I’m back on the interstate minutes later, headed north, going as fast as I dare.
A cast of characters caper through my mind as I make the drive back to Lake Placid: Little Tom Bishop, his mother, his dead father. I have the autopsy report, complete with graphic photos of his obliterated head. Like something from some scary gore-fest magazine kids at grade school used to bring around.
With the phone hooked into the vehicle, I try the lake house again. For the third time.
This time, Paul answers. “Hey,” he says, sounding sleepy. “How’s it going?”
“Where have you been?”
“Huh? Right here. Well — I was working on the boat.”
“Where are the kids?”
“What’s the matter?” It sounds like he’s fully awake now. I picture him sitting up in bed.
“Laura Bishop just got out of prison,” I blurt.
“She got out of prison? What do you mean? You mean parole?”
“Guess how I found out?” I tell him about Starzyk and even get into what Bleeker told me about the police maybe targeting the wife for the wrong reasons. But Paul isn’t as caught up as I am — he’s more focused on me.
“Are you driving?”
“Yes. I’m coming home tonight. I’m already past Albany, so don’t try and talk me out of it.”
“It’s after one o’clock, Em. You won’t — here — three in the — ning,” he says.
“Paul, I’m losing you. Going through a bad spot. But everything is okay?”
I can’t make out his reply. “I’ll call you back,” I say, and then add, loudly — “Just check on Joni, okay?”
I think I hear him affirm that he will, but I can’t be sure. I curse the spotty cellular service and hang up. Well, this is what people want when they come up here, anyway. At least some people. Time away from the world. Time to unwind and unplug.
I try to focus on driving. Out here, towns and villages are fewer and farther between, everything growing darker and colder. Before I know it, I’m off the interstate and heading deeper into the mountains.
Joni and Michael have probably been out at some bar, I figure. While our lake house is in a relatively remote location, it’s not the Yukon Territory. Lake Placid is touristy and popular, especially in the summer. Paul, who’s not really into hiking or camping, likes it for the rustic aspects. Building a boat, chopping some firewood, and he thinks he’s Paul Bun—
I slam on the brakes when the shape jumps out at me, but it’s too late. The deer is in mid-leap across the winding mountain road when I hit it with the Range Rover. The collision sends it flying up over the hood where it cracks the windshield. I’m flung forward, my arms up to shield my face as the airbag deploys.
The airbag is so powerful, it drives my arms back towards my head, and my watch jams into my cheekbone and scrapes across my skin, drawing blood.
The momentum sends the deer off to my left somewhere — but I can’t see anything anyway, not with the airbag filling my vision. All I know is that my foot is still on the brake and the tires are making screeching sounds, but I’m still going forward. Then it feels like the road drops away, and for a moment the Range Rover is airborne. It connects hard with a guard rail, sending me slapping back against the seat, my head whipping against the headrest.
The vehicle thumps over an uneven shoulder as it scrapes along the guard rail and finally comes to a stop.
Somehow, my turn indicator was activated in the commotion, because it’s going “tick — tick — tick,” while all else goes dead quiet.
The whole thing took two, maybe three seconds, but it seemed to happen both in real time and slow-motion.
I pass out.
PART THREE
CHAPTER NINETEEN
DR EMILY LINDMAN
CASE NOTES
MAY 14
Session 1
Met with Thomas Bishop today for one hour, our first session. I am recording the session as per my usual, plus taking notes, and all will go into the submitted evaluation.
Thomas is eight. He prefers to be called Tom. He is an only child, his parents well-off. He has no history of mental illness and no history of medical issues. From his medical report, Tom scored a ten out of ten on the APGAR scale when born. When he was five, he broke two bones in his left arm after falling from a treehouse on his property. And there’s a scar on his inner thigh from falling off a guard rail.
His father has recently been killed in what was apparently an attempted burglary.
Police believe Tom not only saw his father soon after his father succumbed to blunt force trauma to the head, but that he may have witnessed the actual assault. This is due to Tom’s own conflicting statements, from when police first spoke with him and his mother on the night of, to an interview the next day with an ad litem present but no mother, to a third interview several months later, again with the ad litem and without his mother. These discrepancies are in the police report and describe that Tom first indicated hearing a commotion and getting out of bed. Later, he states he awoke to the sound of his mother’s crying and found her in the kitchen with his father, recently deceased. Finally, Tom states again that he was awakened by what he called “bad fighting” and snuck out of his room.
What I see is a boy in a great deal of grief, who has not yet processed a major trauma in his life. My job here, ultimately, is to determine his state and whether the trauma has overwhelmed him to the point he’s either unwilling or unable to consistently recall the events of that night. But I also very much aim to provide Tom with some basic tools to help him begin a healing process.
This first session was a chance for us to get to know each other a bit. I’ve not given Tom any assignments. He is clearly troubled, but he’s not showing any outward signs of phobias, any loss of social function. He’s able to answer and ask questions. He makes eye contact, though his gaze skips around. He’s nervous, as if he knows that being here could lead to something uncomfortable.
*
A concerned motorist is knocking on the glass. “Ma’am? Ma’am, can you hear me?”
I try to speak, but it’s as if my lips are numb. I blink at him and nod. The air bag remains inflated in front of me, restricting my movements. Something drips from above my left eye.
The motorist speaks again. “I’m going to open the door, okay?”
My head is throbbing with pulses of dark energy. My neck is stiff, and just the act of nodding has sent bolts of pain down my spine and up to the base of my skull, scorching around my ears. The motorist grabs the door handle and lifts. The door doesn’t budge. He’s in his twenties, with a beard.
Where am I?
I hit something . . .
“It’s stuck,” he says. Then he tries again. No good. He looks through the glass at me, desperation filling his eyes in the refracted light of vehicle headlamps. “I can’t get a signal,” he says, showing me his phone. He starts to say something else but is distracted, looking off. I think I hear an engine, see more headlights.