What Looks Like Crazy (14 page)

Jay covered my cast with the plastic bag once more. He slowly pulled me to my feet, and I suddenly found my body flush against his: chest to chest, thigh to thigh. I looked up. His face was only inches from mine. Again our gazes locked. I held my breath and waited.

“Katie?”

“Thank you for coming to the hospital and for staying with me, Jay,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady and maybe a little impersonal because I felt too crummy to add to my already complicated life. “I owe you.”

Something in his eyes changed. “No problem.” Finally he stepped back.

 

Mona had the
phone tucked between her jaw and shoulder, and was scribbling furiously on a sheet of paper when I walked through the door. To an innocent bystander it would appear she was hard at work, but I only had to see the Gucci catalog to know that she was placing an order. She looked up long enough to give a meaningful nod toward my office.

I almost dreaded what I might find. I walked inside and found Thad reclining on my sofa, reading my latest copy of
Psychology Today
.

As usual, Thad
was immaculately dressed. He looked up, took me in from head to toe, and shook his head. “You don't look so good, Kate. Heard you broke your wrist,” he added. “I hope that's not the hand you use for you-know-what.” He gave me a hearty wink.

I put my pocketbook on my desk and leaned against it. “How was the fishing trip?”

He shuddered. “I'm still trying to get the smell of fish off my hands, but Thomas has decided not to sue Lucille for killing his hog. That is one mean woman. Could you imagine giving somebody like that the Rorschach test?”

“Thanks for taking my calls.”

Thad tossed the magazine aside and stood. He pulled a couple of slips of paper from the inside pocket of his jacket. “Nobody threatened to leap off a bridge or anything while you were unconscious, but this lady Alice Smithers—” He gave me a look. “Sounds like a candidate for shock therapy. Fortunately I was able to use my great skill and charm to calm her down. She was a different woman by the time we hung up.”

“She's going through a difficult time,” I said.

“Aren't they all?” He handed me the messages. “I've put in two calls to Harold Fry, but he hasn't called me back.”

“I'm concerned about him,” I said.

Thad shrugged. “He may be delusional at times, but he's not dangerous.”

“You didn't have to drive all the way over to give these to me,” I said, indicating the pink message slips. “You could have saved a lot of time by calling.”

Thad straightened his tie. “I figured I'd better check on you and see how badly you were hurt,” he said. “You look tired, Kate. You need a vacation, time to recuperate. And I know just the place.”

“Yeah?”

“A friend of mine has an exclusive spa less than three hours from here. In-room body massages, facials and wraps, and a world-renowned chef. A weekend of pampering, and you'll be good as new. We could leave early this afternoon and drive back tomorrow night. That way I could beg off shooting skeet with Thomas.”

“It sounds great, Thad,” I said, “but I can't. My schedule is all screwed up after yesterday. And I'd really like to find Harold.”

“The cops will call us when Harold decides to get naked in a parking lot someplace.”

“I still can't go away with you, Thad,” I said.

He shook his head sadly. “You used to be a lot of fun, Kate.”

I waited until I'd heard him leave through the reception room door before I ventured out of my office. I found Mona wearing a neck brace. I just looked at her. “Okay, I give up. What's with the brace?”

“I have an appointment with that hot new chiropractor on the sixth floor. Dr. Dan Manning,” she added. “The women refer to him as Dan the Man. I borrowed the brace from Mrs. Perez's son-in-law, who suffered whiplash in an automobile accident. It's my prop.”

“Why do you need a prop?”

“There are women going to him who are perfectly healthy. The guy isn't an idiot. I'll have to convince him I'm really injured, you know?”

“What happens if he discovers there's nothing wrong with you?” I asked.

“I'll think of something. I always do.” She looked at the clock on the wall. “Uh-oh, I don't want to be late for my appointment,” she said, standing and grabbing her purse. “Don't worry about the phones; Nancy said she'll answer them.”

“Um, Mona?”

She turned and glanced, questioning.

“Do you think I'm not as fun as I used to be?” I asked.

“You were more fun before you had your heart ripped apart.” She hurried out.

Good old Mona. I could always count on her to make me feel better.

 

I returned Alice
Smithers's call and agreed to see her at six p.m., which meant a long day. Then I noted that Cynthia Reed was due in an hour. When she arrived, she was holding a manila envelope. At least I saw nothing to indicate that she'd sneaked off to another plastic surgeon since her last visit. She noted my cast right away.

“I tripped and fell on my wrist,” I said. “It's no big deal.”

“Will you have a scar?” she asked. “I can give you the name of an excellent cosmetic surgeon.”

“No scar,” I assured her and motioned her to the sofa.

“I wrote the letter to my father like you suggested,” she said once we were seated. “I told him how all those years of his watching everything my mom and I put in our mouths and making us weigh in every week made us feel bad about ourselves.”

“Did it help?”

Her eyes filled with tears. “I cried a lot. I didn't realize how hurt I've been for so long.”

“Do you feel like reading the letter to me?” I asked Cynthia.

She nodded and pulled a sheaf of pages from the envelope. I eyed the thick stack and wondered how many pages she had actually written.

“I wrote fourteen pages, front and back,” she said, as though reading my mind. “I didn't want to leave out anything.” She cleared her throat. “‘Dear Asshole,'” she began.

It took Cynthia the entire session to read her letter because she paused several times to cry. “I'm really proud of you for taking the time to write to your father,” I said. “How do you feel?”

“I feel good about getting it off my chest, but I'm still angry at him. I want to tell him how I feel, because—” She paused in thought.

“Because you want him to apologize and validate your feelings,” I said.

She nodded. “Right.”

“What if he doesn't apologize?” I asked. “What if he pulls what you refer to as his pouting routine?” Cynthia looked uncertain. “I'm not saying you shouldn't confront him, but that is no guarantee that it will turn out the way you want.”

