Mirror Image

by Dennis Palumbo

  Then, below these feelings of dread and panic, the predictable litany of self-criticism emerged: he should have locked his windows. Fought back harder against the guy. Hell, maybe he deserved what happened to him…

  I’d seen it a hundred times. The victim blaming himself as a way to make sense of what’s happened, to gain at least the fantasy of control over events that threatened to overwhelm him.

  These feelings faded over time, and with them the nightmares, the panic attacks. We began to concentrate less on Kevin’s symptoms and more on him.

  It was then, as our bond deepened, that Kevin started to mirror me in dress and appearance. I didn’t do anything to stop it. Given the shattering loss of his mother at a young age—and now with confirmation of my hunch that he’d been sexually abused as well—it was no surprise he’d be yearning for an identity. Even one that was borrowed.

  “If I’m like you,” some part of him was saying to me, “I’ll be okay. So I’ll become you.”

  And I’d been letting him do it. Part clinical judgment, part gut feeling. He’d come into my practice so lost, so fragmented, he needed a platform on which to stand. I was willing to be that platform. For how long, I didn’t know. I’d hoped that same gut feeling would tell me when it was long enough.

  A position I got all kinds of grief for. Recently, I’d presented Kevin’s case at one of our peer review conferences at Ten Oaks, a clinic in suburban Penn Hills where I’d been on staff before going into private practice. Predictably, some of my colleagues there were outraged at what I was doing with Kevin. Or allowing to happen.

  “It’s just an extreme variation of Kohut’s twinship longing,” I’d argued.

  Brooks Riley, the new shrink down from Harvard Med, disagreed. “No, it’s a pathological accommodation. The poor bastard’s willing to disappear, to allow himself to be literally usurped, and replaced by you.”

  He shook his head. “Christ, Rinaldi, I knew you were nuts. I didn’t know you were arrogant as well.”

  Riley was a prick, but maybe he was right. I knew I was taking a big risk—sure as hell not the first I’d taken in my work. But I was convinced it was paying off. Kevin’s bond with me was stronger now. He’d just trusted me enough to reveal the details of his incest with his sister.

  A painful, anguished revelation. In the strange, hallowed vocabulary of my world, a breakthrough…

  ***

  I cleared my throat, which made Kevin tilt his head slightly. When at last he spoke, still gazing out the window, his words seemed faint as ghosts.

  “One day, it all came out. I mean, about me and Karen…I got sick at school and was sent to the nurse’s office. Then, all of a sudden—I don’t know why—I start talkin’ about my sister foolin’ around with me…” He turned at last. “I ratted her out, Doc.”

  “You were just a kid, Kevin,” I said gently. “In turmoil. No way you could deal with what was going on inside you. Hell, it was brave of you to—”

  “Brave?” He gave me a fierce look, as though I were an idiot. “I screwed everything up, man. It was me!”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, the shit hit the fan. The County sent social workers to our house—my sister just…she just freaked. And my poor Dad…Banford’s a small town, with small, angry minds. They blamed him. He worked at the one goddam bank in town. People deserted him, said he was a bad father—”

  “Wasn’t he? He sure didn’t protect you—”

  “His wife had died the year before!” Kevin’s eyes filled with tears. “And, yeah, he drank…Who the hell wouldn’t? Two kids to raise alone, and then this shit—”

  “Kevin, you can’t blame yourself.”

  “I coulda kept my mouth shut. I coulda dealt with it.”

  “At eight years old? Come on…”

  He looked away from me again. “Big deal. It had already been going on practically every night for months, maybe a year. Why didn’t I just—”

  I hesitated. Waited for whatever it was he needed to say to work its way out.

  “Karen and me…what she did…what we did…” He let out a breath. “It’s not like I didn’t like it, ya know?…”

  He turned to me at last, a deep angry blush burning his cheeks. This was his secret shame, his sin, and he wanted me to see it.

  “I hated it…and I loved it…Okay?”

  I nodded.

  Another long pause, as though time had frozen. Then, hand trembling, he reached to touch the back of his chair.

