Page 46 of Dead Man's Hollow
Dr. Marchand shakes both their hands and then pulls a chair around to sit beside them instead of positioning herself behind the desk like an authority. Chloe appreciates it instantly. No matter what news this woman is going to give her, she’ll deliver it with respect and grace.
“You experienced an episode of dissociative amnesia, formerly called psychogenic amnesia,” the doctor explains. “It’s a fairly rare condition. A person will sometimes travel long distances, engaging in tasks of daily living, such as taking public transportation, handling monetary transactions, or cooking meals. They can remember how to do these tasks, similar to how you purchased a pass to the winter festival and knew you loved roasted chestnuts, but they have no memory of their own identity.”
“What causes it?”
“It sometimes occurs in response to trauma or tremendous stress.”
“Like Emilie’s accident?” Bastian asks.
“Yes, absolutely. An event such as that could cause extreme stress in a new mother.”
Chloe doesn’t remember Emilie falling, but Bastian has told her and Dr. Marchand that Emilie tumbled from her seat and struck her head on the kitchen floor, and Chloe ran. Bastian didn’t realize at first that she’d taken off. He thought she’d gone to call a doctor or a neighbor for help. When she didn’t come back immediately, he tended first to their baby, as any parent would. Only after the doctors had assured him that Emilie was perfectly fine—she would have an egg on her forehead, and it wouldn’t be the last—did he focus on the fact that his wife was missing.
She didn’t return that evening. She didn’t answer her cell phone. Late that night, beside himself with worry, Bastian asked Madam Bouchard next door to stay with the baby while he combed the streets one by one, looking for Chloe. He imagined the worst: that she’d been hit by a car, mugged, raped, or murdered. When he didn’t find her, he called every friend he could think of, then the hospitals. Nobody had seen her.
He’d gone to the police, who advised him to give it a few days because she was an adult. He spent two days, distraught, pacing the floors of the house with Emilie. Then, desperate to do something, go somewhere, he remembered the winter festival. Craving fresh air, he bundled Emilie up in her warmest clothes and walked over to the market stalls. When the smoky, slightly sweet scent of roasted chestnuts filled his nose, he stopped to inhale the aroma of his wife’s favorite treat. That’s when he saw her queued up at the stall.
He’s told Dr. Marchand how Chloe reacted to him and says if the baby hadn’t reached for her, she might not have remembered her life with them. Privately, Chloe thinks he’s right, and it terrifies her.
“Will it happen again?” Chloe asks now.
“It could. It sometimes does,” Dr. Marchand replies. “There’s a woman in the United States, a famous case, who experienced at least two well-documented episodes.”
“At least two?” Bastian asks.
“She went missing a third time during a hurricane and hasn’t been found, so it’s unclear whether she’s out there somewhere unaware of who she is or if she was a victim of the storm.”
They process this information in silence for a moment, then Chloe asks a question that’s been haunting her since Bastian found her at the winter festival. “Could it have happened to me before?”
“You mean when you turned up in Montreal?” the doctor asks softly.
“Yes. I don’t remember anything before that.”
“It’s possible. I can’t say with any certainty because I didn’t examine you then. And the notes in your chart are, well, they’re a product of their time.”
Chloe shakes her head. “What does that mean?”
“The program’s priority was finding you a safe, caring home. Nobody was looking for a missing girl who matched your description. Reading between the lines, they seemed to think you were running from a bad family situation and chose to believe you didn’t know who you were. But, in truth, they thought you were afraid to disclose your identity, not that you’d genuinely lost it. So they didn’t do the testing I would have done. I’m sorry, I can’t be more definitive.”
Bastian seems impatient with this focus on the past. “But what can we do going forward? How can we prevent this from happening in the future? Emilie and I can’t lose Chloe.”
The break in his voice pulls Chloe away from her musings about the past, too. He’s right. What’s done is done. She has a life—a beautiful life—here and now with him and Emilie. She needs to protect it at all costs.
Dr. Marchand leans forward in her chair and extends both hands. Chloe and Bastian exchange a look before each taking one of the woman’s outstretched hands in theirs. Her skin is warm and soft.
“I can’t promise it won’t happen again,” she tells them, giving their hands a quick squeeze. “The most important thing you can do, Chloe, is to talk to your husband when you feel yourself becoming stressed—before it spirals out of control. Right now, during this postpartum period, you’re particularly vulnerable. Be mindful of that. And above all, you both must do whatever you can to ensure Chloe feels safe and secure.”
ChapterTwenty-Six
The notification bellon Maisy’s phone dings.Weekly meeting.She sets aside the presentation she’s writing for her business mastermind group and wanders into the dining room for the weekly check-in with her producer. When she and Jordana are deep in the middle of a case like they are now, the scheduled meeting is largely unnecessary because they’re working so closely on the episodes, but she keeps the time carved out to reinforce how important communication is.
“What are you doing?” She peers over Jordan’s shoulder at the array of pie charts, graphs, and numerals, percentages.
“I’m looking at the analytics from episode two. People are riveted.” Jordana grins up at her.
She smiles back. “Kristy’s a compelling storyteller. You wouldn’t think it to look at her. She’s so quiet and unassuming. But she spoke with so much emotion and feeling. And your edit highlighted all the dramatic parts. Nice work.”
“You forgot to mention the talented interviewer,” Jordana counters.
