The Liar's Room

by Simon Lelic

  Adam is looking at her dubiously, the way a school kid might look at a teacher who’s caught him doing something he shouldn’t but has assured him it’s OK to go on. Like it’s a trap, in other words. Like she’s trying to trick him.

  “As for confidentiality,” Susanna says, “what transpires in this room is entirely privileged. That means you can trust me as much as you would trust your doctor, say, or your solicitor. The only exception is if I were to deem you to be a threat. To yourself, I mean. Or to others.”

  It is so subtle that Susanna almost doesn’t notice it: Adam shows a shadow of a flinch.

  “Adam? I promise you I would never breach our bond unless we’d absolutely come to a dead end. I’m here to help you. That’s my priority. And I know I can’t possibly hope to do that unless you feel able to trust me. To confide in me.”

  “So that’s a rule,” Adam answers. “Like a law? You’re not allowed to say anything unless I agree you can? To . . . I don’t know. To the authorities, I guess. Like”—Adam’s eyes peek out at her from beneath his fringe—“to the police.”

  Susanna does her best not to react.

  “That’s right,” she responds. “I can’t tell anyone anything about you, not unless I believe you’re about to hurt someone—yourself included—and there’s nothing more I feel I can do to keep you safe.”

  Adam is considering. Deciding, Susanna assumes.

  Finally he puffs out a breath. “Can I start at the beginning?”

  “Please do,” Susanna says.

  * * *

  • • •

  “So there’s this girl . . .”

  If Susanna had been put on the spot, she probably would have guessed Adam’s story would begin like this. Girl/boy—one or the other. Adam doesn’t come across as being homosexual but Susanna has been surprised before by her clients’ sexual proclivities. Not that she’s judgmental. For all her faults, that’s one thing she’s never been. Not like Neil, her ex-husband, who’d once confessed to her that his biggest fear was that their son, Jacob, Jake to his parents and his mates, would turn out “queer.” This shocked Susanna at the time but now she finds it almost laughable—Neil’s prejudice, yes, but also that there was a time when her husband’s biggest fear centered on the manner in which their only son would fall in love.

  “She’s younger than me. This girl. Not a lot. Just, like, three years younger.”

  Susanna realizes she still doesn’t know Adam’s exact age. If he is indeed nineteen or twenty, that would make this girlfriend of his sixteen or seventeen. Two or three years older than Emily, then, Susanna’s daughter, her only child other than Jake.

  “She’s pretty, I guess. Not just pretty. She’s beautiful actually. She’s slim, kind of short, I suppose, and she’s got this amazing hair, like, I don’t know. Like polished wood. It’s sort of brown but also red in places, gold even, and it shines like she’s advertising shampoo. And she’s got this laugh. I don’t really know how to describe it. It’s kind of a dirty laugh, you could say, but at the same time it’s exactly the opposite. It’s just pure. With no malice in it. It’s like she laughs and you want to laugh too. You know?”

  Susanna nods, and Adam, instead of continuing, all at once clamps his lips tight, as though he’s embarrassed. And perhaps he’s worried that he’s coming across as soppy, daft even, which maybe in his terms he is but to Susanna’s ear all he sounds like is a young man who is very much in love.

  “She’s obviously a very attractive young woman.”

  Adam appears worried at first that Susanna is mocking him but then he allows her a glimpse of that schoolboy grin.

  “She is,” he says. “Absolutely, she is. And that’s why I’m so worried, I suppose. About . . .” The grin freezes, fades.

  “About what, Adam? What is it you’re worried about?”

  “I’m worried about . . .”

  Susanna waits.

  “I’m worried about hurting her,” Adam states, and there’s a silence as understanding blooms between them that he’s not talking about hurting her feelings.

  Susanna is careful to remain quite still.

  “What is it that makes you think you might hurt her?”

  And the way Adam looks at her now . . . It’s like before, when he first alluded directly to his “problem” (There’s something I want to do) and all innocence drained from his expression. It occurred to Susanna then that Adam was more troubled than she’d initially assumed and that maybe she was right to be wary of him.