  “Later on, after I was placed in County Services, and Karen was sent to counseling…Right in the middle of all this, my Dad takes off…”

  “Takes off?”

  “Leaves town. Gone. The social worker has to tell me about it herself, one day out in the playground. Dad’s skipped town, nobody knows where. No note, nothin’.”

  “I’m sorry, Kevin.”

  “So…me and Karen are placed in separate foster homes, and life goes on in Mayberry.” A shrug. “Wasn’t too bad. My foster father only beat me when he needed a fix, or his old lady wouldn’t fuck him, or he lost money on a ball game…” His pale eyes found mine. “Coulda been worse.”

  “Jesus, I don’t see how.”

  I tried to collect my thoughts. In our first sessions, Kevin had told me only that his mother had died, and that he’d spent his adolescence in foster care. He’d always been vague about the details concerning his father. I figured they’d come in time. Well, they were coming now…

  “Did your own father ever contact you after that?” I asked. “Have you talked at all with him since then?”

  His silence gave me the answer.

  He looked down, his breathing shallow. There was only the sound of the rain clattering against the windows, the ticking of the thermostat as the heat kicked on.

  “Where’s Karen now?” I asked.

  “She left town soon after Dad did. Ran away from her foster home. I never saw her again, either. I just found out a couple years ago from some third cousin or somethin’ that Karen was out west. Married, with a kid. Anyway, that’s the rumor. I had a P.O. box address for her in Tucson. Wrote a few times. She never wrote back.” His eyes narrowed. “Hell, that’s fine with me.”

  “Is it?”

  “I guess it has to be, right?”

  Another long silence. Then, abruptly, he came around and sat down again. He pushed his glasses up on his thin nose. Glasses he didn’t need, I reminded myself.

  I phrased my next words carefully. “I appreciate the fact that you told me about all this. I know it was hard.”

  He sat back. “Well, as long as you’re happy…”

  As I’d expected, after such a painful revelation, Kevin’s defenses were up. With feigned casualness, he slowly crossed his legs, hands clasped at the knees.

  Though there were still ten minutes left on the clock, I knew today’s session was over.

  ***

  Outside, the storm had subsided, the rain now a misty curtain drawn against the blackness.

  Kevin stood up, stretched. “So, Doc, what’s the diagnosis? Bi-polar? Psychotic?”

  “Beats me. I haven’t read that chapter yet.”

  “Very funny. It’s just that I wonder what all this shit has to do with why I came here in the first place.”

  I took a long pause before answering.

  “The way I see it, there are some things you’ve needed to talk about for a long time. Regardless of what brought you here, some part of you wants to talk about them now.”

  He considered this. “But I feel a lot better,” he said. “I mean, about that night. No more nightmares and stuff. No more guys in ski masks.”

  “That’s good news,” I said, walking him to the door. “If anybody deserves a good night’s sleep, you do.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  I opened the door to the waiting room. It was empty. Kevin was my last patient of the day. As he started for the coat rack, I stopped him.

  “Kevin, I meant what I s
aid in there. It took guts to reveal such an old, painful secret…”

  He gave me an odd look, a mixture of intensity and ruefulness that I’d never quite seen on his face before.

  “Hell, man, I got lots of secrets…”

  And with that, he turned away. I shut the door behind him.

  Chapter Four

  I went over to my desk and jotted down some notes about the session while it was still fresh in my mind. I’d need ammo if I was going to present Kevin’s case again next week at Ten Oaks.

  Though I was still smarting from Riley’s criticism, I usually got valuable insight and support from most of the others there, and I felt I needed it. Especially now, in the wake of these latest revelations. The road ahead was going to be tricky.

  I glanced at my desk clock. I had plans for dinner, having promised to meet my cousin (and accountant) Johnny Manella at a restaurant in nearby Shadyside. Figuring dinner traffic and rain, parking in the newly gentrified district would be hell. I knew I better get going.

