House Rules

  An unreadable expression crosses Theo's face, but then he nods. --That would be cool,|| he says gruffly, and he slides away from my grasp.

  The door to the mudroom opens. --Jacob?|| I call, and I go to meet him.

  For a moment, I can't speak. His eyes are wild and his nose is running. His hands flap at his sides as he shoves me into the wall and runs up to his room. --Jacob!||

  He has no lock on his bedroom door; I removed it years ago. Now, I push the door open and find Jacob inside his closet, underneath the tendrils of shirt cuffs and sweatpants, rocking back and forth and emitting a high, reedy note from his throat.

  --What's the matter, baby?|| I say, getting down on my hands and knees and crawling into the closet, too. I wrap my arms tight around him and start singing:

  --I shot the sheriff ... but I didn't shoot the deputy.||

  Jacob's hands are flapping so hard that he is bruising me. --Talk to me,|| I say. --Did something happen with Jess?||

  At the sound of her name, he arches backward, as if he's been pierced by a bullet.

  He starts smacking his head against the wall so hard that it dents the plaster.

  --Don't,|| I beg, using every bit of strength I have to drag him forward, so that he cannot hurt himself.

  Dealing with an autistic meltdown is like dealing with a tornado. Once you are close enough to see it coming, there's nothing to do but weather the storm. Unlike a child having a temper tantrum, Jacob doesn't care if his behavior is making me react. He doesn't make sure he's not hurting himself. He isn't doing it in order to get something. In fact, he's not in control of himself at all. And unlike when he was four or five, I am not big enough to control him anymore.

  I get up and turn off all the lights in the room and pull down the blackout shades so that it is dark. I put on his Marley CD. Then I start pulling clothes off the hangers in his closet and pile them on his body--which at first makes him scream harder and then, as the weight builds, calms him down. By the time he falls asleep in my arms, I have ripped my blouse and my stockings. The CD has repeated four times in its entirety. The LED display on his alarm clock reads 8:35 P.M.

  --What set you off?|| I whisper. It could have been anything--an argument with Jess, or the fact that he didn't like the layout of the kitchen in her new accommodations, or the realization too late that he was missing his favorite TV show. I kiss Jacob on the forehead.

  Then, gently, I disengage myself from the knot of his arms and leave him curled on the floor with a pillow under his head. I cover him with the rainbow postage-stamp summertime quilt that's been folded up for the season in his closet.

  Muscles stiff, I walk downstairs again. The lights have all been turned off, except for one in the kitchen.

  Let's go out for Chinese tonight.

  But that was before I knew that I would be sucked into the black hole that Jacob can become at any given moment.

  There is a cereal bowl on the counter, with a puddle of soy milk still in the bottom.

  The Rice Chex box stands beside it like an accusation.

  Motherhood is a Sisyphean task. You finish sewing one seam shut, and another rips open. I have come to believe that this life I'm wearing will never really fit.

  I carry the bowl to the sink and swallow the tears that spring to the back of my throat. Oh, Theo. I'm so sorry.

  Again.

  CASE 3: BRAGGED, TAUNTED, "KAUGHT"

  Dennis Rader was a married man with two grown children, a former Cub Scout leader, and president of his Lutheran church. He also--after a thirty-one-year investigation--was revealed to be the serial killer known as BTK, short for Bind, Torture, and Kill--his method for murdering ten people in the Wichita, Kansas, area between 1974 and 1991. After the killings, letters were sent to the police bragging of the killings and offering grisly details.

  Following a twenty-five-year silence, those letters and packages resumed in 2004, claiming responsibility for a murder for which he had not been suspected. DNA was taken from beneath the fingernails of a victim, and authorities gathered eleven hundred DNA samples, attempting to find the serial killer.

  In one of BTK's communications--a computer disk mailed to KSAS-TV--metadata from the Microsoft Word document revealed that the author was someone named Dennis, as well as a link to the Lutheran Church. Searching on the Internet, police were able to find a suspect: Dennis Rader. By obtaining his daughter's DNA and comparing it with DNA samples found on the victims, the police were able to make a familial match--giving them enough probable cause for arrest. He has been sentenced to 175 years to life.

