Inanimate Page 6

  “Of course I did. I hear he’s soon to be our next patient. And she wasn’t his step-mom; she was his dad’s girlfriend.”

  “As if that makes a difference. How could he do that to her?”

  “Maybe she kept waking him up.” MacNamee said sipping his tea.

  Greta frowned at her husband who was finally starting to wake up.

  “Well you had better get ready Greg, you have to be at work soon and I’m pretty sure Crass will be calling you any moment.”

  “Yeah, as if he thought I don’t watch the news.”

  “Look, your tea’s beside you. I’m going to put the shower on.”

  Greta glided off into the en suite bathroom; their large townhouse provided high ceilings and lots of room to move. Heavily, Greg pulled his body up and stood up. He pushed a hand through his hair a second time, hoping a quick head rub would reset his memory of a long week at the hospital. No such luck. He noticed Greta come out the bathroom so he decided to over exaggerate his fatigue as he walked towards her.

  “Shower’s ready” stated Greta, ignoring his obscene yawn.

  Putting his arms around his wife’s waist he looked into her beautiful brown eyes.

  “I don’t deserve you. How did I get so lucky?”

  Greta brushed him off of her.

  “I needed a green card.”

  Feigning shock Greg ambled into the bathroom.

  “I’m calling immigration when I get out of the shower! Better start packing!”

  After starting the car in the garage MacNamee slowly pulled out. His blue two-seater sports car was his pride and joy. He knew that soon he would have to give it up if he wanted to start a family, but right now he had more urgent things on his mind. He thought about his words to Greta.

  “I hear he’s going to be our next patient.”

  While it was true he was one of the top Doctors at Hallcombes psychiatric hospital, and it was also true they had a lot of very disturbed patients, they were never usually this high profile (or young for that matter). The drive to work took around twenty minutes; time Greg used to build up an image of the boy the media had already dubbed “The Baby Killer.”

  The main corridor in the west wing of Hallcombes was very long, with many numbered doors adorning either side of it. The building had served many uses in the past before it’s conversion into a mental facility including a palatial home and a military hospital. Effectively, what it was now was a hospital for those never expected to see normality again. Budget constraints coupled with a laggard economy stretching back many years meant the staff had to make do with aspects of the hospitals infrastructure politely classed as “dated.” Head physician Doctor Benjamin Crass was fond of using the adage “If it isn’t broken, then don’t fix it” and so he justified cuts to surveillance, plumbing repairs and lighting as “keeping the old ways.” This notion suited him just fine until something actually broke, then he would be bullish in pushing to get it repaired. A stubborn man with a penchant for clinical psychology; he found himself a worthy ally in the young Greg MacNamee, a thirty something up and comer who became Crass’s right hand man and unofficial second in command. Other Doctors found this a great balance and the nurses liked it too, because it meant they had more opportunity to deal with the dashing young MacNamee.

  The poor design of the building meant doctors were constantly moving in order to get to their destinations; they spent more time walking to and from rooms than they did actually dealing with patients. Standing at the nurse’s station alongside the imposing figure of Doctor Crass, MacNamee reviewed the information on their new patient. He could feel the nurse’s adoring stare but was used to ignoring it. He read the notes.

  “Is he in 101?” asked MacNamee.

  “Of course” Crass matter-of-factly retorts.

  MacNamee did not like the fact the boy was in this room. Dr. Crass only looked after a very small amount of patients directly. His job was mainly as an advisor and boss to the Doctors below him. However every now and again he would take charge of a particularly troubled individual and, being a creature of habit, he always housed them in room 101. This made the occupant somewhat of a celebrity within the building, drawing unnecessary attention to them from staff, select outsiders and even patients who were “with it” enough to be aware of such things. Frankly speaking however, the latter number was so low it was almost non-existent. That said; MacNamee still did not like the fact. The boy was getting enough notoriety as it was; he didn’t feel there was any need to add to it. Still, he said nothing to Crass, his objections had been noted in the past and his boss was aware of them already.

