“He’s not having lunch?”
“What I need to talk to you about is confidential. Dick understands that. So why did I bring him with me, right? To be honest, it’s because I’m still shaky. Still haven’t gotten used to being alone.”
“I don’t blame you.”
“Don’t you think I should be past it by now?”
“I probably wouldn’t be.”
“That’s a very nice thing to say.”
“It’s the truth.”
Another smile. She reached over and touched my hand, just for a second. Then back to her coffee cup.
“I’m sleeping a little better,” she said, “but still far from perfect.
In the beginning I’d be up all night, heart pounding away, nauseated.
Now I can get to sleep, but sometimes I still wake up all in a knot.
Sometimes the thought of going to work makes me just want to crawl back in bed. Dick works in Westchester near the airport, so sometimes we take one car and he drops me off and picks me up. I guess I’ve become pretty dependent on him.”
She gave a small smile. The unspoken message: for a change.
“Meanwhile, I’m telling the staff and the patients there’s nothing to worry about. Nothing like consistency.”
Ear brought the food.
“This looks yum,” she said, pushing her fork around in her salad bowl.
But she didn’t eat, and one arm stayed around her purse.
I tried a little linguine. Memories of school lunch.
She nibbled on a piece of lettuce. Dabbed at her mouth. Looked around.
Unsnapped the purse.
“You have to promise me to keep this absolutely confidential,” she said. “At least where you got it from, okay?”
“Does it relate to Hewitt?”
“In a way. Mostly–it’s nothing that can help Detective Sturgis–not that I can see, anyway. I shouldn’t even be showing it to you. But people are being harassed and I know what it’s like to feel besieged.
So if this does lead anywhere, please keep me out of it–please?”
“All right,” I said.
“Thank you.” She inhaled, shoved her hand into the purse, and drew out a legal-sized envelope. White, clean, unmarked. She held on to it.
The paper made her nails look especially red.
“Remember how sketchy Becky’s notes on Hewitt were?” she said. “How I made excuses for her, saying she’d been a good therapist but not big on paperwork?
Well, it bothered me more than I let on. Even for Becky that was cursory–I guess I just didn’t want to deal with anything related to her murder. But after you left, I kept thinking about it and went looking to see if she’d taken any other notes that had somehow been misfiled. With all the upheaval right after, housekeeping wasn’t exactly a high priority. I didn’t find anything, so I asked Mary, my secretary. She said all Becky’s active charts had been distributed to other caseworkers, but it was possible some of her inactive files might have ended up in our storage room. So she and I took some time on Friday and looked around for a few hours, and sure enough, stuck in a corner was a box with Becky’s initials on it–‘RB.” Who knows how it got there.
Inside was junk that had been removed from her desk– pens, paper clips, whatever. Underneath all that, was this.”
Her hand shook slightly as she handed me the envelope.
I removed the contents. Three sheets of horizontal-ruled chart paper, slightly grimy and bearing deep fold marks, each partially filled with typed notations.
The first was dated six months ago: Saw DH today. Still hearing voices, but meds seem to help. Still dealing with stress of start-life. Came in with G, both stressd.
BB, SWA Three weeks later: D lots better. Snstv, too. Just meds, or me? Ha ha. Maybe some hope?
BB, SWA D showing feeings, more and more. Tlking lots, too. Very good! Yeah, thrpy!
Success! But keep limits.
BB, SWA D cohrnt–hr brshed, totally clean! But still late. Talk re childhd, etc. Some p-c, but approp. G there, waiting. A bit hostl?
Jealous? Follow.
BB D a diff prsn. Open, vrbal, affectnt. Still late. A bit more p-c.
Approp? Set lmts? Talk to JJ? Wrth the progrss? Yes!