Delirious. Daniel James Palmer

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      “Shut your trap!” Gomes said.

      Leon Yardley was out of his seat and standing in the corner farthest from Charlie.

      “You’re out, Charlie. We’re letting you go, effective immediately,” Mac said.

      “Fuck you, Mac,” Charlie spit.

      “You’re lucky it isn’t worse, Charlie,” Yardley said as the two security teams arrived, four stern-looking men in total. They weren’t armed, but Charlie knew they had permits to carry Mace.

      Gomes let Charlie up.

      Charlie stood, shaky on his feet. The security teams surrounded him and began to escort him out of the office. Charlie swung around, the security teams now pushing him backward out the door.

      “I’m not going to let this go, Mac. You, too, Leon,” Charlie stormed. “I’m not going to quit. I’m going to figure out why you’re setting me up. I’m going to figure it out! Do you hear me?”

      Moments later Charlie was outside. A police cruiser was parked out front, lights flashing, presumably to escort Charlie out of SoluCent forever. The police officer and Gomes talked a moment.

      The officer approached Charlie. They exchanged a few words. Charlie showed his ID, and after several embarrassing moments crowds began to gather. Eventually, the officer let Charlie go. Charlie felt the stares burning into his back as he walked away. He walked to his BMW and climbed inside. The police car stayed a good distance away. Gomes could have pressed assault charges if he wanted. He still might, Charlie thought.

      The sun was low in the midmorning sky, making it difficult to see as Charlie drove out of the parking lot. Instead of grabbing for his sunglasses, which were in his bag in the backseat, he pulled down the sun visor. When he did, a shiver of fear shot through him. A yellow sticky note was taped to the inside flap. As with the other note, the one line was written in his handwriting. He had no memory of writing it, but there it was in black ballpoint pen. The sentence was a part of one of his favorites. It was from a Kurt Vonnegut novel, Mother Night, a book he’d discovered in college while putting off studying for a chemistry test.

      It read: We are what we pretend to be!

      Chapter 10

      Joe had never missed a therapy session before, and Rachel was growing worried. She took another sip of coffee, filed some papers, and waited for the wall-mounted clock to read 8:15 a.m. before calling Joe’s house again. Still no answer. If Joe was scheduled to work the overnight, his shift would have ended hours earlier, leaving him plenty of time to make their weekly one-on-one session. Rachel wondered if Charlie’s stunning visit yesterday, his disturbing revelations, and Joe’s unprecedented absence were connected. Her skin prickled at the thought.

      If her meeting with Charlie had in any way derailed Joe’s therapy, it would be an unforgivable breach of trust. Rachel understood the ethical boundary she had tiptoed across by helping Charlie out, yet at the time, she believed her actions to be harmless. Now Joe was a no-show, and her belief was fast giving way to fear.

      Could Charlie have hurt Joe? Could she have unwittingly pushed Charlie over the edge?

      The mystery of the mind meant that anything was possible—from the benign to the unfathomable. The more Rachel dwelled on it, the more she regretted ever meeting Charlie Giles.

      At quarter to the hour Rachel gave up waiting for Joe and began readying herself for the scheduled staff meeting. Lately, it seemed as though meetings and administrative make-work were consuming more of her time than patient care. It was a disturbing trend that showed no signs of reversing. On her way to the conference room, Rachel spotted Dr. Alan Shapiro, one of several staff psychiatrists on the Walderman payroll, making his way to the same meeting.

      Perhaps, Rachel thought, if Shapiro agreed she’d done nothing wrong, it would lessen her mounting anxiety. Shapiro was a bit irritating at times, with his know-it-all smirk and fondness for rubbing elbows with anybody on the Walderman board of directors, but she respected his abilities and opinions equally. All Rachel wanted was a simple affirmation—along the lines of “I would have done the same.” Hopefully, that would be enough to set her mind at ease.

      Rachel quickened her step to catch up with the slight-framed, short-legged psychiatrist, who favored obnoxious-colored ties and rainbow-hued shirts. After exchanging perfunctory hellos, Rachel kept pace alongside Shapiro as they made their way toward the conference room.

      “Did you get the budget numbers straightened out?” Shapiro asked.

      “Mostly. Well, close enough at least. Budgeting is part art, part pseudoscience, if you ask me.”

      Shapiro laughed warmly. Immediately, Rachel felt more comfortable and approached him about Charlie.

      “Alan, can I ask you something?”

      “Anything,” Shapiro replied.

      “If a relative of a patient of yours came to your office for psychiatric advice, would you give him any?”

      “Treatment?” Shapiro said with noticeable concern.

      “No, just information. Something you could get off the Web if you were researching a topic.”

      “Maybe. I don’t know. You said this person is somehow connected to a patient I’m treating?”

      Rachel felt a knot form in her stomach. “Yes. A relative.”

      “What’s the motivation? Is it really research, or is it a personal inquiry?”

      Rachel hesitated a beat. She wanted to lie and say it was for research, knowing Shapiro would take no exception to that.

      “More personal.”

      Shapiro shook his head. “Slippery slope,” he said. “I mean, you don’t really know what they’re after. What if they take whatever information you share as actual medical advice? Not saying it could happen, but suppose something were to happen—a car crash, whatever. A shady malpractice attorney might try to use a meeting in a professional setting without a professional relationship against you. These days I’m a big fan of caution.”

      Rachel nodded her head slowly. Her lingering doubt about inviting Charlie into her office had just mushroomed into full-blown anger at herself for allowing it to happen.

      What was her motivation?

      Did she find him attractive?

      Perhaps, but that was not a conscious factor in her deciding to let the interview continue. More likely, curiosity had got the better of her. There was something about Charlie Giles she found irresistibly intriguing. According to Joe, Charlie was awash with confidence, but to Rachel, he appeared adrift, scared even.

      There was no doubt in her mind that something chemical was happening to Charlie. She was convinced he was in mental distress, perhaps even suffering the onset of some sort of psychotic breakdown. Without thorough testing and a complete medical workup, forming an uneducated diagnosis was not only unprofessional, but it could be dangerous. All she did, she reassured herself, was to give him the names of some doctors to call, including a neurologist. That seemed a harmless outcome.

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