Second Child (35 page)

“You have a lot of friends there?”

Melissa shrugged. “More than out here, anyway.”

“What about D’Arcy?” Andrews asked.

Melissa shifted in her chair and her eyes clouded slightly. “Wh-What about her?” she asked.

Andrews cocked his head slightly. “Well, she’s always been your best friend out here, hasn’t she?”

Melissa hesitated, but finally nodded. “B-But she’s not real. I made her up.”

“What if you didn’t?” Andrews suggested, his brows lifting slightly. “What if she’s a real person?”

The cloud in Melissa’s eyes darkened. “But she can’t be. I mean, there’s the ghost story, but …” Her voice trailed off as she remembered the vision she’d seen at the top of the attic stairs late on Saturday night.

“I’m not talking about the ghost story,” Andrews told her, leaning forward once more to rest his forearms on his desk. “But it seems to me that D’Arcy might be something more than someone you just made up. Maybe she’s someone who helps you out when things get so rough you just want to disappear.”

Now it was Melissa who cocked her head, her brows furrowing deeply. “You mean like when my mom’s really mad at me about something?”

Andrews felt a tingle of excitement, for there was something in Melissa’s voice that told him he’d struck close to home. “What happens when your mother gets really mad at you?” he asked, deliberately echoing Melissa’s exact words.

Melissa’s tongue ran nervously over her lower lip. “Sometimes,” she said hesitantly, “well, sometimes D’Arcy comes, and lets me go to sleep. And then when I wake up, it’s all over.”

Andrews nodded. “I see.” He picked up a pencil from his desk, twirling it idly. “What about when your father’s home, on the weekends? Does your mother get as mad at you then?”

Melissa glanced unconsciously toward the door, then shook her head. “It’s better on the weekends,” she admitted.

Andrews nodded almost absently, as if the words held little importance to him, then smiled. “How would you like to try an experiment?”

Melissa looked at him cautiously. “What kind of experiment?”

Andrews grinned at her. “How would you like to be hypnotized?” Melissa’s eyes widened and she looked almost frightened. “It would be just like going to sleep,”
Andrews assured her. “Like when D’Arcy comes. Only this time I would be the one who puts you to sleep.”

“Why?” Melissa asked, her eyes wary.

Andrews considered his next words carefully. He didn’t want to frighten Melissa, but he didn’t want to lie to her, either. “Well,” he said, “I’d like to find out what happens when you go to sleep, and the easiest way for me to do that would be to talk to D’Arcy.”

For several seconds Melissa said nothing, and when she finally spoke, there was a slight tremor in her voice. “W-Will it hurt?”

Andrews laughed out loud. “Of course it won’t hurt,” he replied. “In fact, it might not even work. But if it does, you’ll just feel as though you’re going to sleep, but you won’t really be asleep.”

Melissa still seemed to hesitate. “If you talk to D’Arcy, will you tell me what she says?”

Andrews nodded. “Of course.” He talked to her for a few minutes more, explaining to her what he was going to do, and finally she nodded.

“Do I have to watch a pendulum or something?”

“Nope. Just listen to what I’m telling you, and try to concentrate on nothing except the sound of my voice. I’m going to talk to you, and you’re going to get sleepy. You’re going to find your eyelids getting heavy, and you’re going to want to close them. Now your arms and legs are going to get heavy, too. So heavy you won’t be able to lift them. And you’re going to get sleepier and sleepier, and now you’re going to go to sleep …”

His voice droned on, and after a few moments Melissa’s eyes finally closed.

“Melissa, can you hear me?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Open your eyes, Melissa.”

The girl’s eyes blinked open, and she sat still in the chair, staring at him.

“Raise your right arm, Melissa.”

Melissa’s arm rose up until it extended straight out from her shoulder, where it remained, held so steady it could have been suspended by wires from the ceiling. He kept talking to her, his voice still droning quietly, and finally,
when he was certain she was deep in a hypnotic trance, he told her to lower her arm.

“Now I want you to close your eyes,” he went on, “and then I want you to go to sleep so I can talk to D’Arcy.”

As he watched, her arm settled back onto the arm of the chair and her eyes closed once more.

“D’Arcy?” he asked softly. “D’Arcy, can you hear me?”

There was no reaction from Melissa at all. She simply sat in the chair, her eyes closed, unmoving.

