Love Gone Mad (37 page)

“Any idea why?” Mulvaney asks.

“No. She was really withdrawn these last few weeks. I tried to get her to talk about it, but she wouldn’t.”

“There’s a suicide note in the den,” says Mulvaney.

A schoolhouse clock in the hallway lets out Westminster chimes and bongs twice. It’s two o’clock in the afternoon.

In the den, Mulvaney nods to an officer standing at the computer. A sheet of paper rests on the keyboard. Mulvaney begins reading.

“It’s on the monitor, too,” says the officer. “May I?” Grayson asks.

“Sure,” Mulvaney says. “Just touch the side of the mouse; nothing else.”

Grayson sits in the computer chair and touches the mouse. The screen reveals a single-spaced typed letter.

My dear Nina:

I’m truly sorry for any pain I’ve caused you, my beloved sister, and others.

My life is no longer worth living. This is the only way to right the wrongs that I’ve done. This is the only choice left. My life is an abysmal failure.

Please contact John Grayson at Whitehall and tell him how much I regret my role in what happened. He was right about Conrad Wilson. I was wrong. I was convinced Conrad’s sanity was restored. I became his advocate. It should never have been my role. I was so forceful and so wrong.

Conrad and I had a physical relationship in my office when we met for his counseling sessions. I crossed that boundary and violated everything I held dear. I loved him and thought he loved me. I never saw through his lies and deceit. I convinced myself we would move to Colorado and live together. I even applied for a medical license there.

I lost all perspective. I no longer saw Conrad as a madman. I didn’t let myself see that his only goal was to leave Whitehall so he could exact revenge on Megan Haggarty and Adrian Douglas.

I’m responsible for what happened. I coached Conrad and told him about the MMPI. I warned him about the cross-referenced questions, so he memorized them as he went along and never gave contradictory answers. He outwitted the test and appeared normal. It was all an act. Because I loved him, I was blinded, even deluded by love.

Because of me, Pastor Wilhelm and his wife are dead.

Because of me, Adrian Douglas and Megan Haggarty almost died, and their children were put at terrible risk. I don’t know if their daughter, Marlee, will ever get over what she saw happen. Or if she’ll ever erase seeing John Grayson forced to kill Conrad in their home.

I betrayed my colleagues, my profession, everyone. I thought Conrad loved me, and I was as mad as he was. I caused terrible pain and suffering. I cannot go on.

My dearest Nina, everything I have is yours, especially my love.

Nicole

Grayson shakes his head and peers up at Adrian. “Remember what I said about delusions?”

“They never go away.”

“She loved that crazy bastard,” Mulvaney says. “Maybe love’s mad, huh?”

“Early on, probably,” Grayson says. “You know, the whole falling in love thing, before you get to know the real-life person.”

“You think it’s delusional?” Adrian asks.

“Maybe it is.”

“You think
she
was crazy?” Mulvaney asks.

“Falling for Conrad Wilson was madness,” Grayson says.

“But was
she
crazy?”

“
Killing
herself was crazy,” Grayson says.

“Is
love
mad?” Adrian asks.

“Do you remember first falling in love?”

“Sure,” Adrian says.

“Maybe it’s temporary loss of sanity,” Mulvaney says.

“Do we ever see a lover realistically … in a completely sane way?” Grayson asks. His eyes look bleary.

“I’m crazy about my wife,” Mulvaney says. “How ’bout you, Adrian. You
mad
about Megan?”

“Absolutely,” Adrian says, thinking how he wants—more than anything in the world—to go home to the people he loves. Call it absurd, call it madness, or even crazy.

Soon Marlee will be home from school, and she’ll ask him with those eyes of hers, wide and inquiring—as she always does—to help with her homework. It’s a ritual by now, almost a little game they play. Like when they play checkers; and now she’s learning chess. He teaches her and she catches on to everything very quickly. He loves it, and Marlee knows he does. She adores it, too. It’s part of their being together, sharing; it’s part of being a family.

And for the rest of the day, into the evening and night, he’ll be with them—with Megan, Marlee, and Philip—and while the next day’s surgeries will be at the back of his mind, as they should be, the most important part of his life is being with them, spending time with the three beings on this earth who are so precious to him. It’s impossible to find words to express his feelings.

