The Game You Played (13 page)

Saturday afternoon

DRY, BROWN LEAVES DROPPED FROM AN archway of trees as I drove Phoebe to Leona Moran’s clinic. The knobbed branches seemed skeletal and diseased to me.

An hour ago, there’d been some hope that a resolution to what happened to my son was in sight. That hope was dust.

I’d called Dr Moran as soon as Phoebe and I had left the police station. Dr Moran said that considering the circumstances, she’d see Phoebe straight away. Phoebe didn’t want to see Dr Moran, pleading to just go home. But I wasn’t going to let that happen. Someone had to look out for her, and that person obviously couldn’t be herself.

Dr Moran stepped from her office to greet us as soon as we walked into the clinic. With her librarian-style smooth hair, rimless glasses and quick smile, she was a walking advertisement for her profession. She could make you shiny new and get rid of all the bad stuff cluttering your head.

I expected to wait outside, but Dr Moran surprised me by guiding me into the room along with Phoebe.

“I’d like to have a little chat with both of you.” She gestured towards two comfortable-looking chairs. “Because this is happening to you both. First of all, can I get either of you a drink? A tea or coffee? Water?”

Phoebe refused the drink flatly, and I followed suit. I was thirsty for something stronger than coffee anyway.

“Okay,” she started with a concerned set of wrinkles indenting the centre of her forehead. “Luke, you gave me a brief background on what’s been happening over the past three days. I’d like to take it from here and see if we can’t get things to a better place.”

Her milky green eyes rested on Phoebe. “How are you? You’ve missed your last two appointments. I’ve been thinking about you.”

“I just want to go home.” Phoebe looked away from me and Dr Moran.

Anger pitted itself inside me again. She caused all this, and now she wanted to walk away from it? I didn’t even know she’d been missing appointments. She’d lied to me.

“We just need to make sure you’re okay,” Dr Moran told her in a tone that was far gentler than I would have liked. “And you haven’t been okay. I understand that both of you are hurting right now. Perhaps we can start by you telling me how you’ve been lately, Phoebe.”

Phoebe wrapped her arms across her stomach, eyeing Dr Moran with a defensive expression. “How can I tell you when I don’t understand anything right now? I need time to figure this out.”

“You’re feeling confused?” Dr Moran nodded.

“Confused doesn’t begin to describe it. I didn’t write those letters. I couldn’t have. Why would. . . .” Phoebe’s voice trailed away.

“Of course,” said the doctor. “You’re not going to untangle this straight away. Don’t expect to. You’ve been through severe and unrelenting trauma these past few months. Have you been sleeping? How has the new sleeping medication been working for you?”

I wanted Dr Moran to drill her about the letters. Analyse why she’d done it. Instead, she was starting in a different place.

Phoebe gave a nod. “The medication’s fine. I’m sleeping.”

“Except for the sleepwalking episodes,” I broke in.

“I had a couple of restless nights,” Phoebe’s voice snapped tight. “Ever since the letters started.”

“That’s understandable.” Dr Moran paused. “The sleepwalking is definitely something new. So, these kinds of restless nights weren’t happening before the letters?”

“No.” Phoebe shook her head firmly.

Dr Moran looked to me for confirmation.

I didn’t know why the hell we were talking as though the letters had caused Phoebe’s state of mind when it was Phoebe’s state of mind that had caused the letters. But I wasn’t the doctor, and I decided to play along.

“As far as I know, that’s right,” I agreed.

The doctor chewed her lip for a second. “Okay. I knew you were having intense dreams, but this whole thing has really progressed. And not in a good way.”

Phoebe lifted her head and eyed Dr Moran in an intense gaze. “I need to know something. Is it even possible for someone to write those letters while sleepwalking?”

Dr Moran seemed to think for a second, her forehead wrinkling again. “As I understand it, the letters are in rhyme, and they were written on a typewriter and delivered to your letterbox, over the course of three days. Correct?”

“The second letter was pinned to the coffee shop noticeboard,” I cut in. “And the video showed that Phoebe ran to her grandmother’s and back before she posted the third letter.” I sounded like the prosecution in a courtroom. I stopped myself from saying any more. “I’m just trying to give you a clearer picture.”