Andrews kept talking, urging the second personality he was almost certain resided within Melissa to come forth. “I need to talk to you,” he said. “I need to talk to you about Melissa. Wouldn’t you like to talk to me, too?”

There was no reaction from Melissa, not even a flicker of movement from her eyes. And yet, from what she’d told him, he was sure that somewhere within her subconscious, the “D’Arcy” personality was there, if he could only reach it.

In his mind he reviewed what he knew of the multiple personality disorder, in which a single individual literally divided the various aspects of his personality into separate entities, each of which reacted to the outside world in a specific manner. If he was right, then D’Arcy—the personality equipped to deal with Phyllis Holloway’s unending criticism and anger toward her daughter—might see no reason to come forth now. Indeed, if she feared discovery might lead to something that could harm Melissa, it could be very difficult to reach her. Finally, he decided to try a different tactic. “Melissa,” he said. “Can you hear me?”

“Yes.”

“I want you to talk to D’Arcy for me. Can you do that?”

There was a momentary silence, then Melissa uttered a single word. “No.”

Andrews frowned. He’d been so sure. “Why not?” he asked. “Why can’t you talk to her?”

“Because she isn’t here.”

Andrews’s frown deepened. “Where is she? Do you know?”

Melissa hesitated, but finally spoke again. “Yes,” she breathed.

“Tell me where she is, Melissa.”

There was a long silence, and then Melissa spoke once
more. “She—She’s at home,” she breathed. “She’s in the attic.”

Andrews probed a little further but could find out nothing more. Apparently the D’Arcy personality was buried so deep that Melissa couldn’t contact it unless she were under stress. But in time, Andrews was sure, that would change. Or perhaps he was completely wrong and D’Arcy didn’t exist at all.

Five minutes later Melissa blinked, opened her eyes, then cocked her head. “When are we going to start?” she asked.

Andrews grinned at her. “We already started,” he said. “In fact, we’re all finished.”

Melissa’s eyes widened in surprise. “We are? How come I don’t remember what happened?”

Andrews chuckled. “Well, for one thing, not much happened. I tried to talk to D’Arcy, but I don’t think she trusts me yet. She wouldn’t talk to me at all.”

Melissa seemed to shrink into the chair slightly. “Did I do something wrong?” she asked, her voice anxious.

“No, of course not,” Andrews hastily reassured her. “It will just take some time, that’s all. But you could do me a favor.” Melissa gazed at him questioningly. “When you talk to her, you could tell her it’s all right for her to talk to me.”

“But if she doesn’t want to …” Melissa began.

Dr. Andrews shrugged. “If she doesn’t want to, she doesn’t have to,” he said. He leaned back in his chair, then another thought occurred to him. “Do you ever talk to D’Arcy in the city?”

Now Melissa looked completely baffled. “How can I?” she said. “She lives out here.”

Andrews nodded. And out here, he thought, your father isn’t around all week. Out here, you’re left alone with your mother, and that’s when you need D’Arcy most. He reached out, pressed a button on his intercom, and a moment later Charles and Phyllis Holloway came in. “That’s it for today,” he told Melissa. “I’ll just talk to your parents for a minute, and then you can go home.”

Melissa’s eyes once again flicked toward her mother, but she said nothing, scurrying quickly out of the office.

When he was alone with her parents, Andrews gave
them an encouraging smile. “Well, I think we have a few problems, but nothing we can’t handle. Melissa’s been under considerable stress the last few weeks.”

“We’ve
all
been under stress, Dr. Andrews—” Phyllis interrupted, but Andrews held up a hand.

“Of course you have,” he agreed. “But at this point I’m not certain what’s happening with Melissa. I have a couple of theories, and I’d like to talk to her again.”

“Theories?” Phyllis demanded. “What kind of theories?”

Andrews sighed, and forced a smile. “I’m afraid that until I have a better grasp on things, I really can’t go into it. I don’t want you to worry when there may be nothing at all to worry about.”

“But what are we supposed to do?” Phyllis pressed. “If she keeps walking in her sleep—”

“I’m not sure that’s what’s happening,” Andrews broke in. “There are several possibilities I want to explore. For now, the best thing you can do is simply let her rest. She’s been under a lot of strain, and it’s affecting her.” His eyes fixed on Phyllis. “Just let her be herself,” he said. “Try not to pressure her.”

