Gregg Hurwitz - The Program

"Why don't you pull the covers off her?" Tim whispered.

"She likes being hot." Dray clicked the "rewind" button on the tape recorder. "You get the meeting set?"

"Nine o'clock at Reggie's motel. What's that?"

"I convinced Leah to record her seven A.M. check-in message to TD so she could sleep in. I'll be up – I'll just call the number for her and play it." When they stepped into the hall, she took note of his expression. "What's wrong?"

He gestured for her to follow him into the bathroom. As he took a steaming shower, she sat on the toilet so he could finish filling her in. She didn't say much; there wasn't much to say.

He dried off, brushed his teeth, and got into bed. Beside him, Dray had her nose buried in a book, her prerequisite to sleeping. Continuing to read, she reached over and took his hand. He stared at the gun safe, the ceiling, the dark leaves tapping softly at the window.

Without lifting her eyes from the paperback, Dray said, "She is rather willowy."

Walking down the hall, Tim could hear the murmur of Dray's voice. Morning light suffused the kitchen, a pale stillness that bleached the polished counters.

Leah's mouth hovered over a bowl of Lucky Charms, her pistoning arm providing elevator service for yellow moons and blue diamonds. Despite nearly twelve hours of unrestricted access to the kitchen, still she ate like a war orphan. Between her and Dray, Tim was beginning to feel anorexic.

Leah wore Dray's favorite academy sweatshirt; when she caught the milk dribbling down her chin with a swipe of the sleeve, Dray didn't even object. Leah's skin was a healthy, well-scrubbed pink, her hair shiny and nicely combed, bangs covering the abrasions at the hairline.

"Morning," Leah and Dray said simultaneously.

Tim forced a smile. An emptiness had replaced his stomach since he'd surrendered his badge last night. "Ready?"

Leah released a shuddering sigh.

Dray popped her vitamins, then tapped a few extras from the jar and pushed them across the table at Leah. "Grab some juice and take these."

Leah got up and perused the inside of the refrigerator. "Orange juice or apple?"

"Whatever you want."

Leah stared at Tim as if he'd spoken another language. Tim stared back. Leah glanced inside the refrigerator, then at Tim and Dray – a momentary crisis. "Just tell me."

"Go on and choose for yourself, Leah."

Leah reached tentatively for one carton, then the other. She shook her head, and tears streaked down her cheeks.

Dray got up, pulled out the OJ, and poured her a glass.

If we attack the cult directly, she'll either shut off or drown us in dogma," Bederman said. "Focusing on the cult's controlling aspects will get us further. But she's got to make the connections herself."

Tim sat beside him on the sagging twin bed they'd pushed against the wall to make room for a ring of chairs. Reggie had moved the plastic wastebasket so he could settle on the floor with his back to the corner and the brown paper bag in his lap. After a cursory examination of the motel room's furnishings, Emma had elected to stand, remaining cautiously erect in the center of the thinning carpet. When she'd met Reggie, she'd taken his hand with a thumb and two fingers, as if grasping a soiled diaper.

Will faced the gauzy window curtains, his hands clasped behind him. Outside, a garbage truck impaled a Dumpster and hoisted it overhead, curling like a great clanking scorpion. The Dumpster discharged its contents and began its noisy descent.

"Perhaps you could turn around?" Bederman said.

Will pivoted, thumbs bent over the rim of his plastic cup. On the sill rested two empty minibar Absoluts, caps discarded among the dead flies. Though he'd forgone a tie, he looked ridiculously formal in a suit.

Through wire-frame spectacles, Bederman regarded him evenly. "We've got to help her envision a happy future outside the cult."

Lank hair down in his eyes, Reggie spread his arms. "Ta-da!"

"We want to give her as much of a sense of control as possible. Reggie's got the right idea, sitting on the floor so we don't seem threatening."

"I'd prefer not to sit on the floor," Emma said.

"Perhaps you could consider a chair." Bederman gestured at Will, who'd moved to lean importantly against the bureau. "And you, too."

Emma brushed off the seat with her hand and sat at the edge. "I feel like I don't know who she is anymore. If she does come home, it'll be like having a stranger -"

"You'll need to go to therapy," Bederman said. "All of you."

Will remained standing. "What is it with this town and shrinks? For people here it's like going to the barber." He drained his cup and dropped it into the wastebasket. "I haven't gone to a shrink in fifty-eight years -"

"Big surprise, that," Reggie said.

"- and I certainly don't need to start because my stepdaughter got herself turned around."

"It was my understanding that Leah is your daughter," Bederman said. "By adoption."

Tim said, "To salvage your family, is it such a sacrifice to sit in an air-conditioned office for an hour a week and talk about your mother?"

Emma's face took on a sudden sternness. "Sometimes I think we'd all be better off if we just let her go ahead into whatever life she wanted."

Will went rigid. "Emma."

A knock sounded at the door, and then Dray stuck her head in. "Ready?"

Bederman nodded. Dray held the door open, her attention directed patiently just around the jamb. Maybe a full minute passed. Finally Leah trudged into the room. Dray withdrew silently, closing the door.

Leah swept her fingers over an ear, hooking back her stray hair, and risked a glance up at her parents. "Hi."

Emma gasped. Tim wondered what her reaction would have been to seeing Leah before she'd cleaned herself up. Will had gone back to assessing the garbage truck's progress. In Leah's gaze at her stepfather's back, Tim felt the burn of her desired approval.

"Hi, Will."

"Turn around and face your daughter," Bederman said.

Bent slightly at the waist, Will raised a hand to his face and held it there a moment. When he finally turned, his eyes were moist but his expression impenetrable. "Leah."

They studied each other. It was as if they were alone in the room.

"I'm Glen, and this is Reggie. We're here with your parents because we want to find out more about you -"

"Why are my parents here?"

Emma remained frozen in the chair, her face drawn and bloodless. Will's hands fussed as if desirous of a rocks glass.

"Well," Bederman finally said, "because they love you and they're concerned about you."

Leah kept her eyes on Will. "Really?"

"Yes, really," Will said. "Christ, Leah. This has been awful for us, your mother -"

"I'm sorry to have made your life difficult."

"- you running off half-cocked -"

"Mr. Henning." Bederman's voice had the sharp anger of a disobeyed parent, and as much authority. Amazingly, Will was silenced; he appeared shocked at his own obedience.

Bederman removed his spectacles and polished them on his shirt, first one lens, then the other. "Would you like to come in and sit down, Leah?" With an open hand, he indicated one of the chairs. She sat, and the others joined her, except Reggie, who stayed in the corner, looking as if he might barf.

"I love The Program," Leah said. "It's the most important thing that's ever happened to -"

"That's just what you think now," Will said.

Bederman silenced him again with a terse gesture and said to Leah, "I understand that. And we want to talk more about that. But at some point we'd also like to hear a few of the things you don't like about The Program."

Leah's cheeks colored. "There's nothing I don't like."

A grimace tightened Will's face. "She's brainwashed. Completely -"