Dr Moran’s frown deepened. “Well, that’s a lot of complex activity. People do all kinds of things during
somnambulism—
sleepwalking. Just about anything you can do when you’re awake, you can do sleepwalking. You can walk down the street, and you can write letters. You can even drive a car. It’s not what people usually do when in that state, but it’s possible. I haven’t heard of carrying on an activity over several sleepwalking sessions, but I’ll need to investigate that further. I’ll also look into the possibility that Phoebe was in some other kind of altered state.”

“What kind of altered state?” Phoebe asked, folding her arms in tightly.

“That’s what we need to find out,” Dr Moran told her. “Look, I’m going to book you in for a sleep study, to see what’s been going on with you at night.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“The patient just stays overnight in a clinic, and their sleeping phases are monitored while they sleep. And—”

“I don’t want to go and stay somewhere else right now,” Phoebe hurried to say.

Dr Moran gave her an understanding nod. “It won’t be straight away. As you can imagine, seeing as it’s an overnight stay in which you are monitored all night, the waiting lists are long. In the meantime, we might need to have a think on your sleeping medication. It might be an idea to dial back to the previous meds you were on. The new medication might be stronger than what you need.”

A hint of alarm flicked through Phoebe’s face, but then she swapped that for a cool expression. As if she had a mirror in front of her and could see her own face. “I’m doing well. I’m getting sleep. The old meds weren’t working for me.”

“We can try a different type, in that case,” said Dr Moran. “I’m not happy with the way things are going with the current ones.”

Phoebe plunged into silence. I could sense a cloud thickening around her.

What the hell was going on with her? She’d just been caught sending kidnapper-style letters about Tommy to our house. Anyone halfway sane would be trying to make amends, trying to fix whatever clouds of crazy were floating in her head. But not Phoebe. Instead, she was arguing with her psych over medication.

I was trying hard to play the understanding husband. Gilroy was right—the last six months had been a nightmare, and maybe I could understand that Phoebe was desperate. If she really didn’t remember writing or sending the letters, she’d be in a world of confusion right now.

But I couldn’t understand the way she was behaving in Dr Moran’s office.

Had she written the letters intentionally and then just pretended the whole sleepwalking scenario—just in case she got found out?

She was hiding something. I was sure of it.

“I don’t want to try something new,” Phoebe said finally. “I’m tired of . . . change. I’m tired of everything changing and out of my control. Could I just stay on what I’m on a while longer? Just one more prescription, and we’ll see how it goes?”

I stared at my wife. Her tone sounded strangely fake, but her face gave nothing away, her eyes large and slightly pleading.

Dr Moran didn’t seem to catch what I did. She shot Phoebe a regretful look. “I’m sorry. I hear you—really, I do. But as your doctor, I’m afraid I can’t prescribe that again for you at the moment. We need to try something else.”

Phoebe gave a sigh that made no sound.

The doctor wrote out a script. “Will you be okay tonight, Phoebe? If there’s a concern about you wandering around your home—or outside of it—an overnight stay in a mental health clinic might be safest for you. That might sound extreme to you right now, but what happened in the early hours of this morning was far more extreme. It’s dangerous for you.”

“Luke put in a new alarm,” Phoebe answered. “And we have a deadlock on the front door. Everything’s okay.”

Phoebe sounded almost clinical.

Dr Moran eyed me quizzically.

I nodded. “Yesterday.”

“That was quick. Good job.” She handed the script to Phoebe, who took it reluctantly, like a child taking medicine.

Turning to me, the doctor pressed her lips together. “How are you, Luke?”

I want to strangle my wife’s bony neck. That’s how I am.
“I’m . . . just trying to process everything. Not succeeding.”

“It’ll take a while. How’s the real estate business?”

It was an unexpected question. But I got it. She was trying to bring things back to normal, to reorient me. Maybe she sensed my anger. Something inside me resisted. I didn’t want to go back to normal. I’d been so fucking understanding with Phoebe all along. She was the one with Tommy when he vanished. It happened when
she
was supposed to be watching him, not me. But she was the one to receive the lion’s share of the sympathy afterwards—from everyone. She was the mother and the one expected to suffer the most. She was the one to have ongoing visits to Dr Moran and the need for antidepressants and sleeping aids. I’d gotten past those things after the first month. Everything had been centred on Phoebe.

