The Suicide Gene Page 20
Matt: (Silence.)
Dr. Kerr: Matt?
Matt: (Silence.)
Dr. Kerr: Her memory of your fight with Minnie gave her the impression you may be blaming yourself, your sisters, and your grandmother for the baby’s death.
Matt: She thought we were talking about the baby.
Dr. Kerr: Yes, she did.
Matt: And you told her we weren’t.
Dr. Kerr: (Silence.)
Matt: It’s fine. I’m not mad. I’m sure one of the twins told you Sara killed her sister.
Dr. Kerr: I’d like to hear your side of the story.
Matt: (Laugh.) I understand. It’s hard to believe either twin. The truth is, yes, my grandmother did kill her sister.
Dr. Kerr: Was it intentional or unintentional?
Matt: Ah, therein lies the problem. Two different opinions from two different sisters.
Dr. Kerr: (Silence.)
Matt: (Pause.) Intentional.
Dr. Kerr: Is that what you overheard that night?
Matt: Yes, and while I’m not sure which twin told you the story, I’m sure Melanie threw the unintentional spin to it. She was too little to understand what my grandparents were saying. She’s also too kind to believe anyone in our family would be that vicious.
Dr. Kerr: Are you completely sure you understood?
Matt: I am. Unfortunately, Mary, Minnie, and I all understood. We knew before that night we overheard them.
Dr. Kerr: Now, I’m confused. You knew before that?
Matt: Yes, we did. You can’t mask that kind of evil—even to a child.
Dr. Kerr: You’re telling me you suspected Sara killed her sister before you overheard that conversation.
Matt: Yes, we knew. Ask either twin, but for now, I have to go. It’s after six, and I’m meeting someone for dinner.
Dr. Kerr: I didn’t realize the time. Yes, we’ll talk at your next appointment. Get going. Enjoy your dinner.
Matt: Oh, and Doctor Kerr?
Dr. Kerr: (Pause.) Yes?
Matt: I’ve always been honest with you, so I want to clarify one misconception. This one on your part.
Dr. Kerr: What is it?
Matt: Minnie and I weren’t arguing over our great-aunt.
Dr. Kerr: You weren’t?
Matt: No. Mel was right. We were talking about the baby.
****
He had stood and moved to the door, grasped and turned the knob, and then uttered two shocking words before Giff rushed in.
****
Matt: Also intentional.
****
Chapter 29
Sunday, May 3, 2015
Eleven days.
What the hell was going on in the McKinney family? Ten days after Matt insinuated both Melissas were murdered, she still didn’t know the truth.
Emma turned her laptop off and sat in front of the black screen. She counted to thirty, pressed the power button, and while programming screens lobbied for position, she fingered through the paper copies of last week’s appointments, searching for Mel McKinney’s.
Her computer was playing with her again. Occasionally, it started up and purred like a Lamborghini. At times it puttered like a jalopy, and sometimes it kicked up squiggly images and quit like a tired old nag.
Yesterday, she and Giff spent the afternoon with a dorky computer kid—somebody Gouldthorpe, even his name hinted nerd—who promised he had fixed the problems. Two locked screens and three phone calls later, she resorted to the “unplug, count-to-thirty, plug in” routine. She waited with guarded anticipation. “Welcome” flashed across the monitor, and she felt pangs of joy as the system startup screen appeared. It was surprising what little it took to thrill her these days.
She put Mel’s paper files away and opened her digital records to what would be Mel’s last transcript. Her first appointment with Doctor Christy was next week. As expected, the other McKinneys declined the referral.
Patient: Melanie McKinney
Psychiatrist: Dr. Emma Kerr
Date: May 1, 2016 2 p.m.
****
Mel: Minnie is extremely smart. Sometimes I think smarter than Matt. That may be the reason they hate each other.
Dr. Kerr: Competitive?
Mel: Yes, very.
Dr. Kerr: And Mary?
Mel: Well, of course she’s bright, too. Matt doesn’t like her either, and Mary’s afraid of him.
Dr. Kerr: But you three girls get along, so the tension is strictly between Matt and the twins, correct?
