The Program

Chapter thirty-six

Walking down the hall, Tim could hear the murmur of Dray's voice. Morning light suffused the kitchen, a pale stillness that bleached the polished counters.

Leah's mouth hovered over a bowl of Lucky Charms, her pistoning arm providing elevator service for yellow moons and blue diamonds. Despite nearly twelve hours of unrestricted access to the kitchen, still she ate like a war orphan. Between her and Dray, Tim was beginning to feel anorexic.

Leah wore Dray's favorite academy sweatshirt; when she caught the milk dribbling down her chin with a swipe of the sleeve, Dray didn't even object. Leah's skin was a healthy, well-scrubbed pink, her hair shiny and nicely combed, bangs covering the abrasions at the hairline.

"Morning," Leah and Dray said simultaneously.

Tim forced a smile. An emptiness had replaced his stomach since he'd surrendered his badge last night. "Ready?"

Leah released a shuddering sigh.

Dray popped her vitamins, then tapped a few extras from the jar and pushed them across the table at Leah. "Grab some juice and take these."

Leah got up and perused the inside of the refrigerator. "Orange juice or apple?"

"Whatever you want."

Leah stared at Tim as if he'd spoken another language. Tim stared back. Leah glanced inside the refrigerator, then at Tim and Dray – a momentary crisis. "Just tell me."

"Go on and choose for yourself, Leah."

Leah reached tentatively for one carton, then the other. She shook her head, and tears streaked down her cheeks.

Dray got up, pulled out the OJ, and poured her a glass.

If we attack the cult directly, she'll either shut off or drown us in dogma," Bederman said. "Focusing on the cult's controlling aspects will get us further. But she's got to make the connections herself."

Tim sat beside him on the sagging twin bed they'd pushed against the wall to make room for a ring of chairs. Reggie had moved the plastic wastebasket so he could settle on the floor with his back to the corner and the brown paper bag in his lap. After a cursory examination of the motel room's furnishings, Emma had elected to stand, remaining cautiously erect in the center of the thinning carpet. When she'd met Reggie, she'd taken his hand with a thumb and two fingers, as if grasping a soiled diaper.

Will faced the gauzy window curtains, his hands clasped behind him. Outside, a garbage truck impaled a Dumpster and hoisted it overhead, curling like a great clanking scorpion. The Dumpster discharged its contents and began its noisy descent.

"Perhaps you could turn around?" Bederman said.

Will pivoted, thumbs bent over the rim of his plastic cup. On the sill rested two empty minibar Absoluts, caps discarded among the dead flies. Though he'd forgone a tie, he looked ridiculously formal in a suit.

Through wire-frame spectacles, Bederman regarded him evenly. "We've got to help her envision a happy future outside the cult."

Lank hair down in his eyes, Reggie spread his arms. "Ta-da!"

"We want to give her as much of a sense of control as possible. Reggie's got the right idea, sitting on the floor so we don't seem threatening."

"I'd prefer not to sit on the floor," Emma said.

"Perhaps you could consider a chair." Bederman gestured at Will, who'd moved to lean importantly against the bureau. "And you, too."

Emma brushed off the seat with her hand and sat at the edge. "I feel like I don't know who she is anymore. If she does come home, it'll be like having a stranger -"

"You'll need to go to therapy," Bederman said. "All of you."

Will remained standing. "What is it with this town and shrinks? For people here it's like going to the barber." He drained his cup and dropped it into the wastebasket. "I haven't gone to a shrink in fifty-eight years -"

"Big surprise, that," Reggie said.

"- and I certainly don't need to start because my stepdaughter got herself turned around."

"It was my understanding that Leah is your daughter," Bederman said. "By adoption."

Tim said, "To salvage your family, is it such a sacrifice to sit in an air-conditioned office for an hour a week and talk about your mother?"

Emma's face took on a sudden sternness. "Sometimes I think we'd all be better off if we just let her go ahead into whatever life she wanted."

Will went rigid. "Emma."

A knock sounded at the door, and then Dray stuck her head in. "Ready?"

Bederman nodded. Dray held the door open, her attention directed patiently just around the jamb. Maybe a full minute passed. Finally Leah trudged into the room. Dray withdrew silently, closing the door.