And now
this crazy shit.

I just shook my head in response.

She hesitated for a second, her pen poised. “I’d like to make a booking to see both of you again next week. Separately this time.”

Phoebe didn’t answer. When I glanced at her, it seemed to me that she’d completely switched off and was no longer part of this conversation.

“We’ll give you a call later and arrange something,” I said.

“Please do.” Dr Moran shot each of us a direct gaze.

I half-expected Phoebe to jump in and say that she didn’t need to come back, but she remained silent.

“Phoebe?” questioned Dr Moran.

She smiled at the doctor.
Smiled.
“Luke will sort it out.”

“I’ll see you soon, then.” Dr Moran nodded along with her words. I could sense her staring at us in concealed confusion as Phoebe and I left the office. At least Phoebe hadn’t completely pulled the wool over her eyes. I was sure that she could see, as I could, that something was going on with my wife.

Saturday night

LUKE DROVE STRAIGHT TO GET THE prescription filled. I wasn’t trusted to do it myself. I wasn’t trusted to steer myself around anymore. I was a child, and Luke, Dr Moran, and the detectives were the adults. My adult status had been stripped away.

I didn’t know what was happening. At the police station and at Dr Moran’s, I’d had to pack the events of today into a box and seal the lid, waiting until I was alone. Only then was I going to be able to take out the contents of the box and examine each piece in isolation.

That was what I’d always done. When I was growing up, I’d learned to pack things away.
Don’t let anyone see your fear. Don’t let anyone see inside.

By the time Luke pulled up the car outside our home, his eyes had grown almost hostile. What had happened to
team Luke and Phoebe
? We’d been strong and united ever since Tommy had been taken from us. But not now. The letters had been an axe. I wanted him on my side, to tell me the police were wrong and there had to be some other explanation. But he’d already sharpened himself against me.

I headed upstairs and ran myself a bath. I wanted to soak. And wash off the terrifying scenes of the past two hours. Water surged from the tap, looking destructive. Everything seemed out to destroy me.

Mesmerised, I watched the dark water build.

Our bath was black, chosen by Luke. The entire bathroom—the whole house—was styled in masculine black and white. Luke had said this look was popular with clients when he took them to look at apartments and townhouses.

When the bath was filled, I could no longer see the bottom of it.

I needed something to help me relax. Running into the bedroom, I pulled out the shoebox in my wardrobe. I swallowed pill after pill. I didn’t know how many. A dozen? I wouldn’t sleepwalk after taking that many. I wouldn’t be able to move from the bed.

Dropping my clothes on the floor, I stepped into the water and laid myself down.

The prospect that I really was going crazy drifted at the edges of the watery haze inside my head.

It
was
me in that footage from the police camera.

Undeniably me.

What was wrong with me? Had those terrible rhymes really come from me? Had I done those things while I was in a deep sleep?

Dr Moran had skirted around my questions. I could tell she wasn’t convinced that someone could have written three rhymes and delivered them separately—to my home and to the café—all while in a deep sleep. The police didn’t believe it either. I could tell.

Which only left one thing. That I’d written the letters deliberately. That I’d gone slightly nuts and concocted the whole thing (Dr Moran’s euphemistic
altered state
.)

I didn’t have a single memory of writing the letters. Nothing.
Where did I get the paper from? When did I drag out Nan’s typewriter and start writing? How did I pin that letter to the noticeboard of the café? How did I come up with those rhymes?

A valve slipped open in my brain, and the horror of the day flooded in fresh.

Tommy was gone, and this pain was never, never going to end. Luke and I were going to live this every day for the rest of our lives. No end. No resolution.

There was no way out.

I slipped low in the water. I’d been deceiving myself. My dreams weren’t going to lead me to Tommy. I’d been trying to escape the pain by drugging myself and creating my own little make-believe world.

The one thing that had kept me going the past couple of months had just been shattered.

My head grew
heavy, heavy, heavy
.

I could
sleep
.

The water covered my face.

If I could just stay here like this for a little while . . .

Just a while
. . .