  I got up and locked Kevin’s case folder in the filing cabinet. Then I checked my voicemail. Three calls, nothing urgent. One even announced good news. A former patient, who’d been raped four years ago, had since married, and had now delivered a baby. In a happy, astonished voice, she promised to send me a photo of mother-and-child, doing fine.

  I couldn’t help smiling. Nice message to get, especially at the end of a long, hard day. Grabbing my briefcase, I locked the waiting room door behind me and padded down the narrow, carpeted hallway.

  Ahead of me, Lenny Wilcox, building maintenance, was backing out of the storage room, balancing an armload of boxes. He was in his fifties, with smooth black skin and the build of an SUV.

  “Hey, Lenny,” I said, holding open the door with my foot. “How ya doing?”

  “Not bad.” An eyebrow went up. “By the way, Doc, I saw you on CNN the other night. A show about that kidnapping in Miami. You ain’t gettin’ famous, are ya?”

  “Hardly. They just needed some talking heads for a panel on trauma. The after-effects on the victims. Since I’d been consulted on the Florida case—”

  He shook his head. “Man, I don’t know how ya do it. Those poor kids…what they went through…”

  “Yeah,” was all I said. Lenny didn’t know the half of it. And like the rest of the public, hopefully never would.

  We exchanged brief good-byes, then I took the stairs down to the parking garage. The stairwell was damp and concrete-cold. My footsteps echoed, a hollow sound that only emphasized the silence as I descended to parking.

  Briefcase in one hand, jacket in the other, I shoved the heavy metal exit door open with my shoulder. A blast of cold air hit me as I stepped into the near-vacant garage.

  The dim, cavernous structure was criss-crossed with shadows and damp from the rain. Shallow puddles had formed here and there on the uneven concrete.

  Then I saw it.

  Or thought I did. A flicker of movement, a shadow flitting against the far wall…

  I tensed, senses alert. A surge of adrenaline. I peered into the darkness. Nothing.

  I glanced over at the attendant’s booth near the exit, though I knew he’d be gone for the day. And he was. His little overhead light was out.

  I looked around. Not a thing. Probably never was. I’d had a long day, my brain was fried. And yet…

  Ignoring my every instinct, I started walking. Most of the other tenants kept banker’s hours, so it wasn’t unusual for me to be the last one out. I was used to walking across the deserted parking structure, past no more than a dozen remaining parked cars, to get to my assigned space.

  So why this prickling at the back of my neck? This sense of foreboding?

  “Jesus,” I said to myself, aloud. “Get a grip.”

  My voice echoed off the slab pillars and the scalloped ceiling, absorbed by the deep shadows. I headed toward my car that was parked around the corner, hidden from view by a double column. As I approached the turn, walking briskly, I heard—something.

  Someone. Crying out. Choked, guttural, in agony.

  I dropped the briefcase and coat, took another step—

  And heard something else. Behind me. A staccato beating of footsteps, running fast to my left.

  I whirled in time to see another access door, at the far wall, closing. It clanged noisily.

  I turned back in the direction of the cry. At first I saw only my car, a green reconditioned ’69 Mustang, half in shadow, parked in its usual spot. In the space next to it was a beat-up looking Nissan.

  As I approached the vehicles, I heard the sound again. I broke into a run, looking wildly about.

  Where the hell—?

  He was in the darkened space between the two cars. Body crumpled on the cold asphalt. Covered in blood.

  It was Kevin Merrick.

  Panic tore through me in a fluid rush, as though my heart was pumping ice water. For a moment I couldn’t move. Or breathe.

  Forcing myself, willing each step, I came toward him, crouching beside him. I reached down and lifted his head, cradling him…for the second time that day.

  His eyes were wide, white with horror. His mouth moved, lips trembling, trying to form words. Only a scarlet foam trickled out.

  I looked down at his chest, at the spreading rivulets of blood. My mind raced blindly, trying to make sense of what I was seeing.

  He’d been stabbed. Repeatedly. Savagely. The blood was…everywhere. Seeping, lava-like, wet and dark. Pooling beneath us.

