Page 74 of It's One of Us

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It can’t be him. Her Peyton did not do this. The police have made a mistake.

Ah, but you were afraid of him when he was ten years old. Could they really have fixed him so easily? Did he not grow out of his problems, as the doctors thought, only found a way to channel them? To hold them close to his heart and never share them again? Have they finally risen up and overwhelmed him? Has he been hiding his true self this whole time?

No. It is not him. Of course it’s a mistake.

It started with night terrors. Peyton had slept alone for years with no problem, but after Scarlett was born, suddenly needed to be in Darby’s bed or he would scream in fright all night, waking the baby, who would join in the chorus.

Then the tantrums began.

Not typical tantrums, not crying because he couldn’t have candy at the checkout tantrums, but full-blown rages that forced her to lock him in his room so he wouldn’t hurt her, or the baby. Frustrated by the lack of targets, he would bang his head on the wall until huge lumps formed on his forehead.

She took him to his pediatrician. To specialists. There were brain scans, MRIs, drugs. So many drugs. He’d cry his little heart out at the kitchen table because he couldn’t feel anything anymore, then tear through the house ripping paintings from the walls and overturning tables if she tried to console him.You’re doing this to me. You hate me. You love her more than you love me.

More drugs. Higher dosages. They zombified him, and he sat, staring blankly at the walls, losing weight because she couldn’t rouse him to eat. He was tall and thin, a wraith with a shock of brown scarecrow hair and dead eyes.

She tried everything. Every drug. Every doctor. With every new specialist, a different diagnosis.Autism.Bipolar. Borderline. ADHD. Early-onset schizophrenia.She changed his diet, eliminating gluten, dairy, soy. Skipped his vaccinations. Anything, everything, she tried it all.

He was eight when he accused her of trying to kill him. He was nine when she caught him in the bathroom, Scarlett in the bathtub merrily splashing away and Peyton with his dead eyes, a knife raised over his head.

She had no choice at that point but to try inpatient treatment. She had to protect Scarlett. And she was so tired. So tired.

The horror of her choice wouldn’t let her rest. She’d chosen her daughter over her son.

Her safety, Darby. You chose to keep her safe. Big difference.

The hospital that specialized in childhood-onset psychological disorders was in Maryland, so she moved them there to be close. And miracle of miracles, it worked.

After the first few months, they experimented by weaning him off the drugs. Her little boy was clear-eyed again. After a year, they let him do an in-home visit. He cuddled with Darby and played dolls with Scarlett and seemed so happy again.

When he was thirteen, after they’d definitively determined the psychotropic drugs he’d been given in the early days of his disease were inducing schizoaffective disorder and got him on a small dose of antidepressants daily with good vitamins and lots of clean food, he returned to the sunny, bright, precocious child he’d always been, and was deemed stable enough to be sent home permanently.

He never blamed her. This he told her the first night after Scarlett had been put to bed, round-eyed that her big brother was home. They’d sat at the table, Darby with a glass of chardonnay, Peyton with chamomile tea, and he told her his heart.

“I don’t blame you. I was terrified of myself. You did exactly the right thing, making sure I was safe, with specialists who could help me. It was beyond us both, Mom. If I’d hurt Scarlett...” He’d closed his eyes and shuddered. “I love you, Mom. Thank you for saving me.”

She thought about locking the bedroom doors that night. But she had to trust him. Had to trust that the doctors were right.

And they were. Peyton outgrew his problems. The darkness was no longer. Now it was only light. The frightening chapter was closed for good.

Or so she’d thought.

Her mind wars, the thoughts tumbling against each other. It’s a mistake. He isn’t the one. This is just a man someone saw and thinks is involved. It’s not him. It’s not. She knows in her heart her son could never do such a thing.

Doesn’t she? Doesn’t she?

Yes. He could never hurt someone like this.

Ah, but he could. He might have if you hadn’t stepped in and put him in that place. If you hadn’t had the strength to get him help.

No. This isn’t happening. He couldn’t be capable of such a thing.

Darby needs to talk to her son, and she needs to do it right now. Before anyone gets their hands on him. She wants to look him in the eye and hear him say the words.

I didn’t do this, Mom. I swear it.

What if he said,Oh God, Mom, I lost control again. I didn’t mean to do it. It was a mistake.

Could she still love her son properly if he admitted his darkness had become a real, tangible thing? That he had raped and strangled a woman Darby herself knew? And, dear God, possibly taken another?