Adrian knows he wants always to be with them—the people who make everything worthwhile, who give his life substance and meaning, who fill his life with possibility, who’ve kept his soul alive and about whom he’s crazy and without whom Adrian knows he’d go mad.

And he thinks to himself,
so what if love is a form of madness? That’s just the way it is. I’m lucky to love and be loved. I’m the luckiest guy in the world
.

T
he interface between psychiatry and the law has always been murky.

The cases and principles of law cited in
Love Gone Mad
are all true. They depict the medicolegal quandaries occurring frequently in American courtrooms. Of course, neither psychiatry nor the law can address the conundrum of the soul. What exactly is a “soul”? Is it the capacity for human empathy, for feelings, understanding, caring, and loving?
¹
Or does it have some higher, even religious implication?

A novel usually depicts conflict and feelings: love, jealousy, hatred, revenge, greed, lust, and others. In living our lives, we often face dilemmas—legal and otherwise—as complicated as the human condition.

_________________

¹
Dr. Leonard Shengold, in his book
Soul Murder: The Effects of Childhood Abuse and Deprivation
, noted the phrase
a soul murder
was first used by playwrights Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg to describe the destruction of the love of life in another human being.

A
s I’ve said before, no novel is a product of its author alone. Many people contributed their time and effort to reading and making suggestions, thereby improving the manuscript. They were my brain trust—my partners in creativity—and were indispensable to my writing efforts. I cannot thank them enough.

Deepest thanks to Kristen Weber for showing me the way of the novel. She devoted time, energy, and enthusiasm to this project.

Relatives and friends graciously devoted their time and talent to reading the manuscript at various stages and made valuable suggestions. They include Claire Copen, Rob Copen, Marty Isler and Natalie Isler, Helen Kaufman and Phil Kaufman, Arthur Kotch and Jill Kotch, and Barry Nathanson and Susan Nathanson. Their suggestions, criticisms, and comments were marks of friendship and vastly improved what I’d written. They cared enough to provide me with honest feedback, which was crucial to the novel.

Other people, both living and dead, made their own (most unknowingly) contributions to my knowledge base and authorial efforts. They include Dick Simons, Bill Console, Warren Tanenbaum, Charles Darwin, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Clarence Darrow, Sigmund Freud, Zane Grey, the Grimm Brothers, Edith Hamilton and a vast array of Greek myths, Homer, Herodotus, Aeschylus, Sophocles, Jim Kjelgaard, John R. Tunis, Jack London, Edgar Allen Poe, and William MacLeod Raine.

Equally important to the writing of the novel and its eventual execution were Melissa Danaczko, Bruce Glaser, Sharon Goldinger, Kristen Havens, Lynda Ling, Penina Lopez, Pam Miller, Leonard Shengold, Liz Lauer, Tracy Minsky, Meryl Moss, and a cadre of writers, artists, physicians, attorneys, and educators of every kind.

My brilliant wife, Linda, tirelessly read different versions of the manuscript and made all the difference in the world to the final outcome. She’s a source of courage, inspiration, and love.

A
fter graduating from NYU with a degree in business administration, Mark Rubinstein served in the US Army as a field medic tending to paratroopers of the Eighty-Second Airborne Division. After discharge from the army, he gained admission to medical school. He became a physician and then took a psychiatric residency, becoming involved in forensic psychiatry and testifying in trials as an expert witness.

He became an attending psychiatrist at New York Presbyterian Hospital and a clinical assistant professor of psychiatry at Cornell University Medical School, teaching psychiatric residents, psychologists, and social workers while practicing psychiatry.

Before turning to fiction, he coauthored five nonfiction, self-help books for the general public. His first novel,
Mad Dog House
, was published by Thunder Lake Press in 2012.

He is a contributor to
Psychology Today
and a blogger for the
Huffington Post
. He lives in Connecticut and is working on other novels.