Leah swept her fingers over an ear, hooking back her stray hair, and risked a glance up at her parents. "Hi."

Emma gasped. Tim wondered what her reaction would have been to seeing Leah before she'd cleaned herself up. Will had gone back to assessing the garbage truck's progress. In Leah's gaze at her stepfather's back, Tim felt the burn of her desired approval.

"Hi, Will."

"Turn around and face your daughter," Bederman said.

Bent slightly at the waist, Will raised a hand to his face and held it there a moment. When he finally turned, his eyes were moist but his expression impenetrable. "Leah."

They studied each other. It was as if they were alone in the room.

"I'm Glen, and this is Reggie. We're here with your parents because we want to find out more about you -"

"Why are my parents here?"

Emma remained frozen in the chair, her face drawn and bloodless. Will's hands fussed as if desirous of a rocks glass.

"Well," Bederman finally said, "because they love you and they're concerned about you."

Leah kept her eyes on Will. "Really?"

"Yes, really," Will said. "Christ, Leah. This has been awful for us, your mother -"

"I'm sorry to have made your life difficult."

"- you running off half-cocked -"

"Mr. Henning." Bederman's voice had the sharp anger of a disobeyed parent, and as much authority. Amazingly, Will was silenced; he appeared shocked at his own obedience.

Bederman removed his spectacles and polished them on his shirt, first one lens, then the other. "Would you like to come in and sit down, Leah?" With an open hand, he indicated one of the chairs. She sat, and the others joined her, except Reggie, who stayed in the corner, looking as if he might barf.

"I love The Program," Leah said. "It's the most important thing that's ever happened to -"

"That's just what you think now," Will said.

Bederman silenced him again with a terse gesture and said to Leah, "I understand that. And we want to talk more about that. But at some point we'd also like to hear a few of the things you don't like about The Program."

Leah's cheeks colored. "There's nothing I don't like."

A grimace tightened Will's face. "She's brainwashed. Completely -"

"I am not."

Bederman directed a stern look Will's way before turning back to Leah. "Nothing on earth is perfect, right?"

Leah thought this one over for a few moments. "I don't know. I haven't experienced most of what there is on earth."

"Is The Program perfect? I mean flawless?" Bederman pressed on gently when she didn't answer. "Everything has flaws, right?"

Leah shifted her jaw to one side, then back. "So I'm told."

Bederman asked Leah to enumerate some of The Program's positive aspects. Will and Emma squirmed during this but didn't interject. After spending some time talking about what Leah liked about the group, Bederman resumed his earlier line of questioning. "What are some of The Program's flaws?"

"I guess…I guess it's not growing fast enough."

Will made a perturbed sound through his teeth.

"Okay," Bederman said. "That's a fair answer."

Leah scratched her rash, hard, through Dray's sweatshirt. "And maybe…maybe I wish it was a little more forgiving." A flash of panic in her eyes. "But that's just my weakness -"

"No," Bederman said. "That's a fine answer, too." His hand rasped across his well-trimmed beard. "Is there anything that would make you consider leaving The Program?"

An immediate answer – "No."

"Nothing at all? Use your imagination – it doesn't have to be real. Say you found out they were planning a mass suicide or running a child-pornography ring."

"Or the extermination of the indigenous people of Guatemala? It's not possible. TD's no more capable of that than we are."

Will made an exasperated sound against his teeth, but Bederman just smiled at her. "Okay. Okay." He nodded a few times thoughtfully. "If you'd never met TD – if TD and The Program didn't even exist -and you could do exactly what you wanted to do with your life, what would that be?"

Chewing her lip, she thought for a few minutes, shifting in her chair so she sat nearly sideways on her hip. Tears welled in her eyes, and then she said in a cracked whisper, "I don't think I want to answer that right now."

Will said, "We're all here for you to answer -"

"We invited her. She came at our invitation, as much to ask us questions as to answer ours." Bederman's voice stayed soft, but it had taken on an edge. Will's testiness might have met its match.

Leah's eyes had gone cold. "You don't know anything about TD. He knows what works for people. You're just too weak to want to see it."

In the corner Reggie's head snapped up. He'd been so silent, Tim had almost forgotten about him. "I thought that, too," Reggie said. "I really did."

