Last Man Standing

by David Baldacci

  Web’s face contorted and he lurched forward. Claire looked alarmed and she sat forward too. “Relax, Mr. Cameraman. It’s just a picture you’re looking at, that’s all. Just a picture. What do you see?”

  “I see men. Men have come in the house.”

  “What men? What do they look like?”

  “They’re in brown, dressed in brown with cowboy hats. They have guns.”

  Now Claire’s heart skipped a beat. Should she pull the plug on this? She studied Web closely. He appeared to be calming down. “What are the men doing, Mr. Cameraman? What do they want?”

  “They’re taking him, they’re taking the man away. He’s yelling. He’s screaming, they’re all screaming. The cowboys are putting shiny things on the man’s hands. The mommy is screaming, she’s grabbed the little boy.”

  Web covered his ears with his hands and was rocking back and forth so violently he was close to tipping the recliner over. “They’re yelling, they’re yelling. The little boy’s yelling, ‘Daddy! Daddy!’” Web was now screaming himself.

  Oh, shit, Claire thought. Shiny things on his hands? The police had come to arrest Harry Sullivan right in the middle of Web’s sixth birthday party. Good God!

  Claire looked back at Web. “Okay, Mr. Cameraman,” she said in her smoothest, most comforting voice, “just relax, we’re going somewhere else. Take your camera and turn it off for right now until we decide where to go. Okay, your camera is going dark now, relaxed Mr. Cameraman. You see nothing. You’re relaxed and seeing nothing at all. Everyone is gone. There’s no one left yelling. All gone. All dark.”

  Web slowly calmed and put his hands down and leaned back.

  Claire sat back and tried to relax as well. She had been through some intense hypnosis sessions before and discovered some surprising things about patients’ pasts, but each time was still new, still emotional. For a minute or more Claire wavered. Should she move forward? There was the very real possibility she would never get Web in a hypnotic state again.

  “Okay, Mr. Cameraman, we’re moving forward.” She glanced at the notes she had pulled from the file she had placed under a couch pillow. She had waited until Web was under hypnosis before taking them out. She had noted from their previous sessions that the use of files bothered him. That wasn’t unusual, for who would want their life set forth on paper for all to see and scrutinize? And she remembered how she had felt when Buck Winters had pulled the same tactic on her. The pages had dates scribbled on them. She had gotten them from Web’s file and discussions with him. “We’re moving on to . . .” She hesitated. Could he handle this? Could she handle this? She made up her mind and told Web the new date to move on to. It was the date his stepfather had died. “What do you see, Mr. Cameraman?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Nothing?” Claire remembered. “Turn your camera back on. Now what do you see?”

  “Still nothing. It’s dark, totally black.”

  That was odd, thought Claire. “Is it nighttime? Turn on the light on your video recorder, Mr. Cameraman.”

  “No, there are no lights. I don’t want a light.”

  Claire leaned forward, as Web was now referring to himself. This was tricky. This now placed the patient right in the bull’s-eye of his very own unconscious. Still, she decided to press forward.

  “Why doesn’t the Cameraman want a light?”

  “Because I’m scared.”

  “Why is the little boy scared?” She had to keep the objectivity here even as Web continued to wander to the cliff of subjectivity. It could be a long way down, Claire well knew.

  “Because he’s out there.”

  “Who, Raymond Stockton?”

  “Raymond Stockton,” Web repeated.

  “Where is the little boy’s mother?”

  Web’s chest started to heave again. He was gripping the sides of the recliner so tightly his fingers were shaking.

  “Where is your mother?”

  Web’s voice was high, like a boy still a ways from puberty.“Gone. No, she’s back. Fighting. Always fighting.”

  “Your mother and father are fighting?”

  “Always. Shhh!” Web hissed. “He’s coming. He’s coming.”

  “How do you know, what do you see?”

  “The door’s coming down. It always squeaks. Always. Just like that. He’s coming up the steps. He keeps it up here. His drugs. I’ve seen him. I’ve seen him.”

  “Relax, Web, it’s all right. It’s all right.” Claire didn’t want to touch him, for fear she would startle him, but she was so close to Web there was practically no discernible space between them. She watched over Web as she would have over her mother if it were the woman’s last minute on earth. Claire prepared herself to end this before it got out of control, yet if they could just get a little further. Just a little further.

  “He’s up at the top of the stairs. I hear him. I hear my mother. She’s down there. Waiting.”

  “But you can’t see. You’re still in darkness.”

  “I can see.” The tone of voice took Claire by surprise, for it was deep and menacing, no longer the cry of a terribly frightened boy.

  “How can you see, Mr. Cameraman? What do you see?”

  Web screamed the next words out so suddenly that Claire nearly fell to the floor.

  “Damn it, you already know this.”

  For a split second she was sure he was talking directly to her. That had never happened before in a hypnotic session. What did he mean? That she already knew this information? But then he calmed and continued.

