Burn Patterns (4 page)

‘Not supposed to touch the clients, Frank. Boundaries.'

He gave a hurt look.

She moved away from him to unlock the front door.

‘Let's go out and have something to eat,' he said to her back.

Iris punched the security code. ‘Come in. Let me get cleaned up.'

She went through to the kitchen, turning on lights. Her note remained untouched on the kitchen bench.

Frank called from the lounge room, ‘How's Mathew's campaign going?'

‘Campaign?' She could hear glass clinking.

‘Process. Ascension? The road to the judiciary.'

Iris poured herself water. Added ice from the ice-maker.

‘Slow and steady. A patient game.'

‘Can I have some of his good scotch?' he said as he came into the kitchen with a tumbler already filled. He moved past her to get to the ice. ‘How's Rosemarie?'

‘You know: study study study.'

‘Have you called her?'

‘Yes.'

Iris went out into the hall.

‘You promised me you'd call her, Iris.'

‘I will. When there's time. Back soon. I'll get changed.' She headed up the stairs.

He called, ‘Yesterday was Sunday!'

Was it? Where had the day gone? Mathew had been playing golf somewhere in the country. She'd been in the garden. She remembered transcribing, writing up casenotes. She recalled television later. A cooking contest program. Hilary Mantel in bed, or was that Saturday?

Iris headed for the ensuite where she considered herself in the mirror. No wonder everyone was so concerned. She looked like she'd been involved in an explosion.

Frank insisted Rosemarie was of an age where her life consumed her. He felt it important for parents, at this time of their selfish children's lives, to have scaffolding still in place, so when they inevitably came back, usually, mostly when they were having children of their own, the lines of communication were still open. Iris recalled being evasive; asking Frank if the lines of communication were attached to the scaffolding, like party lights, perhaps. Frank had a theory about mixed metaphors. He felt they were not only excusable but necessary in a postmodern, multiple media–bombarded world. Or was it multiply mediated? Frank could justify any grammatical error or moral choice. Was
the world really, merely, linguistic? A critic referred to narrative therapy as a therapy of literary merit.

Frank had been the one to get her back into narrative therapy, although ‘back into' was a bit of a stretch. He had decided she was sufficiently well. ‘A job has come up, Iris. I think you might find it amusing. What else are you doing right now?' Recovering? She'd spent months recovering. She had recovered. Frank pressed, ‘As I recall, you have done some training in narrative therapy.' Which was true, in her travels, somewhere between her work with post-traumatic stress and hooking up with the fire service, she'd done a month's training and six months as a therapist. ‘Hardly expert and far from practised, Frank!' But he knew she was considering it. ‘Excellent. There's a psychology practice in the city. The replacement for their resident narrative therapist has fallen through. Decided to trek in Katmandu or raft down the Amazon or some such selfish, sanity-saving, life-threatening nonsense. You meet Patricia in the morning. You'll get on like a house on fire.'

Iris dabbed at her temple. A glancing blow. Her hair was a mess. No. She could not do this.

She went back to the top of the stairs. Frank was sitting at the bottom, on the steps with his back to the wall. He always resembled a discarded cleaning rag.

Iris said, ‘We have chairs, Frank.'

‘It's a great staircase.'

She didn't go down. ‘Listen, I don't have any acute distress. I'm fairly sure I'm not in shock, although I was. Just tired now. A post-adrenalin low. I can't do dinner.'

He nodded, didn't move.

‘Frank, in spite of me being a little manic when Patricia saw me, I don't need any help. There's no emergency debriefing to be done. I'm good.'

‘You thrive on trauma where others succumb?'

‘Apparently.'

‘Well, we shall see,' he said, looking down into his empty glass. He stood again with difficulty. ‘I'm not here to heal you, Iris. I want to ask a favour.' He gave an odd smile. Slightly chagrined, if Iris were pressed to categorise it along the smile scale. ‘Step into
my office. I'll have a splash of my best scotch ready for you.'

Iris's shoulders sagged. He wasn't going to go. ‘No. Wine. Open a bottle of red. I'll be down.'

Iris took off her shoes, bloody blouse, her bra, her skirt, tossing them into a corner. She would throw them out. She changed into a t-shirt, sloppy windcheater, tracksuit pants. She didn't bother about her hair or her face. Frank had seen her battered before.

