5 - The
Wallflower
 |
| Available on Amazon |
If Roberta hadn’t wanted to be deposed, she’d have had to file a motion to quash the subpoena ordering her to appear. She didn’t. The subpoena required Leavitt to bring her resumé, her Abernathy files, her process notes, and photos of any anatomically correct dolls she used at her office. She brought them all except for most of Chloe’s drawings.
Bea was eager to delve into
Leavitt’s credentials. The thought of Chloe being treated for a non-event by an
inexperienced social worker was frightening.
Leavitt tried to allay those fears
by saying she had attended a multitude of courses, but then she couldn’t or
wouldn’t say what she had learned from them. “It was too long ago,” she said.
Her school courses, seminars, and experience had long since blended together.
How many seminar-filled years are we talking about here? Bea thought, prompting her to ask, “How old
are you?”
“How old am I? I’m 28.”
Surprise. Maybe it’s the glasses. Bea would’ve put her closer to forty, with that kind of old-maidish
face you don’t remember. A wallflower. She did have short, dark, curly hair and
was slender. Probably around 5’4”. Her posture was defensive: shoulders
forward, straining to touch each other across her body. Royal blue short-sleeved
sweater, good with her coloring and hair. Understands
color. Artistic? Active imagination? Overly sensitive?
The deposition was a mixed bag.
Straight answers were simply not Roberta’s forté. One moment, Leavitt said when
she was a graduate student, her clients had been sexually abused; the next, she
said they hadn’t been.
One moment she said she’d not been
taught about using a tape recorder or a camera when interviewing children; the
next, she said she had. Then she asked Bea, “Using a camera to do what?”
“To record the words and body
language of the child when making a fresh complaint,” Bea explained.
Leavitt must have heard the
I-can’t-believe-she-asked-that-question-what-else-would-you-do-with-a-camera-during-an-interview?
sound in Bea’s voice, because Leavitt then added, “Oh, I learned about it in
graduate school as well as out of graduate school as something people suggested
as a possibility.”
Bea was drowning in Leavitt’s
words.
When Bea tried to learn whether
Leavitt knew the dangers of interviewing a child who’d been interviewed by many
people, Bea met resistance from Aguilar. He objected, reserving his right to
object at trial to Leavitt’s answer being considered as evidence by a judge or
being read to a jury.
Bea did not like Aguilar. He was a
hardball player who lacked both masculine charm and social grace. His business
partner and father was well-respected in Salem County as a probate and family
lawyer. The son expected the same respect, but he hadn’t earned it.
The always-unsmiling and very rigid
Aguilar was in intimidation mode: he wanted Bea to shrink and ask Leavitt
straight out, Did you ask the child leading questions? or Did you suggest to
Chloe what her answers should be? and then have Leavitt give an Alfred E.
Neuman response. “Who, me? I wouldn’t lead or suggest answers to the child.”
Then Bea would end the deposition and they could go home.
Bea counted to 10 aloud. It drove
Aguilar crazy. The second time she counted, she did so silently and then
shuffled papers as a stall to think. Given Leavitt’s evasiveness—deliberate or
not—Bea’s expectations were limited. Leavitt had been leaning more forward than
she had been earlier, shoulders still facing inward with her forearms
disappearing below the surface of the table. Her hands were probably folded on
her lap or between her legs.
“When you studied how to work with
sexually abused children, did they teach you about reinforcement and
repetition?”
“That’s a difficult question for me
to answer because I don’t have a definition of what you mean by reinforcement
and repetition.”
“Reinforcement and repetition
affect how a child learns and can seriously shape a child’s memory. Chloe’s
memory. Reinforcement—by some act like nodding yes or smiling when a child
tells a story—can produce a story of questionable accuracy. Repetition can make
Chloe believe her answers are accurate. The result would be arguably
unassailable but inaccurate testimony because the child’s credibility wouldn’t
become an issue.”
Aguilar said, “Let’s go to a judge.
I’m not going to sit here while you go through her entire career and
educational background.” Contentiousness was a common ploy for a deponent’s
lawyer. The more unpleasant the deposition, the shorter it would probably be.
Actually, Aguilar was not as relentless as some.
Bea ignored him and gave it one
more stab, dispensing with academic terms. “When you are teaching a child the
alphabet, you may show the child the letter A, isn’t that true?”
