Hope To Escape by Jack Parker Read Free Book Online Page A

met her. Listen to yourself. You're as obsessive about her as you ever were."
     
    "I am not obsessed!" Now Max's rising anger returned to shame. "Why can't I have a chance to show her my thanks? I remember her, and I am grateful to her. And I'm not the only one who remembers, either. She remembers me. You heard her yourself."
     
    Roden was stunned at this realization. He kept messing up. First he confronted the woman to tell her he recognized her childhood story and to recommend Max's artwork, then he told Max that she remembered their previous encounter. He was doing a very bad job at being a psychiatrist right then, and he never felt so disloyal to his profession. He needed to smooth it over.
     
    "Max, listen to me. I had no right to meddle, and – quite stupidly – I thought that telling her about the statues you sculpted of her would be a nice gesture without interfering with your life. Now I see that I was wrong. I'm sorry."
     
    "You're sorry you interfered? This could be the most important thing that ever happened to me, and you're sorry that you made it happen? And here I thought we were friends."
     
    Roden looked at his patient, and saw the disappointment on the younger man's face. "The coincidence of overhearing her was one thing, I should not have acted on it. I should have left it alone. It was none of my business and against my occupational ethics." Then, trying to divert the topic, he suggested, "Maybe we should discuss the obsessive feelings a little further."
     
    "Like hell," Max's response came with quick disgust. "I'm done with this discussion." He rose from the couch and headed for the door. "After all these years," he turned around before heading out of the office, "I can't believe you'd think that of me."
     
    The door slammed shut. Roden just sat in his armchair staring at the void where his friend and patient had been only seconds before. After a moment, the door slowly reopened a crack and Martha popped her head in. "Is everything okay, Doc?"
     
    "Ah," Roden came out of his stupor, a headache starting to form in the back of his head. "Yeah, Martha, just fine. We just had a very emotional session, that's all."
     
    Martha looked a bit puzzled and disbelieving, but she started to close the door. "Martha," Roden spoke up just then, "Could you get me Max Esther's charts? I think I want to review them."
     
    "Certainly."
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     

CHAPTER FIVE
     
     
     
    Two weeks after the naked art horror, Ess walked out of the McKnight Building on 51st street and Jackson, where her job practically incarcerated her for ten hours a day, five days a week. It was Friday afternoon, and she strode with a feeling of exhilaration coursing through her veins and tickling her nerve endings. This exuberance seemed a strange sensation, and it made her laugh. She hadn't felt so giddy to start the weekend since college.
     
    Not that she had any plans for the weekend, but she had felt out of sorts for a while, and needed the free time to really unwind. She had a few neglected books piling up on her coffee table that were making her feel guilty; and there was supposed to be a documentary on Saturday evening on the Peloponnesian Peninsula. After the Greek history class she had taken in college – which felt like forever ago now – she developed a keen interest in the ancient country, and was determined that she would visit someday. Of course, unless she could convince Jill or tolerate Manda to go with her, she would have to find a more suitable, and preferably male, companion to accompany her. Until then, she had to content herself with documentaries.
     
    Typically, the weekends were saved for running errands, paying bills and whatever other personal tasks she didn't have time for during her workweek. This weekend, though, she decided to dedicate as a recuperation weekend. She had motivated herself and put extra effort in the last few days after work to get anything and