by Anni Taylor
“That’s understandable.” Dr Moran paused. “The sleepwalking is definitely something new. So, these kinds of restless nights weren’t happening before the letters?”
“No.” Phoebe shook her head firmly.
Dr Moran looked to me for confirmation.
I didn’t know why the hell we were talking as though the letters had caused Phoebe’s state of mind when it was Phoebe’s state of mind that had caused the letters. But I wasn’t the doctor, and I decided to play along.
“As far as I know, that’s right,” I agreed.
The doctor chewed her lip for a second. “Okay. I knew you were having intense dreams, but this whole thing has really progressed. And not in a good way.”
Phoebe lifted her head and eyed Dr Moran in an intense gaze. “I need to know something. Is it even possible for someone to write those letters while sleepwalking?”
Dr Moran seemed to think for a second, her forehead wrinkling again. “As I understand it, the letters are in rhyme, and they were written on a typewriter and delivered to your letterbox, over the course of three days. Correct?”
“The second letter was pinned to the coffee shop noticeboard,” I cut in. “And the video showed that Phoebe ran to her grandmother’s and back before she posted the third letter.” I sounded like the prosecution in a courtroom. I stopped myself from saying any more. “I’m just trying to give you a clearer picture.”
Dr Moran’s frown deepened. “Well, that’s a lot of complex activity. People do all kinds of things during somnambulism—sleepwalking. Just about anything you can do when you’re awake, you can do sleepwalking. You can walk down the street, and you can write letters. You can even drive a car. It’s not what people usually do when in that state, but it’s possible. I haven’t heard of carrying on an activity over several sleepwalking sessions, but I’ll need to investigate that further. I’ll also look into the possibility that Phoebe was in some other kind of altered state.”
“What kind of altered state?” Phoebe asked, folding her arms in tightly.
“That’s what we need to find out,” Dr Moran told her. “Look, I’m going to book you in for a sleep study, to see what’s been going on with you at night.”
“What’s that?” I asked.
“The patient just stays overnight in a clinic, and their sleeping phases are monitored while they sleep. And—”
“I don’t want to go and stay somewhere else right now,” Phoebe hurried to say.
Dr Moran gave her an understanding nod. “It won’t be straight away. As you can imagine, seeing as it’s an overnight stay in which you are monitored all night, the waiting lists are long. In the meantime, we might need to have a think on your sleeping medication. It might be an idea to dial back to the previous meds you were on. The new medication might be stronger than what you need.”
A hint of alarm flicked through Phoebe’s face, but then she swapped that for a cool expression. As if she had a mirror in front of her and could see her own face. “I’m doing well. I’m getting sleep. The old meds weren’t working for me.”
“We can try a different type, in that case,” said Dr Moran. “I’m not happy with the way things are going with the current ones.”
Phoebe plunged into silence. I could sense a cloud thickening around her.
What the hell was going on with her? She’d just been caught sending kidnapper-style letters about Tommy to our house. Anyone halfway sane would be trying to make amends, trying to fix whatever clouds of crazy were floating in her head. But not Phoebe. Instead, she was arguing with her psych over medication.
I was trying hard to play the understanding husband. Gilroy was right—the last six months had been a nightmare, and maybe I could understand that Phoebe was desperate. If she really didn’t remember writing or sending the letters, she’d be in a world of confusion right now.
But I couldn’t understand the way she was behaving in Dr Moran’s office.
Had she written the letters intentionally and then just pretended the whole sleepwalking scenario—just in case she got found out?
She was hiding something. I was sure of it.
“I don’t want to try something new,” Phoebe said finally. “I’m tired of . . . change. I’m tired of everything changing and out of my control. Could I just stay on what I’m on a while longer? Just one more prescription, and we’ll see how it goes?”
I stared at my wife. Her tone sounded strangely fake, but her face gave nothing away, her eyes large and slightly pleading.
Dr Moran didn’t seem to catch what I did. She shot Phoebe a regretful look. “I’m sorry. I hear you—really, I do. But as your doctor, I’m afraid I can’t prescribe that again for you at the moment. We need to try something else.”
Phoebe gave a sigh that made no sound.
The doctor wrote out a script. “Will you be okay tonight, Phoebe? If there’s a concern about you wandering around your home—or outside of it—an overnight stay in a mental health clinic might be safest for you. That might sound extreme to you right now, but what happened in the early hours of this morning was far more extreme. It’s dangerous for you.”
“Luke put in a new alarm,” Phoebe answered. “And we have a deadlock on the front door. Everything’s okay.”
Phoebe sounded almost clinical.
Dr Moran eyed me quizzically.
I nodded. “Yesterday.”
“That was quick. Good job.” She handed the script to Phoebe, who took it reluctantly, like a child taking medicine.
Turning to me, the doctor pressed her lips together. “How are you, Luke?”
I want to strangle my wife’s bony neck. That’s how I am. “I’m . . . just trying to process everything. Not succeeding.”
“It’ll take a while. How’s the real estate business?”