D
anny Burns sits at his office desk and rubs his forehead. His temples throb. It’s another headache beginning, and this one’s going to be a bone-crusher. Doc Gordon says it’s tension, because he can’t find a thing wrong—physically. It feels like a vise is clamping down on his skull.

“So what’s troubling you?” Doc Gordon asked.

“Nothin’, Doc … absolutely nothin’.”

“Well, these are classic tension headaches.”

Tension, worry, and aggravation: they’re permanent fixtures in his life, ever since what went down ten months ago.

It’s nearly eight o’clock on this frigid February night. The office is sepulchral. The only sound is the occasional whooshing of tires as cars pass by on McLean Avenue, two stories below. The windowpane rattles as a gust of wind whips against it. Danny reminds himself to talk to the landlord about the thermal pane replacements he said he’d install.
Yeah, don’t hold your breath
, Dan thinks.
Leave it to Donovan and it’ll never get done
. The building’s owner is too busy flipping properties all over Yonkers.

Danny gazes at his laptop screen and then at the papers on his desk. The April 15 tax deadline is only two months away, and he’s got a ton of work. Even though most clients have their returns filed electronically, the majority don’t use the worksheet Danny provides them. They mail him hand-scrawled notes and figures—a jumble of jottings along with heaps of documentation. He and his assistants spend more time sorting through the junk than actually entering data into the computer. They’re all billable hours, but it’s mostly crap that could be done by a monkey. He thinks it might be wise to hire another part-time assistant. If he does, it’ll set a personal record for employing temporary help.

Danny knows the reasons he’s needed additional assistance these last few months: he hasn’t been focused on work. Sometimes he just zones out like he’s floating in space. God Almighty, he used to zero in on things like a laser beam. “Detail Dan” was what Angela would jokingly call him. But for the past ten months, he’s been lucky if he remembered to slip into his pants in the morning. And Angela’s noticed it big-time.

“You’re not listening to a word I say,” she calls after him as he wanders through the house, looking for his wallet or car keys, which always seem to be misplaced. “You’re in another world,” she mutters as he retraces his steps for the third time, searching for his watch or cell phone.

“Angela, I’m late and I need my cell phone.”

“I swear, Danny, you’re out of it these days. You were never this way … not till last May or June. What’s happened to you?”

Dan’s thoughts are interrupted by a nerve-jangling blast of sound that sends him lurching forward. It’s the telephone. He picks up the receiver.

“Daniel Burns …” he says, trying to sound professional.

“Danny, when are you coming home?”

“Angela, honey … I have a ton of work.”

“
Daniel
…”

She uses his formal name only when she’s really annoyed, totally pissed. She picked it up from Ma, years ago. But nowadays, she uses
Daniel
way too often. It annoys him, but why start an argument? It’ll just bring on another headache.

“You’re always late and you’re always at the office. I swear, if I didn’t know better, I’d think you had a girlfriend.”

“Oh, Angela … please stop this nonsense.”

“I can’t. You’ve been
living
at the office. You used to rush home so we’d have dinner together at six, as a family. Now you’re a ghost.”

Ghost
. The word sends a shiver through him. And it runs the risk of throwing his lungs into a full-blown asthmatic attack.
Ghost
. It was Grange’s moniker, and it reminds him of that horrific night in the woods with Roddy and Kenny.

“What’s happening with you? Can you tell me something …
anything
?”

“I’ve been working on some personal deals for Jack Sobin—for John Harris, too. It’s gotten very complicated and I—”

“Oh, c’mon. You’ve always hired people a few months before tax time. You never stayed at the office this late. I’ll bet you’re there alone, right?”

“Look—”

“Am I right? You’re there alone. No help?”

“I know, but—”

“Danny, what’s going on?”

“Whaddaya mean?”

“It’s not because of tax time. It’s been almost a year since I had the
real
Danny …
my
Danny.”

“C’mon, Angie. You’re exaggerating.”

“No, I’m not. Since you guys got rid of that restaurant, you’ve changed.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“You’ve been jumpy. And remote.”

“Remote?”

“Yes,
remote
. As though you’re not really here with me and the kids anymore. And Tracy says it’s the same with Roddy. She sometimes sees him with this faraway look in his eyes. What’s with you two?”