Brooklyn Gothic, page 21
With her feet planted apart, pepper spray in one hand, knife in the other, her mind zinged between the determination to use them and the grim realization she wouldn’t be able to.
“My plan had been to tell you everything today,” he said. “I was going to let you decide. Do I get to start over, or do I kill myself?”
“Bullshit. Liar!” she growled. “You told me that story about your father. Making yourself sound like some kind of semi-killer, accidental killer, like a not-so-bad killer.”
“I wanted to tell you, but I couldn’t. So I told you about my father first, testing things. Seeing how you’d react. Not in the same realm, I understand.”
“Did you think I’d accept this? Fly off to Geneva with you?” Her breath came in heaving waves. She tried to slow it down, not wanting to faint. “You almost married me!”
“I wanted to protect my estate in case the aneurysm got me after all. And I convinced myself it was better to live a new life helping people rather than to die and do nothing. We could work together. I could spend my life loving you. For a while, I thought that was enough. But I realized it wasn’t fair, even if you never knew about me. I was going to tell you everything today, I swear I was.”
Now he seemed irritated, as if she was lobbing questions she had no right lobbing.
“How would you like to wake up one day with a conscience?” he asked. “That thing you have that you assume everyone has that everyone doesn’t have? I wanted to end it right away, but I needed to try and help the families.”
Wild energy spurted through her. She paced like an animal in a barred enclosure, a brute snarl vibrating in her throat. “I’m going turn you in!” she cried. “You know I have to!”
“You can save yourself the trouble,” he said, becoming more agitated. “Leave and let me kill myself.”
“No, you can’t do that.” She flattened the back of her wrist on her forehead, slick with sweat.
“My confession is in the safe. You were obviously in the safe. The confession is in my handwriting and the police will see the postal stamp from last year. They can compare my writing to the one on the postcard to Miss Brock. She knew where the key was, and had instructions to get the envelope and postcard to the police in case of my death. There’s a letter in there to you too, I wrote it after I fired you.”
The envelopes that had been in the safe were in her knapsack on the floor. In case she’d needed to escape quickly, she’d wanted to bring them with her. She knew whatever was in them must be important to be in the safe with the buckle, but she hadn’t dared open them for fear this would mean she’d tampered with evidence.
“You told Miss Brock to go to the police. She knew about this all along, didn’t she?”
“No, no. Let me be clear. She thought it was a confession about my father. I told her how I’d been a part of that, and instructed her to get my confession to the police after I died, which she assumed would be from a ruptured aneurysm. I sweetened the deal by paying for her daughter’s care and setting up trust funds for them.”
No wonder Miss Brock had acted so icily and given those cautioning speeches. She’d been trying to warn Casey off in an ambiguous way while protecting her and her daughter’s income source.
“You can’t kill yourself, Samuel.” She hated that she’d used his name and that her voice sounded reasonable, as if they were discussing where to go for dinner. It crossed her mind she was going into shock. “You owe the families. Let them look you in the eye. They’ve got your money. They have to know where it came from.”
“They’ll know soon enough and they can get rid of it if they don’t want it. How many do you think will? Not many, if any, that’s my guess.” He looked at her morosely, then up at the ceiling. “Does the man I am now have no chance?” Then, back at her. “I’d thought—I’d hoped—you’d be the one who’d allow me that chance.”
She dropped like a bag of wet sand. Her fingers went flaccid, the weapons settling to the floor. Retracting into a fetal position, she balled her hands down by her stomach, her skin shriveling into her bones, and her bones shriveling into the floor.
Suddenly, she was hotter than she’d ever been in her life, and she panted, tearing at her jogging sweater, desperate to get it off. But a gate to nothingness opened, a sucking void of black.
39
He was against her and she relaxed into him, wanting his body as flat as it could get against hers, and she knew he would start kissing her, and roll on top of her, and they would ride into their rhythmic bliss.
She paddled upward out of a desolate, helpless dark and rushed through to consciousness—those things he said, the handcuffs, her cries. He was a killer. He was a fiend, subhuman, non-existent as human, a tornado of horror.
Her heart raced, her breath stopped, a helium balloon expanding rapid-fire behind her eyes. She hoped it would all go away, and she would realize it had been a nightmare. But it was reality. How could this be reality? How does life go from normal to nightmare with no warning?
She was in his bed and he was beside her, the weight of his arm heavy on her ribcage, and she put it together—he had used the safety latch on the handcuffs, and brought her upstairs to their bed when she’d fainted. She barely remembered being carried, her face squashed against his arm, the movements of his legs up the staircase.
She forced herself to look at him. He was asleep but more than asleep. His mouth hung in a loose oval and his eyelids were half-open, his corneas bleary, staring at nothing.
“Samuel?” she asked. Her eyes shot to the orange prescription bottle on the side table. She leaned her elbow on him and grabbed it, hoping when she touched it, she would see she was wrong, that the pills were there. But the bottle was empty, white dust clinging to the sides.
She traced her thumb over his lower lip. It was cold. She didn’t feel any breath coming from his mouth. He had done it, killed himself.