  So to all of you who surf for Internet porn or spend your free time writing anarchist manifestos: Beware. You can't ever really get rid of something on your computer.

  3

  Rich

  I've faced down a lot of harrowing situations in my twenty years on the job: suicides in progress, felons on the run after an armed robbery, rape victims too traumatized to tell me their story. None of these, however, compare to having to work an audience made up of seven-year-olds.

  --Can you show us your gun again?|| one kid asks.

  --Not a great idea,|| I say, glancing at the teacher, who already asked me to remove my holster and weapon before coming into the class for Job Day--a request I had to refuse, since technically, I was still on the clock.

  --Do you get to shoot it?||

  I look over the ammo-obsessed boy's head at the rest of the class. --Any other questions?||

  A little girl raises her hand. I recognize her; she might have come to one of Sasha's birthday parties. --Do you always get the bad guys?|| she asks.

  There's no way to explain to a child that the line between good and evil isn't nearly as black and white as a fairy tale would lead you to believe. That an ordinary person can turn into a villain, under the right circumstances. That sometimes we dragon slayers do things we aren't proud of.

  I look her in the eye. --We sure try,|| I say.

  On my hip, my cell phone starts to vibrate. I flip it open, see the number of the station, and stand up. --I'm going to have to cut this short ... So one more time--what's the number one rule of crime scenes?||

  The class sings the answer back to me: --Don't touch something wet if it's not from you!||

  As the teacher asks them all to thank me with a round of applause, I crouch down near Sasha's desk. --What do you think? Did I embarrass you beyond repair?||

  --You did okay,|| she says.

  --I can't stay to have lunch with you,|| I apologize. --I have to go down to the station.||

  --That's all right, Daddy.|| Sasha shrugs. --I'm used to it.||

  The hell with a bullet. What kills me is disappointing my kid.

  I kiss her on the crown of her head and let the teacher walk me to the door. Then I drive right to the station and get a quick briefing from the sergeant who took the original complaint.

  Mark Maguire, a UVM graduate student, is slouched in the waiting room. He's wearing a baseball cap pulled low over his face and is bouncing his leg up and down nervously. I watch him for a second through the window before I head out to meet him.

  --Mr. Maguire?|| I say. --I'm Detective Matson. What can I do for you?||

  He stands up. --My girlfriend's missing.||

  --Missing,|| I repeat.

  --Yeah. I called her last night, and there was no answer. And this morning, when I went to her place, she was gone.||

  --When was the last time you saw her?||

  --Tuesday morning,|| Mark says.

  --Could there have been some emergency? Or an appointment she didn't tell you about?||

  --No. She never goes anywhere without her purse, and it was still in the house ...

  along with her coat. It's freezing out. Why would she have gone somewhere without her coat?|| His voice is wild, worried.

  --You two have a fight?||

  --She was kind of pissed off at me this weekend,|| he admits. --But we'd talked it out.

  We were good again.||

&
nbsp; I bet, I think. --Have you tried calling her friends?||

  --No one's seen her. Not her friends, not her teachers. And she's not the kind of person who cuts classes.||

  We do not usually open up a missing person's case until thirty-six hours have passed--although that's not a hard-and-fast rule. The extent of the net to be cast is determined by the missing person's status: at risk, or at no apparent risk. And right now, there's something about this guy--some hunch--that makes me think he's not telling me everything. --Mr. Maguire,|| I say, --why don't you and I take a ride?||

  *

  Jess Ogilvy is doing pretty damn well for a grad student. She lives in a tony neighborhood full of brick houses and BMWs. --How long has she lived here?|| I ask.

  --Only a week--she's house-sitting for one of her professors, who's in Italy for the semester.||

  We park on the street, and Maguire leads me to the back door, which isn't locked.

  That's not an uncommon occurrence around here; in spite of all my warnings about being safe instead of sorry, a lot of folks make the incorrect assumption that crime could not and does not happen in this town.

  In the mudroom, there's a melange of items--from the coat that must belong to the girl to a walking stick to a pair of men's boots. The kitchen is tidy, and there is a mug in the sink with a tea bag in it. --I didn't touch anything,|| Maguire says. --This was all here when I showed up this morning.|| The mail is stacked neatly in a pile on the table. A purse lies on its side, and I open it to find a wallet with $213 still in it.

