“Only one rule, kid, which you should carry with you every day, every minute. Cover your ass. You know why?”
“Why?”
“Because, kid, in the cop world you joined, there’s always a foot headed right for it.”
Brady recalls the advice even before he asks Carolyn Grand the obvious question. “Why don’t you tell me what happened?”
The woman looks down at her feet, hesitating for a moment, but then finds her resolve. “I’m afraid,” she tells him, “that I’ve forgotten.”
It’s the best she can do, and Brady admires the effort, but it’s not enough. He puts her back in the car, then again approaches Ribotta. The woman’s nuts, that’s for sure, and there’s no knowing what she’ll do next. Meanwhile, Ribotta ran her name, so there’s a record that leads right back to Louis Brady.
“Call in the EMTs, send her to Kings County,” he tells Ribotta. “Let the shrinks figure it out.”
Brady takes a final look at Carolyn Grand as he heads for his own unit. The look of utter defeat tugs at his heart. He tells himself that if he’s wrong, if she’s not crazy, she’ll only spend a day or two at Kings County. No big deal, right? But some tours of duty, as Brady learned many years before, are worse than others. Some tours are worse than others and some tours are fucking impossible.
CHAPTER ONE
VICTORIA
I take a second to adjust my game face—I should say we, because there are others watching—before I open the door and step into Dr. Halberstam’s office. It’s four days since we were discharged from a locked psych ward at Kings County Hospital and our appearance is a condition of our discharge. Do it or else.
I find our therapist standing behind his desk, his expression as composed as my own. He says, “Good morning, Ms. Grand, please have a seat.”
I accept the chair he offers, though I would have preferred another. The back of this chair is tilted. I can’t sit up straight unless I perch on the edge. Nor can I walk out of his office, which I and my sisters and my brother would most like to do. I’m stuck here, forced into a posture, if not seductive, at least vulnerable. For the present, Dr. Laurence Halberstam owns us. I know it, and he knows it.
I watch him sit behind his desk, his chair back far more upright than mine. I watch him shuffle through the case file on his desk, our case file: thick, substantial, the history of our lives as told by the many therapists and psychologists and psychiatrists who’ve dissected us over the past twenty years.
“Well, Ms. Grand—”
I stop him with a small shake of my head. “There’s no Ms. Grand, Doctor, and there hasn’t been for many years. There’s only us.” I can afford to be open here because I’m not telling him anything he doesn’t already know. “I want to be frank,” I claim, “right from the beginning.”
His expression doesn’t change, but I didn’t expect it to. Our therapist is in his midforties, with a slender body and a full head of neatly parted hair that I suspect to be his pride and joy. Every hair is in place, every strand uniformly black. There’s not a hint of gray, or even a thinning on top when he bends forward to study his notes, taking his time about it. He wears a gray suit over a starched blue shirt and a muted red tie. The tie’s Windsor knot forms a perfect triangle beneath his chin, but the tie itself is slightly askew, an imperfection that somehow pleases me.
Without changing expression, he lifts his head and looks at me, a technique we’ve encountered several times in the past. Still, I have to concede Halberstam’s mastery of the silent stare. His blue eyes are piercing, even behind the glasses. Finally, he says, “Can I assume that I’m talking to Victoria?”
Presenting an acceptable public face is my job, my function. I represent the family, the four girls and one boy who share this body. In that capacity, I’m required to project, first and foremost, that our situation is under control. Which it’s not, of course, which it’s never been, as my siblings are quick to remind me when I’m too full of myself. Still, I’m wearing my demure best, a full, brown skirt that falls to within two inches of my knees, a white blouse with a scalloped collar and a tan sweater. My shoulder-length hair has been swept back to cover my ears. Except for a light coating of dark red lipstick, I’m not wearing makeup.
“And where are the others,” Halberstam asks, his tone studiously neutral. “Right this minute?”
“Some watching, some wherever.”
“That’s interesting. Who would you say is watching? And why?”
As I compose myself, I glance around Halberstam’s office. We’ve passed time in many psych offices, enough to know they fall into three general patterns. The warm and cozy, the ultrahip, the cool, calm, and collected. Halberstam’s office fits the latter category. Beige wallpaper, a lacquered desk that reflects my shins, hints of mauve in the chairs, porcelain and pottery in lit niches. LED lights frame the outer edges of the ceiling, while a desk lamp with an amber shade provides the only real color in the room.
The décor advertises Halberstam’s approach. He will be neither friend nor foe. He will play the part of the objective observer, his goal to help us help ourselves. Sadly, we’ve generally done better with the homey types, the huggers. “Martha, of course, and Tina. They’re watching.”
“And the others? Where are they?”
I shrug. “Wherever.”
He’s not having it, and he gets right to the point. We don’t exist and never will. “Where do you go, Victoria, when you’re not in control and not watching?”
“Well, that’s the question, isn’t it? And I apologize for not having an answer, except to say we don’t relate well to clock time. It seems to me that I exist at every moment, but I know that can’t be strictly accurate.”
“And why is that?”
“Because there are periods of time I can’t account for, long periods of time. But, then again, where does your anger go, Doctor, when you’re not angry? Your laughter, your hunger, your thirst?”
I watch his eyes narrow. My feeble challenge has annoyed him and he’ll try to put me in my place. To prove the point, he asks a question I think he was saving for later on.
“Describe the incident that brought you here. Or better yet, perhaps you can summon the identity who precipitated your encounter with the police.”
“That would be Eleni. She’s not around, and I have no way to reach her. As for summoning?” I pause long enough to smile. In the movies, split personality types call their various identities into consciousness at will. If only that were true, our lives would be a lot easier. “The truth, Doctor, is that we have no central identity to do the summoning. If Eleni were observing, there’s a chance she would appear spontaneously. But she’s in hiding, in disgrace, hopefully repenting for the monumental screwup that put us in this position.”
“That’s fine, Victoria. Just tell me what you know. Eleni and I will meet later on.”
Do I detect the beginnings of a leer? Because we could live with the sexual interest, a natural consequence of a childhood passed in bondage to a sexual sadist who liked to entertain his friends. Eleni, especially, would be eager to accept the challenge, assuming there’s a deal in the offing.