Elementary, My Dear Watkins (11 page)

Alexa finished tying her shoes and looked up at the mess she had made on the canvas. Nicole was right. Even in the midst of the giant glob of black, little streaks and swirls of the other colors were still there. Alexa leaned back against the window seat, resisting the urge to cry, though she couldn’t even say why. Just a short while ago, she had been so happy. Now she couldn’t imagine feeling any worse.

“Why do you always keep pushing, always get all symbolic on me?” Alexa asked miserably. “You just won’t let things rest.”

Nicole turned from the canvas and crossed the room to where Alexa still sat on the floor. Nicole sat across from her, cross-legged, elbows on her knees.

“The art doesn’t lie,” she said matter-of-factly, her curls falling perfectly into place. “That’s why it’s such a good starting point for conversation.”

Nicole was so pretty, not in a glamorous way, but in a slightly plump, mom-ish sort of way—all soft curves and friendly smiles and gentle eyes. Sometimes late at night, Alex pretended that Nicole was her mom. She would imagine her tucking her in at night, reading her a bedtime story. And cookies. In Alexa’s fantasies, they were always baking Nicole’s secret family recipe for cookies. But that was dumb, Alexa knew.

Nicole probably didn’t even
have
a secret family recipe for cookies.

“Of all my teachers and tutors and medical people,” Alexa said, “how come you’re the only one who worries about what I’m feeling? Can’t we just stick to the art lessons? You’d think this was counseling or something.”

Her words came out sounding more bitter than she meant, but when she looked at Nicole to apologize, she didn’t understand the expression on the woman’s face.

“Alexa, what do you think this is? What do you think we’re doing together?”

“Art lessons.”

“Art
therapy
,” Nicole corrected.

“Yeah, like to go with my physical therapy. Art therapy. Coordination. Physical movement. That kind of stuff.”

Nicole shook her head, and she seemed so disconcerted that Alexa frowned in confusion.

“Honey, I’m sorry you didn’t understand. Art therapy isn’t physical. It’s emotional. We’re using the art to understand your feelings.”

Alexa felt like such a dummy. Of course. Therapy. Counseling. Art therapy. How many of these once-a-week lessons had they had now? Five? Six? And every time, Alexa just thought Nicole was especially nice, especially chatty. Especially insightful.

Figures
.

“I’m so stupid,” Alexa said softly, covering her face with her hands.

“No, you’re not,” Nicole said. “Look at me, Alexa. Look at me.”

She reached up and gently pulled Alexa’s hands from her eyes.

“What?” Alexa asked, blinks sending tears down her cheeks.

“This is my fault and my husband’s fault. You are not stupid. You misunderstood because we didn’t make it clear. You probably never even heard of art therapy until Dr. Stebbins asked you if you wanted to meet me and give it a try. And since you were already in physical therapy and occupational therapy, you made a logical conclusion.”

Alexa nodded, wishing she had just kept her big mouth shut about the whole thing. Dumb, dumb, dumb.

“Why do my feelings even matter?” she asked finally, wiping at her cheeks. “What does that have to do with anything?”

Nicole explained, saying there were two reasons Alexa needed therapy—one, as yet another part of the research, one more area that needed to be cataloged and documented. That wasn’t too surprising, since Dr. Stebbins had had Alexa tested and examined in a thousand other ways.

“That’s not fair. Isn’t counseling supposed to be confidential?”

“It is,” Nicole said. “All I do is fill out a checklist once a week, evaluating your emotional state. I never add any notes or include any specifics.”

Alexa considered, and then she decided that made it okay.

“What’s the second reason?” she asked.

Nicole seemed to study her face for a moment before speaking.

“Because Dr. Stebbins and I care about you, Alexa, and we worry. In less than a year, your entire life has done a complete one eighty. Everything’s changed—your body, your mind, your living situation, your schooling. That’s hard enough, but add to that practically living under a microscope, and you’ve got a recipe for major stress. I want to help you learn how to cope.”

