Sibs

by F. Paul Wilson

  "I thought you didn't like kids."

  He looked embarrassed. "Yeah, well, most of them are a pain, but your Jill is something else. You've done a great job with her. You should be proud."

  "I am," she said, and she could barely hear her own voice.

  Finally the elevator doors opened on the lobby. She said a quick goodbye and hurried Jill out to the street.

  ▼

  2:00 P.M.

  "I do wish you'd stay another day or so," Aunt Ellen said as she sipped her sherry.

  Kara took a sip of her own. She didn't usually drink wine in the afternoon, and wasn't at all used to sherry.

  But once you got past the sweetness of the first couple of sips, it wasn't half bad.

  Ellen had greeted them at the door where there had been a round of embraces and a few new tears shed over Kelly. She looked great as usual. With her carefully coiffed and tinted hair, her tasteful make-up, and trim figure, she appeared a good ten years younger than her fifty-eight years.

  They'd sat in the living room of her richly furnished Turtle Bay condo and talked awhile, and then Lucia, her Filipino cook and housekeeper, had served lunch. Kara thought she could never get used to a maid, but decided she could probably adjust to having a cook fairly quickly—especially one as skilled as Lucia. Her aunt seemed to take the service for granted. Her husband had been a partner in a Wall Street brokerage house. He was gone now but he had left her extremely well off.

  After lunch had come the sherry. Kara had almost refused, then decided she needed it. After her encounter with Dr. Gates, and then seeing Rob and Jill together, she really needed it.

  "And see how Jill loves to play with Bella," Ellen said.

  Kara glanced over to the sunny window seat where Ellen's black Persian was allowing Jill to stroke her fur.

  "I'd love to stay," Kara said, lying, "but I've really got to get back to the farm."

  "Oh, pooh. What for? It's not a real farm. I mean, it's not as if you grow things and keep livestock."

  Kara smiled at her aunt. Ellen was the only one she knew who could say "Oh, pooh" and not sound ridiculous.

  "Oh, no, you don't," Kara said. "You're not going to get me into that old argument. You call Mom in Florida if you feel like mixing it up."

  Kara's mother, Martha, was Ellen's sister. It seemed that Ellen had lived here in Turtle Bay in the shadow of the U.N. complex forever, while Martha had stayed on the farm. They had argued about which was the better life ever since Kara could remember. She and Kelly had called them Country Mouse and City Mouse.

  Strange how generations follow similar patterns, she thought. Mom and Ellen had chosen different roads early in life, just like Kara and Kelly. But Martha and Ellen were both still alive.

  "Didn't you tell me that Rob was in charge of the investigation?"

  "Such as it is, yes."

  "And yet you brought Jill in? Do you think that's wise? I mean, considering that he's—"

  "I didn't have much choice. There's no one to leave her with back home."

  "You can leave Jill with me anytime. You know that. By the way, what about Kelly's things?"

  Kara took another sip. "I don't know. I'll have to come back for them."

  She knew that the smart thing to do would be to spend the next few days packing up anything of Kelly's she wanted to keep and shipping it all back to the farm. But she had a blind urge to flee the city. Not tomorrow. Today. Now.

  "Suit yourself, dear. I know you have to do what you think best. We all do."

  Something in her voice made Kara look more closely at her aunt. She saw that her eyes were glistening, and her lips were trembling. Kara got up and went around the coffee table to sit next to her. She took Ellen's hand.

  "What's wrong?"

  "You blame me, don't you," she said. A tear slid down her cheek, trailing mascara in its wake. "That's why you won't stay here."

  "Blame you for what?"

  "For Kelly's death!"

  She was crying now, and trembling all over. Kara put her arms around her.

  "Don't be silly! No one blames you at all."

  "Martha does! She hasn't said so, but I know she thinks that if I hadn't encouraged you two to try life here in the city, Kelly would still be alive!"

  Yes, Kara thought with a pang, she probably would be.

  But she couldn't say that to Ellen.

  "She thinks nothing of the sort. Kelly made her own choices. Someone is to blame for Kelly's death, Aunt Ellen, but it's not you. It's not you."

  The older woman clutched her and stifled her sobs. Then she straightened up and dabbed her eyes with a napkin.

  "Won't you stay the night? I've felt so terribly alone here since Kelly died. She only stopped in once in a while, but just knowing she was in the city made me feel as though I had family here. Won't you and Jill please stay? Just this once?"

  "Okay, Aunt Ellen," Kara said, forcing a smile. "Just for tonight."

  She hoped she wouldn't regret it.

  ▼

  6:02 P.M.

  Before dinner, Kara made a quick trip back to Kelly's apartment to pick up the clothing and personal items they had left there. She was barely in the door when the phone began to ring. Thinking it was probably Rob, she let it ring three times, then wondered it if might be someone else. A friend of Kelly's, perhaps. She picked it up on the fourth.

