Midway through his black onyx chocolate cake, Thomas pulls out his vibrating phone. He glances at the screen and frowns.
“I’m so sorry,” he says. “A patient of mine has just been admitted to Bellevue. I hate to cut this short, but I have to go consult with the attending doctors.”
Everyone at the table expresses understanding; this sort of interruption is a natural consequence of his line of work.
“I’ll be home as soon as I can,” he says as he lays a credit card down on the table. “But you know how these things go, so please don’t wait up.”
The brush of his lips; the bittersweet taste of chocolate.
Then my husband is gone.
His absence feels like a theft.
The town house is dark and still. The bottom step groans softly under my step, as it has for years. In the past, that noise was comforting; it often signaled that Thomas had finished locking up and was coming to bed.
Upstairs, a light shines softly on the nightstand in the empty bedroom.
This moment was supposed to be very different. Candles would be lit; music would softly play. My dress would slowly slip down, revealing the hint of enticing pink silk.
Instead, my shoes are returned to the closet. Then my earrings and necklace are replaced in their velvet compartments in the top drawer of the bureau. Thomas’s note from this morning rests alongside the gems, like another precious item.
His words, so comfortingly ordinary, have been committed to memory.
Still, the note is opened and read again.
Three tiny beads of ink mar the sentences.
These smudges bring forth a sudden clarity.
They were made with a specific fountain pen that leaves blots on the page when the nub rests against the paper for too long.
This fountain pen is always kept in the same place: the desk in my study.
Twelve swift steps are taken across the bedroom and past the threshold into the study.
When Thomas reached for the pen before going out for bagels, he would have seen two files—yours and April’s, with the names clearly visible on the tabs—only inches away on the surface of the desk.
The instinct to grab the folders and check their contents is almost uncontrollable; however, it must be suppressed. Panic begets errors.
There are five items on the desk: the pen, a beverage coaster, a Tiffany clock, and the folders.
At first glance, everything appears intact.
But something almost imperceptible is amiss.
Each item is scrutinized in turn, as a rising wave of anxiety is battled.
The pen is exactly where it should be, on the top left-hand corner of the desk. The clock is opposite it, at the top right-hand corner. The coaster is beneath the clock, because beverages are always held in my right hand, which frees my left hand to write notes.
The alteration is spotted within a minute. It would be invisible to ninety percent of the population, however.
Individuals who fall into the vast majority, the right-handers, rarely recognize the inconveniences those of us in the minority are acutely attuned to. Simple household items—scissors, ice-cream scoops, can openers—are all designed for the right-handed. Water fountain buttons. Car cup holders. ATMs. The list continues.
People with right-hand dominance naturally orient the page to the right side of the body when they take notes. People who use their left hands to write orient the page to the left. The practice is automatic; it requires no conscious thought.
The folders have been moved several inches to the right of their usual resting spot on the desk. They are now in the space where the brain of a right-handed person would decree they belong.
The file folders briefly blur as my vision swims. Then reason reasserts itself.
Perhaps Thomas simply brushed the folders a few inches aside when he replaced the pen, and then attempted to recenter them.
Even if Thomas had picked them up out of curiosity, or in a search to find a sheet of paper for his note before he discovered a blank pad in the top desk drawer, he would have realized they were client folders. Therapists are bound by rules of confidentiality; Thomas abides by this professional mandate. Even in our private discussions about clients, they are never mentioned by name. Even special clients, like Subject 5.
Thomas was told about my first encounter with Subject 5, how she fled the NYU classroom in tears midway through her initial computerized survey session. When Subject 5 revealed to my assistant, Ben, that the questions had triggered an intense emotional reaction for her, Thomas agreed that the moral course of action was to provide her with some expert guidance. He listened supportively as our subsequent interactions were described—the conversations in my office, the gifts, and finally the invitation for cheese and wine at the town house on a night when Thomas was occupied at a business event.
He understood that she became . . . special.
But her name has never been spoken between us.
Not once. Not even after her death.
Especially not after her death.
However, Thomas did see the e-mail sent to me by the private investigator hired by the Voss family. If he hadn’t made the connection by then that Subject 5’s name was Katherine April Voss, it certainly became crystal clear to him in that moment.
The tension stored in my muscles eases slightly as my thought process continues along a reassuring path.
If Thomas had seen everything in your file, Jessica—the pages of notes detailing our conversations, the specifics of your assignments, and your accounts of your interactions with him—his behavior surely would have been altered. At breakfast, his affect seemed unremarkable. It remained so when he arrived at the town house this evening.
And yet . . . at dinner tonight, his tenor changed. He grew increasingly distracted. His departure was abrupt; his farewell kiss, perfunctory rather than regretful.
It is difficult to think clearly; the two glasses of Pinot Noir consumed this evening hamper my ability to draw a firm conclusion.
Other considerations swim through my mind: Despite the rules of confidentiality, you and April are unlike all of the others who have entered my office. Neither of you were technically clients. And Thomas thinks you both hold one other distinction: that each of you has caused his wife great distress.
April is fading away. She can cause no fresh pain.
But Thomas believes that you, Jessica, have demonstrated potential menace, enough to inspire me to install a new lock on the front door of the town house. He could have reasoned that an ethical breach was preferable to ignoring information that would protect his wife.
The probability must be acknowledged: Thomas looked at your file.
The impact of the realization feels like a physical blow. The edge of my desk is grasped until equilibrium is reestablished.
If he chose to pretend otherwise, what would be his motivation?
No clear answer is forthcoming.
Communication is a vital component of a healthy partnership. It is a necessary foundational aspect of a romantic relationship, as well as a therapeutic one.
Yet self-preservation must trump the blind trust of one’s spouse. Particularly when one’s spouse has proved untrustworthy in the past.
The twenty-four-hour reprieve has ended. All conclusions have been upended. Thomas must be watched more closely than ever.
The folders are placed in a locked filing cabinet. The door to my study is firmly closed.
Then a text is sent to him: I’m going to call it an early night. Let’s talk tomorrow?