It was halfway through lunch on the following day before Christine managed to shake of the hazy mental state that had fogged her mind relentlessly since hanging up with Erik Monday night. And the only reason for the sudden clarity of her mind was the form of her boss, sitting right in front of her, eyeing with a dead-eyed stare the uneaten sandwich on her place.

"Christine, I'm starting to wonder if you aren't taking a leaf out of your clients' books. I can't remember seeing you have a decent meal for the last three weeks. Now you finish that sandwich and I'm going to get you a slice of chocolate cake, and I want to watch you eat them both."

The resident doctor chuckled, and picked up her sandwich for a hearty bite. Mouth half full, she said, "Just because you haven't seen me doesn't mean I don't eat."

"Oh, I have spies everywhere," Rebecca laughed, waving her hand. "Meg, for example, is an incorrigible gossip, and even though she's a brilliant surgeon, she can be slightly insensitive to shades of character or behavior. When even she says that she thinks you're not eating right, I have to sit up and take notice."

Christine finished chewing and swallowed, throat tight around her bite. "Geez, Meg. I wouldn't have thought she'd notice either."

"So what's going on? I can tell that something's eating at you. And…in all honestly, I think I can guess what it is."

"Maybe you can," she admitted, "but there are other parts that you might not be aware of."

"So, enlighten me. Christine, you're dealing with a rough client, at a time when other things are going on to put you under stress. By the way, Diana Knorr…you handled the situation brilliantly. When does she check in to the Bryant facility?"

"End of next week. Her parents still aren't handling it well. But she seems happy enough about it. It's really the only thing to do."

"And it's hard enough to deal with looking at your own failure without the parents fighting you at every step."

Christine's head snapped up at the word 'failure' and her pride rushed in a warm flood to sustain her. "I don't call it a failure. I did my best; but she needs constant attention and she needs to be away from her negative home life to really make a full recovery."

Rebecca smiled. "And that's the first show of spirit you've given me since we sat down today. It's good to see that you haven't lost it. Now, I don't call it a failure either. You did your best, and you're right; she needed more. Now that I've got you talking, though, why don't we discuss your other…complicated client?"

Under Rebecca's rather stern maternal eyes, Christine's mouth tightened and her stomach wrenched. It had been hard enough to fall asleep last night, what with her brain racing over all the ways her actions had changed their relationship, but she had hoped to have another few days to put her own mind in order before having to report her progress to her boss. As it was…

"Well…I…" she stammered off into an embarrassed silence, finally looking at Rebecca and spreading her hands in a helpless shrug.

"I know. It's hard to wrap your brain around that guy. I've been reading your reports as far as your progress goes, if you can call it progress, and the only reason I'm following up with you now is because I started to see a disturbing pattern."

Christine sighed. She knew what was coming; she had hidden nothing in her reports, and she had known that her train of thought would not make Rebecca happy.

"I can't believe that after I expressly warned you…I told you that the last thing you wanted was Erik Winters in your head…that you brazenly theorized that the only way to get him to open up was to become his bestest buddy?"

Christine flinched. Rebecca's voice had scaled up and she didn't want to be seen getting a major wrist slap in the public cafeteria. Already some of the orderlies and doctors were starting to look conscientiously oblivious, almost studying the ceiling tiles to avoid hearing her get chewed out. Even Rebecca noticed it, and she backed off.

"Grab the other half of your sandwich and walk with me."

She felt vaguely ridiculous, walking through the halls with her angry boss, trying to swallow her sandwich so that she might have a chance to defend herself when they reached Rebecca's office.

She had taken her last bite when the two of them entered the office, and Rebecca curtly motioned her to a seat before closing the door with a sharp click.

"So what the hell are you doing? How far are you planning to take this?"

Christine had five seconds to decide if she could trust her boss. She weighed everything she knew of Rebecca and all she ever hoped from her career, and everything she knew of Erik. She took a deep breath.

"I don't know if I've already taken it too far. Before last night, our relationship was…nothing improper. I was holding the upper hand and trying to attract Erik to me…and I believe that it was working. But already there were significant drawbacks. I think that Erik was becoming…not attracted, but attached to me. We had certain interactions outside the doctor/patient setting that were completely coincidental and certainly not what I would have wanted."

Rebecca nodded, slowly. "You were drawing him in with your mutual appreciation for music. A good strategy, especially considering your backgrounds and natural talent. You're both frustrated virtuosos, in a way. Such a similarity would make therapy easier. What interactions outside the doctor/patient settings are you referring to? There's nothing in your notes."

"The first time," Christine said, shifting nervously in her chair, "was immediately after Carlotta's show at the Black Cat. I had to return for my purse, and Erik was there, giving a piano concert. I…rather injudiciously stayed to listen, and he saw me there, speaking to me afterwards and…asking me to dance."

One quick glance showed Rebecca's shoulders had ratcheted together as if by tension wires, and her lips were thin and pale. She looked down at her folded hands and kept talking.

"I declined, of course, knowing that it was entirely improper for us to have any relationship of the sort while we were still doctor and patient. He did not take it in the context I intended. I think he thought I was rejecting him personally, and as such, decided to avoid me. He declined to attend our appointment yesterday, and when I confronted him about the situation over the phone, we had a rather…heated argument."

"How heated?"

"I said some things that were probably too blunt. I accused him of being a tourist, of refusing to open up…all the things that every other doctor had noticed, but no one had ever outright said."

Rebecca snorted. "No, I don't believe anyone ever has. I can't really fault you for doing that; he has certainly deserved it. And maybe it would help shock him out of his habits. What did he say to that?"

