Page 28 of The Therapist

SIXTEEN

Lana

‘Just going to the loo,’ Kirsty says through the intercom, ‘and is it okay if I get a quick coffee from the café as well?’

There’s a bell on the counter for my new client to ring if Kirsty is not back.

I shouldn’t have said yes to seeing the man but since I was cancelled on by both Peter and Jessica today, I felt the need to actually do something good with my time.

This whole situation with Sandy and my handling of it has me feeling unmoored, as though I have lost my way as a therapist as old feelings of insecurity creep in and I doubt myself at every turn.

It would be nice to see someone with a problem I can help with.

‘He sounds really worried and like he’s made this big decision to get help but if he doesn’t see someone today, he may go back on it,’ Kirsty told me when she buzzed me to tell me about the new client.

Usually when someone cancels, Kirsty goes down a list of all my other patients waiting for appointments and asks if they want the slot, but Jessica didn’t leave us with much notice.

I turn my chair around and look out of my office window that overlooks a park. There aren’t many people around and those that are there are rugged up against the cold. Sometimes the beginning of spring brings a burst of warmer weather but not this year it seems.

I hear the door that leads out of the office suite slam shut as Kirsty leaves and I am on my own.

It’s 1.45 p.m. I can eat my yoghurt and the muesli that I so carefully packed last night in a special Tupperware, but the thought of it is unappealing.

I am supposed to be trying to lose some weight so of course all I want is food that I shouldn’t have. That’s why diets don’t work.

Instead, I root through my handbag and find a chocolate chip protein bar that I usually keep for Iggy in case he gets hungry somewhere I can’t readily find food.

The protein bar is at least six months old because that has never happened but I open it and eat it anyway, the slightly plastic taste somehow more satisfying than anything truly filling would be.

I know it’s filled with sugar and is only masquerading as health food but I don’t care.

Outside my office I hear the tinkle of the bell on the reception desk and I stand, quickly swallowing down the last bite of the protein bar.

The new client was supposed to have time to fill out the intake form but it’s nearly two now so there’s no point.

Kirsty can get all his details after the appointment.

I have his name, Don, which is all I need.

I open my office door, a smile on my face.

There is a man standing in reception with his back to me looking out into the corridor as though seeking the receptionist. I take a few steps towards him, clearing my throat.

He closes the door to the corridor as I open my mouth to greet him which is an odd thing to do but before I can even question that, he turns around and I freeze.

It’s Mike.

‘Mike,’ I say because I can’t think of anything else.

Every nightmarish scenario that has been running through my head about Sandy takes another turn, but this time, I am the dead body floating in the river, the bruised face, the broken bones.

I should have anticipated this but my senses are off, my abilities dulled, and now I can feel I’m in trouble.

This is exactly what Ben was worried about.

Mike looks jittery as his eyes dart from the reception desk to Ben’s closed office door and back to me. Does he know I’m completely alone right now?

‘Sorry,’ he says and then he wrings his hands together. ‘I gave a fake… I’m Don, but not. I just needed to see you.’

My heart is pounding so hard, I fear he can see it in my neck, and I raise a hand and touch where the skin is moving.

‘You shouldn’t be here.’ It takes everything I have to sound calm and in control.

‘You shouldn’t have come to my house. And you shouldn’t have gone to the police.’ His voice is low, threatening, his fists clenched.

‘You’re scaring me,’ I tell him, again forcing myself to sound controlled.

I want to shriek the words, to turn and run into my office, locking the door behind me, and I consider how quickly I could do that.

Not fast enough. Honesty might work here.

He seems like he wants to be scaring me, but does he?

Sometimes when the reality of our behaviour is pointed out to us, we are forced to stop and address it.

Mike unclenches his fists and lowers his shoulders.

‘I just want to talk to you. I know you talked to the police but I need you to understand that I didn’t hurt my wife.

I’ve done nothing to her. She’ll turn up, I’m sure she will.

I need you to tell the police that and you need to tell me what you’ve said to them because you have no real idea what’s going on here. ’

I take a small, hopefully imperceptible step backwards towards my office.

I think about the handgun that I have there from Ben.

I think about how quickly I could get to it, but do I need it?

Surely, I can speak to this man and figure out a way to get him to leave.

Although right now, I’m not sure about any of my skills.

‘I’m worried about your wife and I’m obligated to report that to the police if I fear she may be in danger or if I think something may have happened to her.’ I keep my voice steady, even, making sure not to betray my fear. I wish Ben was here; I wish Kirsty would return. How long will she be?

‘I assume you haven’t heard from her?’ I ask.

‘No, of course not.’ He shakes his head, looks around the office. Is he trying to figure out if anyone else is here? My phone is on my desk, only a few steps away, but it feels like I have to cross a vast space to get there. I take another tiny step back.

‘Then perhaps it’s a good thing that I’ve reported it to the police.

Something may have happened to her and I’m sure you want her to come home safe.

’ I watch his face as I speak, seeing if his expression changes but it doesn’t.

It’s strange that he hasn’t considered the possibility that something bad may have happened to her, that he is not frantically calling hospitals and everyone else he knows.

That makes me think that he is aware of where she is and of exactly what has happened to her.

Somewhere along the corridor, another office door opens.

There are lawyers on this floor as well, only a few offices away, and a dentist. If I scream, would they hear me?

‘You don’t believe that she’s the violent one at all.’ He’s not asking a question but making a statement. There is no aggression in the words, more like defeat.

‘Mike…’ I take a deep breath, calculating how long I need, but as I do, Mike takes a small step towards me. It’s only small and perhaps he is hoping I won’t notice but all my senses are on alert. What is his agenda here?

