Blameless (6 page)

As a nineteen-year-old sophomore, sitting in a huge lecture hall not all that different from the room she taught in now, listening to Dr. Kaplan describe the infinite variations in human behavior, Diana had been hooked: fascinated by the intricacies of the mind; enthralled with theories of causation; captivated by the idea that she might actually learn to help those struggling with their mental demons. Then, as now, she just couldn’t imagine doing anything else with her life. During graduate school, when all her classmates were teaching assistants, she had volunteered at a halfway house in Roxbury.

She had always been curious about other people’s lives, peering into windows, eavesdropping in small restaurants, wondering what the woman on the park bench was
really
thinking. Here was the perfect profession for a nosy person like herself, a way to connect without getting too close. A way to do something worthwhile. And perhaps, a way to make amends for her sister Nina’s death. Although Diana had been only eight at the time, she had known Nina’s accident—and her own culpability in the tragedy—would be with her forever.

Diana and Nina had been playing in the front yard while Beth Yaffo, the fifteen-year-old who lived down the block, baby-sat. Diana could remember everything about that late summer day: her brother, Scott, arguing with their mother that he didn’t need any new clothes for school as they climbed into the station wagon; the languid, sticky heat; the low buzzing of the somnolent bees as they moved listlessly from one droopy flower to another; the yellowed grass and dusty bushes thirsty from the long drought; Beth’s boyfriend driving up in his father’s new cream-colored Oldsmobile Cutlass; Beth’s admonition that Diana watch Nina for “just a sec” while she took a spin around the block with Mitchell.

Nina was laughing and turning in circles to make herself dizzy and then suddenly, inexplicably, she darted into the street. Diana would never forget the sound of her own scream as she watched the red-and-white appliance truck moving slowly, inexorably, toward Nina. She had shouted and started to run, but before she had crossed half the front lawn, she heard the surprisingly solid thunk of the little body as it was hit by the truck—and the deadly crack that it made when Nina came down hard on the macadam. Frozen with terror and overwhelming guilt, Diana had stood motionless, watching the stocky truck driver standing over the tiny, still form, crying and punching his fist in the air, beseeching his God.

Sometimes she still dreamed of that truck driver, tears running along the wrinkles engraved in his weathered face, and of the little girl who had been herself, shivering uncontrollably in the hot summer sun. Whenever she dreamed of those long-ago people, Diana was glad for the profession she had chosen.

She had gone to Ticknor right from Brown University and completed her Ph.D. in psychology in five years. After a clinical post-doc at Beth Israel Hospital, she had gone into private practice, continuing her affiliation with BI as a research fellow. So she had never thought about the university, and her foray into teaching had been completely serendipitous.

Two years ago she had unexpectedly run into Bradley Harris, her mentor and head of her dissertation committee, at an American Psychological Association conference. Over lunch he told her he was now chair of the psychology department at Ticknor and in desperate need of a last-minute replacement to teach an abnormal psych course. Would she be willing to save his neck?

It had worked out surprisingly well. Not only was she far better at teaching than she would have expected, but she really enjoyed it. Diana had also picked up some clinical hours at the student mental health center and been placed on the university referral lists. She now taught the course every semester and had so many referrals she was forced to wait-list patients. She also knew that the university connection had added bonus points toward the award of her latest research grant.

After the phone call she had just received from the
Globe
, Diana was glad she had a class today. She stood up and dressed hurriedly; her class was at ten and she still had to review her notes. Teaching would get her out of the house and keep her occupied, too occupied to waste any time worrying about what effect Jill Hutchins’s words might have on her life. No effect, she thought as she headed downstairs toward the kitchen. No effect at all.

As Diana poured herself a cup of coffee, she briefly described Risa’s phone call to Craig, downplaying the conversation, hoping not to worry him before his big presentation.

“Do you think we should call a lawyer?” he asked as he stood up and put his mug in the dishwasher, worry creasing his face despite her best efforts. “I don’t want you upset by this.”

“I’m not upset,” she assured him, wishing she could also assure herself. “And it’s just not worth the time—it’s all too stupid to be believable.”

