The Therapist Chapter 9
The alarm woke Ryan at five o’clock. A man and woman were talking about the week ahead. What was on the lunch menu for the local schools? If he weren’t running he’d leave it on and listen while he got ready for work. At least it made sound like he wasn’t alone in the house. But this morning he was headed out for a run so he shut it off as he swung his feet to the floor.
He reached over and grabbed his shorts, pulled his running shirt over his head, and grabbed a fresh pair of socks. He thought of Mitchell and wondered if anyone had found his body yet. He was no longer surprised at the lack of remorse he felt after killing.
When he’d taught history at the Center he’d known teenage offenders who already had five, ten, twenty-five victims. He didn’t even want to think of how many Mitchell had. He wouldn’t have anymore, he knew that. He laced up his New Balance and opened the back door.
A yellow cat shot past him and into the house. “I’ll feed you when I get back,” he said. He always talked out loud to the cats. He saw the black cat coming up the driveway as he headed across the lawn and onto the road. The cat looked at him, probably wondering if he was going to get fed. The cats were Julie and Tim’s.
He never had cats growing up, had never been too fond of them. These cats had grown on him over the years though. He was running the half marathon on Saturday so today would be an easy five. He turned onto Jefferson Street and headed out of town. In a mile or so he would turn onto a dirt road that would take him into a series of rolling hills. It was his favorite run.
He realized his Benefactor was going to wonder if Mitchell was his doing. Killing Mitchell was far too risky and he knew he’d gotten lucky. He’d thought about killing these predators in the past, more as an afterthought than really doing it. It usually came to mind when he’d read about one of them getting six months for sexual assault on a minor.
Then there was the high-profile case of a teenage girl raped and murdered. The bastard lived in the same town. He’d been convicted twice before and was out on probation. He was granted early release for finishing a treatment program in prison and being a model inmate.
He was released from probation after convincing a judge that treatment had cured him. Ryan had read the statement he gave to the judge at his hearing. He wished he’d been there, wished he’d had a treatment manual in his hand. He could have shown the judge the passage the twisted asshole memorized for her. Son of a bitch!
He must have been laughing his ass off walking out of the courthouse. The evidence later showed he’d been routinely raping a fourteen-year-old girl, a relative, before and after his meeting with the judge. The guy was still in prison his case being stalled by lawyers.
People were angry. How did this happen? Why keep delaying justice? But the courts and the professional shrinks thought they knew more. They believed they knew more about the mind of an offender. They believed they were more compassionate. Ryan knew they were just like most of the therapeutic staff he had worked with. Easy marks! Treatment had surely made this guy a better predator. To convince a judge he was cured was easy. A seventy-five percent success rate after treatment!
The courts should make it mandatory that after being released the bastards had to live next to these therapists and their families. Maybe the next teenager to be a victim would be one of theirs. The sweat was really starting to pour out of him now and he was running effortlessly. He was always surprised on days like this. He had a lot on his mind and almost forgot he was running.
His body just took control, while his mind took flight. It was like two separate people doing two completely different things at the same time. It was after the killing of the teenage girl that he seriously began to think about killing these predators. He rationalized it in his own mind. He knew he did this. But so what, it was easy to rationalize.
For every one he killed, as many as twenty to thirty people wouldn’t become victims. Down the road how many people would be spared? It was hard not to see the positive effect this could have. The clincher came when a former colleague contacted him about an offender they both knew. He’d been a student at the Center.
Shortly after transitioning, he’d been convicted of sexual assault on a minor and served time. He was now on the Sex Offender Registry. Lynn told him she had found Jason Nelson on Facebook but he was using the name, Martin Town. Ryan did a quick search and found him easily. He was friending teenage girls in local high schools. It was plain by his conversations that he was grooming them and so Ryan had contacted the authorities.
He was informed that there was no law against this. He was dumbfounded. This was a clear case of the law not keeping up with technology. A quick check found that in New York convicted sex offenders couldn’t even be on a social networking site. Ryan contacted a State Senator he knew on the Judiciary Committee and brought him up to speed.