  --Did you notice anything missing?|| I ask.

  --Yeah,|| Maguire says. --Upstairs.|| He leads me to a guest bedroom where the drawers of a single dresser are half open, clothes spilling out of them. --She's a neat freak,||

  he says. --She'd never leave the bed unmade, or have clothes lying around the floor like this. But this box with the gift wrap on it? It had a backpack inside that's gone now. It still had the tags on it. Her aunt got it for her for Christmas, and she hated it.||

  I walk to the closet. Inside are several dresses, as well as a few button-down men's shirts and pairs of jeans. --Those are mine,|| Maguire says.

  --You live here, too?||

  --Not officially, as far as the professor goes. But yeah, I've been staying over most nights. Until she kicked me out, anyway.||

  --She kicked you out?||

  --I told you, we kind of had a fight. She didn't want to talk to me on Sunday night.

  But Monday, we'd worked things out.||

  --Define that,|| I say.

  --We had sex,|| Maguire replies.

  --Consensual?||

  --Jesus, dude. What kind of guy do you think I am?|| He seems truly affronted.

  --What about her makeup? Her toiletries?||

  --Her toothbrush is missing,|| Maguire says. --But her makeup's still here. Look, shouldn't you be calling in backup or something? Or posting an AMBER Alert?||

  I ignore him. --Did you try contacting her parents? Where do they live?||

  --I called them--they're in Bennington, and they haven't heard from her, and now they're in a panic, too.||

  Great, I think. --Has she ever disappeared like this before?||

  --I don't know. I've only been going out with her for a few months.||

  --Look,|| I say. --If you stick around, she'll probably call, or just come back home.

  Sounds to me like she needed to cool off for a while.||

  --You gotta be kidding me,|| Maguire says. --If she left on purpose, why would she forget to take her wallet but remember her cell phone? Why would she use a backpack she couldn't wait to return for store credit?||

  --I don't know. To throw you off her trail, maybe?||

  Maguire's eyes flash, and I know the moment before he springs that he is going to come after me. I throw him off with one quick move that twists his arm behind his back.

  --Careful,|| I mutter. --I could arrest you for that.||

  Maguire tenses in my hold. --My girlfriend's gone missing. I pay your salary, and you won't even do your job and investigate?||

  Technically, if Maguire is a student, he's not paying my salary, but I am not about to press the point. --Tell you what,|| I say, releasing him. --I'll take one more look around.||

  I wander into the master bedroom, but clearly Jess Ogilvy hasn't been sleeping there; it is pristine. The master bathroom reveals slightly damp towels, but the shower floor is already dry. Downstairs, there's no sign of disorder in the living room. I walk around the perimeter of the house and then check the mailbox. Inside is a note, printed from a computer, asking the postman to hold the mail until further notified.

  Who the hell types a note to the postman?

  Snapping on a pair of gloves, I slip the note into an evidence bag. I'll have the lab run a ninhydrin test for prints.

  Right now, my hunch is that if they don't match Jess Ogilvy's, they're going to match Mark Maguire's.

  Emma

  I don't know what to expect when I go into Jacob's room the next morning. He slept through the night--I checked on him every hour--but I know from past experience that he won't be expressive until those neurotransmitters aren't raging through his bloodstream anymore.

  I called Jess twice--on her cell, and at her new residence--but only got voice mail. I've sent her an email, asking her to tell me what happened at yesterday's session, if there was anything out of the ordinary. But until I hear back from her, I have to deal with Jacob.

  When I peek in at 6:00 A.M., he's not sleeping anymore. He's sitting on his bed with his hands in his lap, staring at the wall across from him.

  --Jacob?|| I say tentatively. --Honey?|| I walk closer and gently shake him.

  Jacob continues to stare at the wall in silence. I wave a hand in front of his face, but he doesn't respond.

  --Jacob!|| I grab his shoulders and pull on them. He topples to the side and just lies where he has fallen.

