Michael Palmer - Flashback

He turned on his heel and stalked from the room. The nurse looked down at Annie and shrugged helplessly. "I'll be back a little later, " she said. "I want her to get some Valium, " Norman ordered when they were out of earshot. "No, no, on second thought, make it Haldol, one point five by mouth every eight hours. Give her the first dose now."

Doreen Lavalley hesitated. Norman smiled at her and patted her on the shoulder. "Hey, Doreen, don't worry, " he said. "This is absolutely routine stuff. Nobody wants to go to a nursing home, but some people have to. And listen, I didn't get to be chief of staff in this system by not caring about my patients. If anything, I care too much. "Believe me, it's all for the best. The Haldol will calm her down, and by this evening she'll be a thousand times easier to reason with. You just watch. Okay?… Now, about my in-service talk next Thursday. What do you say we… "

The 1938 fleet monoplane cut through the warm midday air like an arrow, soared over the dense forest panoply and then across the broad, grassy field. It dipped and looped like a yo-yo, barrel rolling again and again, sunlight exploding off the hand polished, crimson butyrate paint of its wings. At the far edge of the meadow it nosed upward, streaking toward a solitary puff of cloud in an otherwise flawless sky. From his spot on a large boulder, Zachary watched intently as his fingers, through minute movements of the stick atop his radio control, choreographed the flight. A stall, a spin, a roll out, a second pass over the field, Zack had built the Fleet as a high schooler, and although he had sometimes gone a year or more without the opportunity to fly her, he had kept the engine and the finish in perfect condition.

With a final, wide bank, he eased the model upwind and set her down sweetly in the grass. The plane was, as always, fascinating to watch, and this day, with any luck, she would be more than just a hobby. This day, she would be a toot to help him unlock the tortured silence of a young boy. "Hey, Ace, that was a nifty piece of flying."

Suzanne, dressed in snug white shorts and a Dartmouth T-shirt, stood on a small rise, looking as if she might have just drifted down from the sun. She had a plaid blanket draped over one arm and a wicker picnic basket hanging from the other. "You know, " he said, squinting up at her, "about twenty minutes ago I started getting this funny feeling you might show up."

"Do we have time for lunch?

" she asked, making her way down the slope. Zack glanced at his watch.

"About forty-five minutes. I'm glad you're here." Suzanne stretched on her tiptoes and kissed him lightly on the mouth. "Me, too," she said.

"Can I set this food out, or is Cheap dog lurking somewhere? "

"No, no. Mop-face and the Fleet out there are avowed enemies. Sort of like sibling rivalry. He's home digging up the yard."

She spread the blanket and set out dishes of fried chicken, smoked fish, and salad. Then she extracted a small portable radio, set it on the grass, and fiddled with the dial until she found WEVO. The announcer was thanking his guests for participating in Midday Roundtable and inviting listeners to stay turned for a special edition of Music of the Masters.

"You must think I'm a little crazy for the way I've been acting around you, " she said as she poured lemonade. "I wanted to apologize. Zack shrugged. "No need, " he said. "You've had a few more important things to deal with than me."

"Perhaps. Just the same, I've been acting like a jerk, and I'm sorry."

He reached over and brushed her cheek with the back of his hand. "Fair enough, " he said. "If that's what you need, then apology accepted. There, do you feel better?"

"Zack, I… I want to explain."

"Hey, I don't require any-"

"No, I want to." She studied her hands. "At least I think I do."

For much of the night she had sat with Helene, struggling to come to grips with the past. "Nothing matters except the truth, " her friend had said. "Nothing matters except how you really, truly feel. Right here, in your gut. I go out the way I do, see men the way I do, because I honestly know, in my heart, that I hate being alone. Otherwise I'd stay at home or join the Ammonoosuc Valley Quilters. Believe me I would. You don't have to do it my way, or anyone else's way for that matter, but your own, Suze. But-and it's a big but-you can't keep fighting your feelings. You can't fight who you are. If you think you care about the man, tell him who you are, where you've been. If he can deal with it, fine. If he can't, that's his problem."

It all had made so much sense while they were talking. Now, Suzanne was not so sure. There was more than a little to be said for living the safe life. The meadow, abutting the low hills southwest of town, glowed verdant and golden in the dry afternoon sun. For a time they ate in silence, save for the deep, cultured voice of the WEVO announcer, who was extolling the virtues of an English composer whose name Zack missed.

"Zachary, " Suzanne said suddenly, "the other night was the first time I've made love in more than three years."

"Well, you certainly haven't gotten rusty, " he replied. "I would also guess that whatever the reason for those three years of celibacy, it wasn't a lack of offers."

She smiled at him wistfully. "You're sweet. Actually, there haven't been that many. I haven't been able to trust any man enough even to be encouraging." 17 "If you're trying to make me feel special, you're doing a great job. "You are special… Zack, my husband-my ex-husband-did an incredible hatchet job on my life, and then left me for dead. The scars that formed just don't seem to want to heal. I don't put all the blame on him for what happened. I could have put my foot down when I figured out what was going on. I could have gotten out. But I stayed. I always told myself it was for Jen, but looking back, I realize that I simply couldn't admit to myself how blind I had been-how badly I had misjudged the man I had married. And I couldn't accept that he didn't care enough about me to change."

"You were young."

"Twenty-three, if you call that young. And not a very worldly twenty-three at that. Paul was a Ph. D. Brilliant, handsome, charming as hell. Already an associate professor at thirty-five. Every woman in school had a crush on him. Unfortunately, what they didn't know what I didn't know-was how sick he was inside. He was a sociopath, Zachary. A womanizer, a drug addict, and a glib, an unbelievably glib liar. He used me. In every way imaginable, he used me."

She searched Zack's eyes for any signs of judgment or revulsion, but saw only sadness. "You don't have to share any more of this if you don't want to, " he said, taking her hand. "No, I'm okay. Much better than I thought I'd be. You're really very easy to talk to. "For several years,

" she went on, "Paul stole prescriptions from the hospital, made them out to his women or his cronies or to people who didn't even exist, and signed my name. He had my signature down even better than I did. He hit up a dozen or more wholesale houses and worked his way through just about every pharmacy in the state."

"Jesus…"

Suzanne gazed off toward the mountains to the south and began rubbing at her eyes. "Are you okay? " Zack asked. "Huh?… Oh, sure. I'm fine. Fine."

She fished through her purse and put on her sunglasses. "Where was IT?"

"You were telling me about the prescriptions. Listen, if you want to change the subject, it's perfectly-"

"No, no. It feels good to be able to talk about it." She reached beneath her sunglasses and again rubbed her eyes. "Besides, there's not that much more to tell. Somehow Paul must have found out that the DEA people were on to me, because a week before they showed up at our door, he emptied out our bank account, sold everything we had of value, and took off. No note, no call, nothing. Jen was only two at the time. A year or so later, I heard that he was teaching at a medical school in Mexico.