A Twisted Ladder (16 page)

“Psych?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re kidding. Any study in particular?”

“A new program—Perceptual and Noetic Science.”

Madeleine slowed her pace as she processed this, wondering when the department started throwing money at pseudosciences.

Ethan said, “Something wrong?”

“No, it’s just kind of surprising. They’re cutting programs left and right. This is the first time I heard anything about adding new ones.”

Ethan nodded. “Well, it’s got private sponsorship, and they’re keeping it pretty quiet. Given the subject matter—you know, psi and all that, it can be pretty controversial.”

“Wait, when you say psi, I assume you’re talking about things like extrasensory perception.”

“Well, yeah. Psi-gamma covers things like ESP. Psi-kappa relates to actions, like psychokinesis. We’re exploring all of it.”

“So as a neurologist, what exactly are you going to be doing with them?”

“Actually, in this sense I’m more of a neuroscientist than a neurologist. Anyway I’m looking at brain activity in cases of proven psi.”

She cut him a sideways look and said, “
Proven
psi? Forgive my saying, but isn’t that an oxymoron? Hate to be cynical, but . . .”

“It’s all right. Wasn’t so sure myself at first. But yes, there are quite a few instances of proven psi. Usually it comes up in the case of unique subjects—people with special abilities. But it’s also reproducible and traceable in a lab with random subjects.”

“Really.”

“Really.”

Her voice took an edge. “So you’re saying that we’re all a bunch of psychics.”

He looked at her with tolerance, and she felt a twinge of reproach.

He said, “As a matter of fact, if you want to put it that way, yes. We are all psychics.”

“Sorry Ethan. Not trying to be cavalier. I just have a hard time believing in something I can’t study with hard evidence.”

“I don’t mind. A long time ago people didn’t believe in invisible fairies that made you sick. Then Louis Pasteur took hold of a microscope and told us about germs.”

She considered this. “Touché.”

Ethan pointed toward the swamp exhibit. “Hey look. Albo gator.”

She looked. A bright white alligator was lying on the banks a fair distance away. Albino like Chloe’s attendant Oran. The contrast of the alligator’s skin made it stand out like a starfish on a black piling.

Beneath their feet, the path changed to boardwalk, and Madeleine realized that up until now she’d been so focused on her own thoughts that she’d barely taken in the zoo itself. Screw pines crowded close around them, dense with foliage, and then they opened to strategically placed vignettes of lily pads, turtles, and cypress. A replication of a trapper’s shanty floated on wood planks, and it reminded her of Zenon’s tiny fishing cottage in Bayou Black. She remembered some controversy after the hurricane, when the zoo had outfitted the swamp shack so that it looked like other post-Katrina houses, with a tarp over the roof and a taped-up refrigerator. They’d even made it look like search-and-rescue teams had been there and found human casualties, complete with the grim painted X and the words, “gators fed.”

Madeleine looked at the trees’ roots rising out of the water, and thought of the wavy-lined patterns from her college parapsychology experiments.

“I remember those old flash cards with the squiggly lines and shapes—the ‘guess which one I’m looking at’ game. Is your team using those?”

“Zener cards. Haven’t been on board long enough to know everything they’re doing in the department, but I don’t think they’re using those.”

“I imagine you’re doing more sophisticated tests.”

“Oh yeah. Real elaborate and complex.”

“Really? Like what?”

He took her hand, and her cynicism felt suddenly unimportant under the spark of his touch. She looked up at his face and saw that he was watching her with a strong, quiet kind of depth. He withdrew his hand, and when she looked down, she saw he’d left a penny in her palm.

He said, “That’s our complex, sophisticated testing equipment.”

“A penny?”

He nodded.

“No wonder y’all found it easy to get funding.” She handed it back to him.

He smiled and slipped the penny in his pocket. “The experiments go a little something like this.”

He took her by the shoulders and turned her around so that she faced the railing. The replica swamp lay ahead, and two green dragonflies were joined in flight over a spray of ferns. Ethan stood behind her with his arms encircling hers, and he placed each of her hands on the railing and then backed away. She started to look over her shoulder at him.

“Don’t turn around,” he said, and so she looked straight ahead toward the pond.

A pelican sat dozing on a log, its head nestled back, its bill almost as long as its wings. She waited for Ethan to act or at least speak to her. But he remained silent and whatever he was doing back there, she felt certain he had his eyes on her. It made her skin prickle.

Finally she could stand it no longer. “What are you doing back there, just staring at me?”

“That’s exactly what I’m doing.”

She turned around and saw his amusement.

“Don’t tell me you’re conducting scientific experiments on staring,” she said.

“Pretty much.”

“And this is neuroscience?”

He stepped toward her and put a hand to her temple, smoothing a strand of hair. “It’s all about your brain, Dr. LeBlanc. That feeling you get when you’re being watched. It’s not just coincidence. The brain emits waves—gamma waves, beta waves—and it’s possible the brain knows how to intercept those waves too. When someone’s brain is focused on you, you can literally feel it.”

Her lips parted in surprise.

He said, “The brain picks up the waves, but it might not immediately register as a conscious thought. So it sends signals to the rest of your body to create other physiological warnings. Tension in the hair follicles, causing your hair to stand on end, and surge in blood flow to the upper extremities.”

