Addiction (4 page)
Authors: G. H. Ephron
A waiter slid by with a tray of hors d'oeuvres. Daphne helped herself to what looked like a stuffed mushroom. She didn't eat it. She just held it. It anchored that free, fluttering hand in place.
“She's gaining back some of the weight she lost, too,” Channing went on. “For a while there, we were afraid she was going to disappear entirely. You should go say hello. She's always been a big fan of yours.”
“Me? She barely knows who I am,” I said.
“Peter, I can assure you, she knows all about you.”
I felt my face get a degree warmer. Daphne had analyzed Channing during her residency. If Channing had discussed her former lovers, which surely she had, then Daphne knew more about me than anyone had a right to know. I caught Annie watching me speculatively.
Liam Jensen, a senior psychiatrist who worked on the Drug and Alcohol Rehabilitation Unit with Channing, was expounding to Daphne and to a small group of listeners; “ ⦠a new treatment for alcohol and drug dependence.” Jensen was hinged over at the hip, his upper body dipping, his waxy nose pressing the point home. “Today we can detox patients with Librium, but the rate of recidivism is discouraging. DX-200 actually diminishes the psychological dependence.”
As we approached, Daphne ate the stuffed mushroom she'd been holding, then reached out her hand to Channing and pulled her close. She gave her a wry smile and rolled her eyes in Jensen's direction. “Of course, Channing is working on a different treatment for the same thing,” Daphne said.
“Kudzu vine,” Jensen said, pursing his lips with distaste.
“Witch doctor's brew,” Channing said, a mischievous gleam in her eyes. “We'll see which one proves more effective. At least we know which one is more expensive.” Channing seemed to savor their rivalry. Jensen did not look amusedâbut then, he was a dyspeptic kind of guy.
A man asked, “And the potential market?”
Daphne broke in. “Dr. Jensen has his priorities. Wouldn't be wasting your time on anything insipid, would you, Liam?” Under her breath, she added an aside to us, “Besides, he owns the bloody patent.” Now she sounded like the old Daphne, self-assured, razor sharp.
Jensen gave a thin smile. “Conservatively speaking”âhe pausedâ“hundreds of millions of dollars, in this country alone.”
The last words came during a little gap in the party noise, and an assortment of heads lifted and angled in Jensen's direction, harvesting his words.
Across the room, Drew Temple was talking to a woman maybe in her early thirties. Between the form-fitting, pale-blue suit, the suntanned skin, and the dark hair that hung like a long, straight curtain, she didn't look like a hospital type. She reached up and smoothed the collar of Drew's dinner jacket. He glanced about and caught me watching. He took a wooden step back and gave a self-conscious cough.
Just then, Channing announced that it was time for dinner and led the way into the dining room. The fellow who'd taken our coats was removing one of the place settings and rearranging the chairs to camouflage the hole where it seemed Olivia wouldn't be sitting. I found myself seated between Daphne and Channing.
Annie ended up across the table, next to Liam Jensen. Jess Dyer sat on Jensen's other side. He put his arm around the back of Jess's chair, and they spoke quietly for a few moments. Then he picked up his empty wineglass and she picked up hers. They touched the glasses together in a silent, symbolic toast.
I quickly got into a back-and-forth with Daphne and Channing about how come smart liberal women in politics don't get any
respect, while smart conservative women do, with forays into abortion rights and gun control. No one commented on Olivia's absence.
respect, while smart conservative women do, with forays into abortion rights and gun control. No one commented on Olivia's absence.
Channing talked about a white-water-rafting trip she was planning for the spring. “Aren't you terrified?” Daphne asked her.
“Completely. That's what makes it exciting.”
I had forgotten that aspect of Channingâthe side that courted her fears. An edge that years of wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase hadn't worn down. She'd once shown me the gun her mother used to kill herself. She kept it cleaned and oiled. Learned to shoot like an expert. She used to say anything you could master loses its menace.
Channing pushed away from the table and picked up her cup. She gave a bright smile to the other guests who'd followed her lead and were standing as well. “Shall we take our coffee into the parlor?” she suggested.
