Blameless (10 page)

She reorganized her library so that her alcoholism and substance abuse books were in the same area as those on addiction, a far better method than before. The calls kept coming, sometimes so fast that the machine couldn’t answer them all, getting stuck resetting itself while new calls were coming in. The
Providence Journal
. Gail. Ned Holt. Brad Harris. Scott. But no Craig.

The reporters all wanted to know if the burglary was related to the malpractice suit. Gail and Scott sent their love and support. Brad left a message saying that the dean’s meeting was scheduled for Wednesday afternoon, but for her not to worry. He had been lobbying on her behalf, and the vote was sure to come down in her favor. She arranged an entire corner devoted to personality disorders, but still Craig hadn’t called.

He must have had his own problems at work, she thought, labeling folders to hold the research papers that had been thrown from the shelves and scattered on the floor; she had been meaning to file these papers for months. He probably hadn’t gotten back to the office yet. Her hand froze above the half-written label. Maybe he wouldn’t go back to his office at all. She stared at the words she had written. If he didn’t call, then she would have to tell him in person.

Diana began working more quickly, as if putting things back the way they had been could somehow erase what had occurred. Craig knew she kept a journal, but not what was in it. He knew every inch of her body, but had no clue of the wild things she often imagined while they were making love, the somewhat perverse fantasies she entertained. Although they professed to tell each other everything—and almost did—this was a piece of herself Diana had kept from him. Maybe she was afraid he would be hurt. Or maybe she was just embarrassed.

Suddenly overwhelmed by exhaustion, Diana dropped into her chair. It spun around and she was facing the window, staring into the dark alley. Once again she saw the huddled figure on the fire escape. As she stood to close the blinds, she heard the front door open. Craig was home.

9

A
T THE SOUND OF
C
RAIG’S GREETING
, D
IANA FROZE
, her hand on the drawstring to the venetian blinds. What was she going to tell him? How was he going to react?

“Diana?”

This was Craig, she reminded herself as she let go of the string. He was her husband, her best friend, her staunchest supporter. He would understand. “Down here,” she called, slowly climbing the stairs. Craig was hanging his coat on the rack when she reached the entryway. Stay calm, she ordered herself. Stay in control. She started to give him a quick hug, but found herself burying her face in his suit jacket; her head ached from the strain of holding back the tears.

Craig kissed the top of her head lightly. Then he stiffened and pushed her from him so that he could see her face. “What happened?” he asked sharply. “Is something wrong with the baby?”

“No, no,” she managed to assure him. “The baby’s fine.” Then she led him downstairs and, as calmly as she could, told him about the break-in.

They walked along the narrow hallway to the back door and Craig silently inspected the shattered wood and broken deadbolt. “Jesus,” he muttered. “Are you sure nothing else is missing?”

“The police figure the thief never even made it upstairs,” Diana told him as they headed toward her office.

“But that doesn’t make any—” Craig stopped in the office doorway and stared at her. “There was sexual stuff about Hutchins in that journal, wasn’t there?”

Diana nodded miserably. “Remember when I told you about countertransference?” She walked into the office, and Craig followed. “Well, James was a real struggle for me. He was so needy, so demanding …” She sat on the edge of her desk and looked at Craig, her eyes begging him to understand. “So good-looking.”

Craig dropped into a chair and stared at her. “Let me see if I’ve got this straight: Hutchins transferred his sexual attraction to you—and you countertransferred it back?”

Diana smiled weakly; Craig had understood more of their conversation than she had thought. “That’s about it.”

“So …” Craig hesitated, his expression bewildered. “You wrote in your journal about being attracted to him.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “And that made you feel better?”

“It’s like talking a problem over with a friend,” she said, overwhelmed with guilt at what her blunders were putting him through. “You get it off your chest, and it doesn’t seem so bad anymore.”

“Did it make you stop being attracted to him?” Craig asked, his voice hoarse with hurt.

