That’s the weird thing about gaming, nobody likes it when it says Game Over, even the winner.
That’s why we play the next game, try to get to the next level, hit the button for a rematch, playing hour after hour into the night.
We never want the game to stop.
Suddenly, I’m not pacing anymore.
I feel better, like myself again.
The game is still on, and I really am good at knowing what motivates people. I always have been. It was never hard for me, it always came easily even when I was little. That’s why I did so well even in elementary school, especially at math. I’m smart enough that I didn’t have to study that hard to get good grades, but that wasn’t what got me great grades.
Being a sociopath got me great grades.
I was the kid who deserved the A-, but got the A. I was even the kid who deserved the A, but got the A+. If there were extra credit questions, I answered them and got all the points, not just partial credit. Every grade that could possibly be rounded up, got rounded up in my favor.
Why?
My teachers liked me. By fifth grade, I could see what the teachers wanted, because it was so obvious. They wanted us to shut up, sit down, and do what they said when they said it. In other words, they wanted us not to be kids.
I learned this in fifth grade math class from Mrs. Cushing, whose left arm ended at the elbow, so she always wore a jacket and tucked her empty sleeve into her jacket pocket, like a fake hand. That year there was a weird bulge in the school enrollment, so Mrs. Cushing had thirty-five kids in her math class, which was seventeen more kids than a teacher with even two arms could handle.
You do the math.
The classes were so big they overflowed the regular school, so they moved us to mods, or modular classrooms, a fancy name for trailers with no air-conditioning.
I remember toward the end of the school year, with a heat wave roasting the mods to eighty-five degrees after lunch and Mrs. Cushing even hotter in the jacket she couldn’t take off because it was the holder for her empty sleeve, and she was trying vainly to control Ricky Weissberg, the ringleader of the bad kids, who called out constantly, shoved each other in their desks, or generally caused non-stop trouble. It was the same thing every day, which gave me a headache, and I never liked Ricky anyway.
Math, I liked.
So I stole some of my mother’s Valium and dropped it in Ricky’s Coke at lunch. He didn’t show up to math that day, or any day after I did that.
Ricky stopped existing for Mrs. Cushing and me.
I didn’t know what happened to him, but school ended before he came back to class. His friends shut up without him to tell them what to do, Mrs. Cushing got her classroom back, and the heat wave broke.
And me, I got an A+ in math.
Chapter Nineteen
Early Tuesday morning, Eric stood waiting outside his own front door, or rather his ex–front door, on the welcome mat that Caitlin had ordered from Williams-Sonoma. The doormat was made of coir, whatever that was, and he remembered that she’d thought it was a bargain at almost $200. He had disagreed, but he thought it was cute that she’d wanted it so badly. He used to think that everything she did was cute. He didn’t think that anymore. But evidently, somebody else did.
“Good morning, Eric,” Caitlin said, opening the front door abruptly. She looked fresh and pretty, and he tried mightily not to love her anymore. Her hair was blown-dry into a sleek ponytail, and she had on a navy blue dress with her coordinating blue-and-red jacket, an outfit he recognized as going-to-court-wear. He wondered if she would wear it to court the day they fought over custody.
“Good morning, may I come in?” Eric asked, like some sort of Best Behavior Robot.
“Yes, of course.” Caitlin admitted him like his Best Behavior Robot Counterpart, then stood aside, picked up her fancy purse from the console table, and grabbed her car keys. Coolly, she said, “I’ll be going, and Hannah said you were going to make eggs, so please don’t leave the dishes in the sink.”
“I won’t.” Eric had never left the dishes in the sink in his life, but let it go. He stepped around her, giving her a wide berth, as if they were fighters in a marital boxing ring, except that nobody was throwing a punch because they both knew the sole spectator was watching from the kitchen island.
“Hi, Daddy!” Hannah called out, but she didn’t come running in to see him as usual, though she smiled at him, a little tiredly, from behind her orange juice. She had already poured his and hers, and set the table, which was her job.
“Get the ketchup, honey!” Eric called back with forced cheer, as Caitlin went to the door, her keys jingling.