As we passed the foot of the stairs on our way to the living room, I said, “Olivia must still be up in her room. Shall I go up?”
Channing sighed. “It sure doesn't look as if she's going to come down.”
“Which door?” I asked.
“Top of the stairs, first door on the left. Make up some excuse.”
AT THE top of the stairs I ran into Jess, emerging from a doorway across the hall from Olivia's. She seemed startled to see me, her eyes large and bright. “Just using the ladies,” she said, as she zipped up her backpack.
Of course, that was the perfect excuse for bumbling into Olivia's room.
Olivia's bedroom door was ajar. I stood in the hall, listening to the tapping of her keyboard. I nudged the door open an inch more. She was sitting at a desk facing me, staring intently at a computer screen. Olivia looked nothing like the lively six-year-old or the mousy preadolescent I remembered. A long neck and bony elbows stuck out of her loose black T-shirt. But the hair was what you noticedâblack spikes with poster-paint red streaks running through them.
She took off her round, wire-rimmed glasses, picked up a bottle of eyedrops from alongside her keyboard, tipped her head back, and squeezed some drops into each eye. She had a leather lace tied around her wrist and silver rings on all her fingers, including the thumb.
She set the bottle down and blinked back the drops. Then she
righted herself, put her glasses back on, and began to type. She stopped abruptly, her eyes flickering from her keyboard to the screen. Then another burst of typing. She took a blister pack of pills from her pocket, squeezed one out, and knocked it back without water.
righted herself, put her glasses back on, and began to type. She stopped abruptly, her eyes flickering from her keyboard to the screen. Then another burst of typing. She took a blister pack of pills from her pocket, squeezed one out, and knocked it back without water.
I rapped on the door. She gave a startled jerk, and her face twisted in anger. She quickly dropped the pills into her desk drawer and said, her voice shrill, “Jesus Christ, can't you leave me ⦔ When she saw it was me, she turned wary, the tendons in her neck stretched taut, her face hard and stillâlike an animal, suddenly aware it's being stalked.
“Bathroom?” I asked.
Her face went blank. “The can's at the end of the hall,” she said in an expressionless voice. I saw immediately why she reminded her mother of Matthew Farrellâthe flat demeanor punctuated by explosions of rage.
“I'm Peter Zak. Do you remember me?” I asked. Olivia gave me a blank look. “I met you when you were a little girl. And then a while back, you came over to my house and my wife helped you make a ceramic pot. That was almost three years ago.” She narrowed her eyes to a squint. “You've grown up since then.”
Her expression turned sour. I could hear the unsaid “Duh.”
I glanced around the room, trying to find a toehold. A poster caught my eye.
“You a Nirvana fan?” I asked.
“Kurt Cobain,” she said.
Now go away,
her body added as she turned back to her computer.
Now go away,
her body added as she turned back to her computer.
Cobain, a sensitive, obsessively driven young man who had stuck a shotgun in his mouth and pulled the trigger, was not a great role model.
“Mind if I have a look?” I asked.
She shrugged. I entered the room. The cloying, minty odor of patchouli took me back to my undergraduate days when we used herbs and incense to mask the smell of pot. Only slivers of wall were visible between the posters of rock groups and newspaper photos
of Eric Harris and Dylan Kleboldâalienated kids who'd worn black trench coats to define themselves, and then made names for themselves by shooting down their high school classmates. I lifted the picture of Eric Harris. It was tacked over a magazine photo of a blond model in a pink, Cinderella prom dress.
of Eric Harris and Dylan Kleboldâalienated kids who'd worn black trench coats to define themselves, and then made names for themselves by shooting down their high school classmates. I lifted the picture of Eric Harris. It was tacked over a magazine photo of a blond model in a pink, Cinderella prom dress.
There were also pieces of lined paper, tacked in random spots on the wall. I looked more closely at one. It was a list, written in purple ballpoint pen in careful childlike handwriting. It was dated about two months earlier. There were twenty-five numbered items. The first one was “Brush teeth,” then “Appointment with Dr. D.” I scanned down. “Buy a birthday present for Mom,” “Math homework,” “Term paper,” “Make bed.” Another list was pinned up nearby, likewise a hodgepodge. Clearly, here was Olivia trying to get organized, struggling to build a structure around her life. But anyone would have been overwhelmed by so much detail. Where to begin?