  “Have you tried speaking to him yet?”

  “Give me a chance Greg. He only arrived a couple of hours ago. Plus, I wanted to wait till you arrived, you know I don’t handle children well.”

  Crass was right, he didn’t handle children well. He had two of his own; both had grown up and left for college already. The word in the doctors lounge was that the successful parenting of the two Crass boys came not from Doctor Benjamin Crass but from his wife, a lady completely different to her husband in almost every aspect (except for her love for her other half). Although it was universally understood by those who knew them that they complemented each other well, Dr. Crass’s stern personality was never praised too highly in parenting circles. The two men said little as they approached room 101. Meeting a new patient was always daunting, the doctors never knew what was going to happen in their first meeting and this day was no exception. Standing in front of the shiny brass plate marked “101” MacNamee noticed just how clean it was. Henry the janitor had been performing his job well. Crass’s deep voice brought him back from his momentary loss of focus.

  “After you” he said, unlocking the door and gesturing towards it.

  MacNamee could have peered through the window before opening, but he didn’t. He didn’t want to appear frightened. Though deep down, he was. The fact that the person in this room was a notorious killer was bad enough, the fact that he was only a child was even worse. They had never housed such a person and to the best of MacNamee’s knowledge he had never came across such a person either. This was boy nicknamed “The Baby Killer” and Greg MacNamee was about to meet him.

  A scratchy meowing sound bounced off the walls in the Williams house ten times in a row. The joke present Andy bought for his wife all those years ago was still going strong. Andy stared blankly from his armchair; his eyes were red from a combination of a lack of sleep and excessive alcohol consumption. Minutes after the last meow, Andy shakily got up and took a stroll around the house; his eyes graced from room to room searching for someone to be there. The ticking cat’s tail was hypnotic, quietly keeping Andy’s pace like a morbid metronome. The family home had no family now; all the rooms had one thing in common: They were all empty. Andy didn’t want to sleep in his room after the incident so the couch was where he ended up. Even if he wanted to, all his bedding had been stripped by CSI’s and now the bed frame lay there, naked, a mausoleum of the memory of what happened. As if staring at it would reverse the past he stood there solemn, trying to piece together what went wrong. He tried to picture his family life before the incident; unable to think of any good memories before Beth’s voice interrupted him; screaming inside his head over some trivial situation. Connor’s face flashed in. It was sad, miserable.

  “How could I not have seen it coming?”

  His whole domestic life was immersed in anger and pain for years and he did nothing about it. As his heart rate rose, his emotions rushed to the surface.

  “Fuck!”

  Andy screamed and with a solid square right he attacked the bedroom door. Splintering the white timber, he bloodied his knuckles in the process. Standing, fighting for composure Andy’s shallow breathing made it hard for him to get oxygen. The fist opened the clouds in his head, allowing clarity to shine through for just a moment. Interpreting it as best he could he headed down the stairs and snatched his car keys which were hanging on a p
ush pin by the door. He needed to get out; he was suffocating in his own house. He convinced himself he was not running away from his responsibilities as a father, he genuinely felt he would be serving people better if he were out of the way. Andy pulled the door shut behind him, leaving the cat clicking away in the house alone.

  Connor Williams looked up at the two Doctors standing before him. The older Doctor Crass stood in the doorway observing as the younger Doctor MacNamee pulled up a chair beside him. The boy’s mind felt a little clearer than it was few days earlier. “Beth’s passing”-as he called it-removed a weight, a weight that had dissolved itself and dissipated back into his subconscious until such time that it may be required again.

  “Hello Connor…” said the younger Doctor in a low voice. “I’m Doctor Greg MacNamee, and this is Doctor Benjamin Crass. How are you feeling today?”

  The high pitch of Connor’s pre-pubescent voice only served to feed MacNamee’s fear of how young the boy actually was. “Fine. How are you?”