Mel: Not exactly. Right now the twins aren’t speaking. It’s over the ring. Mary is still furious. Minnie steered clear of her all week. Wouldn’t go over at all.
Dr. Kerr: (Silence.)
Mel: Our family is totally dysfunctional.
Dr. Kerr: Do you get along with both sisters?
Mel: I do.
Dr. Kerr: Equally?
Mel: (Pause.) I trust Mary more despite her bad temper. Sometimes I think Minnie’s sweetness is a front. I don’t say this often—actually I never admitted this to anyone before—but Minnie scares me a little.
Dr. Kerr: In what way?
Mel: Well, for one, she’s not nearly as good with the kids as Mary. But there’s something else.
Dr. Kerr: What’s that?
Mel: (Pause.) You know, I’m not really sure what it is. A feeling, I guess.
Dr. Kerr: Are you afraid of Mary or Matt?
Mel: Not at all. I do steer clear of Mary when she flies off the handle, but she’s harmless.
Dr. Kerr: Let me ask you something, Mel. Does Minnie tell you when to make the appointments for everyone? Is she, perchance, the family organizer?
Mel: Oh, no, I’m definitely the organizer. I take care of the appointments.
****
Briefly during that conversation, Emma wondered if Mel was the McKinneys’ mastermind. But she quickly reminded herself Mel had no notion Sam Winger may have fathered her. Emma had exhausted herself more than once trying to draw the suspicion out of her. Either Mel did not know, or she was an exquisite thespian.
No, Mel was more normal than most. Somehow, her upbringing did not affect her as it did her siblings. Good genes, Emma thought. Sam Winger’s good genes.
Then, if Sam was such a great person, why had Renee committed suicide? And on December 22nd? The same day of the year she had married her first husband? Odd.
Who did Renee Blake McKinney Winger really love? Emma had only heard stories about Mathew Senior from kids taking their mother’s side. But she knew broken marriages often severed like a wishbone, miniscule differences determining a winner and a loser.
Standing with the short end was a father who took four kids and raised them after their mother perished. Yes, he was far from perfect, but was he as bad as they said? If he never stopped loving Renee, her suicide could have been the reason for his cold despondency. Who was he before her death? Before the revelation his mother murdered her sister and possibly the baby? Hadn’t he argued with her that night? Who was the Mathew McKinney that Renee fell in love with, and had she loved Sam—Peeta—at all?
Emma understood marrying a man for a sense of security. Yet, staying married to that person when you were in love with someone else was a bigger cross to bear.
She read on.
****
Dr. Kerr: Sharon confirmed you were organized and easy to work with.
Mel: Thank you. I try to be. Matt tells me which days he’s available, and which days work best for the twins. I make the appointments and send all three of them their times. It seems to work well.
Dr. Kerr: Matt tells you which days are best for them?
Mel: Yes.
Dr. Kerr: How does he do that? Do they share schedules through an app or Google calendar?
Mel: What’s that?
Dr. Kerr: (Pause.) Mel, how does Matt know their schedules?
Mel: He must check the hospital website. Minnie roves floors. He coordinates her appointments, so she and Mary can come together o
r, at least, on the same day. He worries they won’t show alone.
Dr. Kerr: Their hospital schedules wouldn’t be public information.
Mel: (Laugh.) Matt can get anything off the internet. He’s a genius—a whiz at computers.
Dr. Kerr: That’s what I hear.
****
Wednesday’s child is full of woe. Phrases whirled in her head. You have no idea who you’re dealing with.
She had thought it before. Wondered if Matt was at the root of her computer problems. Once or twice, she had pictured him leaning over a keyboard laughing, his fingers clawing the keys and shredding her firewalls one after another. An extremely dangerous combination, Doctor Kerr. You of all people should know that.
She looked at her watch and, without real concern for the time, picked up her phone, dialed, and whispered when Giff answered, as though whispering lightened the lateness of the call.
“I’m sorry to bother you.”
“Emma, no bother. Is something wrong with your mother?”
“She’s fine. It’s just—I have a question, an odd one. Giff, what’s your IQ?”
