance going on.”
I’d say you look like Frankenstein’s brother.
“One more thing. We’ve got a little test we’d like you to take. I’m sure someone as smart as you will have no problem with it. It’s multiple choice. One answer only. We’d like, of course, for your answers to be honest. Take your time.”
Emily took the pencil and papers he handed her. She was sitting in a student’s desk with a writing table curling around her, and without a word she bent over the test.
I often feel I don’t belong in any group.
My friends keep secrets from me.
Never. ——
Sometimes. ——
Always. ——
My body is ugly.
Yes. ——
Parts of it. ——
No, it’s just fine. ——
As fast as she could, without reading the rest of the questions, Emily sped through the test, checking off the first line of every question. She handed it back to him.
He took it without looking at it and leaned his forearms on his desk, earnestly peering at her from beneath his Cro-Magnon bulge.
“I’d say you are as angry as you are sad.”
She felt her face flame.
“Further, I’d say you’re as angry with yourself as you are with anyone else. And you think no one can help. And you think you are the only person in the history of the entire universe who has ever had the particular problem you’re having.”
She glared at him.
“Isn’t that a little arrogant? A little solipsistic?”
“I don’t know what that word means.”
“Self-centered. Unaware of the rest of the world.”
She shrugged. “Fine, just add being solipsistic to the rest of my sins.”
“You’ve got sins? A pretty young girl like you?”
“Sometimes people are just born bad.”
“I see. The Bad Seed sort of thing.”
Emily nodded.
Dr. Brinton leaned back in his chair for a moment and stared at the ceiling, humming tunelessly. Emily wished there was a clock in the room.
“Now what bothers me,” he said, suddenly turning to her, “is that in these reports I’ve read, interviews with your parents and the dean of your school, I’ve come across nothing that indicates any kind of sinning on your part.”
Emily didn’t reply.
“No suspensions from school. Nothing but glowing remarks from your teachers. So what’s up? I mean, come on, help me out here.”
“Maybe it’s something in the future.”
“I see. Something that hasn’t happened yet, but will. Something bad, planted inside you.”
Emily nodded. “Like a time bomb.”
He looked sad. Shaking his head, he said, “What an awful burden you are bearing, carrying a time bomb within you, thinking you are the only one who can avert disaster.”
Emily wrapped her arms around her stomach. “I don’t want to talk any more.” Pain was swelling through her stomach and chest. “Please.”
Dr. Brinton stared at her a while, considering. When he looked at his watch, Emily felt oddly offended.
“All right. It’s almost time for the fitness hour anyway. We’ll talk again tomorrow.” He rose. “I’ll escort you to the exercise room.”
He rose, a tall, ungainly, Ichabod Crane of a man, all bones and joints. It couldn’t have been easy for him as a boy. He could never have been handsome. He couldn’t help having that bulging forehead, those little eyes. She thought of Kafka’s story they’d read part of in school, where the man turned into a cockroach. Dr. Brinton was like a cockroach turned into a man. He was hideous, as she was, and still a human being. There was almost comfort in that thought.