The former Hope Haven Medical Clinic in Westfield had been empty for many years. In the near future, it will be demolished so that residential buildings can be built on the vacant site. The abandoned site was guarded, but on weekends, it was usually easy to avoid the security guards.
Leonore had parked the phaeton behind the site. Then, she and Caleb had entered the building unnoticed and retreated with him to the former morgue, where they were now waiting for Elizabeth to arrive.
"Where have you been all this time? I mean, she never told me about you," Caleb asked his companion as he walked curiously along the compartments where the deceased patients used to lie.
"I had to leave," began Leonore, who, unlike her youthful conversation partner, was sitting calmly, almost apathetically, on a chair she had previously cleaned of dust with a cloth handkerchief. "Why should I have stayed? I had lost Elizabeth, my father was up to no good with me, and my niece was so disappointed that I couldn't face her."
"I'm about to cry," Caleb replied uncharmingly, opening one of the body compartments.
It was heavy-duty, and to Caleb's disappointment, nothing behind it was bizarre or even creepy. It was just an empty compartment. No stretcher, no medical instruments.
"I went to India for a long time," Leonore continued. "A fascinating country. Incredibly big and very far away from the USA. The ideal retreat."
"What did you do there?"
"I worked my way through. You only need a little to survive in India. And people ask fewer questions than here. I developed my skills and knowledge and gained distance from my old life."
"And if it was so great there, why did you return?"
Caleb now left the corpse compartments and walked over to Leonore. It was dark in the deserted morgue; only the faint light coming through from the stairs on the upper floor illuminated the cool basement a little.
"It has something to do with getting older. You get sentimental and start to long for the places that used to mean a lot to you. And for the people."
"You think I'm pretty stupid, don't you?"
"You're wondering what I'm doing in Boston now, of all places, when Elizabeth is in trouble? And how did I actually get the exculpatory evidence?"
Caleb crossed his arms in front of his narrow chest. "Elizabeth always says that coincidence is by far the least likely of all the explanations."
Leonore laughed. "Oh yes, she said that a lot back then. Still the same. My God, how I missed her --"
Caleb refused to be distracted. "So?" he asked emphatically.
The air was stale and an eerie silence on the deserted clinic grounds.
"No, I'm not here by chance, of course," Leonore admitted. "I've been preparing my return for a very long time."
"I must say, you really do resemble her! Well, that you somehow come across as, how shall I put it, stranger."
"You're a real charmer," Leonore replied calmly, raising her eyebrows.
"I'm charming when I want to be," the teenager replied. "And I don't want to be! Where did you two meet back then?"
Leonore stood up. "Just like before," she said with a blissful smile. "Everyone always asked us that question back then, too. Unfortunately, we were never able to tell anyone."
"And why not?"
Leonore didn't get the chance to answer. Instead, a shadow appeared behind her, cast by a person carefully descending the stairs into the cellar. Shortly afterward, Elizabeth stood in the room.
"I think we can tell CJ," she said calmly. Then she took a deep breath and explained: "We met in a support group."
"Excuse me?" Caleb gasped.
"There aren't many places where people like us can meet," Leonore added.
"You mean a support group for geniuses?" Caleb understood and asked Elizabeth incredulously: "She're supposed to be as smart as you?"
Elizabeth shook her head. "That's not true," she disagreed. "Leonore is much smarter than me."
xxx
Nikki had turned the music on her smartphone up as loud as it would. She had been jogging along the streets and through the parks of Boston for over forty-five minutes to the songs of her favorite band, Billy Talent. Her workout clothes were soaked with sweat, and her breathing was getting shallower, but her feet wouldn't stop running.
Why did you do that, Ma? she asked herself repeatedly, but she just couldn't think of an answer. You fucking idiot!
Finally, Nikki reached the traffic light at a busy intersection. While she couldn't stop moving her legs even when standing still, she caught sight of an older man. He was trying in vain to open a heavy gate that led to the backyard of an old apartment building. It wasn't a remarkable occurrence, a scene that happened thousands of times daily in Boston. It didn't take too long before the old man finally managed to open the gate. But Nikki was still touched by the image of his helplessness.
What if he's really trying to trick you, she thought. And even if it really was you. Why did you do it?
The pedestrian lights turned green. The waiting people crossed the boulevard in a broad stream from both sides. Nikki, however, stopped and switched off the music. A group of students approached her, apparently on their way to the nearby park where Nikki wanted to continue her jog. Her eyes fell on a slim, blond boy in the group.
If I were Caleb's mother, I'd go insane, she thought.
She wanted to reach for her cell phone but pulled her hand back.
Why would she do that? A fifteen-year-old?
A passer-by accidentally bumped into Nikki.
"What are you standing around like that for?" the little man in the hat then railed.
"I'm having fun," Nikki replied with a furrowed brow.
"Well, that's the main thing," replied the passer-by before turning away and crossing the road.
Nikki was about to shout something after him, but suddenly she stopped.
That's right, she thought. That's the main thing.
Determined, she reached for her cell phone.
"Have you heard yet?" Mike asked at the other end of the line before even saying hello to Nikki. "That boy's interview? Tell me, could it be that --"
"Yes, that was him," Nikki cut him short. "The witness is the kid from the mall. And yes, he's in a relationship with Ma." Nikki continued before her friend could add anything: "I think it's really bad, too, but do you want me to tell you something? If the boy wants to be with Ma voluntarily, why shouldn't he be allowed to? Because we'd both have a problem if it was our son?"