He cleared his throat and spoke slowly. His voice wandered high and low, fluctuating from fatigue. “My IQ? Suddenly, at 11:45 at night, you want to know my IQ?”
“There is good reason for me asking but it’s a long story, and I don’t think this is a good time to explain.”
“Well, answer one thing. Are you more likely to continue seeing me if it is higher or lower than yours?”
Now she laughed. “Irrelevant. I don’t know mine. That’s sort of why I’m asking. I’m trying to figure out my own. I scored higher than you on that quiz.”
“Oh, now we are back to that, are we?”
“No, no.” Even when she was dead serious and perplexed, he could coax a laugh from her. “Someone said something to me, and I’m trying to decipher what they meant. My mother once said my IQ was in the 140s and, another time, said it was 194. I’m questioning whether it was high at all.”
“Emma, you can’t possibly not know you are smart.” He sounded surprised. “Is this about the McKinneys again?”
“Yes. Something one of them said.”
“About what?”
“A deadly combination—high IQ and being born on Wednesday.”
“Full of woe,” he said through a yawn. After days of missed runs, he’d gotten up at five-thirty this morning with her to fit one in. She knew he was exhausted. “Were you born on Wednesday?”
“I don’t know.” She smiled, picturing him on the couch under his ragged afghan, head back, trying to stay awake for her.
“Google it. That’s how I found out.”
“I’ll do that,” she said, then as an afterthought asked, “What are you?”
“Friday. Loving and giving, baby.”
She rested her head on the back of the chair briefly and laughed. “Okay, well, what’s your IQ, Casanova?”
“Not sure.” She heard him yawn again. “High 130s maybe. I only remember it was higher than my brother’s and enough to get me into Mensa. He didn’t make it in. That’s all I’m sure of—and that it was sweet.”
“Your poor brother.” She straightened in her chair. “Get some sleep. If your IQ is in the 130s, then mine has to be 140. I did beat you.”
“Is this going to be a lifelong ribbing?”
“I’m not sure.”
“I hope so,” he whispered. He was drifting off.
“Sleep. I’ll see you tomorrow. Good night.”
She tossed her cell down and googled “day of the week you were born,” then selected the first web address listed. She watched as the neat little program formed words on the screen—“Day of the Week” and “Zeller’s Algorithm.”
She entered Matt’s birthday, August 17, 1983, softly, as if the caress of her fingers could finesse a Monday or a Tuesday or a Sunday to the screen. Its glow blinked briskly, and the pixels fell together to form a sentence.
“You were born on a Wednesday.”
Well, she thought, what were the chances of that? Math probability formulas ticked through her head. Was it fourteen percent? Then what were the chances they both had been born on Wednesday? She didn’t know. She could add numbers in her head with the speed of a cheetah chasing a gazelle but was never interested in statistics because of the margin of error factor—uncertainty went against her grain. She liked the finality of addition, subtraction, and multiplication.
She held her breath and pressed the keys of her own birthday, one at a time. Slowly. She selected September, entered eleven for the day, typed 1985 for the year, hesitated, and then gently pushed the “Ok.”
The screen blinked, and it took her a minute to grasp the day that displayed. Her body wrenched because she was still holding her breath. She blew air out forcefully and sucked it back in with the might of a person emerging after a long stint underwater. She grabbed the desk to steady herself.
“You were born on a Wednesday” boomeranged back at her.
These people do know more about me than I do.
Chapter 30
Thursday May 7, 2015
Seven days.
Light from her laptop blued the couch around her. Emma skimmed reports on the hospital’s website and occasionally glanced outside. Earlier, a police officer had stopped about another peeping-Tom incident. Judy had reported seeing someone. Said he ran away when she strut down her driveway to take Moses for a walk.
Now, Emma sat in the dark, angry with herself for not installing the blinds she’d bought, but still refusing to worry much. The police suspected teenagers. Kids had been stealing beer from back porches and garages in their neighborhood all spring.
She finished reviewing the CAT scan reports, crossed her fingers, and changed screens. She pulled up her transcripts, which days ago had done another disappearing act. Damn hardware, or Mathew, or Mary, or undisclosed, deranged hacker.