  But the instinct is fleeting and quickly the notion reestablishes itself that, whatever it is about Adam that has been niggling at her, it’s linked to Susanna’s past, not his. It’s her problem, in other words; her baggage.

  “Adam? What is it that makes you think you might hurt her?” Susanna repeats.

  “It’s just . . .” Adam takes a breath and expels the air slowly. “It just feels right somehow,” he says at last. “That’s the only way I can think to describe it. Like . . .” He is on the brink of speaking again, then shakes his head.

  “Keep going, Adam,” Susanna says. “Remember, I’m not here to judge you. If the words don’t sound right the first time, no one’s going to stop you taking them back. We have all the time we need to get this right.”

  She waits.

  “Adam? Why is it you think you might—”

  “Because she deserves it,” Adam suddenly gushes. And this time there is genuine anger in his expression. He is leaning forward, elbows on knees, and there is a passion—a fervor—in his eyes. “Except, maybe I don’t even mean her,” Adam continues. “Maybe who I really mean is . . .”

  Susanna watches him, still startled by the intensity of Adam’s outburst. Is . . . who? Ordinarily Susanna’s instinct would be to say Adam was alluding to himself, that he is the person he feels should suffer, perhaps because subconsciously he doesn’t believe he deserves to be in the relationship in the first place. But it’s odd. For some reason she can’t escape the feeling that he has in mind someone else entirely.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Adam announces, reclining and folding his arms.

  Susanna allows an extended pause.

  “Let’s go back a bit,” she says at last. “Shall we?”

  Adam looks at her questioningly.

  “Can you tell me a little bit about your parents?” Susanna says. “About what things were like when you were young?”

  There is another flash in Adam’s eyes that Susanna doesn’t fully understand. Irritation, perhaps? Anger again? Triumph, even? It could be any of those things. All of them. None.

  “You said you grew up in London, for example,” Susanna persists. “Is that right?”

  “Yes. No. I mean, I was born in London,” Adam tells her, “but I didn’t grow up there. I grew up sort of all over the place really.”

  “Your parents traveled?”

  “My old man did. Although I’m not sure traveling is quite the right word. Running, more like.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning he was a waste of space.” A flash of anger again, barely contained. And beneath it, Susanna judges, something more, something she can’t quite put her finger on.

  For the moment, she decides to let it slide. “What about your mother, Adam?” she asks instead.

  Adam’s lips crease at one corner. He ignores the question Susanna asked him. “I know what you’re thinking,” he states.

  And Susanna is convinced for an instant that he does.

  “You’re thinking about my background,” Adam goes on. “You’re wondering whether that’s part of this. Part of the way I’ve been feeling.”

  Susanna smiles, as much for her sake as for Adam’s.

  “I am, as it happens.”

  “You’re probably right,” Adam says. “In fact, I’m sure you are.”

  Susanna feels h
er eyes go narrow. “What makes you say that?”

  “That’s the way it is for everyone. Where we come from, our secret pasts—we can’t escape them. They define us. Control us. Trap us even, sometimes.” Adam looks at her intently. “Don’t you think?”

  Susanna, paralyzed, stares back. And a grip of ice closes around each of her shoulders.

  She stands. Conscious that Adam is watching her, she moves across the floor until she is hovering at the visitor’s side of her desk.

  “Is everything OK?” There is the sound of Adam leaning forward in his chair. “Did I say something wrong?”

  Susanna forces a smile. She tries to show it to Adam without fully turning round. She needs a moment. Just a moment.

  “No, of course not, I . . . I was looking for a pen, that’s all. And my notepad.” She makes a show of searching her desktop.

  “You’re going to take notes? I thought you weren’t supposed to take notes? The last therapist I saw, he said something about it interfering in the process.”

  And there it is: the first time Susanna understands categorically that Adam hasn’t been entirely honest with her. He claimed that he’d never had counseling before, and yet with one simple observation, he’s given himself away.