Leah twisted in her chair to stare at him. Her mouth moved, but no words came out.

Reggie leaned back, compressing his shoulders as if trying to melt into the wall. "That's right – I'm the one lucky bastard who made it out. So I'll put it to you: If you were the enlightened one, would you act how he does? Break people down? Take their money? Have virgins rouse him in the morning with hand jobs?"

Emma sagged back in her chair. Will tensed. "Is that true? While we were desperately looking for you, you were off at a ranch jerking off some false messiah?" Emma moaned, and Will laid a protective hand on her shoulder. Leah looked away. "Jesus," he continued, "did you even think about how worried we -"

"No, I didn't think about you. Either of you. I thought about myself and what I wanted for once." Leah looked squarely at her mother. "I don't have to take on your weaknesses."

"Take on our weaknesses?" Will was apoplectic. "You sound like a machine. What you're doing up there, Leah, has got nothing to do with being strong. It's laziness. You're too lazy to face the real world."

"Hey, Pops," Reggie said, "when's the last time you hauled your ass up at six and worked a twenty-hour day?"

"You evidently know very little about film production. I've done it plenty. And it's a bit more stressful than watching the fish tank at a roadside fuckshack. What goes on at that 'ranch' is not work. It's immaturity."

"Don't attack him," Leah said.

Bederman started to object as well, but Emma cut him off, all gentle reason and apologetic eyes. "You've always had poor judgment, Leah."

Leah blew out a shaky breath. "It's just like he warned me."

Will's face was twisted with disgust. "What does that mean? What did the Teacher tell you?"

Leah bent her slender neck, studying the carpet. "That you'd insult me and my practices. That you'd rant, not listen."

Will sputtered for a moment before finding words. "You leave us no choice. You spout recorded nonsense that can't be listened to. There's no reasoning with you."

"Well, how about you, Will? You have your head in a bottle half the day and the other half it's up Colin Farrell's agent's ass – is that living in the real world like a mature person?" Leah turned to Emma, who was drawn back in her chair, hand clasped to the silk scarf knotted at her throat. "And you're gonna teach me about judgment? St. Ursula has nothing on you in the martyr department. People don't even exist to you – they're just walking potentials for inconvenience."

Will withdrew a cell phone from his pocket and punched one button at length. His sweaty face was trembling. "I'm not going to sit here and be judged. It wasn't easy being your parent. You can pick at us all you want, but you're the one who made a foolish, dangerous decision. What you're doing is stupid, Leah. Everyone in this room knows I'm right. We just have to pretend to indulge you so -"

"Don't you dare presume to state my position," Bederman said.

Tim rose toward the door, eyes on Will, the cell phone in his lap. "What was that?"

The knob jiggled, and Rooch and Doug shouldered in. Tim swept Leah behind him. Bederman and Will were yelling at each other. Emma leaked tears, kneading her slender white forearm against her belly with a freckled hand. Shoving himself back into the corner, Reggie bent his arms over his head like a kid in a duck-and-cover drill.

"Enough of this nonsense, Leah," Will said. "The car's waiting."

Leah clung to Tim's back. "You swore. You swore you wouldn't let them."

Dray arrived, winded from the brief sprint across the parking lot, but Rooch put an arm across the doorway, blocking her entry. Doug tugged up his shirt like a dealer punk, showing off the handle of the big-dick. 44 Magnum at his waist – no respect for the weapon. Neither Tim nor Dray was armed.

"Hey, now," Will said nervously. He raised a placating hand to Doug. "Hey, now."

Bederman backed away until he bumped against a wall. Through his shirt Tim felt the heat of Leah's face pressed to his shoulder blade.

"Will," Emma said in a hoarse, outraged whisper. "We never -"

"You don't want to do this," Tim said. "You're committing an armed kidnapping and assaulting a sheriff's deputy and a federal officer."

"You're not a federal officer," Will said, "since last night." He gestured at Doug to lower his shirt and looked at his daughter. "We're trying to do what's best for you. We're trying to protect you."

"You'll go down for this," Dray said.

"You call your contacts, Mrs. Rackley, I'll call mine." Will turned back to Leah. "We're not wasting any more time. You've made your point. We can work it out at home. Let's go."

Leah stayed put.