Aguilar’s hair began to curl. “Bea,
I’m not going to sit here and learn about how to teach kids the alphabet, not
at Denise’s expense, unless you’re willing to pay my legal bill while you go
over her entire kindergarten curriculum. Let’s go in front of the judge. A
judge isn’t going to let you have these questions.”
Bea held both her tongue and her
patience so long the stenographer typed Pause
for the record. In this way, the deposition continued: Bea pressing and Leavitt
evading. If Leavitt was emotionally wrung from the deposition thus far, it
didn’t show. Bea was increasingly frustrated. She had to pull every bit of
information out of Leavitt baby step by baby step.
Some of what she gleaned was
helpful: Chloe didn’t want to discuss sexual abuse with various workers, and
Leavitt was at least the fifth person to interview Chloe. Leavitt was actually
the eighth, but being fifth was good enough for Bea’s purposes. The dangers of
multiple interviewing would have kicked in by then.
Then Leavitt admitted that multiple
interviewing can re-traumatize the child because “it’s very difficult for the child
to have to repeat her story over and over again.” In such a situation, there
was always the possibility the child would repeat a story suggested by someone
else.
“During the history-gathering, we
gather a full history, how the child disclosed and to whom, the parenting the
child has been exposed to. We get information about the parents’ reactions to
the child’s disclosure and how they handle it. We get a history from Mother
about the child’s behavioral symptoms. We get an idea of whether there are any
symptoms that are red flags, whether the child may have been sexually abused:
for example, nightmares, bed-wetting, somatic symptoms, increased anxiety
symptoms, things such as that. I’m sure there is more, but off the top of my
head, that’s it.”
“During your history-gathering, you
didn’t interview Bill Abernathy, did you?
“No.”
“Did you ever send him a letter?
Dear Mr. Abernathy: Thank you for paying for Chloe’s therapy; you can come talk
to me if you would like.”
“No.”
“Didn’t you think it was necessary
to speak to the father?”
“As a rule, I never discuss
parenting with the father,” Leavitt said, “and I didn’t in this case either. I
heard about Chloe’s father from others.”
“Have you been taught about
contamination of information?”
“Yes, I have.”
“And you don’t think your technique
allows for contamination?”
“In this particular case, I’ve felt
it hasn’t been necessary or appropriate for me to meet with the father.”
Leavitt had once again evaded the question. “It would betray Chloe’s trust in
me if I spoke to the child’s father.”
Leavitt had learned, though, Denise
was in therapy with Ruth Stanton for alcohol abuse and was now a sober
alcoholic. As Roberta spoke about the therapist, Aguilar invoked the
confidentiality privilege and objected to questions, causing the substance of
any communication with Stanton to remain a cipher.
“Have you been able to recognize
whether Denise Abernathy appears to be depressed?”
“Yes, I have.”
“Objection. You’re assuming a fact
we’ve not allowed into evidence, that she’s depressed.” Aguilar’s warning to
Leavitt was a little late, but it worked to keep her from answering more about
Denise’s mental condition.
“What are the criteria you use to
evaluate the parenting the child has been exposed to?”
“I have none. I only assessed what
the child told me.”
“So you don’t ask anything of the
parents?”
“At the intake, we frequently ask
how the child is punished.”
“Asked of whom?”
“Of Mother.”
Of course. They had
come full circle: it was back to talking with Mother and asking third and
fourth parties for their assessment of Father’s parenting.
“So all the mother’s horrible and
horrific stories about the father are in here,” Bea said, pointing to the
process notes sitting on the table. “Isn’t that true?”
“No, it’s not true. I think Mother
has not sensationalized and not—”
“Let’s take a short break,” Bea
said. “I’m having a nicotine fit.”
6 - Guts
and Gut Courses
Roberta Leavitt wasn’t a mean or
vicious woman, Bea concluded. She simply didn’t appear to be as bright—or as
impervious to suggestion—as she should be to shoulder the human responsibility
she had. Leavitt’s predicament was predictable, Bea mused.
While looking out at the calm
waters, her thoughts slipped backward in time. In high school she ranked
amongst the highest in the land. The classes were divided into four curricula.
Curriculum 1 was for students headed for top four-year colleges. The much
easier curriculum 2 was populated by students who were headed for lower-ranked
four-year colleges and two-year colleges; among them were future teachers and
nurses as well as those who couldn’t handle the more stringent curriculum 1. To
Bea, it never made sense to require less academically from teachers and nurses.