No, no. This isn’t what she wanted. Not for the man she knew, the man she’d held, and caressed, and made love to, and talked with, and laughed with, and whispered with in the dark. Not for the man whose eyes instantly tendered when he looked at her. Those were all of the things she could remember, the only things. Those others things, they were not real to her.
In that moment, all other choices evaporated. The cream-colored walls of the bedroom pulsed strangely, breathing as if they were alive.
At first, the voice was a low rustle, the wind whisking through trees before a storm. Her ears pricked. She stared at the room’s walls as they pulsated and the voice, neither male nor female but in between, spoke to her.
“Casey,” the voice said, as clear as any voice she’d ever heard. “This can be turned back. Follow him and it will all be undone. Follow him. All will be right again.”
The voice wasn’t frightening, but calming. Someone, something, knew how to correct this.
She pried herself off him, and glided down the hallway as its dark wood panels and white double doors breathed in sync to her movements, urging her on with a soothing whisper, and went to the first floor. Finding her purse in the kitchen, she took out the package of sleeping pills.
Without any feeling whatsoever, as if she were only barely aware of someone else doing this, she pushed one pill after another out of the tinfoil casings and walked to the sink. The water flowed out in an undulating rainbow. She clapped the white tablets into her mouth as the colorful billowing stream swirled in the glass like a mini kaleidoscopic cyclone. She put more tablets in her mouth and swallowed.
Time was running out. Finding her phone on the table in the foyer, she hit “stop” on the recorder. She picked up her knapsack.
The stairs spoke to her as she climbed them, telling her to write a note and let everyone know she would be fine. Yes, she would do that. She got a pen and sheet of paper from the desk in her office. She wrote:
Mom, Dad, I’m so sorry. I love you. This had nothing to do with you. Please understand.
Astrid, I love you and I’m sure you’ll become a movie star. You too, Tyler.
Kate, I’m sure you’ll win a Pulitzer someday. Mia is a keeper.
Police, please read the letters in my knapsack. Please listen to the last recording on my phone. The belt buckle is on the floor downstairs in the foyer. Please tell them I’m sorry.
She glided within the breathing, purring womb-walls back to his bedroom and laid the note on the bedside table. Phone in hand, she nestled into the crook of his body, relieved to have an excuse to do so.
“Samuel...” she whispered into his ear, in case the spirit hadn’t drained fully and it was the right thing to do. It was the right thing to do because it would the last thing he might hear. “You’re forgiven.”
Then there was the overpowering urge to do one more thing. She had to read the letter he’d left her. It was the last she would ever have of him in this world and tampering with the envelopes didn’t matter now.
Pushing off him, she dug the envelopes out of her knapsack and stared at them, not knowing which one contained the letter to her. Hoping the house would tell her, she looked at the walls, but they only pulsed and murmured.
She ripped one open, careful to do it at the bottom so she wouldn’t tear the insides, and saw the letter wasn’t to her, but couldn’t stop herself from reading.
* * *
To the authorities and the families:
I want to die. I deserve to die. But before I do, I want to offer the tiniest amount of insight, in case it informs anyone.
Two years ago, I had a ruptured brain aneurysm. If anyone had taken a brain scan before, instead of all the damn ones after, I’m sure they would have seen my amygdala wasn’t functioning properly. That’s what my research calls it.
I was born with a dysfunctional brain, the inability to process emotions like fear, empathy, remorse, guilt, love. I did feel anger, frustration, lust, self-preservation, pride, attachments of kinds. When I say attachments, I mean I’d attach the same significance to a person that I would a favorite car or tie.
Happiness, I didn’t feel it. Not the way I suspected others did. My happiness was satisfaction I had gotten something I wanted. I couldn’t get a swelling in the heart from walking along the beach, watching a sunset, holding someone in my arms.
I had everything and nothing at the same time. Without an inside, you have nothing. I was a mutant.
Here I confess so no one else is ever blamed for my crimes and so the families know who I am. Here I take full blame for destroying families and lives.
I was a God unto myself. Judge, jury, and executioner. We have scientific names for it now, psychological names, names stamped by doctors. We used to call it evil.
I don’t know if even the most deeply felt apology is an insult to everyone. I don’t expect anyone to forgive me. I’m not asking for it. I don’t forgive myself, can’t forgive myself, and it disgusts me to even get a word in. Even knowing what I deserve, I won’t kid you. I’m terrified.
My death won’t restore anyone’s child, parent, spouse, or friend. Don’t think about me. Don’t let me darken your life for one more second. Forget me. Soon I will be at the gates of hell where I belong. I wish I could kill myself one hundred times over. But I only have one life to give.
Below are the names of the victims and some details of the crimes to prove it was me.
* * *
Casey couldn’t read the rest. She didn’t want to see any details, and the edges of grogginess were closing in. She put the letter, which was several pages long, on top of the bedside table. Then she ripped open the second.
