Doctor Bram Bastiaan is waiting for Elian’s arrival. For today he has put aside her actions of last night and his assumptions of her working girl activities. For even if she does work the streets, or did, it’s not too late, she can be saved. He can save her.
He hears the doorbell ring and stands up sharply. With a quick look in the mirror he appraises his reflection. He’s dressed down today; a checked shirt, beige slacks and loafers. He feels strange not being in a suit, but he’s confident that his appearance is that of a younger, more ‘with it’ man.
“Elian!” he greets her enthusiastically as he opens the door. “Do come in, please.”
And she has also dressed more appropriately, he notes as he looks her up and down, a peasant blouse, jeans, and the ever present sneakers that are scuffed and stained with sand from the beach.
“Did you hear about another attack?” she blurts before he’s shown her into his office.
He nods, sympathetically, he hopes, “Young Naomi Wilson. Such a shame, such a bright and promising future that lady had.”
Elian blinks at him. “They found her, then?”
“Pardon me?”
“They’ve found her body, in the apartments on Gevers?”
Bram isn’t sure he understands and he rubs his hands over his face. “What are you saying, Elian?”
She puts her hands on his desk and leans forward, her voice goes up a notch with impatience. “There was a body, at least, I think it was a body. The Russian guy took it out of his apartment, near where you saw me last night. Him and another man took it out of his apartment and into the one next door.”
Bram sits back and thinks for a moment, unsure of what the girl is talking about. Gevers Deynootweg wasn’t near the church where Naomi was found. Maybe he should arrange an MRI scan for Elian. Or, he thinks, maybe I’ll check out her story for myself.
“Do you have my results, doctor?” Her voice is timid again now, back to how he feels is her natural state. Back to how she should be.
“Elian, my dear,” he says as he reaches for her file. “I’m so very happy to tell you that all of your fears were unfounded. You are as healthy as you were the day that you were born.”
Elian stares at the doctor, not quite believing what he’s telling her. It strikes her that if she’s as healthy as she was on the day that she was born, then that wasn’t very good at all, considering that she was born from a mother addicted to Heroin and God knows what else. Then her heart leaps as she remembers, the doctor doesn’t know that, he has no idea of her history. She’s healthy!
“Let me see,” she demands and practically snatches the paper out of his hands, scanning it, believing it with her own eyes.
It’s in Dutch, but there are three columns with English words next to the Dutch; low, moderate and high. Nothing is recorded in the two latter columns and in low, 0% is marked in all of them.
It’s really true. She escaped Niko with her life and her health. She clutches the paper to her chest and swallows down a sob, before a sobering thought enters her mind.
“And my head injury, the nightmares and the memory loss, what about that?”
He reaches across the desk, takes the paper from her and smoothes it out before placing it in her file.
“I have no doubt that your memory function will continue to get better, until your problems have receded to none. You’ve had a traumatic episode, but I’m confident that with counselling–”
“No.” She holds her hand up to stop him talking. “I don’t need any counselling or therapy. I just need to get home and get over it.”
His small, dark eyes are boring into her and she shifts uncomfortably.
“I’m sorry, doctor. You’ve been so helpful.” Tears that can’t be stopped appear suddenly, rolling down her face and she swallows again, trying to stifle her emotions.
He passes over to her a hanky, asks her if she’d like to use his bathroom, and she nods and hurries into the small room to try and compose herself.
She washes her face and stares at her reflection in the mirror. She feels drained and very tired, but oh so relieved. And the body in Lev’s apartment block has been found. Surely it won’t take them long to reach Lev now? They’ll interview everyone in the building, certainly the deceased’s immediate neighbours, surely?
It’s over, she thinks, Very nearly, almost over.
Lev will be caught.
She is healthy and disease free.
She can go home. To Alex.
It’s with a spring in her step that she returns to the surgery, offering her thanks and money to the doctor, both of which he waves away. Impulsively, she hugs him, and as she collects her bag from where she left it on her chair, she smiles to herself. She must be getting better already; a few days ago she wouldn’t have volunteered a hug to any man.
With a cheery wave she’s on her way, so happy, that every part of her seems lighter. Even the tote bag that she carries on her shoulder seems lighter than it did when she went into the surgery.
Safely ensconced in his office with the door securely locked, Bram opens the little brown notebook that he took from Elian’s bag and, pouring himself a whiskey, he settles down to read.
46
ERIK FONS & ALEX HARVEY
BRONOVO HOSPITAL
10.07.15 Late morning
The scrape of a chair leg on linoleum floor and the slow, steady, insistent beat of machinery pull Erik to consciousness. He blinks, the sun is beating down on his back and he has a moment of