The nerdy computer kid had been fired. Emma hired a computer software company to scour her work computers and laptops. They retrieved her transcripts, installed a firewall, charged her a fortune, and then bragged even a Silicon Valley techie wouldn’t be able to hack it.
We’ll see, she thought. She clicked on Mary’s name.
Patient: Mary McKinney
Psychiatrist: Dr. Emma Kerr
Date: Monday, May 4, 2015 12 p.m.
****
Mary: I didn’t give a ring to Minnie.
Dr. Kerr: You didn’t tell Minnie to hold on to a ring for Ruby?
Mary: Hell, no. Ruby is the heir to all my jewelry, and I have plenty. My ex was a jeweler. But I’m not giving it to her now, and I didn’t give it to Minnie.
Dr. Kerr: I must have misunderstood. I thought you did.
Mary: Yeah, I’ve heard that rumor, but no, absolutely not. My ex relinquished a lot more than jewels when he left, but they can all wait until I die to get it.
Dr. Kerr: You have drawn up a will recently, correct?
Mary: Yes, I should have done it long ago. A nurse at work passed away, and all hell broke loose in her family. They fought over everything. My coworkers and I started discussing it, and we got together and hired a young lawyer just starting out. We all devised one—got it cheap. Minnie, too. It was her idea. She’s going to be my executor, and I’ll be hers. We didn’t want Matt horning in on our things.
Dr. Kerr: (Silence.)
Mary: I know what you’re thinking, and you needn’t worry, Doctor Kerr. I have no desire to kill myself, none whatsoever.
Dr. Kerr: Mary, I know you are refusing to change psychiatrists—
Mary: Like I told you, I’m not starting over with anyone else.
Dr. Kerr: I feel it is important for you to be seen more often than I can accommodate you. I have some personal commitments and—
Mary: Yes, your mother, I know.
Dr. Kerr: (Silence.)
Mary: I’ll be fine, Doctor Kerr. I’m not going off the deep end anytime soon.
****
But that hadn’t been what Emma was thinking. She had been thinking, how the hell does she know about my mother?
She read on.
****
Dr. Kerr: How is work going for you?
Mary: Work is always good.
Dr. Kerr: You work in the IT department, correct?
Mary: Yes.
Dr. Kerr: Is it stressful?
Mary: No, just hectic. Right now we are training on a new system, so we have to put in some overtime.
Dr. Kerr: You are a systems operator?
Mary: (Laugh.) That’s my job title because they don’t want to pay me more money. But I’m really a systems analyst.
Dr. Kerr: You do computer programming?
Mary: Yep, and I’m good at it. I do hate dealing with the computer itself. I’m more of a software person. That’s why they won’t promote me—my lack of knowledge about hardware. But I can find any glitch in the programming, so they cater to me. I don’t worry like Minnie. My boss is afraid of me. (Laugh.)
Dr. Kerr: Afraid of you?
Mary: Yeah, I reassigned her password once, locked her out of her computer for two days. (Laugh.) What a riot. My co-workers and I laughed about it for months. She suspected me but couldn’t prove it. No one sold me out. They’re all afraid of me. When you control information, you control the world. I guess that’s one way Matt and I are alike.
Dr. Kerr: How’s that?
Mary: We’re both good at math and logic. We love mind games.
Dr. Kerr: Games?
Mary: Yes, mind games, like playing with my boss. Matt says life is one big game, and he’s right. I’ll play with anyone—just not Matt. He’s the master game player.
****
Emma juggled delirium and deception indecisively. Which was it? She couldn’t tell. Was Mary on the brink of committing suicide or secretly laughing at Emma’s ignorance because she was hacking her computer?
After a few minutes of trying to decrypt Mary’s words, Emma decided she couldn’t waste time on Mary the hacker, she had to consider Mary the psychotic. Suddenly making out a will and giving your items away was never good.
She pulled Minnie’s file.
Patient: Minnie McKinney
Psychiatrist: Dr. Emma Kerr
Date: Wednesday, May 6, 2015 12 p.m.
****
Dr. Kerr: I’m going to be blunt. Did you and Mary both draw up wills recently?