  “I lifted up the pile of clothes a little. I’m under the pile of clothes. Hiding.”

  “From the little boy’s stepfather?”

  “I don’t want him to see me.”

  “Because the little boy is scared?”

  “No, I’m not scared. I don’t want him to see me. He can’t see me, not yet.”

  “Why, what do you mean?”

  “He’s right in front of me, but his back is to me. His stash is right over there. He’s bending down to get it.”

  Web’s voice was growing deeper, as though he were growing from a boy to a man right in front of her.

  “I’m coming out of hiding, I don’t have to hide anymore. The clothes are rising up with me. They’re my mother’s clothes. She put this pile up here for me.”

  “She did? Why?”

  “To hide under, for when he came. I’m up. I’m standing up. I’m taller than he is. I’m bigger than he is.”

  There was a tone to Web’s voice now that made Claire very nervous. She realized that her own breath was coming in gasps even as Web had calmed. She had a cold dread of where this was going. She should pull him out. Every professional instinct she had told her to stop this, and yet she just couldn’t.

  “The carpet rolls. Hard as iron,” Web said in his deep-man voice. “I’ve got one, had it under the clothes. I’m up now, bigger than he is. He’s a little man. So little.”

  “Web,” began Claire. She dropped all pretense of the cameraman. This was getting out of hand.

  “I’ve got it in my hand. Like a bat. I’m a great baseball player. Can hit it a mile. Swing harder than anyone. I’m big and strong. Like my dad. My real dad.”

  “Web, please.”

  “He’s not even looking. Doesn’t know I’m there. Batter up.” She changed tactics again. “Mr. Cameraman, I want you to turn off your camera.”

  “Pitch is coming. Fastball. I see it. Easy. I’m getting ready.”

  “Mr. Cameraman, I want you—”

  “It’s almost here. He’s turning. I want him to. I want him to see this. See me.”

  “Web! Turn it off.”

  “He sees me. He sees me. I’m swinging for the fences.”

  “Turn off the camera. Stop, you don’t see this. Stop!”

  “I’m swinging. He sees me, he knows how hard I can hit. He’s scared now. He’s scared! He’s scared, I’m not! No more! No more!”

  Claire watched helplessly as

he gripped an imaginary bat and swung for the fences.

  “It’s a hit. It’s a hit. Slash of red, slash of red. The ball’s going down. It’s going down. It’s a home run, a country mile. It’s outta here. Outta here. Good-bye, good-bye, mister asshole.” He grew quiet for a long moment while Claire studied him carefully.

  “He’s getting up. He’s getting back up.” He paused. “Yes, Mom,” he said. “Here’s the bat, Mom.” He reached out his hand as though handing off something. Claire almost reached out her hand to take it before she caught herself.

  “Mom’s hitting him. In the head. Lots of blood. He’s not moving anymore. He’s not. It’s over.”

  He became silent and slumped back in the recliner. Claire slumped down too, her heart beating so hard she put a hand over her chest as though to prevent it from bursting through. All she could envision was Raymond Stockton plunging down the attic stairs after being hit by a hard roll of carpet and hitting his head on the way down and then being finished off by his wife with the same roll of carpet.

  “I want you to completely relax, Web. I want you to sleep, to sleep, that’s all.”

  She watched as his body dissolved even farther into the chair. As Claire looked up, she received another shock. Romano was standing there, staring at her, his hand near his gun.

  “What the hell’s going on?” he demanded.

  “He’s under hypnosis, Mr. Romano. He’s all right.”

  “How do I know that?”

  “I guess you’ll just have to trust me.” She was still too stricken to argue with the man. “How much did you hear?”

  “I was coming back here to check on him when I heard Web screaming.”

  “He’s reliving some very delicate memories of the past. I’m not sure what it all means yet, but it was a big step to get to this point.”

  Claire’s experiences in forensics had prompted several theories to consider. It had obviously been planned that the blows had been struck with the rolled-up carpet. Stockton presumably would have had carpet fibers in his head wound when he hit the floor. And if the carpet on the floor were the same carpet as the remnant in the attic, then the police would just assume that the fibers became embedded in his head wound when he hit the floor. They would not suspect that someone had slugged him with a rolled-up remnant in the attic. After all the complaints of abuse against the man, everyone, including the police, had probably been grateful he was finally dead. Finished with the stepfather, Claire moved on to the mother.

  Web had said Charlotte London had placed the pile of clothes there. Had she also supplied the rolled-up carpet? Had she coached her tall, strong teenage son on how to do away with the abusive husband? Was that how the woman had decided to handle it? And then stepped in to finish the job, leaving Web to later pick up the pieces, allowing him to repress guilt so deep he couldn’t even remember the event except under hypnosis? But such an extraordinary repressed memory would taint every aspect of his being and of his future. It would manifest itself in many ways, none of them positive. Claire could now clearly understand why Web was like he was. He had become a lawman not to make up for Harry Sullivan’s felonious ways but because of his own guilt. A boy helping to kill his stepfather at the instruction of his natural mother; from a mental health perspective it didn’t get more screwed up than that.