Reggie stood up. "Look at me. Look at me." Will finally acknowledged him. Reggie knocked his chest with his fingers. "You want her to end up watching the fish tank at a roadside fuckshack? Just keep it up."

Will's tough facade wavered. "We can't have her go back to that place." He pivoted back to Doug. "Take her, and let's go."

Doug worked his gum nervously. Though, like Rooch, he outweighed Tim by at least fifty pounds, he was no longer exuding confidence.

"Let me make something clear," Tim said. "If you make so much as a move toward her, I'll break your arm."

Rooch held his ground at the door. Doug pulled the revolver from his waistband, keeping it angled limply at the carpet.

Emma let out a strangled little gasp.

"Doug," Will said. "No need to -"

Tim's voice remained calm, his hands spread slightly before his chest, ready. "Never draw a weapon unless you're prepared to use it."

Doug's wide jaw bounced as he clicked his teeth. "What makes you think -"

Tim darted across the tight circle of chairs. The edge of his right hand struck the top of the rising barrel, fingers curling near the base of the hammer and locking the cylinder. He twisted down and away, his other hand striking Doug's hyperextended elbow, which broke with a single sharp pop.

Doug yowled, his torso diving to the floor. Tim stepped over the distorted arm before Doug hit carpet, straining the now-limp limb at the socket, the grotesque bend of the forearm permitting Tim to aim the double-clutched revolver directly at Rooch's head.

Doug's shoulder, smashed across his face, muffled his groans.

Rooch's forehead had compressed into a mass of wrinkles.

"Release," Tim said.

Doug writhed on the carpet. "I…can't."

Tim eased the arm back a few degrees, and the fingers popped open on their own. He snapped the gun wheel free and thumbed it into a spin, letting the bullets drop one by one into his palm. He pocketed the empty gun and said, without removing his eyes from Rooch's, "Dray, come on in."

Rooch moved out of her way, and she stepped through the door and over Doug's body.

"Leah, you're going to step back and sit on the bed now," Tim said. "Go on."

Wiping her nose, Leah moved over and sat.

Tim grasped Doug beneath the arms and hoisted him to his feet. "Rooch is going to drive you to the Brotman Medical Center to have your arm set."

Doug swayed a bit. "O-okay."

Tim gave him a little shove toward Rooch, who tucked his bull neck beneath Doug's functional arm and helped him out. Tim closed the door and stood for a moment, holding the knob. Finally he advanced on Will, who shrank back against the wall. Tim brought his face within inches of Will's and said, "I would advise strongly against your considering another stunt like that."

Bederman glared at Will, clearly too disgusted to speak.

Her makeup staining her bleak face, Emma headed out. Will cast a defeated, heartbroken glance at Leah. "That's fine. You want to ruin the rest of your life, you have my blessing. Go ahead."

He paused at the door. A slight movement turned his profile so it pointed at Leah, even if his eyes did not.

"I'm sorry, sweetheart," he said, and then he walked out.

Reggie lingered alone in the parking lot as the others left, scratching his neck and walking in tight circles. Tim paused pulling out of his parking space, watching Reggie through the window. He killed the engine, glanced at Dray and Leah. "Hold on a sec."

He headed over to Reggie, but Bederman stepped out of his car and got there first. Tim lingered back a few steps.

"May I walk you to your room?" Bederman asked.

Reggie exhaled deeply, then nodded like a little kid.

They walked down the corridor together, Bederman tapping Reggie on the shoulder when he walked past his own door.

Reggie turned the key and shoved.

Blinking curiously, Bederman beheld the impressive condition of the room. "Okay, okay." He made a ticking noise with his tongue. "Are you happy living here?"

"Yeah. Thrilled."

They stood side by side, regarding the room like a swamp they were considering plunging into. Tim watched quietly, not wanting to interfere.

Reggie kicked the toe of his shoe into the ground. "It's like everything else. Just so fucking daunting." They stood outside the threshold, looking in. "I can't do it anymore. I can't go in there."

"Maybe fifteen minutes," Bederman said. "Maybe fifteen minutes cleaning up a day isn't daunting."

Reggie chewed his lip, mulling it over.

Bederman waited. And waited.

Finally Reggie said, "Maybe it's not."

Resting a hand on Reggie's back, Bederman strode with him into the mess.