  Before MacNamee answered, his psychologist brain took note of the boy’s tone, and how it didn’t seem like he was aware of what he had done.

  “I’m very well thank you.”

  Connor turned to Crass.

  “And you?”

  Crass had been studying the boy intently and almost stuttered when he was engaged by the youngster.

  “I’m good, thank you for asking.”

  “Connor, do you know where you are?” MacNamee asked, smiling at Crass’s reaction.

  “Yes. I’m in hospital”

  “Very good. But this is a special hospital; here we help people who have problems with their mental health. Myself and Doctor Crass here were your Doctors”

  “I have two?”

  “Yes, you happen to be a very lucky boy Connor. You have both of us to help you here.”

  Connor switched his glance back to Crass who stood by the door. Uncomfortable with the boys stare, he forced a smile and a nod. Connor just stared back at the awkward Doctor for a moment before looking back at the much warmer MacNamee.

  “Connor?”

  “Yes Greg?”

  “Do you know why you were brought here?”

  MacNamee’s question was more for his knowledge of the boy’s level of awareness than anything official.

  “Yes” Connor looked down at the floor. “I did a bad thing.”

  Satisfied, MacNamee breathed easy.

  “Yes son. Yes you did. But we’re here to help you through it. I’m going to set you up with a colleague of ours, a Doctor Paul Frieda, he’s a very nice man and he’ll talk to you some more ok?”

  MacNamee got up and put his chair back against the wall as Connor simply stared at the floor. MacNamee was walking out the door when he heard Connor say something, it was quiet and his brain had to replay it to make sure he heard it right. He was sure he heard Connor utter:

  “It was fun though.”

  MacNamee stopped dead and turned around, trying to be friendly but not accusing.

  “Did you say something Connor?”

  Connor slowly turned and lifted his head to meet MacNamee’s.

  “My bad thing… I said; it was fun.”

  MacNamee held his breath and focused on composure. His eyes never left Connors. Later he would think about how he had misjudged the youngster, lost sight of the fact that although this was a child in age, the crime he had committed was purely monstrous. At the time though, his mind had no thoughts except composure. All he decided to say was:

  “Dr. Frieda will talk to you.”

  Connors eyes followed MacNamee’s as he left the room. When Crass turned the key in the lock he saw the shock in his young colleague’s eyes.

  “Try not to think about it.”

  “I can’t not think about it Ben, he’s so young.”

  “We have other children in here Greg, and we have had others in the past…”

  “I know Ben but not like this” MacNamee interrupted “We’ve never had a kid who basically committed matricide in his own home.”

  “He’s a very disturbed little boy Greg, nothing more. Let’s get him in with Frieda; he’s the expert on children here. He’ll help the boy more than we can.”

  Walking away from the room, MacNamee couldn’t help but glance over his shoulder at “101” getting further away. He wondered if he would ever know what was going on in Connor’s head.

  CHAPTER 10

  Andy Williams approached the city limits. Driving far, he hoped, would quell some of his guilt. Still partially intoxicated from his all-night bender his driving was fast and erratic. He didn’t stop to think that if a police car saw him he almost certainly would have been pulled over, and if so then he would have been spending at least a night behind bars. He just drove on, past the city limit sign, leaving, he hoped, all of his problems behind him.