What kind of public school system could be sustained where the teachers were
allowed to have less knowledge than their best students? Curricula 3 and 4 were
for kids not planning on college in their immediate futures.
Of course, once in college, a
similar hierarchy was created. The equivalents of curriculum 2 were the
Sociology courses and the Psychology courses, popularly known as “gut” courses,
because all you needed to know was what was in your gut. That isn’t to say
there are no brilliant social workers or psychologists, but too many were able
to BS their way to a degree... and eventually to certification. Leavitt
appeared to be one of them.
Bea chuckled as these thoughts ran
through her head because she knew she couldn’t say them aloud except to a known
audience of elitists. She’d piss off anyone who had a social worker or
psychologist in the family. But damn it
to hell, I can still think it. She had a lot more thoughts that also
weren’t socially acceptable.
Private clients can always sever
the counseling relationships if dissatisfied. They can even sue. But if the
badly trained social workers work for the government or get court appointments,
they’re immune from suit and accountable to no one for their actions.
Her problem with Leavitt was
immediate. She is neither smart enough to
recognize her own deficient performance, nor courageous enough to admit it.
It’s a shame. Courage needs no provenance.
7 - The
Chicken and the Egg
“The lab report that found
chlamydia was proof Chloe had been sexually abused,” Leavitt insisted after the
break.
Hoping to convince Leavitt to open her mind a bit—if not change it—Bea probed to see whether Leavitt properly understood the test results. But Leavitt held her own. By the end of her extensive questions, Bea couldn’t decide whether Leavitt had even read the report.
Bea asked, “But you put the test
result in your report?”
“It’s a red flag of the possibility
of sexual abuse.” She’s budged a bit,
but it’s a typical Leavitt answer, going
straight to the excuse without saying Yes or No.
Bea bit her tongue and changed the
subject to Chloe saying she wanted her daddy to be arrested and go to jail.
“The word ‘court’... where did she learn that word?”
“Probably from me.” Leavitt
described what else she had told Chloe about the purpose of going to court. She
added she also uses special books and workbooks to address the process.
“You say one of the criteria you
use when you’re doing the full history intake is toilet training, and so you
ask a parent, How do you toilet train?”
Leavitt said the should just “throw
that out because—”
“Why would you throw that out?” Bea
frowned.
“Because Chloe’s not a bed-wetter
and toilet training has no relevance in this particular case.” She looked at a
report. “Mother reported no symptoms for Chloe. “Chloe did have, though,
chronic nightmares, putting objects in her mouth, fear of her bedroom, which
she moved out of. More recently she’s had stomach aches, which Mother felt were
related to school starting the following week.”
Leavitt understood Denise used positive
reinforcement for discipline—sticker charts, things that reward positive
behavior—as well as time-outs.
When it is to Leavitt’s advantage, she understands the concept of
reinforcement. So does Denise.
“Does Denise repeatedly do time-out type of
stuff?”
“I don’t know about repeatedly.
Chloe is not the real acting-out kind of... she is not the type who needs a lot
of reprimanding. She is a well-behaved child.”
“Are sexually abused children
generally well-behaved?”
“The typology of the sexually
abused child runs a spectrum of behaviors. You could have some kids who are
overly compliant and overly well-behaved all the way along the spectrum to a
child who is a real acting-out kind of child. So you can’t say it’s one or the
other.”
“Do you agree or disagree that a
sexually abused child does not have one particular profile?”
“I agree with that.”
Good, now Aguilar and the DA won’t be able to have Leavitt say Chloe
fits a profile.
Bea and Leavitt went in circles
about Denise transferring her fears onto Chloe. Bea espoused that Denise’s fear
of rape by Bill was passed onto Chloe.
Leavitt said, “No, Chloe’s fears
are her own fears, and they are due to her being sexually abused by her
father.”
“If a woman is afraid of a man in
any way, particularly his genital organs, can the fear be transferred to the
child?”
“Objection,” Aguilar said.
“Anything is possible.”
“I want her to answer, not you, Mr.
Aguilar,” said Bea.
“Isn’t that true?” Bea asked
Leavitt.
“I’m not going to sit here,
Attorney Archibald, while you rant and rave about irrelevant subjects,” Aguilar
said. “Not at my hourly rate.” He couldn’t resist playing the big man to
impress Leavitt, but it certainly didn’t impress Bea. “I’m going to end my
attendance here. I’ve sat here for two and a half hours and listened to
garbage.”