I'd seen victims of all sorts of abuse confront those who'd hurt them. Although it worked well for the most part, I'd also watched abusers accuse their victims of lying or of making a big deal out of nothing. I'd watched them make excuses or blame others, and I'd watched them storm out of my office, outraged.

“What do you think I should do?” Cynthia asked.

“I think it's perfectly reasonable to confront somebody who has hurt you,” I said, “and I hope you get what you feel you need. But you should be prepared. In the end it might come down to the fact that
you
have to love and accept yourself for who you are. It's your opinion that counts.”

“I think I can do that,” Cynthia said, “but I still want him to know that what he did was wrong. And the sooner the better,” she added.

I reached for my appointment book.

 

Mona was back
at her desk, wearing the brace, when I led Cynthia from my office. “What happened to your neck?” Cynthia said. “Were you and Dr. Kate in the same accident?”

“Not exactly,” Mona said.

“I've scheduled Miss Reed to come in at three o'clock on Monday,” I said, quickly changing the subject. “I want to make sure you haven't penciled anyone else in.”

“Three o'clock is good,” Mona said, entering it in the appointment book she kept. She jotted the time down on one of my cards and handed it to Cynthia.

I waited until Mona and I were alone before I asked about her appointment with Dan the Man.

“Oh, Kate,” she whispered. “The guy is to die for. He has these chocolate eyes, and he smells sooo good. And guess what? I caught him looking at my legs twice.”

“And he's single, huh?”

“Oh, yeah. That's the first thing I looked for. No wedding ring, no pictures of a wife and kids. Of course, he makes up for it. He has pictures of his golden Labrador retriever everywhere.”

“What was his diagnosis with regard to your injury?”

“We just talked today. I'm scheduled to come in Monday for X-rays.” She suddenly frowned. “I wish you could have seen all the sluts sitting in his waiting room, not a darn thing wrong with them. I can't wait till Monday. I'm going to buy a new outfit just for the occasion.”

Mona had at least ten outfits for every occasion that existed, including Groundhog Day.

“So do you want to go to the mall tomorrow?” she asked.

 

I drove home
at lunch to let Mike out, and found a petition on my door, signed by Bitsy Stout and about fifty others, no doubt members of her church. They were demanding that I remove the pornographic sculpture from my flower bed or face legal action. I decided I wasn't going to let it ruin my day, and I went inside, where Mike was doing what appeared to be a bumblebee mating dance at the back door. I quickly let her out.

I put the petition aside and checked on the puppies, then called the vet's office and, because of a cancellation, was able to get an appointment for the following morning. I let Mike in and spent a few minutes of quality time with her before she climbed back into her box to nurse her babies.

 

Alice Smithers did
not look well when she came in at the end of the day, although I saw one improvement. She wore different glasses, and they were actually flattering. As she stepped past me, I caught a whiff of tobacco, which surprised me because I had no idea she smoked.

“Something terrible has happened,” she said once she was seated. “My roommate didn't pay me as promised.”

“Oh no,” I said.

Alice pressed her hands against her cheeks. “It gets worse. I called the restaurant where she said she worked. They've never heard of a Liz Jones.”

“Oh no,” I repeated.

“It gets even worse than that, if you can believe it,” Alice said. “While I'm sitting on my sofa, trying to figure out what to do, Roy, the boyfriend, lets himself in the front door as though the place belongs to him. Liz obviously gave him the key to
my
condo!”

I could see that Alice was on the verge of losing it, and I didn't blame her. Just listening to her was like watching a bad soap opera. “What did you do?”

“Well, I freaked out. I demanded my key back, and I told him to get out. And guess what he did? He laughed at me. He laughed and accused me of being a nutcase. Finally I told him I was calling the police, and he left.”

“Did you get your key back?”

“Yes, thank God! He tossed it on the table before he walked out.”

“You should probably consider having your locks changed, Alice.”

“It's the original key,” she said. “It wasn't a copy.”

“Yes, but you don't know that a copy wasn't made.”

“It's an old building with old locks. You can't just run up to Wal-Mart and get a copy made. I had to go to a hardware store. Liz and Roy don't strike me as people who'd go to that much trouble.” She gave a sudden shiver. “Roy has probably been hanging out at my place while I've been at work. He probably doesn't even have a job.”

“This really isn't my area of expertise, Alice,” I said. “I don't know if you should be talking to the police or to a lawyer, but it sounds like you've got a couple of troublemakers on your hands.”

“If Liz returns, she's going to find her clothes in a box outside the front door. Once Roy left, I went into Liz's room,
after
I used an ice pick to unlock the door, and you would not believe what I saw. The room was trashed. There were spills on the rug and cigarette butts everywhere! It smelled like a giant ashtray in there. And I specifically told her that she could not smoke inside because I have allergies.”

“I thought I smelled smoke on you when you came through the door,” I said. “It must've been from handling her things.”

Alice nodded. “I didn't have time to grab a shower, because I was on my lunch hour and had to get back to the office.”

“What are you going to do if she knocks on your door?” I asked.

Alice shrugged. “I'm not going to answer it, and if she doesn't go away, I'll call the police.”

“How's your job search going?”

“I have an interview on Monday. I'm praying it goes well.”

I sat there for a moment, taking it all in. Just hearing about Alice's life was exhausting. “How are you managing with all this stress, Alice?” I asked. “I know it has to be weighing heavily on you.”

Her eyes filled with tears, and she pulled off her glasses. Again I was reminded what an attractive woman she really was. “I'm taking it one day at a time,” she said. “I wish I hadn't bought my condo. I should have waited. I should have stayed in my little rental and saved more money. Now I'm financially strapped. I'm an accountant; I know better. That's what I get for acting on impulse.”