  In a small room cleverly concealed behind a one-way mirror the two doctors observed Connor’s interaction with Doctor Frieda. Compared to the much larger room where Connor sat this one was dark and very functional. Crass was right, they did have other children in the hospital but they were not often permanent guests. Children with illnesses like autism or severe learning difficulties would come to the larger room to be treated by Frieda. MacNamee did not feel right here. He did not like the fact that children were tricked into feeling safe and comfortable while they were secretly being watched from the next room. However, this was one of Dr. Crass’s generally praised initiatives, designed to allow the Doctors to observe the behavior of disturbed children while they themselves were completely at ease. This ease allowed the children to be able to talk openly without feeling the uncomfortable presence of eyes upon them. Connor sat, in a room surrounded by colorful toys. A selection, chosen by Doctors who had kids themselves in order to get away from the banality of the usual garbage toys you would normally find in GP’s waiting rooms or low-brow pediatrics departments. Nothing here was second hand or broken beyond repair. Connor sat reading a book entitled “The Tastiest Squirrel” under the quiet observation of Doctor Paul Frieda. An expert in child psychology, Frieda knew the best way to open up a child was with patience. Noticing the rate Connor turned the pages he decided to open with a compliment.

  “You’re a very fast reader Connor; you must be a very bright boy.”

  With a flick Connor turned another page. He didn’t acknowledge the doctor at all.

  “I know that book, it’s very good; I read it to my kids.

  This comment did get Connor’s attention and he looked up from his book.

  “You have kids?”

  “Yes” replied Frieda “I have a girl and a boy about your age.”

  “And you read them this?”

  “We read it together yes. We read together often.”

  This comment drew anger from behind the mirror.

  “Why is he lying about having kids?” MacNamee asked Crass sternly

  “I don’t know. To get the boy talking perhaps?”

  “What do you think of the book?” asked Connor.

  Frieda searched his memory banks. Despite the fact he lied about having children, he had read the book, in fact he had read all the books in the room just so he could talk to the kids about them.

  “I liked it”

  “I like it because it’s a simple story” stated Connor.

  “You like simple stories?”

  “Things don’t need to be complicated. Are you a good father?”

  “Yes, I think so, I read to my kids every night.”

  “Does your wife not read to them? Or do they have a bad mother?”

  “No, my kids have two good parents, my wife and I take it in turns to read to them.”

  Aware that this line of questioning was leading them off topic Frieda tried to change it.

  “But let’s get back to the book.”

  Connor had noticed that the doctor’s story seemed to be changing. First they read together, then he read to them, then he and his wife took turns. His a
nswers seemed to change to appease Connor.

  “You don’t wear a ring” Connor interjected as he looked at Frieda’s hand.

  Frieda cleverly tried to dodge the boy’s probe with another lie.

  “Oh, I must have left it at home. Now let’s talk about the book.”

  “Do you enjoy lying to children Doctor Frieda?” Connor asked sternly.

  “Pardon me?”

  “I asked you if you enjoy lying to children.”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  Behind the mirror MacNamee bit on his fist while Crass watched intently. Both knew this was a crucial breakthrough in Connor’s treatment that Frieda may be about to mess up.

  “Yes you do Paul. You’re not married, and you don’t have children.”

  “I don’t know why you would think that Connor but I can assure you I am married. I must have taken my ring off when I was washing the dishes last night. I left it at home, I told you that.”

  Frieda tried to remain composed while he dug his lie in deeper.

  “I don’t think you did Paul.”

  Connor was looking right through him now.

  “You see my Dad used to take me fishing, which meant we would spend hours on boats or wading in rivers. Before we left the house he would always take his wedding ring off to make sure it was safe. When he did there was always a tan mark due to the fact he almost always had it on, stopping the sunlight from getting to it. You don’t have that mark, which means you don’t have a wedding ring which means you are not married.”

  Frieda shifted uncomfortably in his seat, with no answer to give.

  “And since you lied about being married I’m going to assume you lied about having children also. So I’m going to ask you again, do you enjoy lying to children?”

  Half garbled words slipped out of Frieda’s mouth. He was making no sense. Connor’s shrewd observation had left him absolutely speechless.

  “Well that’s it isn’t it!” yelled Crass from behind the mirror.

  “Frieda has screwed it up, the boy won’t talk now!”

  Crass slammed Connor’s files on the desk and walked out, followed by his younger colleague. Coursing up the hallway MacNamee knew to keep his distance for a moment until Crass vented his frustration.