  “Like, I say something,” Adam is explaining, “you write it down, then I change what I say next based on what you’ve chosen to record. Right?”

  Something bad.

  Because she deserves it.

  So he lied. It’s no big deal. Clients cover up all the time. And truth, Susanna knows, is subjective. Isn’t that what her training taught her? What feels true to the client is what counts, not what’s fact and what’s fiction.

  Our secret pasts . . .

  There is a pen beneath Susanna’s hovering fingers and she forces herself to pick it up. “Right,” she says. “That’s exactly right. The pen, the notepad—they’re for after.”

  She reestablishes her smile. She turns . . .

  . . . and is rocked by what she sees in Adam’s eyes: sheer, unadulterated hate.

  It is as though he has been unmasked. He looks . . . older? Younger? Crueler, certainly, and with that somehow also more familiar: the way he seemed to Susanna when he first walked in. As for that innocence she detected earlier in his demeanor, it’s like a sheen that has cracked and peeled away.

  Trust herself. How many times has she been over this? She knew something was off, so why didn’t she trust herself?

  “Are you OK, Susanna?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “You look afraid, all of a sudden. I’m not scaring you, am I?”

  He sounds pleased.

  “Scaring me?” Susanna laughs. “No, of course not, why should you . . .”

  But he is. Absolutely he is. There’s no denying it anymore: something about him frightened her from the beginning. She can rationalize all she wants but now she’s acknowledged it, it’s as obvious as the fear itself.

  “You’ve been lying to me,” she finds herself saying. “Haven’t you?” This is something in ordinary circumstances Susanna would never do. Force a client to confront their inconsistencies. Accuse them, basically. But she has no doubt that Adam is pushing her—testing her?—and instinctively she feels an urge to push back.

  There is a moment when Adam remains perfectly still.

  Then, “You’ve got me,” he says. And it is not only Adam’s appearance now that seems altered. It is his posture, his voice, everything. He unbuttons the collar of his shirt, slumps slightly in his chair. Susanna thinks of actors, slackening as they slip off stage. Of news anchors, ridiculously—of how their personas must alter the instant the camera light blinks off.

  “It was the notepad, wasn’t it?” Adam is saying. “Me saying you weren’t supposed to take notes?” He shakes his head, laughs at himself. “I was trying to impress you, I guess. I’ve done a lot of research, you see. I know my stuff.”

  Research? Susanna is about to echo, when Adam hits his forehead with the heel of his palm. Hard.

  And then he laughs again.

  “But that was all,” he says. “I’ve seen other counselors, I admit it. But my problem. My dilemma, I suppose you could call it. That was genuine.”

  Susanna’s throat is clogged with questions. With shock, with confusion, with fear.

  “Here,” Adam says. “Maybe this will help you understand.” He leans sideways, and slips his hand into his rear jeans pocket. From it he produces a piece of paper.

  At first Susanna doesn’t move.

  “Here,” Adam repeats and this time when he waves the piece of paper Susanna finds herself reaching for it. She takes it, turns it over.

  And sees her daughter looking back at her in a photograph.

  3.

  The memories fizz in free association, bubbling and then bursting at the surface.

  * * *

  • • •

  The pregnancy, which was horrendous. Not like before. Not like the first time. Somehow with Emily everything was different. Unless, equally possible, it wasn’t and Emily, her little girl, was just a fluke. A pearl chaffed into perfection.

  But the sickness. Certainly the sickness was new, something she’d not experienced with Jake. It hit her early and instead of passing only gathered intensity. She was hospitalized. Twice. The second time for almost a fortnight. It became so bad that Neil suggested termination. No, that’s not right. He didn’t suggest anything. He alluded, insinuated. Tried to coax her so that the decision—the responsibility—would become Susanna’s. And looking back, as Susanna has relentlessly, that was the moment, she would say, that their relationship finally broke apart. It had been crumbling anyway. By the time Emily was conceived it was as much a memory of something tangible as a thing itself: an edifice ready to fall at the slightest tremor.