‘If anything happens to me, the police will come to you first,’ I say, my voice betraying me with a small wobble. I think about the fact that this man has a record, that somewhere on a police computer, it has been recorded that he did something violent. And now he’s here.

‘Nothing is going to happen to you, Lana. What kind of a person do you think I am?’ Another expression crosses his face.

Is that anguish or desperation? Desperate people do desperate things.

If he did hurt his wife, why is he here?

If he hurts me, the police will look to him first because I reported Sandy missing so he must know that this is a fool’s errand and yet he’s here, needing to know what I said to them and trying, once again, to convince me he didn’t hurt her, that in fact she hurts him.

I try to slow my mind down, to calm myself so that I can reply to him in a way that will defuse this situation.

‘That’s just it. I don’t know. It may be that even you don’t know what kind of a person you are. You need help, Mike. I’m willing to…find some names for you but the first step to getting help is acknowledging that there’s a problem.’

‘My only problem is that you don’t believe me,’ he says, shaking his head.

‘You’re making it very hard for me to do that. Coming here was a bad idea as was using a fake name.’ I take another tiny step backwards but Mike moves as well and my heart pounds in my ears, my stomach twisting.

‘I didn’t hurt her and if you were open to really listening to what goes on in our house, like I told you, you would know that.’

‘Then where is she?’ I ask him and he shrugs his shoulders. Who do I judge to be the person I should trust, who is telling the truth? A woman’s life is at stake.

‘I…don’t know. Maybe she left to start again.

She doesn’t love being a wife and a mother.

She just doesn’t. If she’s told you that her kids are the most important thing to her, she’s lied.

If she’s told you she loves me and wants to make our marriage work, she’s lied.

I know what you think – you look at her and she’s so pretty and seems so nice that you can’t believe she would lie about anything. But she does lie.’

I can’t help glancing at the clock on the wall. It’s two fifteen already. My limbs feel stiff because I’ve been standing with my muscles tensed for so long. Where the hell is Kirsty?

‘Can we just go into your office and talk?’ he asks.

‘I don’t… No,’ I say firmly. ‘We’re not going to do that.

’ Letting him into the space where there is a door he can lock will be a bad idea.

Although the gun is in my desk drawer and I would be closer to it.

Could I get it out and use it to scare him?

I’m not even entirely sure how to hold a gun and would only be able to imitate what I’ve seen on television.

‘You can’t say that! You don’t get to just dismiss me!

’ he yells, his voice rising sharply as he steps towards me, and I put my hand up to stop him from coming near me but it doesn’t stop him and he is suddenly right next to me, so close I can smell the fresh ocean scent of his cologne.

He grabs my wrist and I can feel the dangerous strength in his hands; his blue eyes darken and his cheeks glow red.

Intense anger is emanating off him and hot tears fill my eyes.

Iggy, Iggy, Iggy.

Mike looks down at his hand gripping my wrist and I can see the horror of what he’s done, what he’s doing, slowly dawning on him. We stand in a moment of silence with only the warm air from the air conditioner making a slight whooshing sound.

The door to enter our offices opens and cold air from the corridor fills the warm space.

‘That took forever,’ says Kirsty as she walks towards the reception counter and then she seems to register what she’s seeing.

‘Hey,’ she says, her voice a terrified squeak, and Mike drops my arm, steps back and shakes his head.

‘I’m sorry, sorry, sorry,’ he repeats and then he looks at Kirsty and then back at me, distress on his face. He pushes his hands through his blond hair and then pulls, muttering, ‘Idiot, idiot, idiot,’ and then he turns and is out the door before I’ve even had a chance to breathe out.

Kirsty puts her coffee down on the desk and comes over to me, laying a hand on my shoulder. ‘Oh my God, are you okay, are you okay?’

‘That was Mike,’ I say, holding my hand over my heart as though I can somehow slow it down. ‘He said he was Don but it was Sandy’s husband. Sandy who’s missing. I have to call the police.’

‘Okay, oh God. Okay, what do you want me to do?’

‘Nothing…nothing, I just need to speak to the police.’ I can feel my body starting to relax now, can feel that the immediate threat is over. I am trembling all over as the adrenalin leaves my body. How close did I come to getting hurt? Would he have done something?

‘Should I cancel your three o’clock?’

‘No, it’s fine, it’s fine,’ I say. ‘I would rather be distracted.’

‘I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have let him come. I mean I shouldn’t have?—’

I hold up my hand to stop her speaking. ‘You weren’t to know but no more new male patients until I know what’s happened to Sandy, until all this is…over.’

‘Right, of course, do you want a coffee, some water, some juice?’

‘No, thanks.’ I shake my head. ‘I just need to talk to the detective.’

I turn away from her and go back into my office, closing the door behind me. Sitting down on my sofa, I drop my head down onto my knees, taking deep breaths to try and regulate my nervous system. Nothing happened, nothing happened.

But something could have happened. I go to my desk drawer where I have left the gun and I take it out.

It doesn’t feel heavy enough to cause any damage but it would scare him if he tries to come near me again.

It would definitely scare him. Knowing I will have to take it home I think about where I can put it in my house so that Iggy never knows it’s there but so that I can get to it if I need it.

Hating the way it feels in my hand, I return it to the drawer.

I really, really hope I will not need it.

If everything Mike said about Sandy is true, if she lies and she’s the one who hurts him, then what might happen to a woman married to a man with a temper like that?

How far did Sandy push Mike, and was it one step too far?

Is that what has happened here? Is Sandy, who lied and manipulated a violent man, now a woman who has paid the price for those lies?