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For one, we were both in other relationships, and the way I saw it, neither of us had any intention of leaving. The problem with this, as I see it now, is that nothing stands still. Everything either evolves or dies.
Toward the end—and we’re getting there—I wasn’t sure which I feared the most. Although in retrospect, it hardly mattered. I wasn’t the one who got to decide.
Yesterday, my attorney brought a file folder full of evidence for me to sift through. He hopes that it will cause something new to spring to mind. I haven’t yet been able to look at it. It’s almost nothing I haven’t seen before, given my profession. Cadavers are well utilized in medicine. It’s how you learn.
Except, in this case, the evidence isn’t easy to look at. It’s personal. It’s taking a look at all the things you thought you knew and realizing you really know nothing. The sad part is I was trained to do that: analyze symptoms, come up with a solution, devise a plan of action.
The world rewards this kind of specialization. But specialization comes at a cost. The trouble is, you learn more and more about less and less until you know everything about nothing. To think outside the proverbial box, you have to be willing to be wrong. You also have to be willing to be right and have everyone think you’re wrong.
If you suggest an idea that is too boring, no one is going to care; if you suggest something too crazy, no one is going to follow you there. I’ve been thinking about this a lot at night, lying in my cell—about what I’m going to have to do to get out of here. The cold, hard fact is there’s a lot of evidence stacked against me. I haven’t figured out how I can prove my innocence when I have no idea how the evidence came to be in the first place. Am I capable of what I’m accused of? Can a person just snap? Can entire parts of our memory be wiped out? I know with my patients that memory loss is certainly possible. But, as my father used to say, putting wings on a bicycle does not make it airworthy. Shoes that don’t fit are not a bargain at any price. A good idea that can’t be executed is a bad idea. And I am running out of ideas.
The first time one of them got me, I was asleep. At the time, I didn’t know there were far more rude awakenings than a simple kneecap to the back. Turns out, there are. After that first time, sleep never was easy to come by, and I always fought. Always. Nothing that is taken by force should ever be taken easily.
“You’re marked for trouble.” I recognized the voice straightaway as belonging to my cellmate. He was a loud mouth but also not one for small talk. He was the kind who got to the point right away. I appreciated that. “I hear you’re some fancy doctor.”
I was neither going to confirm nor deny his statement. Not until I had further information. Such as why he was posing the question. “Well?” he said. “Is you or ain’t you?”
“Who’s asking?”
He jammed his knee in harder, and being that I was on my stomach and he was by no means a petite man, I struggled for breath. “Who wants to know?” he mocked. “Who does it look like?”
“Hard to say when you’re face down,” I managed to choke out.
“You’s a wiseass, I see.”
Fuck. The last thing I wanted him thinking about was my ass. I didn’t have much time to redirect the conversation, because he finished his comment with a blow to the back of my head. I was half in this world, half in another. Not totally unconscious, but close enough.
The real bad stuff didn’t start that night. Just a little sleight of hand. In terms of what would come later, that night was a breeze.
But it shook something loose in me. It broke a piece off somewhere deep down inside, and I knew it was the kind of thing that could never be put back together again.
Chapter Eighteen
Laurel Dunaway
Journal Entry
“Ready?” James asked, dangling the car keys in my direction. “Jesus, Laurel—you’re white as a ghost.”
I ran my hands across my face and shook the thoughts away.
“Everything okay?”
“Fine. Just a little tired.”
He raised his brow before offering me that boyish, impish look, the one that spreads across his face whenever he’s excited. “Eighteen tonight.”
Eighteen. Generally, there are twenty of us or so. Sometimes more, sometimes less. No one will ask where the missing members are. It’s not that kind of club. The rules are simple. The rest is not so.
My husband slipped his arms around my waist. “You look amazing. I’m going to have to watch my back.” Another smile. “Yours too.”
It’s an unconventional arrangement, the club…but then who really knows, since no one ever talks about these things? Maybe it’s more normal than I think. Whatever the case, it works for us.
Over the years, it’s grown from about four couples to as many as thirty. At parties, we’ve had heterosexual couples, bisexual couples, gay couples. The vast majority of us are hetero. It’s not that we try to be exclusive of anyone. The other two groups tend to not like to mix.
Only women are allowed to attend alone. Females are far less likely to want to join, to feel comfortable doing so, so it’s up to the rest of us to groom them in. Abuse is an acquired taste for some. Oddly, those are usually the ones who tend to stick.
My husband released me from his grip and swung me around so that I was facing him. “What are you thinking?”