“Are you representing her? Is there
a conflict of interest here? You cannot represent both the client and this
woman. Otherwise you’re in serious—”
“I’m leaving,” Aguilar said.
“Then you’ll leave and she’ll
stay,” Bea said. She would, of course, prefer Aguilar to leave, but he did have
a right to be at the depo to protect Denise’s interests. In fact, Bea was
required by a procedural rule to invite him to attend.
“I am going to instruct her not to
answer these questions. They’re irrelevant.” Aguilar had a right to object, but
he was risking being sanctioned for advising, without good cause, a deposition
witness not to answer. “Let’s go to a judge.” He rose to leave.
“I’m not going to court right now,”
Bea said. “As soon as we get there, you’ll want to leave. You said you want to
leave at one o’clock. By the time we get there, it’ll be one. That’s a foolish
request for you to make.” Calling Aguilar’s bluff, she looked at Leavitt. “So
are you refusing to answer the question using Yes, No, Possibly, or I don’t
know, whatever?”
Leavitt just shook her head, and
Bea decided it wasn’t worth going after. The morning was almost shot and she
had two more areas to cover: the child’s drawings, which sexual abuse industry
workers use as evidence of sexual abuse, and Leavitt’s role in preparing Chloe
to testify against her father.
“I am showing you a drawing,
Deposition Exhibit 9, and I ask you to describe it.”
“It’s a self-portrait drawn by
Chloe. It shows a human figure with curly hair, torso, legs, arms and eyes,
nose, and a mouth.”
“Now, when a child has been abused
orally, they often omit the mouth, don’t they?” Whether this was true, Bea had
no idea, but it was certainly one of the features sexual abuse therapists were
taught to look for.
“That is sometimes the case.” Bingo.
“Do you have the original, so we
can see the colors?”
Colors of drawings were magically
turned into evidence of sexual abuse by the industry.
Leavitt pulled the original
drawings from her briefcase.
“Can you tell us the colors used?”
“Yes.”
And then they continued to disagree
as to whether Chloe had drawn or scribbled the picture and whether scribbling
indicated Chloe had regressed. Leavitt was attempting to show that sexual abuse
caused Chloe to regress.
“The next picture, Deposition
Exhibit 10. What is that, please?”
“That’s a third drawing Chloe drew
during her intake, and the writing says, ‘Chicken laying an egg.’ This is
certainly a more regressed picture than her two previous pictures.”
“Why regressed?”
“Given that she’s already
demonstrated she could draw more sophisticated drawings.”
“So you’re saying you wanted a full
chicken inside the egg?”
“Would you like me to explain? The
face is much more hastily drawn with less detail than these faces,” Leavitt
said, pointing. “It looks much more haphazard. The quality—”
“Does Chloe see chickens all the
time, do you think?”
“I object,” Aguilar interjected.
“You have to give her an opportunity to answer the question about why she
thinks it’s regressive. Finish your answer.” Aguilar wanted all the testimony
he could get about regression, which he planned on using as evidence of sexual
abuse.
“My impression of this picture is,
it’s much more haphazard. It’s scribbling rather than the clear shading in
there. Being haphazard, it gives the impression of a much more regressed
drawing, a drawing of a younger child. Someone looking at this drawing would
think it’s the drawing of a younger child than the child who drew the previous
two drawings.”
“Do you know how often Chloe has
seen chickens?”
“No, I do not.”
“So it might be she simply isn’t as
familiar with the chicken form?”
“It’s possible.”
Leavitt had other drawings in her
office, so Aguilar said, “She’ll produce them.” Bea was confident he’d make
sure they were produced. He wanted more so-called evidence of regression. Bea,
of course, wanted to get copies of the drawings so she’d know what Aguilar
intended to use against Bill.
Leavitt looked at him and said,
“That’s fine.”
“Have you consulted with the DA’s
office thus far?”
“The DA’s office called me in order
to help decide whether I thought Chloe was ready to be re-interviewed and begin
the court procedure. I was to contact them when I thought she was ready for the
interview. It took several months. It wasn’t until Chloe actually brought it up
herself and said she wanted to do it that I said fine.”
“So you’re part of the prosecution
team then, working and consulting with the DA’s office, isn’t that true?”
“I’m part of the prosecution? No. I
don’t think so. No. I’m the child’s therapist. I’m helping her through this
process.”