“Cope?”

“And grow. When the trial phase is over and Dr. Stebbins is finished collecting his data, we want you to be much, much better for all of this, not worse. You’re not just our medical subject, Alexa. You’re also our friend—not to mention our responsibility.”

Responsibility.

Alexa closed her eyes, in her mind suddenly seven years old, hovering in the hall outside of her classroom, listening to the second grade teacher yell at her mother. It wasn’t anything her mother had done; it was Alexa’s fault. Again.

“This is your responsibility!” the teacher was practically yelling. “It falls on you!”

“Look, we both know Alexa is a handful,” her mother said calmly, trying to soothe the old battle-ax. “In fact,” she added with a conspiratorial chuckle, “that’s what my fiancé and I call Alexa when we’re alone, ‘The Handful.’ But that doesn’t mean she needs to be on medication. I won’t put a seven-year-old child on drugs just to make your job easier. You give it all the fancy names you want—attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, whatever. My kid’s not a psycho. She just has a lot of energy. And maybe a little trouble staying focused.”

Even at seven, Alexa knew what irony was: It was her mother calling this week’s live-in lover her “fiancé”; if so, he was about her tenth fiancé so far that year. It was also her use of the word “drugs,” the heroin addict refusing to give her kid the prescription medication she needed for a legitimate condition. Irony
.

What the teacher and the doctors didn’t know was that Alexa’s mother filled the amphetamine prescriptions, all right, but rather than give the medicine to her child, who needed it, she sold it on the street for $10 a pill. When you had a kid like Alexa, speed was easy to get, and even easier to sell
.

What stung the most, though, was the nickname: The Handful. Alexa knew she was a bad girl and that she was always getting in trouble and that adults didn’t like her, not even the nice student aide who tried really hard to get along with all of the children
.

But for Alexa’s own mother to turn against her, to give her such an awful nickname, to giggle over it in bed with a virtual stranger, not to mention with the latest teacher who hated her guts? That hurt more than anything
.

That was betrayal, pure and simple
.

At seven, Alexa had learned betrayal. Now, at 14, she kept wondering when these people were going to betray her too. She was their responsibility, yes. But was she really their friend? Though Alexa was deeply fond of Dr. Stebbins, her relationship with him was purely professional. Things were a little more relaxed with Dr. Stebbins’ wife, Nicole—including the fact that she had invited Alexa to call her by her first name the day they met—but she was still one more adult who had come into Alexa’s world after the stroke and the treatment, one more person who would eventually cash in on the medical miracle.

You can’t get something for nothing
, her mother had always told her. These days, Alexa was still trying to figure out exactly how the “something” and the “nothing” fit into the picture of her coming here. Nicole and Dr. Stebbins and the old lady had all seemed to do so much for her without asking anything in return except the opportunity to study her, to teach her. It was a lot to cope with.

Hardest of all, though, was living with the fear that eventually it would come to an end.

By the time Jo finished answering questions for the police and got to the hospital, Bradford’s parents, his brother, and two cousins were all in the waiting room. According to them, Bradford was suffering from a number of broken bones and a punctured lung, and right now he was in surgery.

They asked Jo to explain exactly what had happened, but she left out a lot of the details as she talked, making it sound much simpler than it was—that she and Bradford had been waiting for the train to North Ulton, Jo lost her balance, and Bradford fell trying to save her.

His parents were bitter and angry, and at first Jo didn’t blame them. He was in there because of her, after all. But then she kept thinking that Bradford had started it by accepting money to marry her. Anything that came after was simply fallout from that act.

“Why couldn’t you just let it go?” Mrs. Quinn pleaded. “It’s over, Jo. When my son told you goodbye at the wedding, he meant it.”

Jo’s mouth flew open in a silent gasp.

“What are you talking about?” she said finally, once she’d found her voice.