Phyllis’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t,” she said. “I give her guidance, which is my job, since I happen to be her mother. I just want her to fit in with all her friends. But the way she’s been behaving, the things she thinks she sees …”

“Melissa and I will be discussing all that, too,” Andrews said, rising to his feet and moving toward the door. “But the best thing you can do right now is simply be patient with her. She’s going through a lot of changes. Her age—”

Phyllis’s expression hardened. “That’s easy for you to say, Dr. Andrews. But what about the rest of us? What about Teri and me? Perhaps—Well, perhaps we ought to send Melissa away for a while?”

Charles, stunned by the words, stared at his wife, but before he could say anything at all, Dr. Andrews spoke.

“That might be something to consider later on,” he said. “But right now I don’t see that it would accomplish anything except make her feel more insecure than she already does. The best thing you can do, Mrs. Holloway, is let her know that you love her and approve of her just the way she is. If she does things that annoy you, try not to show
it. She’s very frightened, particularly of you. She wants your approval, but doesn’t know how to get it. So just show her that you love her. Do you think you can do that?”

Phyllis smiled tightly at the doctor. “She knows I love her,” she said. “And she knows I want only the best for her. But I don’t believe in letting children run wild. I believe they need to be trained. I shall do for Melissa what needs to be done.” Without waiting for Andrews to reply, she stalked out of the office.

Charles hesitated by the door, then offered Andrews his hand. “I’ll talk to her,” he promised. “I know she tends to be overcritical of Melissa, but I can deal with that. If I have to, I’ll take some extra time out here this summer.”

Andrews nodded. “I think that would be a good idea,” he said. “And the question isn’t whether you can deal with your wife’s attitude toward Melissa. The question is whether Melissa can.”

Teri stepped back and surveyed herself in the mirror on her closet door. The dress she’d chosen for Jeff Barnstable’s funeral was navy blue, with a wide red belt that wasn’t quite bright enough that it could be criticized. She’d also found a pair of earrings in the exact same shade as the belt, but decided against wearing them. In a couple of months, though, when she had moved back to the city with her family, the earrings would set the outfit off perfectly. In fact, if she could find a string of beads in the same color …

Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of muted voices, and after a last satisfied glance at her own image, she left her room. The voices were clearer now, and she knew where they were coming from.

The master suite, where her father and stepmother were also getting ready for the funeral that afternoon.

She glanced at Melissa’s closed door, then moved quickly past the staircase, pausing to slip off her high-heeled shoes, since their tapping echoed loudly against the hardwood floor when the voices of her parents fell silent for a moment. Carrying the shoes, she padded down the hall to the
door to the master suite. Though it was closed, she could hear the argument clearly enough.

Inside, Charles glared at his wife’s image in the mirror as she sat making final adjustments to her makeup. “Is that what you want us to do?” he said, his voice heavy with anger. “Just lock her up somewhere?”

“Of course not!” Phyllis snapped back, leaning forward to apply a touch of mascara to her eyelashes. “It has nothing to do with ‘locking her up,’ as you put it. But if she needs a rest, I don’t see any reason why we couldn’t find her some nice place to go. Like a summer camp, or something.”

“A summer camp!” Charles exploded. “What the hell are you talking about? If she’s having a hard time coping with kids she already knows, how the hell do you think she’s going to do suddenly being thrown in with a bunch of strangers!”

“Oh, really, Charles.” Phyllis dropped the mascara brush onto a small tray and turned to face him. “It just seems to me that we have to think of Teri, too. How is it going to affect her if we have to spend all our time catering to Melissa’s whims? Considering what she’s been through—”

“So now it’s Teri, is it?” Charles broke in. “Let’s see—so far you’ve said we ought to send her away for her own good, and Teri’s good. Now, what about you? It would make it a lot easier for you, wouldn’t it? You could spend even more time than you already do lying around the pool at the club trying to impress all those bitches who won’t give you the time of day!”

Phyllis, quivering with rage, rose to her feet. “How dare you?” she demanded. “How dare you talk that way about my friends? Lenore Van Arsdale is one of the finest people I’ve ever—”

“Lenore Van Arsdale is a crashing snob, which you should be the first to realize, since she won’t even speak to you if she can find a way out of it. Christ, sometimes I think Polly was right. The only thing that seems to count around here is ‘fitting in’ with the ‘right people.’ Not that any of them do anything—most of them spend their lives bragging about what their grandparents did and spending the money they inherited. Half of them couldn’t do a real job if they had to.”