Bea looked at her watch. 12:58.
They agreed to continue the deposition in a month, giving Bea time to look over
the materials and Aguilar a chance to take his objections to court.
Clearly Leavitt didn’t know the
relationship between the DA himself, the DA’s wife, and a judge, who were
co-owners of the Center. She didn’t realize the DA was, in effect, her boss.
She had no clue that the DA had no incentive to ensure the Center would hire
only properly trained workers. The more ill-trained a therapist is, the easier
the conviction. A high conviction rate helps the DA be re-elected.
It’s also common to see in a
therapist’s report the recommendation that the client have more therapy. And on
each report there is a space for the fee to be written. The more therapy, the
more money is made by the therapist’s employer.
So Leavitt was just another profit
center for a thriving new industry. After Leavitt was through with Chloe, the
child would, tragically, need therapy for the rest of her life.
8 - A
Hurty Guy
Bea took the clip off Leavitt’s
notes. Skimming them, she saw that since mid-October, the child had had almost
fifty visits. As she read in earnest and began attaching more and more Post-Its
and highlighting passages, she decided it’d be better to have her secretary,
red-baseball-capped Terry, type up a summary from Bea’s dictation.
Roberta Leavitt’s notes provoked
questions. Is it unusual for a sexually abused child to like school and have
friends? In the Talking-Feeling-Doing Game, Chloe described her father,
Grandfather Charlie Willow, and Denise as happy, but cried and said she was sad
“because I have nothing to do, no one to play with.” On one hand, Chloe was
“angry” because Bill did not live with her, and on the other, “upset” by him
“hurting” her.
Chloe had been brought to a group
called Victims of Sexual Addiction. Did kids exchange stories of sexual abuse
there? Chloe made signs reading “I hate Daddy,” but then said she loved him and
wanted to give him a hug.
At the so-called therapy sessions,
Chloe told of bad dreams and possums that sucked breasts and played with the
anatomical dolls.
While reading Leavitt’s notes of
Chloe’s visits, Bea became nauseous, but she forced herself to continue dictating.
If she felt this way saying it, how would Terry react when hearing it?
Bea clicked the machine off. This is crazy. How can I retrieve this info fast? She got up and stretched, then
bent to reach her toes a few times. Difficult!
Damn. She tried jogging in place. Her breasts were pendulating. She reached
up to hold them still while trying to jog at the same time. She finally
collapsed on the couch, causing the pillows there to spring to life. She
guffawed and then said aloud, “Ohhh, pendulating. I’ll have to try that one out
on Hugh.” Hearing her own voice snapped her out of her small tantrum. She
moaned, got up, and walked to her desk.
She sat, grabbed a pad of paper,
stared at it for awhile, and then began drawing a few vertical lines from top
to bottom, and a few from side to side. Then she clicked the dictating machine
back on.
“Terry, in one box, write all the
dates on which Denise reported. How do you like that word? Leavitt’s favorite.
In another, the dates Chloe played with toy animals. If there’s something
exceptional, like the ‘cat stew’ story on December fourteenth, put that into a
separate box.
“Make a separate box for references
to nightmares, a separate one for all the trips to the judge and what she said,
another for those dates on which Leavitt prepared the child for testifying or
for some court appearance. Get the idea?
“What I’m trying to do is literally
compartmentalize what was going on during these sessions.
“Oh, yeah, a box for Chloe’s
references to penises and any kind of sex. Like he placed his penis into her
mouth and she said ‘Yecch! disgusting!’ In fact, please also type a
chronological list of her comments. Those are, after all, why this case exists.
Her comments are going to come back at us down the road.”
Bea continued naming things that
might have significance: pretending to be a dog because “the nice thing about
being a dog is you don’t have to talk about difficult things. On some level,
Chloe was resisting or trying to resist Leavitt, who probably wasn’t taking
‘No, it didn’t happen’ for an answer. If you see anything that strikes you as
similar, put it in that same box.”
Bea continued skimming, trying to
differentiate between the different types of playing going on in the sessions.
“See March 26th. The child appears
to feel guilty about ‘telling.’ What do you think? Does it sound like she feels
guilty or she’s in fear because she’s telling? A hard call. What do you think?
Your opinion is important to me. Jot it down. Point out anything you think I
might overlook. Don’t hesitate. Your first gut reaction might be the best.
