Crazy in Chicago (13 page)

Tara's mother started to say something but Garnet shook his head. “Why don't you call for your mother, Tara? She's home, isn't she?”

“Yes, she is. But I open my mouth and nothing comes out. I can't move. I can't move my body, Mama. He's going to take me, Mama. Help me, Mama. Help me.”

Cody looked from the terror-stricken Tara to her mother. Tears streamed down the poor woman's face as she realized there was nothing she could do to help her daughter.

Slowly the terror on Tara's face dissolved, replaced by a strange calmness.

“It's all right now. I'm somewhere else. I don't know where. I lie on a metal bed. It's cold and hard. I can't see anything, except light. Cold, white light. And I hear him.”

“Hear who?”

“The little man.”

“Is he speaking English?”

“No. Yes. No. He doesn't speak. I just know what he wants. He wants me to lie there quietly. He lets me know that I'll be fine. That I'll be home soon. It will just take a few minutes.”

“What will take a few minutes?”

“I don't know,” Tara whispered. “I have to be quiet. He'll hear me. I have to be quiet. I can't talk. I have to be quiet.”

“Why do you have to be quiet?”
 

“Because. Because he told me. I'm scared. I want to go home.”

“So what happens next?”

“I don't know. I don't remember. I want to go home.”

“Can you see anything?”

“No, I want to go home. I don't want to do this. I don't want to be here. Mama, please!” She wrapped her arms around her middle and rocked back and forth in the chair.

“Garnet, stop it. Can't you see she's had enough?” Roberta leapt up and stood between Garnet and Tara. Garnet scowled at Roberta, then nodded. Roberta sat down.

“It's all right, Tara,” Garnet said in a sulking tone. “The session is over. You are in the offices of SUFOW, with your mother and Roberta and I. When I count to three and snap my fingers, you will wake up. You will remember everything you recounted here. One, two, three.” He snapped his fingers.

Tara stopped rocking. She blinked several times, and looked around the circle. When she saw her mother, she jumped up and hugged her. “Oh, Mama.”

Cody exhaled slowly and slumped with relief. He ran his fingers through his hair. His hair was damp! He shrugged his shoulders. His shirt stuck to his slick back. His skin felt clammy.

He glanced at his arm and blinked. Tentatively he touched the red, bumpy rash that had risen in the inner folds of his elbow. He looked at his other arm. The same thing there, too.

He suppressed a sudden urge to scratch. Simultaneously, the taste of nausea surged into his throat; his stomach turned.
 

No one noticed as he swallowed and fought against the billowing nausea. Garnet spoke to the girl and her mother. “I think that's enough for one day. We can try to get past that block tomorrow, see what you remember after that. It hasn't upset you too much to go on?”

Tara looked pale but, after a glance at her mother, shook her head. Cody, fighting down nausea, was beginning to think Tara had handled the hypnotic regression better than he had. Until his physical symptoms had intruded on his consciousness, he hadn't realized how caught up he'd been in her story, or how much it was rattling him.

He hoisted himself to his feet, then grabbed the back of the chair to check his swaying. He had scores of questions to ask about the regression; they would have to wait until his equilibrium returned. Now he needed to escape.

“Where are you going?”

Roberta's question stopped his flight. He looked up to find her studying him. Her gaze darted from his face, to the inflamed patches on his arms and back to his face. She frowned.
 

He knew she recognized the rash, just as he did. In the last two weeks he'd discovered that many so-called alien abductees suffered the same symptoms as people suffering from radiation sickness. And that included nausea, rashes and insomnia.

He swallowed, then rushed to put distance between him and the tenderness she seemed able to turn on and off at will, the caring he found so difficult to resist, despite everything he knew.
 

“I'll be back for the session tomorrow.” He pivoted slowly, certain anything faster would send him tumbling to the floor. He focused on the door and headed towards it.

He kept going until he reached the street. He halted beside his Corvette. Another wave of nausea, accompanied by an overwhelming feeling of aversion, struck him. He swayed, then grabbed for the parking meter to stop his fall.

“Cody!”

From behind, Roberta grabbed his other arm.

He swallowed to keep down the nausea. “Go away,” he forced out. “I'm fine.”

“No, you're not. We both know it,” Roberta insisted. “Let me drive you back to work. Or home.”

The billiousness started to fade. Cody straightened. He looked at Roberta and saw the alarm on her face. If he didn't know better, he'd think she really cared.

He shook his head to dispell the last wisps of nausea, though the aversion remained. He forced himself to sneer. “Boy, you're good. Anyone passing by would think you were really worried about me. But we both know better, don't we?”

“That's not true!” Roberta's voice rose in anguish.

“Oh, please.” He pulled his keys out of his pocket. He looked at her again, his gaze hard and unforgiving. “What you're worried about is that something might happen to your ticket to fame and fortune. That you've wasted your time on something that won't pan out.”

“No, that's not true. I know how it looked last night. But it's not like that.”

Her bottom lip quivered. Her eyes shone with the fever brightness of unshed tears.

The tears shook him. He didn't understand why this woman got to him in a way no other woman had. He sighed.

“When you can tell me that it's not all about proving that I was abducted by aliens, then maybe we've got something to talk about.”

He turned away, got into his car, and drove off.

* * *

At five minutes to five the next afternoon, Tara and her mother filed out of the SUFOW offices into the still bright sunshine and warm, muggy air. Roberta waved goodbye, then shut the door and sighed with relief. Thank God that was over. Today the girl—whether hypnotized or not—had refused to cooperate with Garnet, revealing little beyond what she said yesterday. Was it fear, stubbornness, or sheer perversity that prevented her from recalling?

