Robert B. Parker’s Blood Feud

Twelve

I was having my weekly session with Dr. Susan Silverman in the office at her home on Linnaean Street in Cambridge.

There had been times in my life when I had seen Dr. Silverman twice a week. Almost always, in the course of our fifty minutes together, the subject would involve Richie.

So it did today.

“At least,” I said, “I feel as if my feelings about him are uncomplicated this time.”

“Are they?” she said.

She was as beautiful as ever, in a way that was both ageless and timeless. And, if you were a woman, more than somewhat annoying. I had always thought it pointless to try guessing her actual age, though I knew it wouldn’t take much crackerjack detecting to find out. I knew she would probably tell me if asked. When I sometimes did imagine myself asking, I could picture her smiling at me and saying, “How old do you think I am?” Or simply asking me why it mattered.

She had hair that was intensely dark, flawless skin, and an intelligence that felt almost kinetic in a room that today was splashed with sunlight. Often I really would leave this office feeling as if I knew myself better. Always, though, I wondered if I would ever have the sense of self that Susan Silverman clearly did.

Today she was wearing a navy suit with pants and a white shirt underneath and makeup and eyeliner that I knew required both time and effort and an almost professional expertise.

“Sunny,” she said now, “I seem to have lost you there for a second. You had suggested that you felt a clarity to your response to Richie being shot.”

“It was partially anger,” I said, “and partially fear about how easily I could have lost him if the shooter had wanted him dead.”

“Lost him in a random and violent and unexpected way,” she said. “Even in a random world.”

“It’s ironic, if you think about it,” I said.

She leaned forward, elbows on her desk, and made a tent with her fingers under her chin, her focus both calm and fierce at the same time.

“In what way?” she said.

“I’ve always known that Richie was raised within the structure of a violent family,” I said. “But as far as I know, the violence of the world of his father and uncles had somehow never reached him.”

These were things that I had been thinking about and discussing with Richie and Spike and others. Just not with Dr. Silverman. It was as if I had come here today looking for some sort of bottom line.

“But because of my work as a private detective,” I said, “and even having been a cop before that, I’ve frequently encountered violence. It’s kind of a weird duality, don’t you think? At the very least, it’s ironic.”

Duality.

Look at you and your shrinky words, I thought.

Susan Silverman nodded.

“There’s always a lot of that going on with Richie and you, though, isn’t there? Duality and irony.”

“Yes.”

“What emotion was most powerful and present for you?” Susan Silverman asked. “The anger or the fear?”

I thought about that, because I hadn’t until now.

“Fear, I suppose.”

“Of losing him completely.”

“Yes.”

“After all the other different ways when you felt you lost him,” she said. “When he was dating other women, and even married one of them.”

“That was different.”

“Was it?” she said, her eyes big.

“He was still in my life,” I said, “even when he wasn’t.”

“But it was you,” Susan Silverman said, “who initiated the dissolution of your marriage.”

I said, “I could still see him when I wanted.” I smiled at her. “We’ve spoken of this before. We even shared custody of the original Rosie.”

I shifted in my chair. Recrossed my legs. There was no reason for me to feel as defensive in here as I sometimes did.

But I did.

“And you didn’t feel as if some sort of order had been restored to the universe the two of you share until he was the one who ended his second marriage,” she said.

I smiled. “Bastard finally came to his senses,” I said.

She offered a smile in return.

“You’ve suggested that your feelings for Richie are uncomplicated,” she said, “even though there is no clear resolution to them, or commitment from either one of you about the future.”

“I think I might have to table those issues,” I said, “until I find the sonofabitch who shot him.”

I snuck a look at my watch. I know she saw me do it. Only a few minutes left in the session.

“There might be one other thing to consider,” Susan Silverman said. “Perhaps you feel the sense of purpose that you’re feeling right now, and clarity, because you’ve decided that in this particular case he needs you more than you need him.”

“Gotta admit,” I said. “Didn’t see that one coming.”

She tilted her head just slightly and raised an eyebrow, though not as artfully as Spike could. She wasn’t perfect.

“Kind of my thing,” she said. “And something else for you to consider until next time.”

She stood and smiled and said, “While you are occupied with the rat-bastard sonofabitch who shot your ex-husband.”

The mouth on her.

And her such a lady.