Silent Partner

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“Not as sorry as I am. Now you tell me Rasmussen’s all freaked out. Great.”

“He was one of them?”

“Oh, yeah, a real prince. His girlfriend is the one who just cried. One of my walk-in patients, not too sophisticated, vague psychosomatic complaints- she needed attention. I got to know her a little and she started opening up about him- how he drank too much, took dope, pushed her around. I spent lots of time counseling her, trying to show her what a loser he was, get her to leave him. Of course she didn’t. One of those passive types with an abusive father who keeps hooking up with papa surrogates. Then she told me the bum had injured himself on the job, was having back pain, and was thinking of suing. It was his lawyer who suggested he see a shrink- did I know one? I figured here was a chance to get him some help for his head and sent him to Sharon, told her all about his other problems. Boy, did she help him. How’d you meet him?”

“He was up at her house this morning.”

“Up at her house? She gave a jerk like that her home address? What an idiot.”

“She had an office there.”

“Oh, yeah- the paper mentioned that. Makes sense, actually, because she moved out of this building right after I confronted her about the hanky-panky. Got a diagnosis on Rasmussen?”

“Some kind of personality disorder. Possible violent tendencies.”

“In other words, a troublemaker. Terrific. He’s the weakest link, a woman-hater with low impulse control. And he’s already got a shyster. Wonderful.”

“He won’t sue for sexual harassment,” I said. “Few men would. Too embarrassing.”

“Frontal assault upon the old machismo? I sure hope you’re right. So far, no one’s made any moves. But that doesn’t mean they’re not going to. And even if I’m spared legal grief, she’s already cost me plenty in terms of my reputation- one patient bad-mouthing to ten others. And none of the dropouts paid me for work I’d already done- we’re talking solid four figures in lab fees alone. I’m not established enough to kiss off that kind of loss without pain- there’s a doctor glut here on the West Side. Where do you practice?”

“Here on the West Side, but I work with kids.”

“Oh.” She drummed her nails along the rim of the teacup. “I probably sound pretty mercenary to you, huh? Here you are, talking altruism, debriefing patients, all that good Hippocratic stuff. And all I’m worried about is covering my butt. But I make no excuses for it, ’cause if I don’t cover my butt, no one else will do it for me. When I came out from Northwestern to do my internship at Harbor General, I met the greatest guy in the world, married him three weeks later. A screenwriter, doing research at the hospital for a miniseries. Pow, love at first sight. All of a sudden I had a house in Playa Del Rey, till death do us part. He said he was turned on by my being a doctor, pledged he’d never leave me. Two years later he left me. Cleaned out our bank account and went to Santa Fe with some bimbo. It’s taken me two years to climb out of it.”

She looked inside the cup as if searching for gypsy leaves. “I’ve worked too darned hard to get this far and see some nymphomaniac ruin it all, so, no, I won’t be calling to debrief any of the men she screwed. They’re big boys- they can handle it. Probably turned it into a conquest by now, convinced themselves they’re hot studs. You let it rest, too, Dr. Delaware. Keep her buried.”

She’d let her voice rise. People were staring. She noticed and lowered it. “How does someone like that become a therapist anyway? Don’t you people do any screening?”

“Not enough,” I said. “How did she react when you confronted her?”

“Weirdly. Just looked at me with those big blues, all innocent, as if she didn’t know what I was talking about, then started in with the uh-huhs, as if she were trying to play therapist with me. When I was through she said, ‘Sorry,’ and just walked away. No explanation, no nothing. The next day I saw her carrying boxes out of the office.”

“As her supervisor, Kruse was legally responsible for her. Did you talk to him?”

“I tried to. Must have called him twenty times. I even slipped messages under the door. He never responded. I got pretty steamed, thought of filing a complaint. In the end I figured good riddance, just dropped it.”

“His name’s still on the office directory. Does he practice here?”

“Like I said, I’ve never seen him. And when I was looking for him, I spoke to the janitor and he said he’d never seen him. Ten to one Kruse set it up for her. She was probably screwing him too.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because screwing men was her thing, right? It was what she did. Probably screwed her way to that Ph.D.”

I thought about that, got lost in thoughts.

She said, “You’re not going to pursue this debriefing stuff any further, are you?”

“No,” I said, making the decision at that moment. “What you’ve told me puts things in a different light. But we should do something about Rasmussen. He’s a time bomb.”

“Let him blow himself up- more good riddance.”

“What if he hurts someone else?”

“What could you do to prevent that anyway?”

I had no answer.

“Listen,” she said, “I want to make myself very clear. I want out- free of all the garbage, the worrying. Got that?”

“Got it.”

“I sure hope you mean that. If you use anything I’ve said to connect me with her, I’ll deny saying it. The files of all the patients she saw have been destroyed. If you mention my name, I’ll sue you for breach of confidentiality.”

“Take it easy,” I said. “You’ve made your point.”

“I certainly hope so.” She snatched the check out of my hands and stood. “I’ll pay my own way, thank you.”

11

Free follow-up visits. That brought back something I’d worked hard at forgetting.

Driving home, I wondered how many men Sharon had victimized, how long it had been going on. It was impossible now for me to imagine a man in her life without assuming a carnal link.

Trapp. The sheik. D.J. Rasmussen. Victims all?

I wondered especially about Rasmussen. Had he still been involved with her at the time of her death? It could explain why the loss had hit him so hard. Why he’d drunk himself stuporous, made a pilgrimage to her house.

Meeting another pilgrim: me.

How does someone like that become a therapist anyway? Don’t you people do any screening?

I hadn’t screened her out of my life, had long rationalized it by telling myself I’d been young and naive, too green to know any better. Yet three days ago I’d been jacked up and ready to see her again. Ready to start… what?

The fact that I’d broken the date was small comfort. What would have happened had she phoned, put a catch in her voice, told me what a wonderful guy I was? Would I have been able to resist being needed? Spurned the opportunity to hear about her “problem,” maybe even solve it?

I didn’t have an honest answer. Which said plenty about my judgment. And my mental health.

I lapsed into the esteem-sapping self-doubts I’d thought resolved during my training therapy: What gave me the right to mold other people’s lives when I couldn’t get my own life straight? What made me an