“A box for things Denise talks
about first and then Chloe picks up on and talks about later. Like Bill moving
down the street.” Bea’s finger ran down each sheet. “And the flashbacks—give
the flashbacks their own box, too.
“We’ll also need a box for the
monster stories. Try to figure out if something happened to trigger each of
them.
“Lest I forget, the short shorts
incident. Put that into the box with the other things Denise talked about first
and Chloe, second.” Feeling like the notes never stopped, Bea kept on turning
pages.
“Yup, a box for the times Chloe
says she misses her father. She does that quite a bit. Make note if she shows
ambivalence at the same time.
“And a box for the dates, for
instance, the time Leavitt asked her to sign a release to allow Leavitt to
speak with lawyers about what the child had told her. Amazing, isn’t it, that
Leavitt claims a six year old understood what a damn release was?”
Bea was expecting August 29, when
Leavitt returned to finish her deposition, to be one helluva day.
9 - Sprinkles
of Gold
“Hugh, if you’re going to take
those kids out again, you really should learn how to swim,” said Bea.
“Love, seamen don’t swim. It’s a
rule of the sea.”
“Don’t give me that ‘you sink faster’
routine, Hugh, it’s not funny.”
Hugh laughed. “One of the lads will
save me.” He always slipped into his Brit-hood with Bea. It had been his
accent, something different, that had caught her attention and drawn her to him
thirty years earlier.
It was Bea’s turn to laugh. “You’re
such a cranky bastard at times, the lads’ll probably wave goodbye to you.” She
still played along with him. It was as good an escape as a good novel.
“I won’t even see them. I’ll just
close my eyes and not fight fate.”
Their trip north to the Maine coast
would have to wait. Everything went on hold during those few weeks every summer
when he volunteered to take the “impoverished lads” from London, Southampton,
Liverpool, out onto the briny and teach them how to sail. Every year he said it
was his last year, and every next year he changed his mind. He loved the male
camaraderie, particularly the unconditional admiration the lads bestowed on
him.
“M’god, you’re a goldmine and a
minefield at the same time!” she said.
“I think you just like the sound of
those words. It seems to me you just said that about the social worker’s
notes.”
“Aren’t you brave to bring up that
subject again?”
“I have to give you some reason to
wish I will return safely.”
She burst into a deep-throated
chuckle and rubbed her hands over her open mouth, stifling a yawn at the same
time. They’d started out to do flea markets that day and ended up at some town
fair where Hugh got into endless conversation with the town firemen manning the
fire trucks parked on the field. The men were ignoring the youngsters crawling
over the engines and discovering the fascination their fathers had with the
vehicles. Bea had been bored stiff.
She took Hugh’s comment as bait to
talk about Leavitt’s notes. “You realize, she was possibly the eighth person to
interview the child,” Bea said as she poured some Chardonnay into glasses, “and
she had access to Chloe every week.”
“Therapy, my dear, takes time,” he
said as he reached over to the ice bucket and added ice to her glass, not his.
He knew she got maudlin if she drank too much.
“Leavitt’s probably brainwashing
the child.”
“I’m sure the young woman has
nothing but pure intentions, Darling.”
“Probably true,” she said, while
putting some mild Brie on a plate with a few dates for him. “But what questions
is she asking Chloe? How much of what the child says is true or merely the
result of Leavitt leading her?”
“Ask her,” Hugh said.
“She’ll never admit that. Surely
you know that.” Bea’s voice filled with disgust. “And one of you boys in black
will let her get away with it.”
Now he chuckled. “Because she’ll
have been told to tell one of us who have to sit there and listen to this kind
of rot that the child came out with it voluntarily.” The tone of his voice
deepened and his mouth tightened as he went on. “We have no choice.”
“That’s what’s wrong with the
system. The likes of her will’ve been told by Joe Aguilar or a prosecutor what
to say and how to say it, but there will’ve been no one to train her adequately
to do her job.”
She took advantage of Hugh’s mouth
being full, and continued. “All she’s had is a few seminars, a few hours here
and there. She’s not been tested. She follows no standards. She’s never been
properly supervised. No one’s ever pointed out her mistakes to her. She didn’t
even admit she made mistakes.”
“Life has it hiccups, Dear.”
“Oh, Hugh, Hugh, that’s not good
enough. Someone like that has to be held accountable for her performance. And
she isn’t. She’s immune from suit.”