“Don’t forget to lock up. Use Hannah’s keys and then put them in the lock box in the garage.”
“Of course.” Eric had no idea why she was telling him things he already knew.
“Have a good day, Eric,” Caitlin said, then waved good-bye to Hannah. “Bye, sweetie, have fun at school! I’ll pick you up at aftercare.”
“Bye, Mommy!” Hannah was already climbing down from the stool, and Eric left the entrance hall, plastering a smile on his face that didn’t waver as he heard the front door close and Caitlin left the house. He entered the kitchen, looking around quickly. He remembered choosing the rustic Mexican tile on the floor, the white-and-blue flecked granite countertops, the white cabinets, the light blue of the walls, the oversized window behind the sink. The kitchen had been the heart of their home, but that time had passed. He understood suddenly why it didn’t make sense for him to come here and fix breakfast, as if he had never left.
“Hey, pretty girl.” Eric went to Hannah, tousled her hair, and gave her a kiss on the top of her head. “Scrambled or fried?”
“Can we have scrambled eggs?” Hannah righted her glasses, blinking. Her eyes seemed troubled behind them, and her mouth made an unusually sad little line. Still she looked adorable in her little pink T-shirt, jean shorts, and pink Converse sneakers.
“Of course.” Eric wondered what was bothering her. Maybe Caitlin had told her about the move. “You okay?”
“Yep.”
Eric knew better than to rush her. “Are you cooking today or am I?”
“I cooked last time, so it’s your turn.” Hannah headed for the pantry off the kitchen, where they kept the ketchup.
“Okay.” Eric went to the refrigerator, opened it, and got the egg carton, butter, and Half & Half. The latter was his secret ingredient, which made his scrambled eggs so delicious. Caitlin had never liked when he made them that way, not wanting the extra calories, but now he was free to get crazy. “How’s your ankle?”
“Fine, no more bandage.” Hannah retrieved the ketchup, closed the cabinet door, and brought it back to the island, where she set it down with finality.
“Does it still hurt?”
“Not really.”
“How did you sleep?” Eric flipped his tie over his shoulder so he didn’t stain it, took a knife from the silverware drawer, carved some butter, and put it in the pan, then turned on the heat.
“Okay.”
“You ready for school?”
“Yes.”
“Only one week left, right?”
“Yep.”
“Good.” Eric got a Pyrex bowl from the cabinet, cracked an egg into it, and held out the drippy shell for her. They liked to play Eggshell Golf, a game in which they tossed eggshells into the sink and scored a point if it landed in the garbage disposal. “You want to take a shot?”
“No.” Hannah shook her head.
“Why not?”
“I just don’t want to.”
“Okay, then watch the master.” Eric raised the eggshell, faced the sink, and tossed it in a perfect arc, so it landed in the garbage disposal. “Did you see that? A hole-in-one?”
Hannah giggled, and Eric smiled too, happy that he’d gotten her out of her mood.
“I’m on fire.” Eric returned to cracking the rest of the eggs in the bowl, but tossed the shells into
the sink. “Are you doing okay, munchkin? You seem quiet.”
“I’m trying to be quiet.”
“Why would you do that?”
“Because, well, just because.” Hannah looked away, went back to the kitchen island, and scrambled up into her seat.
Eric returned to the stove, which faced him away from her. Something was going on, but he didn’t want to push it, and he certainly didn’t want to be accused of pumping her for information. He wondered if Caitlin had told her that they were moving, but he sensed he would find out soon enough. He retrieved a fork from the silverware drawer, scrambled the eggs, then poured in the Half & Half.
“Daddy, am I a whiner?”
“No, not at all. Why?”
“Michelle said that her daddy said that I am.”
“You’re not a whiner, honey.” Eric kept his back to her, stirring the eggs needlessly, because he knew that if he turned around, his face would show the anger he felt.
“He thinks I am, he said so. We went to the carnival with Mommy and Michelle and Michelle’s daddy, and he said that I was a whiner because I didn’t want to go on the rollercoaster.”