  "Miss Kara Wade?

  It was Dr. Gates. She recognized the slightly accented voice immediately.

  "Speaking."

  "I'm glad I found you. I spent most of the afternoon calling this number."

  "Is something wrong?"

  "I'm not sure."

  Kara felt a chill run over her skin.

  "What do you mean?"

  "Miss Wade," he said, "I've changed my mind. Please do not think that your threat of a lawsuit or the presence of your policeman friend in my office today have anything to do with this decision. It is simply that upon further reflection I've concluded that it might be in the best interests of all concerned if I break confidence and discuss your late sister's medical history with you."

  "Best interest? What does that mean?"

  "I'll discuss everything with you in detail tomorrow morning at ten o'clock in my office. I do not see patients on Wednesdays so there will be no time pressure. Can you be here then?"

  "Yes, of course, but—"

  "Ten o'clock. Good night."

  And then he hung up.

  Kara stood and stared at the buzzing phone. What had made him change his mind.

  The chill hit her again.

  She almost wished he hadn't.

  The new one is just like the last one, the lost blond. Exactly like her. Resemblance is truly remarkable.

  He wants the new one. Hasn't told me about her, but I can tell when he wants someone. Can sense whenever he's excited, and he's very excited by this new one.

  Poor thing. Hasn't got a chance. Only hope is to stay away from him, never come near him again. Once he gets his hooks into her, that will be it. She'll be at his mercy.

  So it's all up to her now. Stay away and stay well, or come back and be driven mad. Like me.

  Me. Mad. Crazy. Insane. Meshugge.

  All his fault. The swine, the dirty, filthy, stinking, parasitic scum. I'd have had a normal, productive life without him. A spouse, a child, a future without him.

  But I have nothing. Not even hope.

  I'd kill him if I could. If only I could! If only I had the means. But I do not. I'd kill myself if I had the nerve—ram this pencil through my eye and into my brain and end this misery. But I do not. I'm a coward. I'll have to wait and hope, that someone else will do it. I can only hope.

  But why bother hoping? No one knows about him, or about what he can do. Only me.

  And to think that once I loved him.

  February 11

  10:09 A.M.

  They sat as they had yesterday: Dr. Gates behind his mahogany desk in a high-backed swivel chair, Kara in the armchair
facing him. A chart lay open on the desk before him. His hands were held before his lips, palms together as if in prayer, as he stared at her with his watery blue eyes.

  What little Kara had eaten of the huge breakfast Ellen's cook had served—waffles for Jill, eggs Benedict for her—weighed heavily in her stomach. She'd left Jill at Ellen's, following the cat from room to room.

  Finally Dr. Gates lowered his hands. His tantalizingly accented voice took on a lecturing tone.

  "I wish to emphasize, Miss Wade, that asking you here was not an easy decision for me. A psychiatrist deals with the most intimate details of his patients' lives, details they keep from their friends, their spouses, even their internists and gynecologists. Because of this intimate knowledge, a psychiatrist must be the most rigorous of all physicians in preserving the confidentiality of his patient records."

  "I appreciate that," Kara said, and meant it.

  "Good. But there are details of your sister's case that are extraordinary, details I assumed that you, as her twin, would know. However, it occurred to me yesterday after our conversation—or more properly, your tirade—that you appeared completely unaware of what your sib has been through. That raised the possibility that you might share her diagnosis."

  Kara shook her head in bewilderment. "I don't understand."

  "You will by the time I am finished. But you may not like hearing what I have to say. It is not pleasant. It will make you angry and you will probably resist accepting it. But let me start at the beginning."

  "Please do," Kara said. Her throat had gone dry.

  Dr. Gates leaned back in his chair and picked up a pair of keys on a ring. As he had yesterday, he began twirling the ring on his index finger.

  "Your sister first came to me sixteen months ago complaining of insomnia and poor concentration. I'm a consultant at St. Vincent's and I occasionally treat some of the nursing staff there on a courtesy basis. The precipitating event in her life appeared to be the break-up of an affair in which she felt her trust had been betrayed by her lover."

  That would have been Tom, Kara thought. The lying, married bastard from Long Island.

  "But as therapy progressed, I began to suspect that your sister was suffering from a disorder far more serious and complex than a simple reactive anxiety-depression syndrome. She wanted to continue therapy. As I probed deeper, I became alarmed. Finally, we tried hypnosis. It was then that I confirmed my presumptive diagnosis."

  He paused, and Kara found that she was gripping the arms of her chair so hard it hurt. What was he waiting for?

  "Well?"

  "Your twin, Kelly Wade, suffered from multiple personality disorder."