Roberta didn't know. What she did know, however, was that Garnet's mood had turned foul. Never good at patience, and far too aware of the eye of the media on him in the person of Cody, Garnet had pressed Tara repeatedly, his voice rising to a shout. She had responded by alternately cowering away from him or clenching her fists and setting her lips in a grim refusal to remember, or even try to remember.

Roberta winced at the recollection. Garnet wasn't the only one affected by Cody's presence. From the moment he'd walked through the door, her tension had zoomed upwards. She'd wanted to talk to him so badly, to justify herself—to make him understand that she could help him, and the best way to do it was by investigating his disappearance and determining once and for all if it had anything to do with aliens. To make him understand that liking him and wanting to be a success were all mixed up together, whether she liked it or not.

But Cody ignored her, focusing his attention on Garnet and the girl. His distant politeness hurt Roberta more than any of the accusations he'd hurled at her earlier. Every time she looked at his stiff profile, her heart cringed with guilt. It didn't matter what she told herself. It didn't matter if her motivations were not all bad. It didn't matter if she cared about him. She felt guilty. While she hadn't actually lied to him, neither had she been forthright about her intentions, about her desire to make him her star abduction case.

Roberta glanced at the open door to Garnet's office. Cody had saved his questions about the regression until after this second session. The combination of Cody's skepticism, his dislike of all things “weird”, and his anger at her, with Garnet's foul mood and suspicions, was likely to result in fireworks any minute. Then Garnet would never forgive her for setting up this interview, and her life at work, as well as at home, would be hell.

Roberta started toward the office. She wondered if today's session had affected Cody as strangely as yesterday's had. She remembered his ashen face, the sweat on his forehead, and the rash on his arms. If he'd developed a rash today, she couldn't tell; he still wore his suit jacket. If he'd suffered from nausea, he'd managed to hide it.

 
She slipped back into Garnet's office. Cody sat on the edge of his chair, a notepad open on his knee and a pen in his hand, his attention focused on Garnet. Garnet was rattling off a monologue about alien abduction that Roberta had heard many times before.

A rush of guilt-tinged affection for Cody nearly bowled Roberta over. She clenched her fists. Why did she care about this man at all? It made no sense. Besides being a potential case, he was all wrong for her. He moved far too fast, and with far too much charm, for her to handle. He had a reputation for loving and leaving, even if he said it was no longer true. And despite his claim to open-mindedness, she was certain he considered alien abduction just so much craziness, no matter what he heard or saw to the contrary. How could she possibly care?

A picture of the way he smiled at her filled her head. She knew why she cared. No one had ever looked at her like that, as if she was the most wonderful, delicious, lovable female in the world. No one had ever pursued her so relentlessly, teased her so unmercifully, made it so obvious he wanted her. She hated to see a man like that hurting. And hurting he definitely was.

She sighed. But it didn't matter. Since the discovery of the file, Cody had made it clear he wanted nothing to do with her. With a heavy heart, she sat down across from Garnet and Cody, and tried to pick up on the conversation. At least it hadn't come to blows.

Finally Garnet paused, allowing Cody a chance to question.

“Dr. Jones, why have you chosen to use hypnotism, in particular hypnotic regression, with people who believe they may have had alien encounters?”

Garnet steepled his fingers under his bearded chin. “I don't use it with everyone who claims to have had an alien encounter. Only in cases where we are already investigating, and it is clear the individual has lost a block of time. I know from personal experience that alien encounters can be traumatic. The human mind regularly defends against such trauma by blocking the conscious memory of such traumatic events. Hypnosis can be an effective tool for unlocking blocked memories.”

“You've already noted that it wasn't particularly successful with Tara today. But you've found it to be successful with others?”

“Not just others. I've been hypnotized myself, in an attempt to uncover the alien encounters that occurred when I was a child. Together with a hypnotist, I discovered truths that had been buried deep in my subconscious mind.”

Roberta relaxed a little. So far Cody hadn't attacked. Perhaps the interview would progress without a fight.

Cody frowned. “Many therapists have used hypnotism to uncover forgotten incidents of rape or incest in their clients' lives. One of the criticisms often leveled is that the therapist asks leading questions. Weren't you worried that you were leading Tara?”

Garnet shrugged and looked through his bifocals at his hands. “You were here. You heard what I asked her. I think if you examine the recording we made of the sessions, you'll see I never put any ideas or suggestions into her mind.”

“Hmm.” Cody looked at the painting of the alien on the wall behind Garnet. If that painting wasn't suggestive, he didn't know what was. He frowned, then looked back at Garnet. “What about expectations? Some studies have shown that a subject will say what the hypnotist or therapist expects her to say.”

“That's only a theory. And it's clear Tara didn't do that. Especially after today, I don't know how you can conclude that.” Garnet frowned. He started to drum his fingers on his knee, a sure sign of his growing displeasure. Roberta grimaced. Oh no.

“The same study showed that subjects were as likely to recall forgotten fantasies as they were to recall real events,” Cody persisted. “How can you be sure that what Tara recalled was real and not just a dream or a fantasy?”

“It's not a fantasy. No one has fear like that in connection with a dream.”

Cody changed tack. “Is Tara pregnant?”

“I don't know yet.” Garnet looked taken aback by the abrupt question. “She's having a pregnancy test later this week.”

“I didn't see a ring. She's not married, is she?”

“No. What does that have to do with this?”

Cody paused. “Well, it seems to me there's one thing you haven't considered. Isn't it possible that Tara is making this whole story up? That she knows she's pregnant, and is afraid to tell her parents, so she's concocted this story to protect herself.”