Page 38 of You Can't Hurt Me

Patient X hesitates: “I think that maybe it would be so helpful if I could talk to you more than once a week?”

I sense Patient X is on the verge of a breakthrough here. I know how significant it is to feel understood by a therapist, how transformational it can be, so of course I agree.

14

A few days later, on the dot of 10:00 a.m., I hear two beeps outside my apartment. I hurry downstairs and out to the street, duck into the passenger seat of the sleek black 4x4. The harsh slam of the door jars with the lush silence inside. Nate’s car purrs into motion as I wrestle off my jacket and throw it across the back seat.

“So, destination Dungeness it is,” he says decisively, punching some digits into the satnav, and I watch the contours of the map swirl into life. “We should be at the coast in time for lunch.”

Rain slakes the windows as the windshield wipers pound into action. He drives slowly, tailing the other cars in the rain and, as we head out across the river, the weather unexpectedly begins to lift. There is something strangely soporific about sitting here with him, watching the asphalt landscape flash past, empty office blocks and ghostly retail parks, flyovers, rows of pebbledash semis trapped on the edges of the divided highway.

“So how did your meeting with Priya go?”

“Kind of fine,” I say, more as a question than a statement.

He glances across at me and we exchange a smile. “So she gave you the third degree?”

“Yep. You could say that. She suggested a change of scenery for a reason.”

“Don’t tell me, she thought it would be a good way to get me to open up about myself, let go a little?”

“You know her only too well.”

“I know she likes to think she can read people better than they can read themselves.”

“And can she?”

“She couldn’t read you at all.” He shakes his head. “You’ve probably worked out I was the one who wanted to hire you. She took some persuasion.”

“She made that pretty clear in the interview.”

“It wasn’t really a personal thing, but she wanted someone older, preferably male,” he says, throwing me a look.

“I gathered. Has she always been like that?”

“Kind of.” He shrugs. “She and Eva met at college. They’d known each other for a while by the time I came along. She could be...possessive around Eva. But since she died, it’s shifted.” He shrugs. “Maybe it’s grief; she’s latching onto me to remember her. We talk about Eva a lot but sometimes, somehow—well. It’s all complicated. I’m probably not explaining it very well. This is all new, talking about my life, my marriage, none of it is easy for someone like me.”

“Well, we can take it slowly, don’t worry,” I say lightly, not wanting to frighten him off now that he’s revealing a more vulnerable side.

We have exited the highway now and the narrow lanes are like lush corridors of green, a soft haze of sun filters through the clouds. Nate turns down a small lane with an expanse of horizon before us and I open my window, the saline tang of the sea drifting in. He parks on the roadside and we walk up the shingle toward the shoreline. I look up at the sky like a great glass dome and feel caught under its curves.

Sea kale, samphire and bramble bushes spread low along the ground and curl up between the rocks, giving it an edge-of-the-landscape feel. It’s a wonder anything can grow at all but it does. Red poppies and yellow broom dot the shingle. I meander for a moment, enjoying the view. He strides ahead of me, past a scattering of beach houses, cubes of corrugated wood and mirrored windows. A derelict fishing boat lies stranded on the shingle near the tideline, its cabin windows smashed in.

Black telegraph poles line the path, outlined against a dust-colored sky. It’s more arid desert than beach: a chunk of Arizona on the Kent coast.

Nate’s figure shrinks to a black comma and, watching him from this distance, I’m aware how strange it feels being here with him in this setting, beyond the professional familiarity of his study. He turns and waits for me to catch up. Behind him the ocean is oily and muscular, shifting below the horizon. On the shoreline we stand a little apart, watch as the wind drops and a low watery sun turns the sea from dirt-brown to metallic-blue.

“When was the last time you came here?”

“A few weeks before she died.” There is a stillness in the way he says it, a resigned emptiness. “In fact, the last weekend away we ever spent with each other was in a small cottage just down the coast. We meant to come back but I couldn’t. I’d hurt my back quite badly, slipped disc,” he says, grimacing at the memory.

“So that’s where the fentanyl came from?” I say, thinking of my discovery that afternoon, the blister pack of pills in his glasses case.

“You did do your research that day, didn’t you?” He looks at me wryly, smiling for the first time today. “Thank God for opioids—but don’t quote me on that. Anyway, we never did come back here.”

“If I’d known, I’m not sure I’d have suggested here.” Though, I wondered, was this really true?

“Don’t look so worried. I’m fine talking about it here. It seems different somehow.” He covers his eyes from the bright sunlight, frowns into the wind. “It feels easier. At home, it’s as if she’s—”

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