  Kara blinked and relaxed her grip on the chair arms. Multiple personality disorder. She'd heard of that.

  "You mean like in Sybil and Three Faces of Eve?

  He nodded. "Precisely."

  "How… how many did she have?"

  "Two that I know of. The Kelly Wade personality you and everybody knew, and one other."

  Kara leaned back, shocked. Two personalities? Weird, but it could have been worse. She could accept this. It wasn't so hard. She wasn't angry.

  But another Kelly inside her twin? How come she had never guessed?

  "Did this other personality ever come out?"

  "Yes. Many times. Right here, when Kelly was under hypnosis."

  This was fascinating—disturbing, but somehow fascinating too.

  "What was she like?"

  "Quite different from Kelly. The second person called herself Ingrid, by the way."

  The name electrified Kara. She sprang from her seat.

  "Ingrid? Ingrid? Kelly signed into the Plaza under that name! That means it was… was 'Ingrid'—the other Kelly—who was picking up those men!"

  In a way it was an enormous relief. Kelly hadn't changed—it had been that other personality taking her over and doing those crazy awful things!

  "I imagine so," Dr. Gates said, still cool and clinical. "Ingrid was, ah, rather promiscuous."

  "And the clothes!" Kara said, still on a roll. "That's why they were hidden! Kelly wasn't hiding them from anyone! It was Ingrid hiding them from Kelly! Now I understand!"

  Kara turned away and fought the tears that sprang into her eyes. It was so good to understand. And poor Kelly. What she must have been going through.

  She sat down again.

  "God, it's so bizarre! What could cause something like that to happen?"

  "It is almost always severe trauma." His eyes bored into hers. "Childhood trauma."

  "Kelly had no childhood trauma. Neither of us did. We were 'the Wade twins.' Everyone loved us. If anything, our childhood was uneventful—blissful and uneventful."

  "Ingrid has a different story."

  A chill tiptoed down Kara's spine.

  "What… what did Ingrid say?"

  Dr. Gates leaned forward and stared at her.

  "Do you truly have no idea what I'm talking about?"

  Kara met his gaze and tried to override the growing fear that he was going to say something awful, that here was the part she couldn't accept.

  "No. Not the faintest."

  He leaned back and rubbed his eyes, then leaned forward again. He took a deep breath.

  "Very well. I'll say it flat out: According to Ingrid, she was sexually abused on a regular basis between the ages of five and nine."

  "No! That's crazy! By whom?"

  "Your father."

  Kara felt her body go numb. The room swung around and the lights seemed to dim for a few seconds. She fought for focus and managed a single word:

  "What?"

  "That is what Ingrid told me, and she was quite detailed."

  "My father! Never!"

  "It fits, Miss Wade. It's that type of abuse, that degree of trauma that incites the formation of a second personality."

  Kara was on her feet again, shaking with revulsion.

  "Listen to me, Dr. Gates! Nothing like that ever happened! So get this straight, and get it straight now: My father never committed incest! It never even crossed his mind! If it had, I'd have known about it!"

  Gates leaned back again, twirling that damn key ring.

  "I told you that you would resist the facts. Your sister went through a period of denial too."

  Kara's revulsion was now turning to anger.

  "I will not have my father defamed! He was a good man who's been dead a dozen years and can't defend himself! Besides, Kelly would have told me!"

  "Kelly didn't know."

  That brought Kara up short. She stared at Dr. Gates without speaking.

  "Listen," he said, "and perhaps you will understand why I asked you here. The regularly repeated trauma of such magnitude can cause a child's mind to create a second personality as a defense mechanism. The second personality takes over during the times of recurrent trauma. There is no communication between the personalities. The secondary personality shields the primary personality, forming a barrier between it and an intolerable reality, thus allowing the child to go about her everyday life as if nothing happened. And in a sense, nothing does happen to the primary personality—the second personality absorbs all the trauma."

  "it never happened!" Kara said.

  "When the trauma stops, the second personality is no longer needed. But it doesn't dissolve, it doesn't go away, it merely becomes dormant, ready to leap to the surface should the first personality be traumatized again. I believe that the traumatic break-up of Kelly's last relationship—the lies she had believed, the betrayal she felt—awakened Ingrid. Kelly managed to handle the emotional trauma in a mature manner, but Ingrid was awake. And Ingrid wanted out. It was that tug of war going on in her subconscious, and the unexplained lapses in memory when Ingrid managed to take over, that eventually brought Kelly to me."

  Kara sank back into the chair and closed her eyes.

  Kelly… Ingrid… it had to be true. It explained so much. But the rest of it… sickening…

  "All right," she said slo
wly. "I'll grant the existence of this Ingrid personality. But she's a liar. You said she was sexually promiscuous—"