Frank liked to flirt, had once seemed to toy with taking it further, against all professional or ethical considerations of course. Iris had never been interested in him in that way. She liked his wife, Janine, and his four children, whom she'd known for life. Frank and Janine held rambling lunches at an enormous table under a jacaranda tree. He had been a colleague and a mentor for a long time before he became her shrink.

Frank had poured the wine. He sat with his glass on the far couch.

‘I hope you're not thinking of driving,' she said as she took a look at the bottle. ‘Cheeky, very cheeky.'

‘Mathew can afford it.'

She took her glass, settled on the other couch, her legs tucked up under, so she could see Frank past the Bailey's Red roses in a vase on the table. He'd switched on a couple of lamps instead of the overhead light, creating a soothing and restful mood.

‘So, a favour,' she said guardedly.

‘An assessment. A second opinion really.'

‘Is this a project to distract me from thinking about today? Or are you going to tell me about this case, while you're really assessing me?'

He smiled. Of course. ‘It involves fire.'

‘Oh.'

‘I know you're not doing that, only … I'd like your expert second opinion.'

‘Not tonight, please.'

‘No, not tonight. Recharge your glass and I'll tell you a story.'

‘I'm not lying down on the couch.'

‘Sitting can work.'

Iris gulped the last of her wine. She poured more, aware he
was waiting until she was ready.

‘Two girls.'

‘Girls?'

‘Our witnesses. Two girls driving towards Candonin on a dark and stormy sunset.'

Iris made a face.

‘True. A thunderstorm. Wheeling white cockatoos – like live, angry snow.'

‘Are you about to present me with an allegory?'

‘Reporting. I've talked to them on the phone.'

‘Where's Candonin?'

‘It is about nine hundred kilometres from here. Permanent population of nine. Petrol station, caravan park of sorts, motel. At the start or end of ninety kilometres of straight highway, depending on which way you're travelling. Importantly, perhaps, it's very near where Skylab fell from its orbit.

‘Our two girls, Ilsa and Helen, are Norwegians. Ilsa is a university student studying here and her friend Helen is a tourist. They were driving across the country, mostly to get to the other side, sightseeing while playing their music loud in their hired Volkswagen. They had been watching a thunderstorm to the south, which appeared to be travelling with them. The clouds were black and lightning flashed, yet on their left, to the north, the sky was clear, sunny. Helen found this particularly surreal.

‘He came walking out of the desert, the dark clouds and lightning and a cloud of birds swarming and darting and careering about him. It was as though he'd emerged from a rookery, said one of them, just out of his shell.'

Frank was enjoying himself. His sense of drama. Showing off his excellent memory for the details told to him, the embellishments of his own.

‘They stopped. It was strange, this man, walking out of the storm in the desert. No car, no truck, no motorbike nearby. The girls kept interrupting each other at this point to describe him. Mid-thirties but acting younger. Helen felt Anglo-Indian; Ilsa thought Eurasian, smidge of gypsy. Lightly dark; tall, thin. He wore jeans and a white shirt, good walking boots, all dusty. He carried a sports coat and a kind of shoulder bag. Ilsa described
him as like a university lecturer, on his way to class. They thought he was younger, the way he walked, until he got close.

‘“What are you doing out here?” they asked. “I am looking for my spaceship,” he replied. He spoke well. Educated English, Australian accent.'

‘Oh,' said Iris, flatly. ‘Where's he from?'

‘Mars, according to the Norwegian girls,' said Frank.

‘Schizophrenia,' said Iris.

‘Not so quickly.'

‘Schizophrenia and substance abuse.'

‘So, the girls think this is funny. He says things with a grin. A sparkle, it's a joke. It's getting dark, coming on for dusk. They give him a ride. They explain they are from Norway. He explains he's from Mars. Ilsa has been in the country for over a year, Helen for only a few months. He has been on Earth for some time. It's a game. They came here by plane, he by spaceship, which crashed. They talk of Norway and snow and skiing and mountains, and he of Mars and heat and aridity. They all talk of the desert and the flatness and the vast horizons and the sunset behind them, where you can see the edge of the Earth.