  Panic climbs the ladder of my throat. --Speak to me,|| I demand. I am thinking catatonia. I am thinking schizophrenia. I am thinking of all the lost places Jacob could slip to in his own mind, and not return.

  Straddling his big body, I strike him hard enough across the face to leave a red handprint, and still he doesn't react.

  --Don't,|| I say, starting to cry. --Don't do this to me.||

  There is a voice at the door. --What's going on?|| Theo asks, his face still hazy with sleep and his hair sticking up in hedgehog spikes.

  In that instant, I realize that Theo might be my savior. --Say something that would upset your brother,|| I order.

  He looks at me as if I'm crazy.

  --There's something wrong with him,|| I explain, my voice breaking. --I just want him to come back. I need to make him come back.||

  Theo glances down at Jacob's slack body, his vacant eyes, and I can tell he's scared.

  --But--||

  --Do it, Theo,|| I say.

  I think it's the quiver in my voice, not the command, which makes him agree.

  Tentatively, Theo leans close to Jacob. --Wake up!||

  --Theo,|| I sigh. We both know he's holding back.

  --You're going to be late for school,|| Theo says. I watch closely, but there's no recognition in Jacob's eyes.

  --I'm getting in the shower first,|| Theo adds. --And then I'm gonna mess up your closet.|| When Jacob just stays silent, the anger Theo usually keeps hidden rolls over him like a tsunami. --You freak,|| he shouts, so loud that Jacob's hair stirs with the force of his breath. --You stupid goddamn freak!||

  Jacob doesn't even flinch.

  --Why can't you be normal?|| Theo yells, punching his brother in the chest. He hits him again, harder this time. --Just be fucking normal!|| he cries, and I realize tears are streaming down Theo's face. For a moment, we are caught in this hell, with Jacob unresponsive between us.

  --Get me a phone,|| I say, and Theo turns and flies out the door.

  As I sink down beside Jacob, the bulk of his weight sways toward me. Theo reappears
with the telephone, and I punch in the page number for Jacob's psychiatrist, Dr.

  Murano. She calls me back thirty seconds later, her voice still rough with sleep. --Emma,||

  she says. --What's going on?||

  I explain Jacob's meltdown last night, and his catatonia this morning. --And you don't know what triggered it?|| she asks.

  --No. He had a meeting with his tutor yesterday.|| I look at Jacob. A line of drool snakes from the corner of his mouth. --I called her, but she hasn't phoned me back yet.||

  --Does he look like he's in physical distress?||

  No, I think. That would be me. --I don't know ... I don't think so.||

  --Is he breathing?||

  --Yes.||

  --Does he know who you are?||

  --No,|| I admit, and this is what really scares me. If he doesn't know who I am, how can I help him remember who he is?

  --Tell me his vitals.||

  I put the phone down and look at my wristwatch, make a count. --His pulse is ninety and his respirations are twenty.||

  --Look, Emma,|| the doctor says, --I'm an hour away from where you are. I think you need to take him to the ER.||

  I know what will happen then. If Jacob is unable to snap out of this, he'll be a candidate for a 302 involuntary commitment in the hospital psych ward.

  After I hang up, I kneel down in front of Jacob. --Baby, just give me a sign. Just show me you're on the other side.||

  Jacob doesn't even blink.

  Wiping my eyes, I head to Theo's room. He's barricaded himself inside; I have to bang heavily on the door to be heard over the beat of his music. When he finally opens it, his eyes are red-rimmed and his jaw is set. --I need your help moving him,|| I say flatly, and for once Theo doesn't fight me. Together we try to haul Jacob's big frame out of his bed and downstairs, into the car. I take his arms; Theo takes his legs. We drag, we push, we shove. By the time we reach the mudroom door, I am bathed in sweat and Theo's legs are bruised from where he twice stumbled under Jacob's weight.

  --I'll get the car door,|| Theo says, and he runs into the driveway, his socks crunching lightly on the old snow.

  Together, we manage to get Jacob to the car. He doesn't even make a sound when his bare feet touch the icy driveway. We put him into the backseat headfirst, and then I struggle to pull him to a sitting position, practically crawling into his lap to fasten his seat belt. With my head pressed up against Jacob's heart, I listen for the click of metal to metal.