Diana knelt down next to Craig and wrapped her arms around him. “It’s not like that,” she said. “It’s like being attracted to a movie star. Like James was Tom Cruise.” She looked up at Craig, who sat with his arms held rigidly by his side. Despite her best efforts, her eyes filled with tears. “It never meant anything. Nothing. I promise.”

He looked at her for a long moment, but didn’t move to touch her. “I know it didn’t,” he said slowly. “Of course it didn’t.” He stared over her head into the dark alley. “So what exactly did you write?”

Diana stood and walked to the window. Turning her back to Craig, she rubbed her hands together, suddenly cold. What should she tell him? He needed to know enough so that he would understand the impact of the theft. But, since there was a chance he would be spared actually reading the journal, there was no point in giving him too many details. Diana snapped the blinds shut and turned. “Most of the entries are pretty benign,” she began slowly, “but some could be bad for us.” She looked down at her hands. “The things about James are the worst.”

“Like what?”

“Well, there are some dreams—weird, mixed-up images … And there are fantasies …” When Craig didn’t say anything, she took a deep breath and plunged ahead. “About how handsome he was.” She raised her head and looked Craig straight in the eye. “About how I wanted to have sex with him.”

Craig flinched at her words, and his face paled. “Oh,” he said, his knuckles white on the arms of the chair.

Nausea coursed through Diana; she gripped the edge of the desk for support. “I’m so sorry.”

Craig stood up. He didn’t say anything and he didn’t look at her, he just paced the small room. Then he stopped pacing as abruptly as he had started. Standing in front of Diana, his arms crossed, he said, “We’re not going to let James Hutchins tear apart everything we’ve built.”

Diana dropped her head in relief. She wanted to rush into his arms, but she had to know if he really understood. “What if the journal ends up in court?” she asked softly, raising her eyes. “It would be so humiliating. It could destroy us. You. Professionally, personally …”

“People get bored easily,” Craig said. “If the worst happens, we’ll just tough it out until they do. But,” he added, motioning her to sit down in the chair next to him, “we’re not going to let the worst happen. We’re going to figure out a way to get that journal back.”

Diana sat and they began to analyze the situation from all sides. She told him the details of her conversations with both Detective Levine and Valerie. Craig suggested a private detective, but Diana dismissed the idea as far too expensive. Craig was silent for a moment, then he asked, “Have you thought about what you want to do with James’s money?”

Diana stood up and played with the sociology-anthropology shelf, rearranging it so that the sociology books were directly beneath the social psychology on the shelf above. “We don’t even know for sure that there
is
any money. Or if Jill is going to contest the will.”

“You wouldn’t be asked to the reading of his will if there weren’t money—and if it was done legally, the money’s probably going to be yours.”

Diana stopped fussing with the books and dropped back into her chair. “Is it really important to you?”

He rested his elbows on his knees. “Is it important to you?”

“It’s like being rewarded for my screw-ups …” Diana looked him directly in the eye. “I can’t take it. It’s blood money …”

“You mean you want to tell them to keep it?” His voice was both resigned and disappointed.

“We could give it to charity.”

He searched her face. “This is your call,” he said slowly. “I’ll go along with whatever you decide.”

“Then I want to give the money to AIDS research or the homeless or maybe some halfway house for borderlines.”

He nodded and smiled sadly. “I’ve got to admit I had a few thoughts about all the things we could do. As much as I’d love to be rich and get Frey and Associates off the ground,” he said, reaching over and touching her cheek, “I know this is the right decision. And to tell you the truth—I’m proud of you for it.”

Diana dropped her head to her hands and finally allowed herself to cry, overwhelmed with love for Craig and with fear for them both, overwhelmed with guilt for everything she had done. Craig rubbed her back, murmuring consoling words. When she regained her composure, they returned their attention to the theft.

Craig proposed that the thief had been a crack junkie or some overzealous reporter. But Diana knew enough about drug users to be quite certain a junkie would go straight for the easy-to-carry, easy-to-fence items: jewelry and silver, perhaps the answering machine and a few CDs. It just didn’t make any sense for a junkie to break into a house and steal a diary. They then came to the reluctant conclusion that although the story was hot, it was equally unlikely that a reporter would risk arrest just for a front-page byline. No matter how they tried to dodge it, the only possible culprit was Jill: There just wasn’t anyone else with enough motive.