It was an unexpected question. But I got it. She was trying to bring things back to normal, to reorient me. Maybe she sensed my anger. Something inside me resisted. I didn’t want to go back to normal. I’d been so fucking understanding with Phoebe all along. She was the one with Tommy when he vanished. It happened when she was supposed to be watching him, not me. But she was the one to receive the lion’s share of the sympathy afterwards—from everyone. She was the mother and the one expected to suffer the most. She was the one to have ongoing visits to Dr Moran and the need for antidepressants and sleeping aids. I’d gotten past those things after the first month. Everything had been centred on Phoebe.
And now this crazy shit.
I just shook my head in response.
She hesitated for a second, her pen poised. “I’d like to make a booking to see both of you again next week. Separately this time.”
Phoebe didn’t answer. When I glanced at her, it seemed to me that she’d completely switched off and was no longer part of this conversation.
“We’ll give you a call later and arrange something,” I said.
“Please do.” Dr Moran shot each of us a direct gaze.
I half-expected Phoebe to jump in and say that she didn’t need to come back, but she remained silent.
“Phoebe?” questioned Dr Moran.
She smiled at the doctor. Smiled. “Luke will sort it out.”
“I’ll see you soon, then.” Dr Moran nodded along with her words. I could sense her staring at us in concealed confusion as Phoebe and I left the office. At least Phoebe hadn’t completely pulled the wool over her eyes. I was sure that she could see, as I could, that something was going on with my wife.
22.
PHOEBE
Saturday night
LUKE DROVE STRAIGHT TO GET THE prescription filled. I wasn’t trusted to do it myself. I wasn’t trusted to steer myself around anymore. I was a child, and Luke, Dr Moran, and the detectives were the adults. My adult status had been stripped away.
I didn’t know what was happening. At the police station and at Dr Moran’s, I’d had to pack the events of today into a box and seal the lid, waiting until I was alone. Only then was I going to
be able to take out the contents of the box and examine each piece in isolation.
That was what I’d always done. When I was growing up, I’d learned to pack things away. Don’t let anyone see your fear. Don’t let anyone see inside.
By the time Luke pulled up the car outside our home, his eyes had grown almost hostile. What had happened to team Luke and Phoebe? We’d been strong and united ever since Tommy had been taken from us. But not now. The letters had been an axe. I wanted him on my side, to tell me the police were wrong and there had to be some other explanation. But he’d already sharpened himself against me.
I headed upstairs and ran myself a bath. I wanted to soak. And wash off the terrifying scenes of the past two hours. Water surged from the tap, looking destructive. Everything seemed out to destroy me.
Mesmerised, I watched the dark water build.
Our bath was black, chosen by Luke. The entire bathroom—the whole house—was styled in masculine black and white. Luke had said this look was popular with clients when he took them to look at apartments and townhouses.
When the bath was filled, I could no longer see the bottom of it.
I needed something to help me relax. Running into the bedroom, I pulled out the shoebox in my wardrobe. I swallowed pill after pill. I didn’t know how many. A dozen? I wouldn’t sleepwalk after taking that many. I wouldn’t be able to move from the bed.
Dropping my clothes on the floor, I stepped into the water and laid myself down.
The prospect that I really was going crazy drifted at the edges of the watery haze inside my head.
It was me in that footage from the police camera.
Undeniably me.
What was wrong with me? Had those terrible rhymes really come from me? Had I done those things while I was in a deep sleep?
Dr Moran had skirted around my questions. I could tell she wasn’t convinced that someone could have written three rhymes and delivered them separately—to my home and to the café—all while in a deep sleep. The police didn’t believe it either. I could tell.
Which only left one thing. That I’d written the letters deliberately. That I’d gone slightly nuts and concocted the whole thing (Dr Moran’s euphemistic altered state.)
I didn’t have a single memory of writing the letters. Nothing. Where did I get the paper from? When did I drag out Nan’s typewriter and start writing? How did I pin that letter to the noticeboard of the café? How did I come up with those rhymes?
A valve slipped open in my brain, and the horror of the day flooded in fresh.
Tommy was gone, and this pain was never, never going to end. Luke and I were going to live this every day for the rest of our lives. No end. No resolution.
There was no way out.
I slipped low in the water. I’d been deceiving myself. My dreams weren’t going to lead me to Tommy. I’d been trying to escape the pain by drugging myself and creating my own little make-believe world.
The one thing that had kept me going the past couple of months had just been shattered.
My head grew heavy, heavy, heavy.
I could sleep.
The water covered my face.
If I could just stay here like this for a little while . . .
Just a while . . .
23.
LUKE
Saturday night
I POURED MYSELF A BOURBON AND listened to the silence in the house.
Then pulled out my phone from my pocket and dialled my mother.
She answered with that slightly worried tone she always used when she answered the phone—to anyone, as though eternally bracing herself for bad news. “Luke?”
“Yeah, it’s me.” Of course it’s me. The name popping up on your phone’s display right now is telling you it’s me.
“Is everything okay?” she asked.
“No, not really.”
“Well, what’s going on? Is it Phoebe?”
“Why do you think it’s Phoebe?”
“Oh, Luke, it’s always her. You’re always the one picking up the pieces.”