  Claire looked over at Web, who just sat there so peacefully, with his eyes closed, awaiting her next instruction. She also now understood his somnambulism. Children from homes of terrible abuse often withdrew into fantasy worlds as protection from the horrors of reality. Such children created imaginary friends to combat loneliness and also invented wonderful lives and adventures to ward off feelings of insecurity and depression. Claire had treated somnambules who could control their higher brain functions to such an extent that they could either embellish or completely wipe out whole sections of their memories, just as Web had done. Though a dynamic, independent, self-reliant sort on the outside, Web London, she concluded, was obedient and relied upon others on the inside; hence, his dependence on his HRT team and his exceptional ability to carry out orders. He was eager to please, to be accepted.

  She shook her head. The man was a mess inside. And yet he had withstood the psychological battering of both the Bureau and HRT. Web had said he had figured out the MMPI test and had managed to lie his way right through it. He did not know how right he was about that.

  She looked at Romano as something new occurred to her. She would have to craft the question delicately because she couldn’t reveal any patient confidences. Web had told her previously that he wasn’t taking any medications, and she had accepted his word on that. With what she had just learned, though, she wondered if he were taking something that would help combat the internal traumas that were clearly eating away at him. She motioned Romano over to a far corner, out of Web’s hearing. “Do you know anything about any medications Web might be taking?”

  “Did Web say he was taking any pills?”

  “I was just wondering. It’s sort of standard operating procedure for shrinks to ask,” she answered evasively.

  “Lots of people take pills to help them sleep,” Romano said defensively.

  She hadn’t said they were sleeping pills. So Romano did know about them, thought Claire. “I’m not saying it’s wrong, I was just wondering if he ever mentioned to you if he took anything, and if so, what he took.”

  “You think he might be addicted, is that it? Well, I’m telling you you’re nuts.”

  “I’m not implying that at all. It’s just important that I know in case I want to prescribe something for him. I don’t want any dangerous drug interactions.”

  Romano still was not buying it. “So why don’t you ask him?”

  “Well, I’m sure you’re well aware that people don’t always tell their doctors the truth, particularly the kind of doctor I am. I just want to make sure there are no problems.”

  Romano looked over at Web, apparently to make sure he was still out. He looked back at Claire and seemed to be having trouble getting the words out. “I saw him holding what looked like a prescription bottle the other day. But look, he’s hurting right now and he’s probably a little screwed up about things and maybe needs a little help pill wise, but the Bureau’s real stiff on that crap. They throw you overboard and let you sink or swim on your own. Well, guys have to look out for each other, then.” Romano stopped, looked over at Web and said a little wistfully, “He’s the best HRT’s ever had.”

  “You know he thinks very highly of you too.”

  “I guess I did know.”

  Romano left the room. Claire went to the window and watched as he crossed the road and was soon out of sight. It would have been very hard for him to reveal a confidence like that about his friend, and he probably felt himself a traitor for doing it. But in the end it would help Web far more than hurt him.

  She sat across from Web, leaned forward and spoke slowly so that he wouldn’t miss a word. Ordinarily hypnosis was used to pare away the inhibitions and layers covering repressed memories that prevented patients from really talking about their troubles. Typically the patient was brought out of hypnosis fully remembering everything that had happened while he was under. Here, Claire could not do that. It would be too traumatic. Instead, she gave Web a posthypnotic suggestion. It instructed him that when he came out of the hypnotic state he would remember only enough to allow him to deal adequately with the situation. What would control what, if anything, he remembered would be his unconscious. Under the circumstances, Claire felt certain he would remember almost nothing. He was not prepared to deal with this, so buried was it within his unconscious. She slowly brought him up the escalator, step by step. Before he came fully out of it, she finished composing herself, prepared herself to face him.

  When he finally opened his eyes, he looked around the room and then at her. He smiled. “Anything good?”

  “First I need to ask you a question, Web.” She paused to collect herself again before saying, “Are you taking any medication?”

  His eyes narrowed. “Didn’t you already ask me that?”

  “I’m asking you now.”

  “Why?”

  “You mentioned voodoo as an explanation for why you froze. Let me offer another one: negative drug interaction.”

  “I wasn’t taking any medication before we went into that alley, Claire. I would never do that.”

  “Drug interactions are funny,” replied Claire. “Depending on what you’re taking, the effects can materialize some time after you’ve stopped taking them.” She paused once again and added, “It’s important for you to be entirely truthful on this point, Web. It really is, if you want to get to the truth.”

  They stared at each other for a long moment, and then Web rose and went into his bathroom. A minute later he came back and handed her a small vial with pills in it. He sat back down as she examined the contents.

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