Chapter 5: Not In My Clinic

I didn't call the number on the card.

I drove to his clinic that evening, because a text can be deleted and a door sensor can't.

The parking lot was almost empty.

The receptionist had left, and Lena's white car was gone.

A light was still on in a corner office at the back.

I knocked once and pushed the door open.

Justin sat behind a desk with his sleeves rolled, reading a file with a pen in his teeth.

He looked up, and the pen fell out of his mouth.

"Susanna," he said. "You can't be here."

"Lena found me in Dayton."

He stood so fast the chair rolled back into the wall.

"What did she say?"

I told him about the door sensor, the forty minutes, and the sign-in sheet.

I told him about the board.

He listened with his hands flat on the desk, and he didn't interrupt once.

"She's been waiting years for something like this," he said.

"Then why did you do it?"

He took a long breath.

"I don't know," he said. "That's the truth. I've been a doctor for eleven years, and I never once touched a patient."

"You touched me."

"I know I did."

"You said to say it so you were sure," I said. "I said it."

"I remember."

"Then why are you apologizing to my mother with a bag?"

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