About twenty minutes into the half-hour session was when Schmidt always asked: “Are you taking your medication?”
“Mostly.”
She nodded and frowned, a popular combination with her. “We know what happens, right, when we don’t take it? Do we need help being reminded about this?”
We. “Nah, we, I can handle it. I’ll put a beep into my phone.”
“Which is exactly what we said last time.”
“I couldn’t figure out how to do it.”
“Give me your phone,” she said.
I did, and she put the beep in there for me.
“So that’s how you. . Cool, thanks, Mrs. Schmidt.”
“It would be Ms. if it weren’t Doctor.” She took a break from the nodding but kept on frowning. “Any thoughts about rejoining wrestling?”
“Yeah, no, I’m not. It’s too much. PSATs coming up.” Like I’d even cracked the book. That stupid vocabulary builder download? I need to know that ramify and bifurcate are synonyms, if they even are?
“How we doing on the college planning? Any schools jumping out at us?”
Accruing half a million dollars in high-interest loan debt for an engineering degree I can steal online? No. “Taking my time looking, enjoying the information-gathering process, you know.”
“Jay, we need to develop interests.”
“I know we do. And I appreciate the time you’ve taken to try to help us in that regard. I’m grateful. Really.” Really I just didn’t want my father to kick my ass for not showing up to therapy.
And then it came, the question that wasn’t a we but a you: “What do you want to do? With your life, I mean.”
“Dedicate myself to bringing the drinking age down to twelve.”
“We’re very distracted today. C’mon, Jay, what’s up? And no BS, I’ll be able to tell. You’re a very bad liar.”
Actually, I was a very good liar. But I was looking at Schmidt’s hands, really wrinkled, chipped cheap nail polish. I felt sorry for her for a second, so sorry I felt compelled to tell her the truth. “What’s on my mind, Doctor, is why haven’t the cops caught the punk who messed up Nicole Castro?”
She nodded like a bobblehead doll. “I hear you, Jay. It’s very difficult to figure out why someone would do such a horrible thing. It wasn’t traumatizing to Nicole alone but to all of us. We have this burning desire to know, to help. At the same time, we need to leave the crime-solving to the detectives, don’t we?”
“But what if they don’t nab him before he gets her again?”
Schmidt leaned back in her chair. “Now, why would you say that, Jay? According to the investigators, it’s highly unlikely the attacker will try for another strike, not with all the scrutiny. And even if that were to happen, we’re nearly assured the perpetrator won’t go after Nicole. The damage is done. The attacker’s goal was met. The operating thesis is that this was a one-time event.”
“The operating thesis. That’s pretty funny.”
“I don’t know if I’d call it funny. Look, nearly all of the case studies show that acid throwers are not serial actors. They more often than not know their victims or imagine they have some sort of relationship with them. They feel the target has forsaken or wronged them in some way, and they’re almost always motivated by revenge. Once they get their payback, they’re done.”
“Until the next time he remembers what made him mad in the first place.”
“How do you know it’s a man?”
“Excuse me?”
“Has it ever crossed your mind that maybe the attacker is a woman? For instance, somebody insanely jealous of Nicole?”
I’d never really looked into Schmidt’s eyes before that. They were this stunning gray, so light the irises almost blended in with the sclera. My eyes went to the windowsill just behind her, one of those picture frame digital clocks. An old black-and-white snapshot, a baby in a swing, wide angle, nobody else in the picture. The readout went from 4:59 to 5:00. Without looking at the clock, never letting her eyes drift from mine, Schmidt said, “I guess that’s all the time we have today.”
Somebody jealous of Nicole, huh? Way to narrow it down, Doctor.