Blood Memory

Chapter 33

“I’ve always needed certain things during sex,” I say softly. “Pain, for example. Nothing masochistic really, but justvery physical penetration. With fingers, objectsI don’t know. And choking. Sometimes I have this intense desire to be choked during sex.”

Michael is still leaning back from the dinner table, but I sense a new alertness in him. “And?”

“I have a problem reaching orgasm. Even if I get those things I want, it just doesn’t happen for me. On one hand I have this hyper-active sex drive, but on the other, I can’t make it to the point of release. Not with a man, I mean. I can do it alone. But with men, it’s this maddening spiral upward without ever being able to break through.”

“But the men you’re with think you’re the best sexual partner they ever had, right?”

Now I’m really blushing. “They say so.”

“All classic signs of past sexual abuse. Pain was part of your sexual imprinting, just like secrecy. Your father may have put his hands around your throat during sex. Or maybe you just felt you couldn’t breathe during the acts. Maybe that’s what you’re trying to repeat with the choking. That makes me wonder about your free diving, too. Lying on pool bottoms for five minutes at a time to relax? That would put most people into a coma.”

“I guess it is kind of a red flag.”

“And your sexual performance? That’s the easiest thing of all to understand. From childhood you were trained to please a man sexually. That was the only goal of the abuse, and your survival instinct made you learn it well. So, you’re an expert at giving pleasure. You just can’t feel it yourself.”

“I guess.”

“The good news is that now that you’re aware of the abuse, this therapist you like-Dr. Goldman?-she should be able to make some real progress with you.”

“Maybe. But right now I just want to pretend it never happened. Even if it’s the answer to everything, I don’t want to think about it.”

“Who would? That’s a normal response.” Michael gets up and starts clearing the table. “I’m actually more concerned about this murder case you’re working on. I mean, somebody tried to blow your brains out tonight.”

I carry the glasses to the sink, and he starts rinsing the plates to put in the dishwasher. “I’m not sure that has to do with the murder case,” I tell him.

“What, then? These revelations of abuse? Your father’s been dead for twenty years.”

“What about the Vietnam angle?”

“You think someone’s trying to prevent thirty-year-old atrocities from coming to light? You said Jesse Billups served in a whole different theater of the war than your father. I don’t think that’s it, Cat.”

“Then what?”

“I think the murders in New Orleans are somehow connected to your life here. To your past. Maybe even to your abuse, though I can’t see how. But sexual abuse is the common factor in both situations.”

It’s oddly familiar, standing in a kitchen batting around theories about a murder case with a man. Only the man I’m doing it with is not familiar.

“Both Pearlie and Louise told you that Tom Cage was your father’s doctor here in town. He’s been practicing for more than forty years, and he’s a great guy. You should talk to him about the Vietnam stuff. Do you know him?”

In my mind I see a tall man with a salt-and-pepper beard and twinkling eyes. “I know who he is. I don’t think he likes my grandfather much.”

“That wouldn’t surprise me. Tom Cage is the opposite of your grandfather. He never gave a damn about making money. He just treats sick people. I’ll be glad to call him for you, if you like. Set up a meeting.”

“Maybe tomorrow.”

Michael turns on the dishwasher, then takes a tub of Blue Bell ice cream from the freezer and starts scooping it into two bowls. “This is my reward for doing a good deed tonight,” he says with a smile. “I didn’t ask if you wanted any, because I knew you’d say no. I’ll have to run an extra mile tomorrow morning.”

“I think I already got my workout tonight.”

“No doubt. Hey, who knew you were going to that island today?”

I think about it as we walk to the table. “Pearlie. My grandfather and his driver. Somebody probably told Mom after I was gone. I guess Mose, the yardman, could have found out.”

Michael slowly stirs his ice cream. “Once you were on the island, word probably spread quickly that you were there. But I don’t think it was anybody from that island who tried to kill you. I think somebody followed you there, or found out you went there and went after you.”

“But I don’t get it. What good does killing me do anybody?”

“ Good is a relative term. What good did killing the other five victims do?”

“You’re right. If I knew that, I could solve the case.”

“I know you feel like this Dr. Malik isn’t the killer. But you’re not stable enough right now to make that kind of judgment.”

“I know. When I’m off my meds, I feel much more alive and in the moment, but that comes at a price. My memory and logic definitely suffer. Maybe if I wean myself completely, they’ll come back.”

“Malik’s at the center of this whole mess. He’s the only known connection between you and the New Orleans murders. He’s already demonstrated that he’s fixated on you. I think you should consider him the prime suspect.”

I hold some ice cream in my mouth, savoring the rich taste of vanilla. “Wellthe FBI is already searching for him, and he couldn’t have known I was on the island.”

“You don’t know that. You do know he’s going to call you back, yet you haven’t told the FBI that. Why?”

“How do you know I haven’t?”

Michael’s eyes say, Give me a break. “I think you want to talk to Dr. Malik without anyone listening in. You think he can figure out things about your life that other therapists never could.”

“Like?”

“Like why this abuse happened to you. Proof that it did happen. That’s one thing I read today about people with delayed memories of abuse. Even when they manage to find proof that their memories are real, they still doubt the truth of what comes back to them.”

This gives me an unexpected chill. “Why?”

“Because accepting that the abuse really happened means accepting that the person who abused them never really loved them. To accept your abuse, Cat, the little girl inside of you is going to have to admit, My daddy never loved me. Do you think you can do that? I’m not sure I could.”

I’ve never wanted ice cream less than I want it now.