She was stunned. “So that feeling that you’re being watched—you’re saying it’s real, not just a coincidence?”

“It’s real all right. And it’s a good habit to get into, paying attention to that. The more you tune in, the stronger it gets because you’re forming neurons specifically for tuning in. Neuroplasticity. I’d be willing to bet a whole lot of crimes can be avoided if people just learned to trust their instincts.”

“And the penny?”

“A randomization generator.”

She thought for a minute. “You flip a coin.”

“That’s right.”

“And what does that do for you?”

“Put two people in a room. The subject faces a wall, the researcher sits directly behind the subject. The researcher flips a coin and if it’s heads, he’ll stare at the subject. If it’s tails, he won’t. The subject has to guess whether or not he’s staring.”

“I see. And how often does the subject get it right?”

He shrugged. “On average, about fifty-four percent of the time.”

“Fifty-four? Come on, that’s hardly even noticeable. Chance is fifty-fifty.”

“Yes, except that extra four percent above an even fifty-fifty makes all the difference in the world. It’s repeatable, consistently, time and time again. You know what the odds are for that kind of result?”

“Tell me.”

“202 octodecillion to one.”

She grinned at him, aware that she had resolved to suppress her own mad scientist for the evening, and yet here he was relating on her own terms. Odd how all his talk about brain waves seemed to bring out the highlights in those brown eyes of his.

She said, “I have no idea how much an octodecillion is.”

“I had to look it up myself. Lotta zeroes.”

She tore her gaze away from his eyes, feeling lighthearted, and he slipped his hand in hers as they stepped off the boardwalk onto the path toward Monkey Hill.

She said, “I never thought of neuroplasticity in terms of psi before.”

“Most people haven’t. I know how you usually think of it, because I read about it in your paper on cognitive schizophrenia.”

She laughed. “Sure. Part of the treatment is to assist the patient with creating healthy mental habits. Which is, essentially, neuroplasticity.”

“I’d be curious to see the fMRIs of those patients, before and after.”

She looked at him. “Does this mean you’re going to pursue this for the rest of your career?”

He shrugged. “It fascinates me. Not something that originally attracted me to brain science, but the deeper I get into it the more exciting it becomes. But I’m not obsessive about it. There are other things that are important.”

“Oh? Like what?”

“Oh, you know. Home life. Getting married someday. Creating some creatures.” He grinned at her. “How about you?”

“I don’t know. Haven’t thought much beyond my career.”

BATON ROUGE, 2009

ANITA RAN HER HAND
along the smooth, brushed steel as they stood amid parallel shooting alleys. Zenon took the weapon from her grasp.

“Always assume it’s loaded. And always point the muzzle downrange. If you’re pointing at something, be prepared to shoot it.”

She nodded, fiddling with her headphones and plastic safety glasses that converged in an awkward spot just behind her ear. In the next booth, the shooter fired several rounds in rapid succession. As the shooter’s paper target swung into motion, she could see the shots grouped near the center circle.

“Wow,” she said, raising her brows.

“Anita, this is important. Pay attention. You keep your finger
off
the trigger, and off the trigger guard until you are ready to shoot.”

She shifted her weight, resisting the urge to point out that they had already gone over this. Many times.

“Got it.” She smiled.

He nodded. “Load and make ready.”

She held the gun with her right hand and loaded a magazine.

“Downrange,” Zenon said. “Keep it pointed downrange at all times.”

She sighed and swung the muzzle to point directly downrange. It hadn’t been that far off, she thought. If it had discharged, the bullet would have just hit someone else’s target. No biggie.

“Never thought I’d shoot a gun before. It’s kind of sexy.” She cut her gaze back toward Zenon, or at least toward the broad moguls under his black t-shirt, and wished she was wearing something sexier than these birth control goggles. She pulled the slide, chambering the round, and applied the safety.

“Magazine,” Zenon said.

She let the empty drop to the floor. “My dad wanted me to learn to shoot. For protection. Did you hear about that girl, Angel Frey?”

He said nothing.

“They still haven’t found her. I wonder if she’s alive.”

She inserted a fully charged magazine. As she did this, her pinky grazed the trigger guard.

“Finger off the trigger!” Zenon barked.

This startled her. She lifted the offending pinky finger and crooked it in the air so that it resembled the formal manner of sipping tea. Zenon’s face clouded. Anita holstered the pistol.

“Gun clear, hammer down,” he said.

The command sent a surge through her body. She pinched the slide and extended her arms, and finally—finally!—squeezed the trigger.

The gun jerked in her hands, and she couldn’t see whether the bullet even hit the target, though she suspected it hadn’t.

“Breathe, relax, aim, and squeeze,” he said, stepping behind her and lifting her arms so that they were level. He held them with one hand and used the other to shift her hips to a centered position, pushing his knee between her legs. She felt his breath at her ear.

“Feet shoulder-width apart.” He stepped back and folded his arms.

The hair stirred on the back of her neck. Though she couldn’t see him, the knowledge that he was staring at her back gave her a thrill. She spread her feet and strengthened her stance, taking care to tighten her butt, then fired again.

“Better,” he said. “Relax.”

She fired a few more rounds and bit her lip, deliberately letting her arms sag a little. He reached out and lifted them again.

She smiled.