The Green Memory of Fear. B. A. Chepaitis

been great, really protective. His guards, and his law guardian’s wonderful, but Daro has to answer all these questions over and over again. And so do I. So does his father.”

      “What questions do they ask you?”

      “Oh, why did we send him to Dr. Senci? Do we have any marital trouble?” She made a derisive sound. “Marital trouble. As if that explains why Daro—why any of this happened.”

      As if they were the criminals, Jaguar thought. Technically, anyone who reported sexual abuse was only a witness, acting properly as citizens to help the Province prosecute a crime, but Daro was inherently suspect because he’d gone to see a neuropsych specialist in the first place.

      “Daro went to Dr. Senci for help with nightmares, didn’t he?” Jaguar asked.

      Susan confirmed this, but added that nightmares were too mild a word. He had wild, raging, terrifying dreams that woke him nightly and kept him up until daylight, when he could sometimes collapse into a few hours restless sleep. He stopped doing his homework, going to school, playing with friends.

      His parents wanted to know if he was a candidate for Liratone, a new wonder drug for childhood Attention Deficit Disorder that had the unexpected benefit of giving beautiful, soothing dreams. They wanted the best for their son, and Dr. Senci was known as that, so they consulted with him. Dr. Senci’s notes indicated his belief that Mr. and Mrs. Karas were somehow creating the nightmares. They were suspect from the minute they called him.

      And for all Jaguar knew, they should be. She’d worked with enough pedophiles to know upper middle class white parents were not immune from that moral disaster. It was entirely possible that Daro, unable to accuse his parents, threw the blame onto the nearest available substitute. Jaguar had to consider that possibility. Of course, it didn’t explain what happened to the other boys, but technically that was none of her business. She was here only to collect information on Daro and Dr. Senci.

      The panel of judges they’d present their case to, borrowed from the Medical Protective Board, made a public fuss about their policy of zero tolerance for sexual abuse between doctor and patient, but the MPB also took care of its own, so Jaguar was also wary of them. She knew they’d agreed to a closed hearing, at the parent’s request. She wondered if that was to shield Daro, or the doctor. Or maybe it was meant to shield the parents. This would wreak havoc on their social lives, Jaguar thought.

      Mr. Karas was in banking, and had a social circle where this sort of thing wasn’t mentioned. Mrs. Karas worked part-time in an art gallery, a pretty career for the wife of a banker. Of course, Daro’s name had been kept out of the press, and so Jaguar supposed they could still hide their involvement from some people, but if the trial was public, that would be all over.

      “Dr. Senci was treating the boys involved in the shooting, correct?” Jaguar asked.

      “Yes. Also for nightmares. Daro talked to one of them in the waiting room. They—they got to be friends. The other boy—John DeLucas—Daro didn’t know.”

      “Did you get a diagnosis for Daro from another doctor?” Jaguar asked.

      “Two. Good thing it was all covered. They went over him head to toe. They both said they wouldn’t have prescribed the liratone. Nothing wrong with him except—PTSD, they said.”

      “Post-traumatic stress disorder,” Jaguar said. The cluster of problems someone develops when they’ve been traumatized and haven’t integrated or healed the traumatic events. PTSD was assumed in her prisoners, and then specific syndromes diagnosed. What fear couldn’t they integrate? Why not? Did they need medication as well as intervention? She’d have to see Daro’s files to find out if the doctors had gotten any more specific.

      “That’s right. I remember I was just relieved he wasn’t born with anything wrong. I guess I worry,” Susan admitted.

      “He’s your only child, isn’t he?”

      “One I never thought I’d have. Even with the in vitro, I had a hard time going to term. I keep thinking—”

      She paused, and Jaguar filled in the blanks for her.

      “If only you didn’t have that glass of wine while you were pregnant. If only you were younger. If only you took more vitamins. And what about great uncle Harry who never was quite right. Like that?”

      Susan shook her head. “Stupid, isn’t it?”

      “Normal is a better word, I think.”

      “Well,” she said uncertainly. “Maybe. Would you like something to drink? Coffee, or something cold maybe? And a little food?”

      “Coffee would be wonderful, if it isn’t any trouble. Shuttle coffee’s the worst.”

      “No trouble at all,” she said.

      They were moving toward the kitchen when the front door swung open wide and then slammed shut hard. Jaguar turned, and saw a smallish boy in sleeveless net shirt and shorts, baseball cap turned around backwards on his head, a gold hoop earring with a growling tiger dangling from the end of it in his left ear.

      She found herself grinning. He could have been any child, from any age, except for the blinking electronic earcuff clipped over the tiger earring, which would allow him to communicate with his guards from anywhere. He scowled, removed it and laid it down on the table by the door before it was done blinking.

      “Daro,” his mother said reprovingly, “aren’t you supposed to keep that in all the time?”

      “Why? I mean, I can’t go anywhere except the yard and the stupid courthouse, and the guy’s always right there. And now I’m just here.” He stopped himself, and knit his brow at Jaguar. “Who’s she?” he asked, pointing.

      She walked over to him, keeping her grin under control. “I’m Dr. Addams,” she said, extending a hand.

      She saw his instinctive withdrawal. Another doctor, here to poke and prod at him.

      “Not that kind of doctor,” she said quickly. “It’s an academic title. It means I went to school for too long. You can call me Jaguar.”

      His face shifted its expression to interest. When he wasn’t scowling he seemed younger. Those eyes, open wide enough to let in the whole world, too wide to keep out danger.

      “Jaguar?” he asked. “Like those big cats? They’re extinct.”

      “Actually,” she said, “There’s still some left in captivity. Not too far from here, at a place called Exotic Cat World, off the 401.”

      “Superhype,” he said. “You mean that? Hey mom, you hear that? Maybe we could go?”

      “We’ll see,” she said. “I’ll talk to your father about it.”

      He grinned, lopsided. Mothers, his face said. Then he pushed his hand out to her, and she took it. “Are you, like, a lawyer?”

      “Not even close.”

      “Cop?”

      “Not that either. I’m a Teacher on the Planetoids.”

      His eyes widened with respect. The general public didn’t really know much about those bits of glowing light floating above them, but they understood the work there was dangerous. The rest they filled in with their own imaginings.

      “What’re you here for?” he asked.

      “Daro,” his mother said, “A little politeness, please.”

      “I wasn’t impolite,” he said. “I just asked.”

      “That’s fine,” Jaguar agreed. “Always ask when you want to know something. I’m here to collect preliminary information on Dr. Senci for Planetoid research, in case he ends up there.” She paused a moment. “And I’m here to help you. You did a brave thing, getting that recording on Dr. Senci. You deserve some help.”

      Officially, that wasn’t true.