‘The girls talk Norwegian together. The Martian, who says they can call him James, refuses to break out of his “act”. Ilsa starts to find it annoying. Helen finds him most amusing. He knows about music, film, popular culture.

‘Oh, yes. The girls have a motel room booked at Candonin. More Norwegian. Helen wants him to stay, Ilsa isn't so sure. He may be crazy. An axe-murderer or serial killer or, worse, a boring man. Giggles. Marijuana is smoked, also by James, the Martian. He has money. He buys everyone hamburgers and a bottle of vodka. A party in their room, the three of them. He dances. He's athletic. Like a professional ballet person. He juggles. He juggles a variety of items, starting with fruit. He juggles a knife, fork and a spoon. He throws the knife and it sticks into the edge of a cupboard. This is a butter knife, mind. He does the trick again, juggling the knife, fork and spoon and flicking the knife so it sticks in the side of the cupboard again. Same place.

‘He juggles Helen's cigarette lighter, cigarette packet and the car keys. They all begin to make jokes about Earthlings.
It becomes the theme of the night. Earthlings take oxygen for granted. Ilsa swears it is Helen who raises the question of Martian procreation and physiognomy. Helen agrees, it was she who fancied him first. He's quite beautiful, apparently. He has flecks of grey in his hair. Very clear eyes. Brown. Dark. It was light, funny and they all have no clothes on. James has sex with both girls, together.

‘The girls are embarrassed to tell this part to the police and to me later. They make the point they did not have sex with each other, but both with him, at the same time, and it was a lot of fun. They are too drunk for orgasms, says Helen. Very nice, says Ilsa. Oh, wow, says Helen. They giggle, over the phone. They are maybe early twenties, these girls.'

Frank waved his hand in an appropriately European gesture.

‘He has a strange back. He has strange skin on his back. He says it's where his wings were. Burn scars?'

Iris shrugged a yes.

Frank shrugged agreement. ‘They sleep. The girls in the double bed where all the fun had been and James in the single bed also in the room. Each of the girls got up in the middle of the night to pee. All is well, if groggy. At dawn they were awakened by the smoke alarm. It's one of those small plastic ones which gives a piercing uninterrupted squeal. Ilsa wakes first. The room is full of smoke. Acrid smoke from burning plastic. James is fully clothed. He's feeding the fire. He's piled the cane chairs and the table against a cupboard in the kitchen. The furniture is well alight, the fire bending off the ceiling. Ilsa screams, wakes Helen. James is feeding the bedclothes from the single bed to the fire. He's singing something. Like a nursery rhyme. Ilsa grabs shorts and a top. The window in the kitchen pops, a rush of air and heat, everything gushes. Helen is in the bedsheet, they flee. Other guests are coming out of their rooms. The alarm continues.

‘A road worker is already up, in his fluoro vest. Goes in, punches James, drags him out. People grab fire extinguishers. Too late. The fire is up into the roof cavity and spreads to the other rooms. James is in a state. He is upset. Perhaps incoherent. “I crashed. I crashed. I couldn't save them. It was a crash. Oh
dear. Oh dear.” This from other witnesses. Helen and Ilsa are hysterical. “I told you, crazy. Did I say, I said, crazy.” '

‘They still have not quite forgiven each other. They are resilient, though. Wrong Martian at the wrong time. The police have asked me to take a look at him at Biara tomorrow.' He contemplated his barely touched wine.

Iris said, ‘I repeat my assessment. Check him for schizophrenia. Possibly triggered by the alcohol and drugs and whatever else he might have been on. He may have been acting out a psychotic episode – burning the voices in his head? Reliving the burns on his back, or the burns on his back are the result of a prior psychotic episode. You don't need me for this, Frank. You know this already. Anyone can do this, better than me.'

‘Well, not better than you. He's not obviously dissociative. He's coherent in his delusion. All by the by. I need to know if he's a pyromaniac.'

Iris watched Frank studying her. She asked, ‘Has this got anything to do with the school explosion?'

‘It's unlikely.'

‘Unlikely?'

‘The police think it is possible for him to have travelled this far. They have reason to believe it might have been set up sometime Saturday night into Sunday.'