She surprised me with those words, and it took me a second to adjust. She’d never spoken of Phoebe in that negative way before.
“I’ve been trying to get you on the phone since this morning. So has Aunty Joan. I’m guessing you haven’t heard what happened?”
“Oh my goodness, what is it? No, you know the cabin’s out of range for phone calls. We’re in town right now, having some dinner.”
“It’s all over the news, Mum. We’ve been getting letters. About Tommy.”
“No. About Tommy? What kind of letters?”
“Just . . . letters. Rhymes. They make no sense.”
“So you’ve told the police?”
“Yeah. Mum, it’s national news.”
“Oh dear. Just who are these letters from? The kidnapper?”
“The police don’t think so. Just some misguided person . . .” I wasn’t going to tell my mother the whole story. Not yet anyway.
“Oh, I feel terrible. All the way down here away from everything.”
“Look, I was thinking . . . Phoebe’s not handling it well. Maybe I could bring her to the cabin for a bit. Give her a change of scenery.”
I could almost hear Mum thinking. “I just don’t know if it’s the best timing.”
“What’s happening?”
“Your father’s not well.”
“Yeah? What’s up with the old guy?”
“He’s just going through a bit of a thing. Depression, I guess you’d call it. He really needs some quiet time so he can recharge and get back to being himself again.”
“When did that start?”
“A while. What happened with little Tommy affected him deeply. I think he just can’t make peace with the world at the moment.”
I rubbed my forehead, not knowing if I could handle hearing about how Tommy’s disappearance had affected yet someone else. Sometimes it seemed like I was the one expected to soldier on while everyone else had a licence to fall apart. “Okay, well, I’ll figure out something else.”
“I think that would be best.”
She didn’t even try to offer me any alternative. I was on my own with this. I’d been hoping my mother would welcome us with open arms and that Dad would take me fishing out on the lake. They’d had the cabin for the last sixteen years, ever since I was a teenager. Nine hours down the coast, on a lake about twenty minutes inland from the ocean. Damned freezing in winter when snow covered everything, but the best place ever in the summer. Dad had always seemed in his element there. He tolerated his trips around Europe with Mum well enough, but the cabin was his special place. He’d sit out on the porch with a grin so lazy and contented it was half sliding off his face, hands on the ballooned gut that was a sign of the good life.
Mum and I chatted briefly about nothing in particular. It was obvious she was just being polite before we ended the call.
I dropped the phone back into my pocket. It occurred to me that I didn’t know when the bulk of my mother’s attention had swapped from me to my father. I used to be the one that she worried and fussed about. But now it seemed that it was all about your father. Maybe the two of them were just getting old and afraid, and in her eyes, life had become all about keeping her husband alive for as long as possible. My dad wasn’t known for his healthy eating. And he drank a lot more than was good for his liver.
Watching myself in the mirror, I set my bourbon down on the side table. I wasn’t thirty yet, but already I looked older than thirty. My hairline was creeping back, and the tired look around my eyes had become a permanent fixture. For a second, I saw my dad’s face merging with my own. Who was I going to be when I was in my sixties? Was I going to become a faded version of myself who sat on the porch of his cabin, drinking and staring transfixed at a lake, occasionally thinking about the toddler son he hadn’t seen grow up? The son that was still missing? In all likelihood, that was my future. My parents would leave the cabin to me. What I couldn’t imagin
e was Phoebe still by my side, fussing over me. Phoebe was never going to become like my mother or even her own mother. She was made of different stuff.
The silence of the house seemed different now. Like I was alone in it.
Leaving my drink, I headed upstairs.
The smell of vomit soured the air. The bathroom door was ajar, and I pushed it open.
Phoebe was lying fully submerged, her eyes wide open, just staring from beneath the water. A small pile of vomit sat on the tiles beside the bath, a thin trail of it leading to the toilet. A film of vomit floated in the toilet bowl. She must have flushed the rest.
It took me a moment to register what I was seeing.
In a single leap, I was across the bathroom floor. I was grabbing her, lifting her head and torso from the water. She barely registered that I was there. Just blinked at me.
“What the fuck are you doing?” I didn’t recognise my voice.
“I can’t . . . bear it.” That was all she said.
I knelt on the floor, in the water that’d been splashed everywhere, in her vomit. “I lost Tommy too. Remember that.”
“I don’t understand anything. I don’t understand why Tommy’s gone or how the letters happened. Everything’s wrong, and I can’t fix it. I can’t fix it. I don’t want to live anymore.”
As I stared at her, the urge to choke her rose from the pit of my stomach for the second time today. She’d lost Tommy, but she still had me. But I was not enough. Me—and all the things I’d given her—were not fucking enough. My hands clamped around her shoulders, thumbs on her gleaming, wet throat. A single word hissed from between my teeth. “Don’t . . .”
She showed no emotion. Nothing.
My fingers slipped away, brushing the bath water. It had gone cool. “What were you trying to do? Drown yourself?”
“I don’t know.”
I brought down my fist on the side of the bath. She didn’t flinch. “Tell me why. Why did you write those letters? To punish the police? Or to punish me?”
“Please . . .”