The Senator assured him he would move quickly to draw up the necessary legislation to get this changed. He was moving through the rolling hills now. There were wooded ridges on either side of him and he could hear birds and the screech of squirrels. In the distance, he heard the sound of a gunshot. He remembered it was the small game season. It was just breaking daylight between the ridges.
The dirt road was uneven. It was strewn with rocks, boulders, ruts, and other debris. Yet he was so familiar with this course that even in the dim light his feet moved rapidly and easily over the obstacles. The leaves would be changing soon.
He came out of the hills back onto the paved road. There were meadows on both sides and a couple of whitetail deer were making a breakfast of the wet grass. He could hear the traffic on the main road up ahead. His thoughts turned to Mitchell again. It was likely someone had found his body by now.
He suspected his Benefactor would want to know if he was responsible. He would have to think about how he would respond to that. He first heard from his Benefactor after testifying before a Senate Judiciary Committee on the need for strengthening sentencing laws for sex offenders.
He testified that treatment wasn’t a cure-all and that it simply made many of them better offenders. He told the committee if someone were still committing these crimes after sixteen that in his opinion it would be difficult for them to ever change. He’d testified that the juvenile records of adult offenders should be opened in order to determine if they had committed similar acts as juveniles. If they had, a tougher sentence should be handed down.
Parts of his testimony were published in the media. This angered some people whose programs depended on public and state funding. He knew that was true of people at the Center. They would deny it but he knew it all came down to filling beds.
These were hard cold facts, numbers equaled money, money equaled funding, and funding was needed to stay open. The bottom line was to protect your job at all costs. That was more important than educating the public on the real dangers posed by their clients, as they referred to them. Shortly after that, a person he had begun to refer to as his Benefactor, contacted him.
He had parked his truck on Mill Road. It was great for running affording him a hilly nine-mile round trip course on a dirt road. It was autumn and there weren’t many horseflies. When he returned to his truck he found an envelope on the front seat. He’d locked his truck and was a little spooked as to how an envelope got there.
At first, he thought it might be his ex-wife leaving him a note about this or that. But then he realized she wouldn’t drive up here and leave something. She would have put it in his door or mailbox. He opened the door and picked up the envelope.
There was writing on it. He thought about the anthrax scare right after September eleventh. People were checking their mail, worried they could be targeted. Looking back at it he realized how ridiculous it was. But America was scared and the Bush Administration did little to alleviate the fear. If you’re in power, fear is a good thing.
He opened the envelope. No powder rushed out at him, no strange smells attacked his senses. There was just a sheet of paper inside. It was typed and read, Sorry to scare you this way. You have nothing to fear from me. Society however has much to fear from those you testified about. Increasing sentences and making people aware will not change the sick behaviors of these predators. Together you and I can. If you’re interested in what I have in mind you can contact me. I will understand if you do not wish to. If you would like to speak to me in regards to this matter leave me a message. I believe you are familiar with the stone that reads 1868 just down the road. Behind the foundation is a slab with the number three on it. Beneath that you can leave me a response.
That was it. There was nothing else. He was coming back into town running at a brisk pace. There was the sound of a horn, followed by the quick wave of a hand out a window. He responded in kind. He had no idea who it was he’d just waved to. Oddly enough this happened a lot.
Later someone would say, “Hey saw you running earlier.” Then he would know who it was. Ryan knew he was ready for the half marathon. He was peaking at the right time. Ryan fed the cats, caught a quick shower, and headed for work. He was like clockwork. That was part of who he was.
He realized he could be too intense, maybe even inflexible at times. But he’d accepted that. That was who he was. Sometimes really knowing yourself was realizing there were certain things you didn’t like about yourself but knew you had to accept and so turn them into a positive.
He caught the highway and headed west towards Barton. He would be able to see the rest area from his side of the highway and know if they had found Mitchell yet. He was pretty sure they had. It was daylight. Someone would have pulled in to use the woods to relieve themselves, go hunting, hiking, something, and would have found the body. It only took him about ten minutes to reach it.
He came over a knoll and headed down a slight rise and immediately saw flashing blue lights. They’d found Mitchell. He could see the Crime Lab vehicles. The police had blocked off the rest area and people were moving around. He could see two men standing near a Black Crown Victoria talking.
