Afterlife - Douglas Clegg [81]
Julie said very little, certainly didn’t want to add to her sister’s sense that she was losing it by telling her about Project Daylight and Michael Diamond and seeing blurred faces and burnt bodies. As the thoughts spun through her head, Julie giggled a little and then noticed Mel’s unforgiving look. She knew what Mel was thinking. You’re thinking that I am a terrible Mommy and I need to somehow be strong and pull through and just focus on Mommydom and forget that I had a husband, forget that even though you saw your little sister masturbating on videotape that I saw a man who might’ve been a dead man molesting me in my sleep and you think that I need meds and a good long rest and you’re probably even thinking of taking Matt and Livy away for a while until I get a good doctor and end up like the Numbah One Wife, Amanda Hutchinson, who thought I had big hairy balls. Absurdities encircled her thoughts, and nothing made sense, and she knew that the longer Mel watched her, the worse she would feel, the more she would go whirling into an oblivion of fear and belief and shadow.
Julie thanked her for the coffee and for cleaning the house. She thanked her for taking care of Matt and Livy. She told her that the rest had done her good last night, and that she knew she’d been experiencing crazy thoughts. “Eleanor called it post-traumatic stress disorder,” Julie said. “But I’m getting good care. Honest. I am.”
8
“You went to see this con man again?” Eleanor asked, on the phone. “Julie, you have been through a trauma. Your husband was murdered. Do you think your mind is going to work right, at this point in time? Do you think you’re not going to hallucinate now and then? See things? Wish you could see him? Wish you could hear him? When soldiers come back from war, they often suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder. Why? They’ve witnessed atrocities. You have experienced a personal atrocity. Your husband, the father of your child, was murdered, in a terrible way. Psychics like this man are preying on people like you. They may be worse for you than anything else. He may be giving your subconscious mind permission to break down.”
“Can I see you?”
“Immediately,” Eleanor said. “I’ll be at my office in twenty minutes. I consider this an emergency.”
9
A bald man in a gray, expensive suit sat in the overstuffed chair that Julie normally occupied during her sessions with Eleanor Freeman.
He rose up, as Julie entered the room. She had the feeling that he had too much of a good sense of himself. He must be a doctor.
“This is Dr. Glennon, from Hillside,” Eleanor said. Julie shook his hand, and went to sit on the couch next to Eleanor.
“I’ve brought Dr. Glennon in, Julie, because I thought you two might talk more openly. I feel I’m a little too close to the situation to be of much help.” “But…” Julie began. Then, “The situation?” Eleanor smiled. “What you’re going through. Your sister called last night. She was worried about you.” “She called you?”
“Now, don’t be angry with her,” Eleanor said. “She’s thinking of your well-being. You’ve been through a lot, Julie, and my fear is that I haven’t been as much help as I should’ve been."
Julie picked at the hem of her skirt. “All right.” Then, to the doctor. “You’re a psychiatrist?”
Dr. Glennon nodded.
Eleanor patted Julie on the knee, and then got up and walked over to the doorway. She stepped out of her office, shutting the door behind her.
Julie glanced back, toward the door, feeling like a little girl being left behind by her mother on the first day of school.
10
An hour later, she stopped by the pharmacy to fill her prescriptions for Xalax, and some drug she’d never heard of called Darmien. She had seen them advertised on TV commercials constantly—the green pill was Darmien, and it ensured “a restful vacation in one night,” according to the advertising. Less familiar with Xalax, she had remembered Dr. Glennon mentioning something about how it was a mild sedative. She wanted whatever would be necessary to somehow help her mind clear up. Glennon had told her,