  Finally, as if tearing myself from a dream, I laid him back down on the asphalt and rummaged in my pockets for my cell phone. I found it and dialed 911.

  After leaving the address and confirming that an ambulance had been dispatched, I turned back to Kevin.

  But it was too late.

  Crouching again, I peered down into sad, lifeless eyes. Only his blood, forming an ever-widening circle on his chest, was moving.

  I sat back on my heels, stunned. I couldn’t swallow. Couldn’t think. I just sat there in the awful concrete silence, staring down at him.

  Then, through a fog of pain and shock, I became aware of something. Noticed something for the first time.

  Kevin was wearing my jacket.

  Chapter Five

  Sergeant Harry Polk, a beer keg in a wrinkled blue suit, stared at me as I sipped strong, hot coffee. He had the opaque eyes and dour expression of your basic middle-aged civil servant, a man who’d long accepted that most things in his life weren’t going to get much better.

  I met his gaze through a cloud of steam rising up from the mug. He then glanced at my hands, now washed clean. Only an hour before, amid the chaos of the parking garage, I’d stood in a taped-off corner, numb as a stone, while a Crime Scene tech wiped Kevin Merrick’s blood off my hands and deposited the swabs in a plastic evidence bag.

  The memory flickered in my mind. Patrol units with flashing lights. A crime lab van with blackened windows. CSU techs in jump suits. An ME wagon, whose bored driver leaned against the hood, listening to blaring hip-hop music. His partner, equally bored, zipping Kevin’s body into a large plastic bag.

  Polk was openly staring at my hands, with a cop’s interest. I’d wondered when he’d notice the purple marks, the discoloration around the knuckles.

  “You box?” Surprise etched his florid, drinker’s face.

  “Golden Gloves. Pan Am Games. A million years ago.”

  “You any good?”

  “Coulda been a contender.” My voice had an edge. Not a conversation I wanted to be having right then.

  “Why’d ya quit?”

  I shrugged. “Marriage. Grad school. Life…Now I just fool around a little in the gym.”

  He digested this in silence. I guess the picture didn’t quite fit the frame. I get that a lot.

  Polk nodded at the cassette recorder on the table between us. “Ya mind?” he asked.

  “I know the drill.”

  “Nothin’ to worry about. You’re a witn
ess, not a suspect. Got a consultant’s contract with the brass.” An insincere smile. “Hell, you’re practically family.”

  It was going to be a long night. I rubbed my neck, feeling the tight knots like lug nuts under the skin.

  Polk and I sat across from each other in a cramped, windowless interrogation room. There were four such rooms sharing the top floor of the old precinct house. A century of brutal Pittsburgh winters had etched huge worry lines in the face it showed the world.

  I thought of the rooms below us, the pallid faces of the uniforms on night-shift, the morgue-like ambiance. Old coffee, leftover sandwiches, fading careers.

  “Sorry you caught this one,” I said to Polk.

  A shrug. “Luck of the draw.” He looked at his watch. “Where the hell’s Lowrey?” His partner, I assumed.

  The closeness of the room was stifling. The pea-green walls, water-stained ceiling tiles, linoleum floors. The smell of sweat, cigarettes, and fear.

  I glanced at the thick mirror to my left. One-way observation window. Were we being observed? Hard to imagine the precinct captain and some Assistant DA coming down here in the middle of the night. Kevin Merrick was a poor college student with a psychiatric history and no family of consequence in the area. Nobody but a homicide detective on night shift, like Polk, would get out of bed for that. If the victim hadn’t been white, I doubted whether even Polk would’ve shown.

  “Fuck Lowrey,” Polk said. He turned on the recorder. “This is a preliminary interview with Dr. Daniel Rinaldi regarding the murder of Kevin Merrick, Case File Number 772-33. The time is 12:30 AM, Tuesday, October 12th.”

  His voice had become oddly stilted, formal. Being on tape made Polk nervous, I noted. After all his years on the force.

  “The victim was in treatment with you, Dr. Rinaldi?”

  “Yes, he’d been referred to me by Angela Villanova.”