Down in the Zero

'That's nice. Well, perhaps Mr…'

'Burke,' I told her.

'Perhaps, Mr. Burke, you can come back sometime.'

'Go wait outside,' I told Fancy.

'Look,' she said, sitting up straight. 'We hired you and— '

'And you're not calling the shots. Go wait in the car.'

Fancy jumped to her feet, a flush under her dark tan.

'You don't have to do that,' the woman said. 'Perhaps you could just excuse us for a little bit? There's really a very nice library, just off the living room…'

Fancy looked at me. I nodded an okay. She flounced off, keeping the wiggle under control this time.

'I hope smoke doesn't bother you,' the woman said, helping herself to a cigarette from a box sitting next to an ashtray on a black plastic cube standing next to her chair. 'Lorenzo— that's my personal trainer— he'd kill me if he caught me.'

'Not at all,' I told her, taking out my own.

'Now…' she said, taking a deep enough drag to give her blouse a workout. 'What can I tell you?'

'Well, I'm not really sure. With this kind of investigation, you can't be sure there is anything. Was Lana depressed in any way before it happened?'

'Depressed? Mr. Burke, she was born depressed. Lana was always a strange girl. You know the type— dressed all in black, stayed in her room a lot.'

'The…suicide wasn't such a shock, then?'

'Shock? Not to me. She'd tried it before.'

'She tried to kill herself before?'

'That's what I just said. She wrote this long, incomprehensible poem first. A piece of drivel. Then she ran herself a warm bath, climbed in and cut her wrists. If my husband hadn't called the paramedics, she would have been dead then.'

'How long ago was that?'

'Almost four years ago. She was still in high school.'

'What happened after that?'

'She went into therapy, what else? Cost enough money, I can tell you. But it was a waste of time. This therapist, she wanted me and my husband to come in and talk about it. And we did that. But I wasn't going to spend the rest of my life in therapy because I had a sick girl for a daughter.'

'Did she ever try it again?'

'She was always trying something. She and a friend of hers, another weirdo, they were always writing this sick poetry about death. She tried pills once, too.'

'And…?'

'And they pumped her stomach out at the hospital. And she went back into therapy. What a joke.'

'You don't seem much of a fan of therapy.'

'Why should I be? Everybody I know has been. They want to quit smoking, their husband has an affair, they're losing their looks…whatever it is, some shrink will do a number on you. You want a therapy fan, you need to talk to my husband— he loves the stuff.'

'Your husband has been in therapy for a while?'

'Sure. Started when he was a kid. He's a rich, weak man. If that sounds like a contradiction to you, it isn't. He inherited the money. From his mother. He was a sensitive poet too, just like his precious daughter.'

'Was?'

'Oh, he's alive. If you can call it that. We have a cabin. In Maine. That's mostly where he spends the summers. Writing,' she sneered, the last word rich with contempt.

'He's a writer?'

'Some writer. He pays to have his own stuff published, can you imagine that?'

'I've heard of it.'

'That's so lame. So weak. Him and his literary little friends. Fags, most of them, the way I see it. I intimidate them. The only kind of women they like are so skinny you could use them to pick a lock.'

'I know what you mean.'

'Do you?' she asked, squirming in her chair to make sure I couldn't accuse her of being subtle.

'Sure. It's a class thing. Working–class men have different taste.'

'And what class are you, Mr. Burke?'

'Low–class,' I told her, earning myself a wicked smile. 'Was Lana at home when she…?'