“But what’s the harm of calling? Of getting some information?” he pressed. “It’d be covered by your malpractice insurance, wouldn’t it?”

“That’s not the point,” Diana said, standing and giving him a hug. “You’re the one who’s always telling me not to worry—so let’s take your advice and wait to worry until there’s something to worry about.”

Craig let her change the subject to the party they were invited to that weekend. But Diana could feel his eyes on her as she ate her breakfast. And he gave her an extra-long hug before he went out the door.

After Craig left, she bustled around the house, throwing in a load of laundry, making the bed, reviewing her lecture notes. But no matter how busy she kept herself, every once in a while a voice would call from the back of her mind:
You’ll be sorry … You’ll be sorry …
Diana pushed it away, reminding herself that there was no way she could be held legally responsible for James’s suicide. That Risa was right—as unprofessional as it might be for Diana to agree. Jill
was
a crackpot. A crackpot with no case.

But the haunting voice wouldn’t stay away, and the same thing kept happening at Ticknor. She would be busy, happy, going through her professor motions: gossiping with the department secretaries; giving an amusing and informative lecture on the difference between narcissistic and antisocial personality disorders; meeting with her teaching assistants to plan this week’s discussion sections; explaining to a student why his excuse of an “unexpected wedding”—on a Thursday, no less—would not change the F he’d received on the exam. And then it would be there, striking her like a slap in the face: the voice.
You’ll be sorry … You’ll be sorry …

For about the fifth time she told the voice to shut up and raced home for her two o’clock appointment: another extra session with Sandy Pierson. Diana had been worried about Sandy before James’s death, but now, after yet another abandonment in her life—no matter how unplanned—Sandy’s precarious grip on reality could easily slip. Diana knew that Gail would reprimand her for giving Sandy so many free appointments, that Gail would say she was too “enmeshed” for her own, or for Sandy’s, good. But Diana also knew that Sandy needed her, and, despite being a bit over their heads on the house, it wasn’t as if she and Craig were desperate for money.

As she pulled into the alley, it occurred to her that there might be a message from Risa waiting for her. A message telling her it was all a mistake—or a message verifying the worst. When she walked through the small waiting room and pushed open the door to her office, she didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed: The red light on her answering machine was still. There had been no calls.

But as she sat, trying to focus Sandy away from James and toward her father—the real source of her abandonment—the machine began to click, indicating an incoming call. Two more times it clicked. Three calls. Blink. Blink. Blink. Diana glanced at the clock mounted discreetly on the shelf behind Sandy’s head. Fifteen more minutes.

“There’s not much there, Dr. Marcus,” Sandy was saying softly. “It’s mostly a big blank. A curtain.”

Diana leaned forward, putting her elbows on her knees. “Can you see anything nudging the curtain?” Blink. Blink. Blink. The red light burst into her line of vision as she bent toward Sandy; Diana leaned back in her chair. “Anything trying to come out from behind it?”

“No,” Sandy said, opening and closing the latch on her day-timer.

“Any shadows you can discern through the curtain?”

Sandy stared out the window behind Diana, her eyes focused much farther away than the perpendicular shadows cast by the fire escape on the brick wall across the alley. “Red Sox,” she croaked.

Diana thought she misheard. “Red Sox?”

Sandy burst into tears. “He took me to a Red Sox game,” she said between sobs.

“It’s okay,” Diana said softly, handing Sandy a tissue. “It’s hard to remember hurtful things. It’s okay to feel sad.” Blink. Blink. Blink. Diana squared her shoulders and sat straight in her chair, furious with herself for her lack of concentration. “It’s okay,” she repeated, forcing all her attention on the sobbing woman. “It’s often the things you’re afraid to feel that keep you from getting well.”

Sandy shook her head, tears sprinkling her blue jeans. “We …” she started, then took a deep breath. “We had a wonderful time.”