* * *
Please deliver to:
Casey Matos
42 Coney Island Ave, Apt 2F
Brooklyn
* * *
Dear Casey,
I sit here in the middle of the night, wondering how you’ll feel about everything once you know. You’re probably wondering why I didn’t do this dirty work myself. Truth is, I couldn’t stand to contact the families. I’d hoped whomever I hired and myself would keep professional distance, and when he or she found out, it wouldn’t be particularly bothersome.
Obviously, my plan went awry. I used to feel nothing special for anyone, and for some reason, thought that’s the way I could keep going. I had no idea of how the heart can betray you, open itself up to someone against all of your defenses.
I write this to you because you knew the person I was at the end. When you find out everything, you’ll be horrified and wonder who I was.
You see why I couldn’t pursue a relationship, even though I wanted to more than I’ve wanted anything. You see why I had to get you to leave.
I won’t ask for forgiveness. I don’t deserve it. Not even from myself. I don’t know why I’m leaving this behind. There are no words to express everything or I’m not skilled enough to formulate them.
Be careful, my Casey, because there are more out there like the man I used to be. You have a natural curiosity and innate goodness and there are those who feed on that.
My most comforting thought is you’ve moved on and I’m nothing but a dim memory of a strange man you didn’t know very well. But I couldn’t risk that wasn’t the case and leave you with nothing.
If I ask forgiveness for anything, it would be the impertinence of leaving this and perhaps disrupting your peace.
The one thing I want you to know is the man you knew was real. You may spend the rest of your life doubting, and I wish I could take that away. But the man you knew was the man I am.
She laid the letter on top of the first one and crawled back into the crook of his shoulder. Yes, the man she knew was the real man, the man she would see again soon.
The grogginess was undeniable now. Her eyelids were fat, fleshy pillows and a sumptuous eventide surrounded her. Peaceful, so nice, soft. What is the word? Downy. Mmm. Sinking. Down. Down.
A slipping sensation gripped her and she thrashed, lungs craving air, her body declaring war on her. This is wrong. This can’t happen.
There it is, there it is, you see it. Right on the bed next to him.
So heavy, heavy as a planet, slow, slow as the world grinding in orbit. So incredibly slow. How could anything be so slow? Too slow, too slow. Too heavy. Impossible.
No, not impossible. Try, try, try, try. One. Keep going. Press, press. Two. Now, now, now. One more. Press!
“911. Police, fire, or ambulance?”
The mattress was so hard and the room so cold and empty-feeling with its with bleak fluorescent lighting and blank beige walls. Her blood was drawn and the young male intern left the room with the vial, but discarded the bloody needle on a metal table. Casey stared at it, mildly disgusted at the intern’s unprofessionalism.
Her stomach still ached, though not as bad, from the cup of mushy charcoal mixture she’d been ordered to drink three days before. It was gritty and tasted like what she imagined cigarette butts must taste like. She would have vomited from the horrible taste but had nothing left inside of her, so she’d gagged after every swallow. It felt like someone had reached in and took a fistful of her insides and tugged.
A middle-aged man came in, the psychiatrist. She’d been waiting for him most of the day.
Did you try to hurt yourself?
Yes.
What led up to your attempt?
I didn’t see any way out. There was no way out. I was insane—insane for a minute.
Has this ever happened to you before?
No.
Had you been thinking about this long?
No. Never. It came on me. Out of nowhere.
Can you tell me what happened to make this come on you?
I don’t know.
Have thoughts of hurting anyone ever come to you?
No!
Have voices ever come to you in your head? Ones that sound as if they’re coming to you from outside your head?
No.
Have images come to you other people indicate are not there?
No.
Are thoughts of hurting yourself coming to you now?
No. No. Never again. Don’t judge me.
“Cassandra,” he said. “No one is judging you. I see the strongest of the strong in here.”
“Cassilda. Not Cassandra.”
They talked for about half an hour more, and he gave her a faded printout of phone numbers, and extracted a promise she would make an appointment with a therapist as early as tomorrow, and create a “safety plan.”
She had made up her mind not to tell the psychiatrist about the walls of the mansion speaking to her. It was clear she’d had some kind of psychotic break with reality. She’d seen enough movies to know women chattering about otherworldly events to authoritarians could lead to a mental institution and she was already in one! She couldn’t believe the walls and their inhuman voice had controlled her. It had all seemed absolutely necessary at the time.
Thank God, thank God, no one had taken her phone from the mansion and called her mother. When she’d been asked various times, by various people, who they could call, she’d said no one, and truly there was no one she wanted to burden with this pandemonium of her soul.
Now she needed to get them to set her free. She lay down and almost went to sleep on the hard, slick mattress of the hospital bed.
A doctor came in, a woman with short dark hair and glasses.
“Cassilda?” she asked, flipping through sheets of paper on a clipboard. “Your vitals are good. EKG normal. Could you be pregnant?”
Pregnant.
She frantically scanned her memory for when she’d last had her period. She used to know exactly when it would come, but there was always so much craziness, she’d lost track not only of her period but even the day of the week.
No. She was on the pill. She remembered forgetting to take it a few times, but she’d doubled up on it the next day. Didn’t that count? She thought about asking the doctor, but only wanted the dreaded subject to disappear.