After a heated discussion of both the personal and legal implications of the journal becoming public, Craig was reluctantly forced to agree with Diana. She had to try to talk Jill into giving it back—and the sooner the better. “I know when you get that expression on your face that I’m not going to be able to stop you,” he said. “Just promise me you’ll be careful and that you’ll call me as soon as you get home.”

She must be in the anger and irritability stage of the grieving process, Diana decided the next morning as she hurtled across the Mass Ave. bridge, raising her fist at a weaving bicyclist, jabbing the horn when the traffic came to a dead stop in front of her. Of course, all her gestures were futile. Nothing moved but the man in the pickup truck in front of her with a Red Sox hat jammed low on his forehead. He raised his third finger in a gesture more resigned than angry.

Or perhaps this was bargaining. She shook her head. Or better yet, just plain insanity. According to the psychological literature on grief, successfully managing the loss of a loved one involved going through a particular sequence of emotions; she had certainly experienced loss and was, equally as certainly, fighting her way through a maddening swarm of feelings. The grief experts said that shock and denial came first, followed by anger and irritability, bargaining, depression and finally, acceptance. “You can’t do that!” Diana yelled to the car triple-parked at the light in Central Square. “Move!” Yes, she thought, this was definitely anger and irritability.

Fury was boiling within her—a fury at herself, at James, at Jill, and at the unlucky fates. A fury she would have considered both predictable and healthy if she were one of her patients. “It’s okay to be angry,” she would have counseled the irate client. “As long as you use it the right way. As long as you don’t let it motivate your behavior.”

Diana laughed out loud, a harsh laugh reflecting no humor. As long as you don’t let it motivate your behavior. That was a joke. For here she was, on her way to Jill’s.

Diana usually dealt with her anger by swallowing it, by trying to avoid confrontation. But there had been times in her life—such as when Scott was wrongfully accused of selling marijuana during college, or when her father’s heart specialist wouldn’t return her mother’s calls, or when Mary Lessing, a clinic patient from her Beth Israel days, had been mistreated at a homeless shelter—when Diana had felt it was necessary to stand up and demand both an explanation and an immediate remedy. Even Craig had been forced to agree that this was one of those times.

Diana swung the jeep neatly around a gaggle of hesitant pedestrians nervously making their way across the busy street. She could handle Jill. She would have the element of surprise in her favor, as well as the fact that she knew much more about Jill than Jill thought. James had spent a lot of time discussing the bizarre relationship he had with his sister.

When James was growing up, he considered Jill his mother; their real mother wallowed in a lifelong depression that rendered her a ghostlike figure who floated powerlessly in the background of her children’s lives. Although Jill had been only thirteen at the time Hank Hutchins’s pornography ring was exposed—and had known nothing of its existence—she had taken it upon herself to ensure that nothing untoward ever happened to James again.

Jill loved her brother passionately and unconditionally: encouraging him with his schoolwork; coaching him to first place in the Connecticut Elementary Student Math Challenge; scrimping to save money for his tropical fish; monitoring his friends; restricting his hours of television. And although James loved her and needed her desperately, her overprotectiveness enraged him. They fought a lot and they played a lot and they worked together a lot. For the five years following the trial, James began to grow into the man he might have been.

But Jill was just a child herself, and in the engulfment-abandonment pattern so common to borderlines, she had left her brother when he needed her most. James was just turning thirteen when Jill took off for Omaha with her boyfriend. As enraged by his sister’s desertion as he had been by her overprotection, James began hanging around with the “bad crowd’: doing drugs, skipping school, committing petty crimes. When Jill suddenly returned two years later—minus the boyfriend—she clamped down on James as if she had never been gone. James graduated from high school with a 3.9 average and 1550 on his SATs; he was accepted early admission at MIT. James and Jill acted out their engulfment-abandonment roles many times over the years; they had been in the middle of another episode when James had killed himself.