Chapter 5: Wednesday’s Child
1226 Words
Chapter 5: Wednesday’s Child
Wednesday Evening
In the large kitchen, Hal crumbled dry herbs, and stirred them into the bubbling tomato sauce. He sprinkled in Parmesan, added a half a cup of Merlot, and then set the pan to simmer. Next he tackled the salad. He was tearing lettuce and running the leaves under the faucet when he heard a noise in the corridor that signaled Guy’s arrival home.
“You’re earlier than usual,” Hal said, turning to Guy for a quick kiss. “I thought you had a four o’clock?”
“I did. Meeda O’Connell.”
“Oh, right.” Hal gave him an understanding pat on the back. “Cut the session short again?”
“No. She was ten minutes early. Lansing buzzed me, and, since I’d finished up reports for the day, I told her to usher the poor soul in.”
Hal went back to the salad and began slicing tomatoes.
“She was actually quite talkative today. In the beginning, we spent much less time discussing Nathan, and her misperception issues—”
“I’m waiting for the ‘but,’” Hal said interrupting him.
“But then she dropped the bomb.”
Hal poured a glass of Merlot for himself, and then another for Guy, who took it over to the small dinette, pulled out a chair, and sat down. “Your second or first?”
“Meaning have I started the happy hour without you?”
“Hmm. Something like that.”
Hal took a sip from his wine glass. “Nope. This is my first, if you must know.”
“I must if I’m to take good care of you. Don’t want you to end up on a liver transplant list,” Guy said, and then took a long swallow of Merlot. “By the way, I think we’ve created a monster.”
“Tell me about the bomb,” Hal said. “A breakthrough of sorts?”
“Not really. More of a setback. When we started the session, Meeda actually seemed better.”
“Talkative. Yes, you said.”
“More interested in reestablishing contact with her older child, Erik. The one in foster care.”
“Well, that is progress.”
“It is and it isn’t.” Guy took out a pocket notebook, the one Hal called his little black book and always kidded him about. “It seems there’s been a development, something we had no knowledge of prior to her arrival, and certainly something not documented in her case notes from Collingsworth State, such as they are. Why of all days when we’re so close to the trip? It’s like one step forward and ten backward with her.”
Hal seemed to sense his partner’s anxiety and dropped what he was doing and went over to him.
“Okay I worry too much. Sorry, love.”
Hal pulled his lover close and hugged him. “You’re far too conscientious for your own good. Meeda is such a different person from the quiet, introverted woman she was when she first came to us. She even talks to me, of all people, when I run into her in the waiting room. That’s real progress. You have to acknowledge it. You’ve done a wonderful job with her therapy.”
“Not exactly,” Guy said. “Seems my goddamned treatment plan is getting in the way of her fully acknowledging what we—and just about everyone else except the goddamned folks at Collingsworth State—know she did.”
“How so?”
Guy pulled away and went out into the hall and returned with his briefcase. “Here. Listen to this. I made notes as fast as I could. Philby, that i***t at Collingsworth, the one in charge of her care, may have done her and us irreparable damage.”
“I don’t see how given what you’ve accomplished—” Hal began.
“Just wait.” He flipped thru his legal size note pad from today’s session. “Here. I’ve paraphrased it, but just the same it’s a backslide. Listen to this: Patient says Dr. Philby, the f*****g i***t—”
“f*****g i***t. Did you actually write that down?” Hal laughed and took off his “Kiss the Cook” apron. He sat down at the kitchen table opposite him. “All right. You’ve got my full attention.”
Guy took a deep breath and began again. “First off, they convinced her near the end of her stay she’d had nothing whatsoever to do with Nathan’s death. Philby told her when a unexpected death occurs, and the child is under six months, then sudden infant death syndrome or SIDS is a likely diagnosis.’”
“Yes,” Hal said, “and it could be except—”
“We know the facts of the case from the police report. Thank God for Ms. Lansing’s connections at the station. There were witnesses who came forward at the time, and it’s well documented Meeda did have more than a little something to do with it—”
“I hear another ‘and’ on the way,” Hal broke in.
“And at State they kept telling her over and over that the doctors on the case, even the police, ruled everything else out but SIDS.”
“Yes, but there was still plenty of evidence to the contrary. Otherwise why confine her so long when most everyone believed at the time she’d done it?”
“Exactly.” Guy paused a moment then went on. “There’s more. Philby and his incompetent staff convinced her the infant’s autopsy results matched those of SIDS, and there was no evidence of disease, no head or body trauma, and no poisons of any kind found in the child’s system. Which runs counter to her treatment plan. We thought she’d accepted long ago she was ill, and that in a state of emotional stress—”
“She’d killed her child,” Hal said.
“Yes. Whether she was guilty or not isn’t the issue here. It happened, and she was treated, we thought, at Collingsworth with psychiatric intervention. Now Meeda’s feeling unsure again, and she’s starting to rehash it all. Thank you, Dr. Philby, very f*****g much. I’ve really screwed up. Not only have I compromised her therapy from the past, but also I’ve sent her backward instead of forward. We’ve been at cross purposes.”
“Nonsense.”
Guy returned to his notes. “Thank God I never depend on my memory. Give me a sec. Need to make sense here. It’s important.” He took a moment and began. “She kept going over that last day with Nathan. The older son, Erik, was…” He looked back at his notes on the previous page. “He was seven at the time. She went on about the sleep deprivation that we know from the court transcripts is true, and what she said about the kid’s nonstop crying. ‘Do you think I wanted to silence Nathan, quiet him long enough for me to get some rest, a little sleep?’ I wrote that down verbatim.”
“What was it you said she’d called her infant son? Something out of a childhood rhyme, wasn’t it?”
“Wednesday’s child,” Guy said.
“Wednesday’s child is full of woe. Yes, I remember.”
Guy went on referring to his notes as he spoke. “No, she couldn’t have done him any harm she said. Besides, the staff at Collingsworth said she hadn’t. That was the worst of it. The proof they’d convinced her she’d been innocent. So the woman she’d imagined wasn’t her. She’d never been to Miller’s Hardware and asked about poisons. Something we know for a fact she did.”
“Yes,” Hal said. “That’s documented in the court records.”
“When she left Collingsworth, Dr. Philby said she had to have confidence in knowing she was innocent.”
“I really don’t think this will be a problem. The upcoming trip and the natural setting may be just the ticket for getting her to relax and accept what really happened. She won’t heal until she does.”
“Maybe,” Guy said. “But after a while she stopped talking. I let her sit there and when she got up to leave, I asked her what she was thinking and she said, ‘I don’t know. Maybe I did do it after all.’”
“That’s good, isn’t it?” Hal reached across the table and took his lover’s hand.
“She’s completely confused and doesn’t know what to believe.” Guy held out his glass for a refill, and Hal poured him another more generous glass of wine.
“She’s definitely going on the trip?”
“Yes,” Guy said, “but I’m not sure it’s—”
“It’s a wonderful idea. When we get all the others together and begin our group sessions in new surroundings, I’m sure things will straighten out. We just need to give it—”
“Time,” Guy said. “Yes.”
“Now I hope you have an appetite as I’ve prepared all your favorites.”
“Yes, of course. You know I love your cooking. Just one thing.”
Hal sighed audibly. “What now?”
“When did we start finishing each other’s sentences?”
- Writer