“Lobby for change. It’s up to the
legislature, not the judiciary.”
Bea wagged her head, as much in
disgust as frustration. All spelled danger. Nothing would change in time for
Bill. She’d have to find in Leavitt’s process notes a strong handle, not just
straws. A pattern of flaws. Now that would be a handle.
Bea walked over to her desk and
brought Leavitt’s notes back to the sofa, refilled the glasses, and as she
burrowed in against the pillows, thought, Too
bad Chloe’s sessions weren’t taped.
Hugh knew enough to leave her alone
for a while. He got up and turned on the telly for news.
Where the hell is the handle? When commenting on a drawing done by Chloe, Leavitt didn’t write in her
notes whether she had asked the child to draw or whether Chloe had begun
drawing the picture spontaneously. Neither did Leavitt record anything she said
to Chloe, but Bea didn’t believe Leavitt remained mute throughout each session.
Even what Leavitt did write was
ambiguous: Who labeled the doll? Who
manipulated the puppet? Who spoke about good and bad touches? Leavitt or Chloe?
Chloe only received positive
feedback from her therapist, it seemed, when she spoke about Bill hurting
children and animals. The child had no choice. It was the only thing her mother
wanted her to talk about with Leavitt and the only thing Leavitt wanted to
hear.
The one hope, Bea noted, was
Chloe’s teacher. But the woman appeared to want to stay out of the fray. Bea
skimmed through the sheets quickly. Nothing
here about Chloe’s school friends, her play outside Leavitt’s office, her
feelings toward her mother.
“Oh, there’s the spear chucker
again,” Bea heard Hugh say derisively about one of the news anchors.
“You bigot,” she said quickly. “I
think she does her job magnificently. A helluva lot better than some of your
brethren do theirs.”
“Just trying to get your mind off
those papers, Dear.”
“The hell you were. Just be sure to
recuse yourself from the next racial discrimination case. Otherwise I’ll call
the Globe and tell the Spotlight team
what I know.”
“Oh, you are getting
mean-spirited.”
“I’m not just now getting
mean-spirited about your brothers. I’ve been waiting to see some creative brass
balls from the pack of them for some time now. The Appeals Court ducks the real
issues, rewrites the goddamn history and facts of the case to get the result
they want, and then you and your friends deny cert, crying that you have too
much work.”
“We do.”
“Sure, you’re overworked. Sorry I
hadn’t noticed.”
Hugh got up, kissed Bea on her
forehead, walked out to the galley, and brought back a bottle of gin.
Good, I’ve hit a sore spot.
She tried to concentrate, but she
was having a hard time. She added a cube to her glass, sipped, leaned her head
back, and closed her eyes. She swore she was seeing Denise priming Chloe to say
certain things. One day, Denise told Leavitt she wanted her father, not Bill’s
dad, to supervise the visits at the house. At the very next session, Chloe said
her grandfather can’t protect her like her mother could, as though it was what
she wanted.
The same thing happened after
Denise told Leavitt that Chloe was worried about Bill living close to home.
Chloe had said nothing about it prior to Denise complaining. And at the next
visit, Chloe told Leavitt she didn’t like it when Bill said he was living close
to her. Terry’s boxes were helpful: all like things together.
But some of what Leavitt wrote just
didn’t make sense.
Because there was no medical
evidence of penetration, Bea thought the child’s references to a penis in the
vagina were solely the result of gratuitous reinforcement by Leavitt.
She opened her eyes and sat up
straighter. “Hugh, if Chloe hadn’t been given dolls with penises and vaginas,
she might not have talked so much about penises, vaginas, and mouths. What if
Chloe had had a choice of playing with ordinary dolls?”
"How did she know the taste of him,
though?” Hugh asked provocatively.
“Her mother told her?”
“Bea, he did it.”
“No, no. I don’t think so.” She
rubbed her eyes. “What if she learned about the stuff from Sesame Street, like she did about the breast-feeding possums?”
“That was just accidental.”
“A helluva devastating accident. It
was the reason Leavitt brought out the anatomical dolls for the first time, and
it was after that, on the same day, when Chloe first hinted at the oral sex.”
“But the taste, Bea, the taste.”
“Maybe she learned about it at the
Victims’ meeting.”
“But she mentioned the taste, Bea,
before she went to the Victims’ group.”
It was a while before she spoke
again. “Hold me, Hugh.”
Part 7 Coming Trursday or Friday
