Chapter Thirty-Seven

“Hey, Leo.”

An hour later, Rory sagged down into an old wooden deck chair and gazed pensively out over the lake that stretched on like an obsidian mirror right up to the edge of the forest. Other than the chirp of crickets and the calling of a few night birds, everything was quiet out here in the middle of nowhere.

“You sound down, my young friend,” Leo said. “What’s wrong?” For someone whose time zone put him somewhere at two in the morning, the old man sounded alert and awake.

“I need some advice, Doc.”

Did he ever. When he’d set out on this assignment, he’d thought he could handle whatever Nina threw his way. But now he wasn’t so sure. She’d gotten to him in a lot more ways than one.

“Shoot.”

“She got to me. Leo. She really got to me.” At this hour of night, outside and alone in the dark, he could say it out loud. Admit he had been so close to losing control. Admit that he who had always prided himself on being able to keep personal feelings separated from his professional life had nearly crossed the line by falling for the woman he had sworn to protect.

Falling?

He blinked and stared out into the darkness.

Had it gone that far already? No. Ridiculous! Last time he’d checked, half of her alternate identities annoyed the heck out of him. And yet, there was something about her, about of all of them, that managed to get under his skin.

The ease with which she got past his defenses, time and again, scared the hell out of him.

“Your DID patient?”

“Yes. Nina.”

Leo grunted. “All right. Nina. Tell me.”

Rory rubbed his face as he tried to find the right words to explain how he felt. What feelings she stirred inside him, despite his best efforts to maintain his distance. But to define it would be to understand it, and he feared he couldn’t. At least not yet.

Or could he?

More important, should he? Or would understanding it make things too real?

“Rory?”

“Yeah. Still here.”

But where and how to start?

Another silence stretched, until finally Leo cleared his throat and said, “Shall I take a leap into the unknown and guess that your issue has to do with the fact that Nina is a beautiful, young, single female, and that you are a virile, single man?”

For a moment, Rory was startled. But then, what had he expected? Leo was not a lauded psych professor for nothing—and one of few people who knew him well.

Rather than bother to deny or confirm the obvious, Rory forged ahead. “I need information. What more can you tell me about multiple personality disorder?” He shifted on the weather-worn Adirondack chair and leaned back wearily. “Nina’s condition doesn’t present itself like any of the other cases I’ve read about.”

“No surprise there,” countered Leo mildly. “It’s not an exact science, Rory. DID is diverse, if nothing else. We haven’t even begun to document all its complexities. But talk to me. Explain what the problem is.”

Rory frowned, organized his thoughts to a semblance of order before he spoke again. “I’ve met a handful of her personalities, so far. Though combative at times, the majority of them cooperate with each other, in their own unique way.”

Leo made a sound of assent, urging him on. “Diverse traits?”

“Very. Opposites in many ways.”

“What about the original personality? Any trace?”

“They all insist the real Nina is gone. But there is an alter they all refer to as Nobody. She talks in plural. They’re very protective of her.”

“Fascinating. And the other alters, are they thoroughly built and distinguishable, or superficial?”

“Very thorough. All four were her cover IDs from when she did government work. She’s adopted them as her alters, with their full histories, dialects, mannerisms, and character traits to match.”

Leo grunted. “Interesting. So they found their origin in her actual past. I take it she used all of these covers for some time?”

“Some of them weeks, others months. It varied.”

There was a soft sound on the other end of the line, a match being struck. “Any information about why, or how, they came into being?” He noisily puffed out smoke. “I presume you are able to meaningfully communicate with at least some of the personalities?”

“Some more than others,” Rory said. “Either they aren’t saying, or they don’t know. But from what I can gather, the breaking point seems to have been due to her electroshock therapy. I get the feeling it went too far at some point, and caused Nina’s original personality to shatter.”

“Intense trauma is one of the principle causes for DID,” Leo agreed. “Hell, trauma of any kind can do a lot of horrible things to the mind. There are plenty of recorded cases of torture breaking a subject. Electroshock, especially when applied against the patient’s will, amounts to the same thing as torture. You said the personalities are aware of each other?”

“They are.” Tiredness pulled at Rory, making a jumble of his thoughts. “But it seems peripheral, possibly situational, rather than full, consistent awareness. Sort of like kids secretly listening in on their parents, but only as long as their curiosity keeps them interested.”

Leo guffawed at the analogy.

“One personality flips to the next without warning, and that can happen several times a day.”

“You sound frustrated, my friend.”

“That is one way to look at it,” Rory muttered.

“What is really making this so hard for you, son? Is it about Nina and what she stands for…or is this about your past?” Leo hesitated a moment, as if unsure if he should say what was on his mind, but then asked bluntly, “About Alice? Does Nina remind you of her?”

“She’s nothing like Alice,” Rory told him with quiet certainty, even though deep down he knew the old man wasn’t all that far off the mark. In a way, it was about Alice. Not that they bore any resemblance to each other, but in the way Nina made him feel. Feelings he hadn’t thought possible since Alice’s death.

“But she touches something inside you. The way Alice used to,” Leo said, and it wasn’t a question. “She gets through that wall you built around yourself when Alice died. To keep people— women in particular—from getting close to you.”

Rory couldn’t deny it, not without sounding like a fool. He was honest enough with himself to admit he had kept people at a distance for years.

Leo let it go at that, apparently content with having sowed the seed in Rory’s mind.

Rory breathed in deeply. “I don’t want to hurt her, Leo.” Or worse, the way it had with Alice. It was his fault that she had died.

What if he fucked up again? And Nina suffered because of him?

“I know you don’t. But she is going to get hurt, regardless. It’s part of life. And not necessarily a bad thing,” Leo pointed out reasonably. “You can’t isolate anyone from pain, Rory. Including yourself. And you shouldn’t. Life is messy, but in its messiness, it is also beautiful. You can’t have one without the other.”

They talked a little while longer, discussing some of the experiences Rory’d had with Nina’s personality changes, and then said their goodbyes.

He sat outside in the chilly darkness for another hour, then sighed and went inside to spend the night alone in his single bed, tossing and turning.

And wondering what tomorrow might bring.