lot prices. Jacob himself had put together a few cabin subdivisions, some of which had led to the slaughter of hundreds of old-growth hardwoods. Money didn't grow on trees, but paper came from trees and money was printed on paper. The progression had once seemed logical.
Instead of running through the forest and screaming at the top of his lungs, he had to walk with feigned dignity a couple of blocks to the counselor's office. He knew he should change his jacket, at least. He'd slept in the shirt for three nights running and the white collar had turned a dingy shade of ivory. His shoes were scuffed and muddy. The uniform was all wrong for the business at hand. But he couldn't muster the energy for a shower and shave, and most of his clothes had burned up in the fire. The real estate mogul's stage costume he once wore was now smoke, mingled with the melted electrical wiring and the ash of rayon carpet, entwined with the soul of his dead daughter.
If only he hadn't stopped by the M amp; W office in the middle of the night, drunk and looking for money. He'd cleaned out the petty cash drawer, flipped through his mail, and found her note:
'Meet me at Total Wellness at 3 p.m. Wednesday. Please. I love you. Renee.'
It was a waste of time, and he didn't want to expose their pain to a stranger. He'd had enough of counselors when he was a teenager. But he owed her something. He wasn't sure what, but if he gave her an hour, maybe she would shut up and leave him alone. She'd brought out the heavy artillery, the bravest lie or the most pathetic truth: 'I love you.'
Total Wellness was a two-story building set off the highway in a business park. It combined a daycare, substance abuse center, and counseling services and was subsidized by various government funds. The behavioral health care industry was booming in these days of escalating stress, all bright brick and painted columns, the sun and clouds reflecting off the windows. Jacob cut through the lawn, no longer a man for sidewalks and other ordinary routes.
Shouts arose from the daycare's playground. Jacob couldn't imagine a worse sound. The high-pitched laughter was broken glass in his ears. How dare those children be happy and healthy when all those tomorrows ahead were denied to Mattie and Christine? Through the whitewashed fence, he could see the swing sets, tangled hair, and pale, dirty faces.
He stopped, his lungs like stone.
Mattie stood behind the fence, her arm thrust between the tall pickets. Her upturned hand was curled into a small fist.
Her fingers slowly uncurled, and gray ash poured from her palm.
Jacob reeled, the sky spun, and he found himself on his hands and knees, his face pressed against the grass. Vomit sluiced up from his gut, razing a raw path through his throat and stinging his nasal cavity. Tears filled his eyes as he coughed and spat the dregs of undigested liquor and bile. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve and looked back at the fence.
Mattie was gone. A dark red ball floated over the playground fence, hung a moment at the apex of its arc then fell as if gravity held a grudge. The giggles continued, an adult supervisor shouted, and one of the kids began bawling. Someone was watching Jacob from a window, and he forced himself to stand and head for the counseling center.
They would think he was just another drunk putting in a court-ordered visit. The disguise fit too readily. He swallowed and the acid burned its way back to his stomach. A drink would help, but he was dehydrated and knew the liquor wouldn't stay down. Jacob staggered through the double doors.
A woman with a pinched face slid open a glass window at the counter and sniffed like a rodent. 'May I help you, sir?'
Help. That was a good one. 'I have an appointment.'
'With whom?' She flipped through a notebook. 'Or are you looking for the AA meeting? That's in Room 117, down the hall to your left.'
'I'm in no shape for quitting,' he said. 'I'm with Rheinsfeldt.'
'Oh.' The clerk checked the book. 'Excuse me, Mr. Wells. I didn't recognize you.'
Jacob was sure he'd never met the woman. But his photo was on file at the local newspaper, and between the Chamber of Commerce and the Kiwanis Club, he appeared in its pages at least twice a year. His development projects often came before various planning boards, sometimes bringing opposition from the neighborhoods where M amp; W's bulldozers disturbed morning sleep and residential character. And, of, course, the fire had been front- page news.
He licked his chapped lips. 'Has Mrs. Wells arrived?'
'No, sir, but if you'll have a seat, I'll let Dr. Rheinsfeldt know you're here.'
'That's okay, I'll do it myself.' Jacob pushed open the door that led to the private offices, feeling the clerk's stare on his back. He wanted to show up for the appointment early and chat with the doctor for a couple of minutes, so that Renee would walk through the door already on the defensive. Jacob had learned from past experience that psychologists naturally gravitated to whichever side seemed most in need of 'curing.'
Jacob read the names on the doors as he went down the hall. A cadre of wise and caring souls sat behind those doors, with leather chairs and computers and rows of books on the shelves. Their heads were filled with questions and they deluded themselves into thinking they served a noble purpose. Their meat was anger and pain, their drink was pity disguised as sympathy. They had all the crude hunger of vampires and slightly less moral conscience.
The patients were perhaps even more complicit in the cycle of mutual dependency. They sat, wept, shared personal troubles that would be worthy of canned laughter if displayed in a television sitcom. The best part was they only had to open their souls for a single hour, and then they could stumble into the sunshine believing they had shed themselves of a bothersome skin. They could pretend they were a step closer to wholeness, but Jacob knew the whole was always less than the sum of its parts.
Because, where he went, so did Joshua.
He took a drink from a water fountain in the hall, then slipped into the rest room and swallowed as much of the whiskey as he could stomach. He rinsed his mouth and splashed water onto his face. A pale, pinched face stared back at him from the mirror. With his bloodshot eyes and swollen eyelids, he could easily pass for a crier. If you wanted to win a joint counseling session, imagined tears scored more points than honest and soul-deep revelations. He should know. He'd won all of his counseling sessions as a child.
Dr. Rheinsfeldt's office was the last on the left wing. The door was open. Rheinsfeldt was a shriveled, shrunken troll doll of a woman, her hair as wild and wispy as Einstein's. She pretended not to see him, as if giving him an opportunity to case the room. Let the rat sniff the cheese before you send it on a run through the maze, Jacob thought.
Magazines were spread haphazardly across the coffee table in the center of the room, smart stuff: Science News, Consumer Reports, Smithsonian. A spotless glass ashtray lay on top of them, one virgin cigarette resting in a notch on the rim. A single shelf on the wall bowed under the weight of thick hardcovers. The dusty books looked as if they had been undisturbed since the days of Jung.
Rheinsfeldt closed the magazine she had been reading, unfolded her rubbery legs from beneath her torso, and reached for the cigarette. She put it in her mouth and spoke around its stem. 'You must be Jacob Wells.'
Jacob looked into the hall behind him. 'Oh, you're talking to me.'
'A sense of the absurd. I like that. Please come in and have a seat.'
The room had two chairs and a small couch, arranged in a triangle. This was the first and most obvious test. Rheinsfeldt would slide his peg into a certain shape of hole depending upon where he sat. If he chose the chair beside hers, it would reflect urgency and desperation, a desire for an ally. On the other hand, if he sat on the couch, then Renee might be expected to sit beside him in a show of matrimonial support. He decided on the third alternative, the middle of the couch, which left no room for Renee on either side of him. When he sat, Rheinsfeldt's dark eyes glimmered with satisfaction, as if she had suspected such a move from the start.
'Most couples arrive for counseling sessions together,' Rheinsfeldt said, removing the unlit cigarette from her mouth and placing it in her small purse.
'Renee believes in being punctual. I believe in being early.'
'Ah. All relationships are built on conflict. Why should marriage be any different?'
'Have you ever been married?'
'What, are you crazy?'