“I’m sure you came up here to the city to chase after him and try to get back together again. But it wasn’t going to happen, Jo. He’s not the same person he was then.”

“First of all,” Jo replied, fighting to keep her voice steady, “your son has been chasing after me, not the other way around. I only agreed to see him today so that we could get some closure and he would leave me alone. His behavior toward me in the last few weeks has bordered on harassment.”

If possible, Mrs. Quinn seemed even angrier than Jo.

“Harassment? Why, you lying—”

“Mom. Mom!”

Both women turned to look at Bradford’s younger brother, Ty, the one who had served as best man at their almost-wedding. A laid back “surfer dude,” Ty was about as different in personality from Bradford as a brother could be—though equally as handsome. He was just 23, with blond hair that hung messily in his eyes and an easy gait that always reminded Jo of boys at the beach.

“Mom, Jo’s right. Bradford’s been weirding out on everybody lately. And we all know why.”

“Why?” Jo asked.

In response, Mrs. Quinn turned, closed her mouth, and simply walked away. Jo looked again at Ty, who pretended to take a swig from an invisible bottle.

“He’s developed a bit of a problem.”

Shocked, Jo sank into a chair and sat next to her almost brother-in-law.

“Alcohol? Bradford’s been drinking?”

“Whenever he can. I’ve been trying to get the family to do an intervention, but they’d rather pretend the problem doesn’t exist.”

Ty spoke loudly, trying to make a point to the relatives nearby. In response, they simply turned their backs and patently ignored him.

“See?” he continued, more softly. “If we don’t mention it, it’s not there. Par for the course with this crowd.”

Jo was surprised. When they were dating, Bradford often enjoyed a glass of wine or two with dinner, but she’d never seen him have more than that, and she’d certainly never seen him get drunk. Then again, maybe that was all a part of who he was pretending to be back then, to court her. Jo didn’t drink, so Bradford curtailed his consumption—at least when he was with her.

“How long has he had a problem?” she asked.

“It’s only been bad the last couple months,” Ty said, considering. “Actually, things have been going downhill for him in a lot of ways. After your failed wedding, he was demoted and transferred to Chicago. But he wasn’t happy there and he wanted to come back to New York, so after a few months he came back here, and went to work for one of the company’s subsidiaries instead. I guess the drinking got really serious once he realized what a piddly, dead-end job he’d landed himself in. More than anything, he wants to get back into your father’s good graces and return to the Bosworth fast track. He had it so good there for a while—until he walked out on you, actually.”

“If he has such a drinking problem, how is he holding down a job at all? He hadn’t been drinking when he showed up today.”

“Oh, he can pull it together when he wants to and seem fine. But right now he’s living on my couch, and I can guarantee you that the last time he made it through an entire day sober there was snow on the ground.”

Jo thought about that, feeling terribly sad. Bradford may have his character flaws, but he was without question smart and talented when it came to business. Had he not gone down such a deceitful path, he might have seen all of his dreams come true in the end.

“Almost every night,” Ty continues, “he sits around the apartment getting on my roommates’ nerves, cooking up conspiracy theories, and obsessing about you.”

“Me?”

“About winning you back. He keeps your engagement photo in his wallet, and he’s always pulling it out and looking at it and talking about how you were the best thing that ever happened to him. Considering how things have turned out, I’m not sure I’d agree. No offense.”

“None taken.”

Jo sat there for a while, thinking about all that Ty had said. Conspiracy theories? If not for the hand on Jo’s back, pushing her toward the train, she’d be tempted to believe that’s all today had been about—a theory. But that hand was real. Bradford’s injuries were real. And certainly whatever was behind all of it was real too.

“What sort of conspiracy theories?” Jo asked carefully.

Ty shrugged.

“Who pays attention? Secret deals, double crosses, corporate infighting—he’s got a real love/hate thing going for Bosworth Industries. I stopped listening a long time ago.”