False Memory

“I know it is. You’ve convinced me. That’s why I’ve got to mull it over. Because it’s so strange. We’ve got to be careful, be sure we do the right thing.”

“I’m afraid. I’m so alone here.”

“You aren’t alone,” Martie promised, her voice beginning to break apart, not just quaverous anymore, but quaking and cracking. “I won’t let you be alone. I’ll call you back.”

“Martie—”

“I’ll think about this, think it through—”

“—if anything happens—”

“—figure out what’s best—”

“—if anything happens to me—”

“—and I’ll call you back—”

“—Martie—”

“—call you back soon.”

She racked the wall phone, although at first she couldn’t release it. Her grip was locked around the handset. When finally she was able to let go, her hand remained cupped, holding fast to a phantom phone.

Releasing the drawer, Martie winced as cramps spasmed through her right hand. Like a clay mold, the soft interdigital pads at the base of her fingers had taken a clear impression of the drawer handle, and the metacarpals ached as if the red groove in her flesh were reflected in the bone beneath.

She backed away from the drawer until she bumped against the refrigerator. Inside the fridge, bottles rattled softly against one another.

One of them was a half-empty bottle of Chardonnay, left over from dinner the previous night. A wine bottle is thick, especially at the bottom, which features a sediment-collecting, concave punt. Solid. Blunt. Effective. She could swing it like a club, crack someone’s skull with it.

A broken wine bottle could be a particularly devastating weapon. Hold it by the neck, jagged points thrust forward. Rake it down some unsuspecting person’s face, jam it into his throat.

Slamming doors could have been no louder than the crash of her heart resonating through her body.

23

“Urine doesn’t lie,” said Dr. Donklin.

From his sentinel post near the door, Valet raised his head and twitched his ears as if in agreement.

Skeet, who was now hooked to an electrocardiograph, remained in a sleep so deep that it appeared to be cryogenic suspension.

Dusty watched the tracery of green light spiking across the readout-window on the heart monitor. His brother’s pulse was slow but steady, no arrhythmia.

New Life Clinic was neither a hospital nor a diagnostic lab. Nevertheless, because of the self-destructiveness and cleverness of its patients, it had the sophisticated equipment required to provide rapid analysis of bodily fluids for the presence of drugs.

Earlier, Skeet’s initial blood samples, taken upon admission, had revealed the recipe for the chemical cocktail with which he had started his day: methamphetamine, cocaine, DMT. Meth and coke were stimulants. Dimethyltryptamine — DMT — was a synthetic hallucinogen, similar to psilocybin, which itself was an alkaloid crystal derived from the mushroom Psilocybe mexicana. This constituted a breakfast with a lot more punch than oatmeal and orange juice.

Analysis of the latest blood sample, drawn while Skeet lay in a comalike slumber, had not yet been completed; however, the urine sample, acquired by catheter, indicated that no new drugs had been introduced into his system and, moreover, that his body had largely metabolized the methamphetamine, cocaine, and DMT. For the time being, at least, he would be seeing no more of the angel of death who had induced him to leap off the Sorensons’ roof.

“We’ll get the same data from the second blood samples,” Donklin predicted. “Because it’s true, urine doesn’t lie. Or in laymen’s terms…there’s truth in a tinkle. Pee-pee can’t prevaricate.”

Dusty wondered if the physician’s bedside manner had been so irreverent when he’d had his own practice or if irreverence had come upon him after retirement, when he’d taken this for-hire position at New Life. In either case, it was refreshing.

The urine sample had also been analyzed for urethral casts, albumin, and sugar. The results failed to support a diagnosis of either diabetic or uremic coma.

“If the new blood workup doesn’t tell us anything,” Dr. Donklin said, “we’ll probably want to transfer him to a hospital.”

* * *

Inside the refrigerator, against which Martie leaned, the clink of glass against glass gradually subsided.

The pain in her cramped hands wrung tears from her. With the sleeves of her blouse, she blotted her eyes, but her vision remained blurred.

Her hands were hooked, as if she were clawing at an adversary — or at a crumbling ledge. Seen through a salty veil, they might have been the menacing hands of a demon in a dream.

With the image of a jaggedly broken wine bottle still vivid in her mind’s eye, she remained so frightened of her potential for violence, of her unconscious intentions, that she was paralyzed.

Action. Her father’s admonition. Hope lies in action. But she didn’t have the clarity of mind to consider, analyze, and then judiciously choose the right and most effective action.

She acted anyway, because if she didn’t do something, she would lie on the floor, curl into a ball like a pill bug, and remain there until Dusty came home. By the time he arrived, she might have turned in upon herself so tightly that she’d never be able to uncurl.

So, now, with pale resolve, push away from the refrigerator. Cross the kitchen. To the cabinet from which she’d retreated only moments ago.

Fingers hooking around the handle. Klick-klick. Pulling open the drawer. The gleaming scissors.

Martie almost faltered. Almost lost her shaky conviction when she saw the shiny blades.

Action. All the way out of the cabinet with the damn drawer. All the way out. Heavier than she expected.

Or perhaps the drawer wasn’t in fact as heavy as it seemed, was heavy only because, for Martie, the scissors possessed more than mere physical weight. Psychological weight, moral weight, the weight of malevolent purpose residing within the steel.

Now to the open back door. The trash can.

She tipped the drawer away from herself, intending to let the contents spill into the can. The sliding scissors rattled against other objects, and the sound so alarmed Martie that she dropped the drawer itself into the trash, along with everything it contained.

* * *

When Tom Wong brought the results of the latest blood-sample analysis to Skeet’s room, Dr. Donklin’s prediction was fulfilled. The mystery of Skeet’s condition remained unsolved.

The kid hadn’t ingested drugs of any kind within the past few hours. Residual traces of this morning’s indulgence were barely detectable.

His white-blood-cell count, which was normal, and his lack of fever didn’t support the theory that he might be afflicted by an acute meningeal infection. Or any infection whatsoever.

If the problem were food poisoning, specifically botulism, the coma would have been preceded by vomiting and stomach pain, and most likely by diarrhea, as well. Skeet hadn’t suffered from any of those complaints.

Although clear symptoms of apoplexy were not apparent, the grave possibilities of cerebral hemorrhage, embolism, and thrombosis must be reconsidered.

“This isn’t a rehab case, anymore,” Dr. Donklin decided. “Where do you prefer we transfer him?”