“That’s not whining, honey. You’re allowed not to want to go on a rollercoaster.” Eric kept his tone judgment-free, which only an experienced psychiatrist could’ve pulled off. He had no idea when they’d gone to a carnival. It had to have been one of the nights since he’d seen her last.
“I was afraid, but they said there was nothing to be afraid of.”
“Not everybody likes rollercoasters. I don’t like rollercoasters.”
“Brian likes rollercoasters. And video games, too. He plays them all the time.”
Brian, Eric thought, simmering. His name is Brian.
“He goes to different rollercoasters on vacations. Michelle loves them and they do it together and they think it’s really fun.”
“That’s good for them, but people have fun in different ways. For example, we play Eggshell Golf. Now that’s fun.” Eric glanced over his shoulder, to see Hannah idly twirling her juice glass.
“Mommy said I didn’t have to go on, but she didn’t want to leave me alone, so she didn’t get to go on.”
“I’m sure Mommy had fun other ways.” Eric flushed suddenly, hearing his own double entendre. “Did you get her some cotton candy? You know she loves cotton candy.”
“Yes, she got it stuck on her sunglasses.”
Good. “So Mommy had fun, in the end.” Eric stirred the eggs again, almost finished.
“I’m trying not to whine so much,” Hannah said after a moment.
“You know what I think, honey?” Eric composed himself, turned off the heat, and grabbed a plastic spatula from the utensils drawer because he was trained not to use a metal spatula with a nonstick pan. He ladled eggs into Hannah’s plate and his own. “I think that saying what you think is much better than holding it in. Do you understand what I mean?”
“Yes.”
“I always want to hear what you’re thinking, and I know that your mommy feels the same way.” Eric couldn’t vouch for that asshole Brian. “So always let me know what’s on your mind, okay?”
“Okay.” Hannah picked up her fork, tilting her head down and digging into her eggs, as Eric turned to put the pan in the sink. He knew that she was mulling it over, ruminating about it, but not in the clinical sense. She processed things, just like he did.
“How are the eggs, honey?” Eric crossed to the island, sat down in his seat, and picked up his fork.
“Good.” Hannah looked up at him, her fork poised, its large tines oversized in her small hand. “Guess what, Daddy.”
“What?” Eric swallowed some eggs, which were delicious. It was because of the Half & Half.
“Mommy and me are going to live in Brian and Michelle’s house.”
Eric didn’t know what to say.
Hannah blinked behind her glasses. “But I’m not allowed to whine about it because they have a pool.”
Chapter Twenty
Eric felt out-of-sorts during the entire drive into work, preoccupied with the fact that Hannah and Caitlin were already moving in with Caitlin’s new boyfriend. It seemed way too soon for Caitlin and it wouldn’t be good for Hannah, though he had to admit to himself that it bugged him for his own reasons, too. He couldn’t stop stewing about it as he parked the car in the garage, entered the hospital, and went directly to the fancy first-floor conference room for a meeting of the Pharmacy Review Board. He had so much going on that taking a meeting felt like an interruption, but it came with the territory of being Chief.
Eric tried to put Caitlin and Hannah out of his mind as he and the other members of the Board took their seats around the long table in the paneled conference room, which they used only for important committee meetings. The Board was composed of eight other department chiefs, the hospital pharmacist, and Mike Braezele from Legal, as a non-voting member. Their function was to determine which drugs would be carried in the HGH pharmacy, and today was the second meeting about a new cholesterol-lowering drug, Rostatin, which had just received FDA approval. In front of each Board member, like a corporate place setting, sat a sealed bottle of no-name water, a handful of generic butterscotch candies, an open laptop, and the slick marketing packet from Wacher Labs, the drug company that had developed Rostatin.