"Nikki, what's wrong with you? I mean, I would forbid our son --"
"...forbid it too. I know. But what if he likes it?"
Mike thought about it for a moment. It was evident that his girlfriend wasn't calling him for no reason. "Okay, what's going on?" he asked without further ado.
"I can't just keep doing nothing. Ma's standing alone in the rain right now, and no one's helping her except the boy. We should somehow stand by her now. At least until we know what's really happened."
"But we can't do that, Nikki," Mike replied. "What are we supposed to do? We're off the case. If we mess around now, especially to help your mother, then we're risking our asses!"
"I know," Nikki confirmed. "But still, I can't go on like this. My mom's about to do something fucking stupid. Otherwise, she wouldn't have left."
Mike paused for a moment. "You could be right about that.
"What if one of us was able to?"
"We wouldn't be. Because your mother would have cleared us before there was even a warrant."
Nikki nodded as if Mike could see her. "Look," she said, "I have an idea. It's pure speculation, but it might be our only chance."
Mike listened up. "Okay, what's it about?"
People were still moving past Nikki, not noticing the woman in the sweaty workout clothes. When the traffic light turned red again, she replied: "Something illegal."
xxx
The dark room smelled of dust and mold. Elizabeth's eyes were slow to adjust to the light.
"Don't you want to tell Caleb a bit more about us? He says you've kept me completely from him so far."
Leonore stood up, took Elizabeth in her arms in greeting, and held the captain for almost half a minute. Her manner was nothing threatening; on the contrary, the meeting seemed to have filled her with happiness.
"Why should I have told him about you?" Elizabeth asked after she had released herself from the embrace.
Then she went over to Caleb and took him in her arms, too, albeit for a slightly shorter time than Leonore. While she sheepishly checked the position of her hair in a broken mirror, Elizabeth continued: "You know, CJ, I had to make a decision back then. It was hard with Leonore from the start because we had so many secrets from the others. She drove from New Hampshire to Boston every week because she didn't want to go to a support group in her neighborhood."
"But the fact that nobody knew me in Boston was only the reason to drive so far initially," Leonore interjected. "Later on, I only did it because of Elizabeth. She was the first person I'd ever met who could follow me mentally."
"It's starting to get creepy," Caleb commented while remaining close to Elizabeth.
"I realized Leonore was a lot like me," Elizabeth continued. "She saw things that were obvious to me, too, but that everyone else didn't notice. It was exactly what I'd always dreamed of. I met someone who was from the same planet as me. Finally, someone saw the world through my eyes."
"Who was supposed to separate us?" Leonore started again. "We didn't have to explain or justify anything to each other. Everything was always just obvious. And because we didn't have to constantly explain everything obvious to anyone like a toddler, we could concentrate on the only crucial thing. The one big insight."
"Oh, the big insight," Caleb repeated mockingly. "Is a violinist coming in now?"
"I'm afraid if we don't leave soon, an RRT team is more likely to come in and arrest me," Elizabeth replied before continuing, "Yes, the big insight. How do I best explain it to you? Before we met, we always thought we were the only people in the world who could see everything around us. And that everyone else was more or less blind and deaf. But when we were together, it was suddenly different. The world was still annoying, but suddenly, we didn't care. And then, when we finally ... moved in together, we realized that life isn't complicated. Because the only thing you need is a partner who understands you."
Caleb was tempted to make another irreverent interjection, but the forcefulness with which Elizabeth spoke to him impressed him too much.
"That's all," Leonore confirmed. "You don't need consent; you don't need instruction. You just need to be understood. And suddenly, we both had someone who did. And that finally made it possible for us to live normally after the long years of loneliness."
"Many people would think that people like Leonore and I solve the world's problems together all day," Elizabeth continued. "But the exact opposite is the case! We finally didn't have to do it anymore. Because everything was always clear anyway. We could just sit back and be there for each other."
Caleb imperceptibly moved away from Elizabeth's side. His eyes darted nervously in all directions more and more often. He leaned back against the body compartments and asked, "So why did you guys break up?"
"CJ asks the right questions," Leonore huffed appreciatively to Elizabeth, then elegantly walked past her to stop directly in front of the boy. She stroked Caleb through his blond mane before finally returning her attention to Elizabeth. "You told everyone who knew about us that I was dead?"
Elizabeth didn't even bat an eyelid. She looked Leonore in the eye with confidence as she replied. "Sometimes you must lie to many people to protect a few."
"Huh?" Caleb exclaimed in surprise. Why would it protect your girlfriend if you told everyone she was dead? Do I need to understand that?"
"Come on, Elizabeth. Tell him," Leonore encouraged Elizabeth, placing her hand on her shoulder.
The captain took a deep breath and gritted her teeth for a second. "Something inside me knew the whole time," she explained to the teenager. "I just didn't want to see it. Maybe I really didn't see it. Objectively, there wasn't a single hint of it."
"What are you talking about?" Caleb asked impatiently.
Elizabeth paused and then licked her lips. "Well, Dr. Molloy, our mutual family doctor, sixteen years ago. I mean, who could have managed to commit a murder I couldn't solve?"
Leonore now clutched Caleb's head with both hands, getting so close that the boy could feel her breath on his face. Then she breathed with a sweet smile: "Oops --"