Now she was starting to get really uncomfortable. "Well…he didn't really say anything. I had been practicing my singing before he called and I had a coughing fit. Being a singer himself, he knew what caused it. When I had stopped coughing he…" The blood rushed to her face and she couldn't go on.

"What?"

She pressed her lips together and shook her head.

"Christine, I need to know what happened. Tell me or by God I'll yank him from your rotation and suspend you for a month."

She looked up from her folded hands and said, "He asked me to sing for him."

Rebecca's shoulders dropped and she leaned back in her chair, breathing deeply. "And did you?"

She nodded.

"Jesus. What on earth made you? Do you realize…do you know what that's gonna do to your relationship?"

"I don't know why I did it…I guess I was…grateful." Christine's eyes were glazed with tears. "I hadn't sung since I was thirteen, and all of a sudden I have to bring it back to relate to a patient…who knows if I would have done it if he hadn't come into my life? I might still be the same person I was two weeks ago, scared and lonely and flinching at the future…and the past."

"Gratitude doesn't justify what you've done. This goes against every regulation in the book. And it's just plain stupid when in regard to him; he's not the kind of person to take any personal confession lightly. He'll remember what you've done till his dying day…or yours."

"I know that." Christine whispered. Suddenly, something plucked at her mind. "But how do you know that? What did you do to make you so afraid of him? How did your relationship change?"

"Can't you put it together from the files?" Rebecca asked bitterly.

"No. I couldn't tell anything, there's almost no detail. Which is confusing, because I've counseled other clients of yours and I know how much care you put into your personal notes. You warned me about him to begin with, but how did you know to do that? What happened between you?"

It was Rebecca's turn to be silent and abashed. Christine had never seen the look of haunted shame that ghosted over her superior's face as she composed the answer to her subordinate's question. The look of her hesitation and fear was enough to send shivers down Christine's spine.

"Like you, I thought the best way to get through to Erik would be to use my personal experience and history to create a bond between us. Unlike you, however, I have no musical talent. But I theorized that his mother—the formative person in his life, and who is still not a clear character to any doctor who has counseled him—was selfish to the point of abusive neglect."

Christine nodded. "I thought so too. From other notes, it is clear that he idolized his mother, but that she remained an unrealized figure, even to him. She was always away, on stage, in the social high life…and though he never mentions when the mask came into his life, I can't help but feel that her hiding him away was central to his identity dismorphia that lead him to assume his disguise."

"So you still think it's dismorphia?"

"Well…do you think it's physical? Do you think under that mask he's really deformed?"

"I don't know. It could sure as hell explain a lot."

"But I interrupted you. How does his mother come into your strategy?"

"Well, my mother was a similar figure. She was a genius immunologist, doing philanthropic work all over the globe and working with some of the highest medical minds. Naturally, all my life I wanted to follow her footsteps and be an academic doctor, helping to save lives with my medical developments. But as time went on, it became very clear to me that I just wasn't as smart, as intuitive as she was. I was a great lab technician, good at procedures and following orders and writing reports."

"But you weren't a genius. And you couldn't keep up with her."

"Exactly," she said, her lips twisting, "I couldn't keep up. And she wouldn't slow down, and I wouldn't have asked her to. I went into management, because I was better with mentoring people than she could ever be, but she never saw my skill. We've drifted so far apart that I don't even feel comfortable mentioning her anymore."

Christine reached one hand across the table, putting her palm above Rebecca's. "I'm sorry."

"It hardly hurts anymore. Anyway…I tried to use our similar positions—emulating our mothers, and trying endlessly for their approval—to create a rapport between us. He saw me coming a mile away; after all, you don't just start a conversation like that out of the blue, and he cut me off. This was when I'd been counseling him for about two months. He said…"

Her face went pale and she looked sick. Christine felt awkward, like she was trespassing on forbidden ground. Whatever had happened between her boss and her patient, Rebecca had buried it deep.

"He said there was no comparison between the two of us. He said that he surpassed his mother in all respects and had no need to idealize her. But that I…I was just an inept child nipping at the heels of a superior talent and was hiding my lack of talent under the guise of being a 'people person'. He said that even the thought of trying to compare the two of us by any means was an insult to himself."

Christine whitened under the shock of those comments and felt her blood boil. "Asshole."

"Putting it lightly. I don't know how I got out of that session without breaking down, and I had to go on leave for a week to get over it, besides immediately having him transferred to another doctor. So, I know the pain and heartbreak that he can inflict when you give him a personal way in. I don't want to see that happen to you. Especially since you just admitted to me that you're under stress and going through personal changes." Rebecca turned up her palm and interlaced her fingers with Christine's.

"So. It's your call. What do I do? Do I get him away from you? Or do you think you have a chance? I don't want to see you hurt. You've crossed a line. If it means getting closer to his cure, would you cross another? I'll look the other way for this one if you want me to. How many more times will I have to look the other way?"

"I don't know." Christine admitted. "All I know is that I want to get to the bottom of this. If I pass this up, he'll go to another hospital, another doctor, someone else to hurt, no one else to help. We're close and getting closer. If I can get through to him, I can find the answer. I need to help him; I need to find the answer."

Rebecca was silent. She folded her hands.

"Okay. Be careful, and get to it."

Christine stood and went to the door. Before she opened it, Rebecca spoke again.

"And Christine? Keep your methods to yourself this time; no detail in the reports. If you need to talk to anyone, come to me directly, and I'll give you my best advice."

"Yes ma'am."

She went through the door and shut it behind her, breath shallow and heart pounding. She had her boss's permission to continue on her path, but was it really what she wanted? How far would she have to go to help a man whom she wasn't certain even wanted help?