Eric zoned out while Chief of Cardiology Morris Brexler began presenting the argument for Rostatin. Morris had practically memorized the data supplied him by Wacher, and it never ceased to amaze Eric how many HGH meetings were composed of people reading aloud information that he could read himself. While Morris droned on, Eric paged through the Rostatin PR packet, with its shiny cover the color of freshly oxygenated blood and the interior materials printed in matching rose-colored headlines. It was some of the most expensive literature that he’d seen, and Morris was doing almost as good a sales pitch as the drug reps themselves, who weren’t permitted inside the conference room, but waited in the hallway outside. Theoretically, they were there in case the doctors had any questions during the meeting, but the real reason was to pressure the committee members into approving the drug.
Eric looked over at him, returning his attention to the meeting. Morris was about Eric’s age but acted a lot older, with a fastidiousness about his appearance. His sandy brown hair was always perfectly groomed, and he had small hazel eyes set close together over a long nose, with a year-round golf tan that made him look permanently prosperous.
“In sum,” Morris was saying, “Rostatin is a better statin than Rosuvastatin and Atorvastatin. The science behind it is better, and we need this new drug, no question, in Cardiology. Now, any questions?”
“Yes,” Eric answered, trying to keep the annoyance from his tone. “I’m trying to understand why we need to carry yet another statin. Rostatin’s more expensive than Rosuvastatin and Atorvastatin, and they have a longer track record. I don’t know why we have to go for the latest and the greatest, when its side effects are unproven. I don’t want to see us go out on a limb. I don’t know why we would.”
“I couldn’t disagree more. Why wouldn’t we?” Morris turned his palms up in appeal, glancing around the table. “I think it’s important that HGH remain in the forefront of medicine. Why should HGH be prescribing yesterday’s statin?”
“Because it’s safer,” Eric answered flatly.
Morris slipped on his black reading glasses, with a frown. “Eric, did you read the papers I sent you?”
“Yes, I have.”
“Then I don’t see how you could have any doubts about Rostatin.”
“Really?” Eric turned to his laptop and scrolled through the notes he’d taken from the papers. “Even in the papers you sent, the data shows that Rostatin correlates with increased incidence of muscle atrophy, and on the macro level, I’m not sure I approve of the treatment goals for this drug. In my field, we know that the brain needs cholesterol for proper function. Yet here comes another drug company that decides cholesterol has to be l
owered from 200 to 190, so they can count on the market share expanding. It’s cholestrol points for dollars. They know the algorithm. It’s only about the money.”
Morris shook his head. “One can hardly fault Wacher for trying to make money. They have shareholders to answer to, as a public company. The only question before us is should we carry Rostatin, which was approved by the FDA with flying colors.”
Eric knew that FDA approval didn’t go far enough, in terms of safety. “Morris, we both know that only two positive studies are required for FDA approval, and an article I found, which I emailed to you all, said in a footnote that Wacher got two negative studies, as well.” Eric gestured at the packet. “I didn’t see anything about the negative studies in here, and all four of the studies were commissioned by the drug company in the first place. Why didn’t they show us those negative studies?”
“That’s proprietary information. It contains trade secrets and the like.”
Morris pressed his reading glasses onto the bridge of his nose.
“If so, then why aren’t the positive studies also proprietary information? In any event, they should produce them to us before we approve Rostatin for the HGH pharmacy. I’ll warrant to them I’m not going to form a competing drug company.”
Everybody except Morris laughed, and Eric was beginning to wonder if the gossip about Morris was true, that he was in Wacher’s pocket—literally. The Cardiology Chief had just built a vacation home in Myrtle Beach and he was putting three kids through private school. Everyone at the table knew how much Morris made at the hospital and also that his wife didn’t work. Nobody could say with certainty where the extra money came from, but they couldn’t say it didn’t come from big pharma, either.
Eric continued, “We all know that data can be manipulated. In my field, for example, when studies showed a few years ago that certain antidepressants created suicidal ideation in adolescents, the FDA required black box warnings on them. More recently, the drug companies who manufactured the antidepressants studied the impact of the black box warning, and it should come as no surprise that they concluded the black box warnings are a disaster because fewer antidepressants are being prescribed and more teenagers are dying from suicide. It’s a superficially persuasive study, but it’s totally manipulated data. When you look at data underlying the studies, it shows that the suicidal patients included heroin addicts. That’s just a faulty proxy.”