“That’s the core of this whole problem,” Michael reflects. “Denial. Mothers deny it’s happening to their children so they can keep their families together. The rest of us refuse to believe that our doctor or our minister or the nice mailman is having sex with his three-year-old child, because if we do, we admit that the whole veneer of civilization is bullshit. Worse, we’d have to admit the danger that our own kids are in. Because if we can’t recognize the abusers we shake hands with every day, how can we protect our children?”

“This is a depressing conversation.”

“You want to watch that movie now?”

“God, no. I want to sleep for thirty hours straight.”

“Then that’s what you should do.” Michael shrugs as if we’re on vacation together, deciding whether to go out to dinner or to eat in. “I don’t blame you for not wanting to go home. Going back into the physical space where the abuse happened to you can’t be a good idea.”

“Do you really have a guest room I can stay in?”

He smiles. “I have three. You’ll have total privacy. The whole second floor is yours. You won’t know I’m here unless you come downstairs and find me.”

I wait a moment before speaking. “I don’t want to sound ungrateful, but guys have made me promises like that before. They never seem to live up to them.”

“I’m not most guys.”

“I believe you. But why aren’t you?”

A self-deprecating smile. “Probably because my puberty years sucked so badly. I understand deferred gratification.”

“Is that what you want from this relationship, though? In the end? Gratification?”

Michael suddenly looks very serious. “I’m not thinking that far ahead, okay? I don’t even know if you’re sane enough to handle a real relationship. I just like you. I always did. I also happen to think you’re beautiful. But anyone can see that. The point is, you can stay here as long as you want, and you don’t have to worry about sex being in the mix.”

I don’t know why, but I believe him. “Okay, deal. Show me the bedroom.”

“You can find it. Upstairs is all you need to know. Take your pick.”

The wide smile on my face surprises me. Before it can fade, I turn and walk to the foyer, where the stairs are. I remember the layout from when the Hemmeters owned the house. As I put my foot on the second step, I hear Michael’s voice.

“I have to go to work in the morning,” he says, walking into the foyer. “But I’m going to leave the Expedition for you.”

“What will you drive?”

“I have a motorcycle.”

“A motorcycle?”

“Does that surprise you?”

“Well” A strange laugh escapes my lips. “You have a plane and a motorcycle. I guess I associate that with a certain kind of guy. And you don’t seem like that kind of guy.”

“It doesn’t pay to stereotype people.”

“Touché.”

He takes a step back toward the kitchen. “I’ll leave the keys on the counter.”

I start to go up, but something has been nagging me since he said it. “Michael, what you said beforeabout why mothers keep quiet about abuse going on in their homes?”

“Yes?”

“You said they do it to keep their families together, right?”

“Right.”

“I would think that’s because the father in those situations is the primary breadwinner. The source of support for the whole family.”

Michael nods. “Exactly. The abuser creates a situation in which everyone in the family is dependent upon him. By denying the abuse, the mother avoids her worst nightmares of abandonment and poverty.”

“But that doesn’t work in my case, see? For my family.”

“Because your father wasn’t the provider?”

“Right. My grandfather was.”

“What about your father’s sculpting?”

“He didn’t make any real money from that until a couple of years before his death. Grandpapa paid for everything. I mean, we lived in his slave quarters, for God’s sake. It sounds terrible, but if my dad had been hit by a bus, it wouldn’t have affected our situation in the least.”

“Materially speaking,” Michael says. “But money isn’t everything. Based on what you’ve told me tonight, I think your father’s early death went a long way toward wrecking your life.”

He’s right, of course.

Michael steps back toward the staircase. “So why would your mother deny that your father was abusing you if she didn’t have to fear losing him?”

I feel blood heat my cheeks. “Right.”

“It may be that she didn’t really know about it. But thinkyour father returned from Vietnam with severe post-traumatic stress disorder. He told you himself that you couldn’t be around him at certain times. Now you’ve learned that he was part of a military unit that committed atrocities during the war. It would probably be difficult to overestimate your mother’s fear of what that man might do to her-or to you-if she confronted him about abuse, or worse, tried to take you away from him.”

Michael’s logic leaves me in cold shock. Why is it so easy to see the essential nature of relationships in other people’s families but not in our own? I’ve been angry at my mother for years, and I didn’t know why. Today I thought I’d discovered the reason. But nowgiven an idea of what it must have been like to live with Daddy, not as a blindly loving daughter but as a wife, my mother seems a completely different person to me.

Michael lays his hand over mine, which is resting on the newel post. “Get some sleep, Cat. It’s going to take a while for all this to sink in.”

I’ve gotten similar advice countless times from the women in my life: Go to sleep. Everything will look better in the morning. But it doesn’t sound the same coming from Michael. He has no illusions that things will be better tomorrow. “Thanks,” I tell him. “I mean it.”

“You’re welcome.” He withdraws his hand and walks back toward the kitchen.

I slowly climb the stairs and flick on the light in the first bedroom to my right. The walls are pale yellow, and the queen bed has a white comforter on it. Walking to the window, I see that it overlooks the glowing blue rectangle of the swimming pool.

I can sleep here.

The bathroom is stocked with towels and toiletries, even a new toothbrush. I strip off the warm-up pants and T-shirt Michael brought me, then lean into the shower to turn the faucet handles. Before I can, the opening notes of “Sunday, Bloody Sunday” fill the bathroom. I glance at the screen of my cell phone, and my pulse instantly accelerates. It’s a New Orleans number that I don’t recognize. Nathan Malik?

I press SEND and then hold the phone to my ear.

“Dr. Ferry?” says a man who sounds nothing like Dr. Malik.

“Yes?” I say cautiously.

“This is John Kaiser. I need to talk to you about Nathan Malik.”