But no amount of pampering could pad the shock of finding yourself living out the single worst fear of your life. Ever since she could remember, Lily had been terrified of being locked up in an asylum-and now here she was. Talk about the other shoe dropping, she thought. In a way, it was like that old cliche about careful what you wish for because you might get it, only with a new twist. Be careful what you’re afraid of, is what they
6
As much as he disliked the responsibilities that came with being the director of an institution the size of Reed-Chase-the administrative details that threatened to swamp him on a daily basis, the weight of all the people, staff and patients alike, whose welfare depended on his decisions-Al Corder had to admit that you couldn’t beat the commute.
It was close to six o’clock when he left Irene Cogan and Lily to say their good-byes. Only minutes later he unlocked and ducked through the arch-topped door set into the ivy-covered brick wall bordering the northern end of the arboretum, strolled across the lawn, passed the disused swing-and-slide set, and let himself in through the back entrance of the eighty-year-old, half-timbered, Tudor-style fieldstone manor that came with the director’s job. End of commute.
“Home is the hunter, home from the hills,” he called.
“Hi, I’m in the kitchen.”
As he passed through the dining room, Corder noticed the table was set for two. “The princess does not deign to dine with the commoners this evening?”
Cheryl Corder was at the stove, wooden spoon in one hand, kettle lid in the other, her dark blond hair limp from the steam. “The princess,” she replied over her shoulder, “is a little down in the dumps.”
“Boy trouble?” Corder gave her a peck on the back of the neck, then peered over her shoulder into the kettle and inhaled greedily.
“What else?” She replaced the lid, set the spoon down carefully on a folded paper towel.
“Should I have a fatherly chat with her?”
“I suppose you might as well give it a shot-Lord knows she won’t confide in me.”
Knock, knock. “Allie? Allie, it’s Dad.”
“Yeah, I guessed from your voice.”
She can’t help it, Corder reminded himself, she’s an adolescent. “May I come in?”
“If you promise not to act like a psychiatrist.”
“Word,” said Corder; it sounded lame even to him, so he hastily added, “On it, you have my word on it.”
His quintessentially fifteen-year-old daughter lay facedown on the bed, her right hand under her cheek, her left hand dangling just above the carpet. She was wearing a pair of skintight, below-the-navel jeans and a cutoff top. She edged her legs away from the side of the bed to give him room to perch-a major concession.
“Speaking not as a psychiatrist but as a father-you want me to beat him up?”
He was rewarded with a giggle. “Oh, Daddy, he’s a football player.”
“I was on the track team-I could pop him one, then run away quick.”
As Alison rolled over and sat up, it struck Corder once again that somehow, almost overnight, his little girl had metamorphosed into, for want of a better word, a hottie.
“How come boys are such a-holes, Daddy?”
“Hormones, sweetie-at that age, they’re a raging stew of hormones. Speaking of which, your mother is cooking up a heavenly beef bourguignonne-if there’s beef bourguignonne in heaven. I’m, ah, thinking about cracking a real nice-looking ’98 Napa cabernet to go with it.”
She cocked her head like a curious jay. “Aaaand…?”
“Your mother and I were talking the other night about whether you were old enough-or I should say, mature enough-for us to start initiating you into the proper enjoyment of the, ah, fruits of the vine. So I was thinking, maybe I’d set out an extra glass tonight-if you’re feeling well enough to join us for dinner, that is.”
She nodded, slowly, responsibly, maturely. “Sure, okay.”
“Good, good-I’ll set a place, we’ll call you when dinner’s ready.” He patted her ankle and stood up, thinking that he’d surely kept his promise not to act like a psychiatrist. Making a unilateral decision-yes, he and Cheryl had talked about letting Allie have a glass of wine at the dinner table, but they hadn’t exactly reached a conclusion-not to mention bribing an underage kid with alcohol: that was about as unpsychiatrist-like as it gets.
But Cheryl let him off the hook with a raised eyebrow, while Alison was the picture of condescending adolescent maturity all through the meal, chatting politely with her parents just as if they weren’t hopelessly retarded. The only down note came when Corder told them about Ulysses Maxwell’s visitor that morning.
“What do you think’s going to happen to him?” asked Alison. Her father had first brought Lyssy over for Sunday dinner-along with one of his attendants, whom they made a pretext of treating as just another guest-when Alison was thirteen. The two had hit it off famously, not least because at that point Lyssy was more or less a boy of thirteen in a thirty-year-old body. Since then, he’d been invited to the director’s residence for dinner every few months or so-always with an attendant in tow, of course.
“Life without parole, at best. At worst, lethal injection.”
“But that’s not fair! Lyssy’s so gentle-he wouldn’t hurt a fly-you know he wouldn’t.”
“That’s true-but in a way, that’s also a function of his former disorder.”
“The DID, you mean?”
Corder nodded. “When a child’s psyche dissociates-that just means it breaks apart-it splits off, not into lots of other complex personalities, but into its own component parts. Each of the alter identities represents a particular, ah,
“And many of these alter identities embody or express the character traits that the original identity finds disturbing. Sexuality, anger, feelings of aggression, and so on. In Lyssy’s case, all the anger he felt at having been abused, along with the desire to strike out, to avenge himself, all those feelings that if expressed would only have resulted in even more abuse, were, ah, segregated into alter identities.
“So while it’s true that Lyssy, as Lyssy, the original personality, couldn’t hurt a fly-or protect himself from one, for that matter-his psyche manifested at least two alters, Max and Kinch, who gloried in violence.”
“But they don’t exist anymore, right? Because you helped him get rid of them.”
“Well, yes. Unfortunately, though, no jury has ever bought DID as a defense in a criminal case.”
“But couldn’t you convince them?”
“I’m going to try, sweetheart.”
“You better.” Alison sipped thoughtfully at her wine, trying not to pull a sour face, then looked up brightly. “I just remembered-doesn’t Lyssy have a birthday coming up this month?”
Corder nodded glumly. “On Wednesday.”
“Are we going to have a party for him again?”
“I don’t know-it’s a stressful time for Lyssy, and-”
“Please? You know how much he loves coming over-and if what you said is true, it could be the last birthday party he ever gets to have.”
“That’s true enough.” Corder glanced over to his wife. “What do you say, hon?”
She shook her head dubiously. “Wednesday’s a bear for me. I’m getting my hair done in the morning, my book club meets in the afternoon, I’m not sure how I’d-”
“That I have to see,” said Cheryl Corder-and so the family’s fate was decided.