  Termination, though; the mere suggestion of it . . . For Susanna that was the beginning of the end. It was like the time Neil had confessed his fears about Jake’s sexuality, except worse, more fundamental, because prejudice was something Susanna could at least account for. What Neil said was he was only thinking of her well-being. That it was nothing to do with the fact that he hadn’t wanted a second child in the first place; had argued for months that it was precisely the wrong thing to do. Which maybe it was, but that didn’t alter how desperate Susanna was for her baby to be born. Her little girl, as things turned out. A baby girl.

  Susanna wasn’t some radical. She was as pro-choice, she felt, as it was possible for a mother to be. But after everything they’d been through Susanna couldn’t believe the thought would even enter Neil’s mind. Kill it, was what he meant. Murder her baby.

  She overrode Neil in the end, of course she did, and the joy of Emily’s birth for the most part rinsed away the pain. Of the pregnancy, that is. Of labor. But afterward, and until Neil and Susanna went their separate ways (separate? Try opposite. Diametrical) Susanna had night upon night of sleepless fear. It had finally dawned on her that she was living with a stranger. Husband, father: impostor.

  * * *

  • • •

  Bottom shuffling. Ha! They both did it. Meaning maybe there were some commonalities after all. Except Jake’s method of movement was like a lurching, sitting-down limp, whereas Emily was always more elegant. It was almost graceful, the way she skulled across the floor, if you could describe dragging your bum across the linoleum as a thing of grace. That was the thing, though. She almost floated. Zen-like. A pink-skinned, talcum-powdered Buddha.

  * * *

  • • •

  Emily with a photograph of Jake. Older now. Six? Seven? And the Jake in the picture, coincidentally, not that dissimilar in age.

  “Who’s this, Mummy?”

  Susanna turning to look. Realization dawning as she sees.

  “Where did you get that?”

  “Hey. Give it
back.”

  “I said, where did you get it? You shouldn’t be going through my drawers, Emily. I’ve told you before about going through my things.”

  “I wasn’t. I just found it!”

  Even if Susanna hadn’t been able to read Emily so easily, she would have known her daughter was lying to her. There were no photographs of Jake anywhere in their house that weren’t at least two sealed layers from being found. This one, Susanna knew—the way a librarian knows the location of the books she minds, a curator the story of each exhibit—was in an envelope in a shoebox in her junk drawer. Junk being a euphemism for hallowed treasures, a label she’d only chosen in the first place in a bid to deter Emily.

  “Mummy? It’s mine, I found it, let me see.”

  “It’s not yours, young lady.” Susanna felt anger in spite of herself. Fury without warning or good reason.

  She tried again.

  “It’s not yours, Emily. It’s Mummy’s. It’s . . . precious,” she settled on, for want of a better word.

  “But I want to see. Show me, Mummy, please.”

  She hesitated at first, but then gave in. What harm, she remembers thinking, could it do?

  For a long time, Emily just stared, trying to decipher what had made her mother so cross.

  “But who is it?” she asked.

  Susanna looked from Emily to the photograph. She allowed her thumb tip to graze her son’s cheek. “Just a boy,” Susanna responded. “No one you know.”

  And she distracted her daughter with a plate of biscuits.

  * * *

  • • •

  Their perfect day. The absolute happiest Susanna has been in what she has learned to think of as her life, part two.

  It was just her and Emily. No one else. No bystanders even who betrayed in glances that they knew exactly who Susanna and Emily were. No imagined scrutiny either, which for a long time had been almost as much of a problem. More even, her counselor would have said. Her counselor being Patti Moorcock. Introduced to Susanna by her bereavement counselor and the person who in turn introduced Susanna to her new career. For two, three years Patti had been Susanna’s mentor, confidante, friend. Perhaps the only true friend Susanna has ever really had. There’s Ruth too, of course, but as much as Susanna adores Ruth there’s still that secret that will always exist between them, which by omission has ripened into a lie—and has, in Susanna’s mind, downgraded their relationship to an illusion. A light show. Something beautiful yet insubstantial. Something she knows will eventually come to an end.