“Pleasant times lost can be hard to remember too.” Diana flashed on the day she and James had sat barefoot and cross-legged at the Public Gardens, eating turkey sandwiches and laughing over a “Saturday Night Live” sketch they had both seen the previous weekend. She and James had met unexpectedly at the Boston Public Library and, although she knew some of her colleagues might think it inappropriate, she had impulsively acquiesced to his suggestion that they share lunch and the summer day. The jab of grief that the memory evoked emphasized the truth in the words she had spoken to Sandy. Diana looked down at her hands for a moment, then looked up, allowing Sandy to see her pain. “Things are very rarely all good or all bad.”

Sandy’s sorrowful eyes locked onto Diana’s, then they lightened with understanding. “People either,” she said, her voice barely a whisper.

Diana smiled sadly. “It’s a thin line.” When she glanced away, she caught sight of the clock: The hour had passed. Slowly she closed her notebook.

Sandy blew her nose and stood. “Next week, same time?” She flipped open her day-timer and raised her pen expectantly.

“Let’s see how you’re doing before we schedule another individual appointment,” Diana said gently, congratulating herself on her cautiousness and thinking of how Gail would approve. “You’ll be here on Monday for group.”

Sandy’s face paled and the pen in her hand trembled slightly. “But I know I’ll need to see you—”

“If you need to see me before Monday,” Diana interrupted, “you will.” As Diana rose, the blinking light caught her eye. She turned her back on the machine and walked the troubled woman through the waiting room and down the hallway to the back door.

Sandy closed her book and slipped it into her oversized shoulder bag, an expression of gratitude crossing her beautiful face. “Thanks,” she whispered as she stepped out into the alley.

Diana walked back into her office and punched the button on the answering machine. Three messages. As the tape rewound, she watched Sandy climb into the battered sports car that was parked next to their equally battered jeep. Sandy angrily wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her coat as she turned the key in the ignition. Then she threw the car in reverse and sped out of the alley.

The machine set itself to replay, and Diana turned her attention to the messages. She didn’t realize she had been holding her breath until the recording played itself out and the air escaped from her lungs in a rush. Risa hadn’t called. There was only a cancellation, a referral, and a staticky message from her missing patient, Ethan, telling her that he was holed up in Provincetown.

Diana dropped into her chair and swiveled it so she was looking out the window. A blanket-clad figure was huddled on the fire escape across the alley. For a moment it seemed to Diana as if he or she was staring at her, watching her, waiting to do her harm. As Diana snapped the blinds closed, she decided that they were just going to have to find the money to fix the alarm system. She shivered and briskly rubbed her arms, futilely trying to depress the goose bumps the sight of the shrouded figure had raised.

Craig was a rock. During every crisis of their eight-year marriage, he had remained resolute and unshakable in his contention that until the worst is verified, there is no point in assuming it will occur. His calm optimism had gotten Diana through her father’s heart surgery, her ectopic pregnancy, and their years of infertility. In every case, Craig had been right: The worst had never materialized.

Despite the fact that she hadn’t heard from Risa—or maybe because of it—by the time Craig got home, Diana was feeling pretty jittery. As they sat over a dinner of cheese omelets and salad, they rehashed her conversation with Risa Getty.

His unflappability was soothing. “This whole wrongful death thing is nuts,” he said. “Malpractice is one thing—and she doesn’t even have a case there—but wrongful death.” He shook his head. “Don’t even bother worrying about it.”

Diana played with the salad on her plate. “We’ve got to face it,” she said. “There
is
a death involved.”

“This isn’t just ‘a death’—this is a suicide,” Craig disagreed. “When therapists start being held responsible for their patients’ suicides, no one’s going to be able to practice. It can’t happen.”

“That’s just what I told the reporter,” Diana said. “But isn’t that what malpractice is all about? That a doctor is responsible for the health and safety of his or her patients? For providing quality care?”

“Fine,” Craig said. “Let’s go from that premise.” He put his fork down and crossed his arms in imitation of a television lawyer. “Would you say, Dr. Marcus, that you used standard procedures in treating James Hutchins?”

Diana smiled at him and then sobered, thinking of how poorly she had navigated the line between sticking close and remaining distant. “I don’t know, Craig. There really are no ‘standard procedures,’ perse. There are …” She paused, looking at him, begging him to make her feel better. “There are theories, acceptable practices …”