On the adjacent wall, there was a little gallery of photographs printed from a computer. I recognized one. A woman in black with a mournful face and long flowing hair stood intertwined with the sinuous trunk and limbs of a tree.
“This is beautiful,” I said. “Annie Brigman's work is quite extraordinary.”
“You know Annie Brigman?” Olivia asked, her voice betraying a hint of interest. She fingered the stack of silver rings on her thumb, took the top one off, slid it back on.
“I wish I knew her better. I had a chance to buy one of her photographs a few years ago, but I blew it.”
“For reals?” She stood and drifted over beside me. “Her photographs are so, like, totally emotional.” Olivia looked as if she needed a good night's sleep. Despite the shot of Visine, her eyes were still bloodshot, and her hand shook as she raised it to the image. The bones stood out like carbuncles at the base of her painfully thin wrist. I wondered what pills she was taking. “It's like, if she photographed you, it would be so scary because you'd get a picture of your insides.”
“That's a very perceptive observation,” I said.
She glanced at me and quickly looked away, the door slamming shut again. I wondered, was there a prom princess or a female Kip Kinkle hunkered down behind Olivia's in-your-face outsides?
Then I noticed a computer printout under an empty water glass on the table beside her bed. The splashy title: Snuff It. It was the subtitle that caught my attention: Suicide Methods. That and the yellow highlighting.
Olivia stood with her head tipped against the wall, gazing at the Annie Brigman photograph, her finger tracing the undulating lines that merged nature and woman into a single form. Despite the blunt, chopped-off black hair, Olivia's resemblance to her mother was strikingâthe strong profile, the intense eyes. When she stopped slouching and carried herself tall, the resemblance would be even stronger. I wanted to ask, did she feel depressed? Angry? Did she ever think about killing herself. But this wasn't the right time.
I left Olivia in her room and went to find the bathroom, which was, as promised, at the end of the hall. My chat with Olivia had left me shaken. The fact that she was intrigued by social outcasts and deviant teenagers didn't, by itself, concern me. At her age, trying on different personas is healthy. But the combination of that with annotated literature on the how-to's of suicide set red lights flashing.
I returned to the top of the stairs and looked down. Drew was at the front door, saying good-bye to guests. The door on the opposite side of the landing from Olivia's was ajar. I heard, “A resignation. That's what I want. Enough of this dangerous incompetence.” It was Channing. Her voice was low and intense, the wine's softness gone.
I couldn't make out what she said next, but the response was loud and clear. A man's voice, the words clipped and carefully enunciated. “It's not something we want to air in public. It could damage the hospital. And at such a critical time.”
I took a step closer to the door. I knew I was eavesdropping, but I couldn't help myself. “Critical to you,” Channing said.
“And to the hospitalâ”
“And to the drug companies. Don't forget the drug companies. The ones that pay those nice, fat consulting fees. Oh, no, it wouldn't look good at all.”
“Right. You're too high and mightyâand richâto take their consulting fees,” he shot back. “But you know as well as I do, the Pearce would have long ago been turned into a housing development if it weren't for their money.”
The house had turned dead quiet. Olivia poked her head out of her room, her expression wary. Drew and Annie were at the base of the stairs; Jess and Daphne, now wearing their coats, stood near the front door. They were all looking up the stairs, straining to hear.
The man continued, “Don't threaten what you're not prepared to do.”
“I'm prepared. Believe me, I'm prepared. A man is dead. And everyone thinks ⦔
“What difference does it make what everyone thinks?”
“It would make a difference to him. And it makes a difference to me.”
“You're so sure of what's right and what's wrong.”
“Why not? What have I got left to lose?” Channing said, her voice laced with disdain.
“You have no one to blame for that but yourself.”
“You son of a bitch,” Channing hissed.
There was a pause. Silence. I could barely hear the clatter of dishes from the kitchen. Then, the man's gasp of outrage. “What the hell do you think you're doing?” he bellowed.
