There’s blood in the water and our shithead of a therapist can smell it. He’s leaning over his desk, his gaze intent and questioning. Something’s different? What is it? Can I exploit this development?
Search warrants aren’t signed by judges because they like cops and want to be nice to them. The cops have to write an affidavit demonstrating probable cause to find whatever’s listed on the warrant. Probable cause boils down to evidence of some kind, which the cops obviously have on us. And now, sitting in the submissive seat across from our caring therapist, I can’t say that we didn’t do it. I can only claim that I, myself, didn’t kill our father. But why would anyone believe me? After all, if we did bump off dear old Dad, at least one of us must be lying about it because we’ve all claimed innocence.
As I watch Halberstam open the center drawer of his desk and reach in for his favorite prop, I’m suddenly reminded of a quote from Benjamin Franklin. Something about hanging separately if we don’t hang together. Of course, we won’t hang, separately or together. But we’ll definitely share the same cell, whether or not I wielded the knife that killed my father. And the murder weapon must have been a knife because the cops seized one of ours and knives were specified in the warrant. I know this because Martha’s memo was quite detailed.
Halberstam points a finger in my direction. “Are you alone, Kirk?” he asks me. “Or are others lurking?”
I take a second to check but sense no other presence, which doesn’t mean there’s no one there.
“Not that I can tell.”
“Good, because I want to work on something today. Tell me. Did you hate your father?”
“Probably.”
“Probably?”
I take a breath and shrug. “You gotta hate the asshole, right? Given what he did? But I can’t say I spent all that much time thinking about him, at least before he showed up.”
“What about Carolyn?”
“What about her?”
“Did Carolyn, as a child, hate her father?”
“How would I know?” I don’t want to remember a single second of Carolyn’s life with Daddy and I change the subject before Halberstam gets up a head of steam. “At the hearing, Doctor, you told the board that you didn’t know who was in control of Carolyn’s body on the night my father was snuffed. Now I’m telling you. Martha was in control. She spent the evening at home watching TV.”
“How do you know this? Were you there?”
“We write memos, Doctor.” And thank God that Marshal had thought to copy ours. “Martha …”
Halberstam waves me off. “I’ll need to see the memos, of course.”
“I can only promise they’ll be produced if I’m around for the next session.”
“Ah, the great disclaimer. Don’t blame me if Victoria shows up without the memos because I’m not in control. I hear one or another version of this excuse at every session. But here’s the thing, Kirk. Therapy can’t succeed unless patients take responsibility. You tell me you want to gain control, to unify, but then, at every opportunity, you employ your … your separateness to excuse your failures. You’re on a merry-go-round, all of you, and you need to get off.”
In fact, I have no desire to get off. The only thing I really want is more rides. I encourage Halberstam with a nod, but he’s not finished.
“Consider this,” he announces. “You told me that you write memos in order to keep each other abreast. Couldn’t you, Kirk, when you get home, write a memo reminding the others to bring all the memos to our next session? Instead, you offer the standard disclaimer.”
I have to laugh. Halberstam just kicked my ass and there’s no wriggling off the hook. I shot off my big mouth and now we’ll have to produce the memos. In fact, if Serena’s around to do the writing, or Victoria, we’ll write a few new ones to replace the ones we leave behind.
“You’re right,” I admit. “I think you’re gonna be bored reading them, but we’ll get them here.”