"Rob is a bully," I said. "He has been since third grade. If you want some signs of aggression, just follow him around for a few hours."
"Aggression is normal in a fifteen-year-old boy," said Neblin, "bully or otherwise. Where I get concerned is when that aggression comes from a sociopathic fifteen-year-old who's obsessed with death—especially when, up until now, you've been a model of nonconfrontational behavior. "What's changed for you recently, John?"
"Well, there's a serial killer in town stealing people's body parts. You may have heard; it's been in the news."
"Has the presence of a killer in town affected you?"
The monster behind the wall stirred.
“It’s very close," I said, "closer than I've ever been to the killers I study. I'll check out books and go online and read about serial killers for—well, not for fun, but you know what I mean—but they're all so far away. They're real, and their realness is part of what's fascinating, but. .. this is Nowhere, USA.
They're supposed to be real somewhere else, not here." ,
"Are you afraid of the killer?"
"I'm not afraid of being killed," I said. "All three victims so far have been grown men, so I assume he's going to stick to that pattern—that means I'm safe, and Mom and Margaret and Lauren are safe."
"What about your father?"
"My father's not here," I said. "I don't even know where he is.
"But are you afraid for him?"
"No," I said slowly. It was true, but there was something I wasn't telling him, and I could tell that he knew it.
"Is there anything else?"
"Should there be?" I asked.
"If you don't want to talk about it, we won't," said Neblin.
"But what if we need to?" I asked.
"Then we will."
Sometimes therapists could be so open-minded, it was a miracle they kept anything in there at all. I stared at him for a while, weighing the pros and cons of the conversation I knew would come, and eventually decided it couldn't hurt.
"I had a dream last week that my dad was the killer," I said.
Neblin didn't react. "What did he do?"
"I don't know, he didn't even come see me."
"Did you want him to take you with him when he killed?" asked Neblin.
"No," I said, uncomfortable in my chair. " I . . . wanted to take him with me, where he couldn't kill anymore."
"What happened next?"
Suddenly I didn't want to talk about what happened next, even though I was the one who brought it up. It was selfcontradictory, I know, but dreams about killing your dad can do that to you. "Can we talk about something else?"
"Sure we can," he said, and made a note on his paper.
"Can I see that note?" I asked.
"Sure." Neblin passed me his pad.
First reason: Killer in town.
Doesn't want to talk about father.
"Why'd you write 'first reason'?" I asked.
"The first reason you scared Rob Anders. Are there more?"
"I don't know," I said.
"If you don't want to talk about your father, how about your mother?"
The monster behind the wall stirred. I'd come to think of it as a monster, but it.was just me. Or the darker part of me, at least. You probably think it would be creepy to have a real monster hiding inside of you, but trust me—it's far, far worse when the monster is really just your own mind. Calling it a monster seemed to distance it a little, which made me feel better about it. Not much better, but I take what I can get.
"My mother is an idiot," I said, "and she won't let me into the back of the mortuary anymore. It's been almost a month."
"Until last night, nobody's died for almost a month," he said. "Why did you want to go in the back room if there was no work to do there?"
"I used to go there a lot, to think," I said. "I liked it."
"Do you have anywhere else you can go and think?"
"I go to Freak Lake," I said, "but it's too cold now."
"Freak Lake?"
"Clayton Lake," I said. "There's a lot of weird people there. But I practically grew up in that mortuary—she can't take that away."
"You told me before that you'd only been helping in the back for a few years," said Dr. Neblin. "Are there other parts of the mortuary you have an attachment to?"
"That reporter died last night," I said, ignoring his question, "and we might get him—they'll send him home for a funeral, of course, but they might send him to us first for embalming. I need to see that body and she's not going to let me."
Neblin paused.
"Why do you need to see the body?" he asked.
"To know what he's thinking," I said, looking out the window. "I'm trying to understand him."
"The killer?"
"There's something wrong about him and I can't figure it out.
"Well," said Neblin, "We can talk about the killer, if that's what you want."
"Really?"
"Really. But when we're done, you need to answer any question I ask."
"What question?"
"You'll find out when I ask it," said Neblin, smiling. "So, what do you know about the killer?"
"Did you know he stole a kidney from the first body?"