That was enough for me. I entered the study to find Channing and Dr. Liam Jensen confronting each other. Jensen was clutching the stem of a brass floor lamp, his face filled with rage. The lamp was lifted six inches off the floor, and I had the distinct impression that he was a hair away from wielding it like a club. His normally waxy complexion had turned florid. Channing was holding an
empty brandy snifter, and cognac dripped from Jensen's beaky nose. More was spattered across the lapel and one perfectly padded shoulder of his pale-gray suit jacket.
empty brandy snifter, and cognac dripped from Jensen's beaky nose. More was spattered across the lapel and one perfectly padded shoulder of his pale-gray suit jacket.
When he saw me in the doorway, Jensen set down the lamp and released his hold. He coughed, pulled a handkerchief from his pocket, and blotted his face, then his jacket.
I stood close to Channing. “You okay?” I asked.
“I'd like to kill the bastard,” she said under her breath. Then she looked up and saw Drew peering in from the doorway. Annie, Jess, and Daphne crowded behind him. Channing backed up until she bumped into a wing chair and sank down into it. She put her head in her hands. “Oh, God, now I've gone and done it.” I put my hand on her shoulder.
“Here, Liam, let me take your jacket,” Drew said.
Jensen looked as if he didn't trust himself to say anything. He took off his jacket and handed it to Drew.
“Cold water,” Channing said wearily. “Before the stain sets. You don't mind, do you, Peter?” She looked up at me. “Take it to the bathroom at the end of the hall.” Drew handed me the jacket. “Cold water should take care of it, but you have to treat it right away. If that doesn't work, take it down to Verna in the kitchen. She'll know what to do.”
I left, holding the jacket. Cold water. I started toward the end-of-the-hall bathroom and stopped halfway there. I looked down at the jacket on my arm and recognized the silky brown Brioni label. I promptly turned around and trotted Jensen's jacket directly down to the kitchen and the ministrations of Verna.
As Annie and I walked back to the car, I felt a cold sweat on my forehead, the aftermath of the adrenaline rush kicked off by the altercation. It left me feeling uneasy, as if the entire evening had somehow ridden off the rails.
Dangerous incompetence. A man is dead.
Who were they talking about? And whose resignation did Channing want?
Dangerous incompetence. A man is dead.
Who were they talking about? And whose resignation did Channing want?
“Any idea what that was all about?” Annie asked.
“I haven't any idea,” I said. I hoped Channing hadn't been added to one more enemies list.
We got back into the car. I started it and cranked the heater, though I knew it would be at least ten minutes before anything but cold air would be blowing on us. Annie yawned and hugged herself.
“Tired?” I asked.
“Not really. It's only eleven. Want to go somewhere for coffee?”
Her stockings hissed against each other as she crossed her legs. Her knee emerged from between the flaps of the coat. I didn't feel like coffee.
“Not especially,” I said.
Annie tilted her head and smiled. “Mmm,” she said, “neither do I, actually.”
I was out of practice. With Kate it had been so uncomplicated, so natural, like a slide down the rapids and at the end coming up gasping for air. It had been a long time since I'd gotten from where I was to where I wanted to be. Even a few months ago, guilt and the feeling that I was being unfaithful looking at another woman would have made it impossible for me to feel what I was feeling now.
All I could manage was, “Hey, you,” as I reached over and touched her face.
She turned her head and tasted my index finger. I closed my eyes. “Hey, yourself,” Annie whispered.
I put my hand on her leg and caressed, the intense feeling in me wanting, needing, to get out. Annie took my hand and pushed it a few inches higher up her thigh. I wrapped my other hand behind her head. She smiled and closed her eyes, her lips parted, her mouth inviting. I meant to kiss her gently, but it came out hard and urgent. She pressed her body hard against mine. I pushed my hand further up her thighs, and her legs parted.
Annie heard the beeper go off before I did. “Must be yours,” Annie said, gasping. “Mine's at home.”
I didn't want to let go, to fish out my beeper. But I did. It's amazing how fast obligation can deflate desire.
I had to wipe the steam off my glasses before I could see the emergency code 900. “Great. Perfect timing.” I groaned. “I go for a week without a beep and now, at this very moment, there's an emergency. I've got to go in.”
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