Schism

Chapter 16 part 1

Chapter 16

The phone rang as Bryan pushed a finger down onto the remains of the bagel.  After half a day on his desk it was inedibly dry.  He curled the paper napkin around it and dropped it into the trash as he looked at the caller ID on the cradle.  By now he recognized the doctor's number.  He thought about letting it ring and getting up for more coffee.  He certainly didn't want to speak with her, but the last few hours had brought in a tide of questions.  He picked up the phone.  "Detective Mickelson."

"Finally."  Her voice was flat out tense, without the usual attempt to cover it.  Bryan grinned to himself as she spoke.  "Do you ever return your calls?"

"Doctor," he said.  "Where are you now?"

He listened to the long pause.  "I'm downstairs again.  They won't let me up to see you."

"I'll be right down.  I have some questions for you."  Bryan hung up the phone before she could reply.

He stood, paused.  He leaned over the bottom desk drawer and opened it.  The picture waited inside.  He hadn't looked at it since he first got in that morning.  "I might be getting closer," he said as he gently shut the drawer and walked to the stairs.

The wind was light, but getting colder as Bryan sat down on the bench.  He pulled his jacket collar closer to his neck and watched Westen lower herself down beside him, her hand held up in the sling.  It was obvious that she was trying to slide a layer of composure over her anger and impatience.  "I appreciate you meeting me, Detective.  I've been hoping for an update."

"I was hoping to pick your brain first."  He saw her mouth tighten.  He could understand her tension over being assaulted, but he knew there was a more personal reason for her interest. Under her attempts at professional behavior there had to be something that explained all of the extra work she was doing to find William.  "What can you tell me about pyromania?"

"What does that have to do with finding William Adams?"

"It's another case I'm looking into," he said.  "It's quite rare, isn't it?"

She turned her eyes toward him for a moment, then Bryan waited as she turned, stared out into the street.  “It’s very rare.  It's often incorrectly diagnosed when something else is a better fit.  Antisocial personality disorder, bipolar, a few others are generally the proper diagnosis."

"It's an obsessive disorder, right?"

That got him a nod.  His guess had been right, clinical topics made her much easier to talk to.  "There's a cycle of excitation and relief or pleasure associated with the starting of fires for the subject.  The true pyromaniac gains no external benefit from starting fires."

"No insurance benefits.  Any outward symptoms, associated disorders?"

"Social and learning difficulties are common."  She still didn't look back to him.  "What case is this?  You think you're looking for an actual pyromaniac?"

"An FBI profiler suspects that the subject we're looking for is one."

"For all of these fires?  Ridiculous.  Do you really know how rare it is?"

She stared at the street and Bryan went on.  "How well does treatment work?"

Finally, she looked back.  He let her study him for a moment, stayed quiet until she spoke.  "Children who are diagnosed respond well.  Adults are rarely cured.  They stay fire starters until they die."

Bryan turned to the street.  He'd had no grand plans for revenge.  He knew that would only temporarily wash away his anger and the lost feeling he carried with him.  But the thought that the person who had murdered his wife and son was simply someone who was incurably insane wasn't something he had wanted to hear.  No matter how sick the fire starter was, Bryan couldn't create sympathy for this person, couldn't draw up anything but more emptiness from his feelings.

He felt the doctor studying him as he moved his hand to the watch.  He began to rub his hands together instead.  "About schizophrenia.  William believes, desperately, that the voices are real.  They are to him."

"That's central to the diagnosis of a schizophrenic, Detective." 

Diagnosing schizophrenia was generally difficult to do, he knew that.  "But you weren't the physician that diagnosed him, were you?"

"I was on the team.  The lead psychiatrist has since retired."

He nodded.  That matched the notes in William's file.  "I saw a note that he failed a hollow mask test.  What is that?"

"It's a visual test.  The subject is shown the image of the inside of a mask.  You and I can't tell the difference between the inside and the outside of the mask, but a schizophrenic can."

"And William couldn't tell the difference, just like you and I?"

"It’s only one test in a battery."

"Then what was the diagnosis based on?"  He asked.

Bryan tried not to look at her red hair as she shook her head.  "It was rather clear cut.  He saw things and heard voices that put him into danger."

"So what are they?"

"What are what?"  She asked.

"The voices he hears.  What are they?"

"You'll have to excuse me, Detective.  I'm a little confused by your question.  Mr. Adams' brain doesn't work properly.  That's why he hears voices."

Bryan paused.  Hiding what he'd seen William do from the doctor would be more difficult than hiding it from the other detectives.  "That's actually the main part of my question.  If his brain isn't working, why does he hear coherent voices instead of static, unintelligible noises.  How is it that he sees and hears things that make sense to him?"

"Detective, the frontal and temporal lobes of a schizophrenic brain show over-activity and actually shrink over time.  This is a serious illness, not something to trivialize with ridiculous questions," she said.

Bryan nodded back.  "And that isn't answering my question, doctor."