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Kill Me by Stephen White
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(Mass Market Paperback - Reprint)
- Publisher: Penguin Group (USA)
- Pub. Date: March 2007
- ISBN-13: 9780451220714
- Sales Rank: 26,373
- 512pp
- Series: Dr. Alan Gregory Series, #14
- Edition Description: Reprint
Synopsis
Throw out everything you think you know about twists, turns, and surprises.
Get ready for the next big thing.
Get ready to meet the Death Angels.
We've all been there. A loved one or a dear friend becomes desperately ill or is tragically injured. Someone - maybe even you - says, "If that ever happens to me, I wish someone would just . . . kill me."
What if you could choose when to die?
But once you decide, you can't change your mind.
Ever.
No matter what.
Welcome to the next step in the evolution of suspense fiction, to an in-your-face/what-would-you-do? topical thriller. Kill Me is a brilliantly conceived roller-coaster ride that zeros in on some of the most contentious issues of our time, the human yearning for connection between the choices we make about our lives and deaths.
Kill Me brings Alan Gregory face-to-face with the most challenging case of his career. As always, White's characters are indelible and the dialogue is dead-on, but Kill Me is fresh and thought provoking in a way that's so uncommon in crime fiction. Kill Me delivers on all the promise of White's earlier work and then raises the bar in an unforgettably inventive tale of life and death. This is the book that you won't be able to put down, but more to the point, this is the book that won't go away. Listeners will be asking each other: "What would you do?" "If you could sign up — really - would you?"
Publishers Weekly
Bestseller White (Missing Persons) takes an endlessly debatable question-at what point would a decline in your quality of life cause you to want to end your life?-and leverages it into a clever, absorbing thriller. The anonymous narrator is in his prime, a happily married father of a young girl given to high-risk sports. An assortment of grim fates and a near-escape of his own make him consider the question. A shadowy group called Death Angel Inc. contracts to guarantee that if the life of the "insured" should reach a certain agreed-upon level, they will terminate that life. Fascinated and impressed by the Death Angels' knowledge and reach, he eventually negotiates terms with them. This Faustian bargain doesn't take long to reveal its dark side, and White pays almost equal attention to the philosophical and the physical as his hero has to both approach the conditions that would trigger his contract's death clause yet remain healthy enough to fight back. Some finely scripted action scenes build to a telegraphed ending that weakens the book only slightly. (Mar.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
More Reviews and RecommendationsBiography
Writers often use elements of their own personalities to craft their most-enduring characters, and Stephen White has certain done so in creating fellow-clinical psychologist Dr. Alan Gregory. However, White’s electrifying series of crime thrillers aren’t likely to be mistaken for autobiographies anytime soon.
More About the AuthorCustomer Reviews
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never put it downby Anonymous
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June 04, 2008: really great story - kept me up all night
thought provoking thrillerby harstan
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January 01, 2006: He is a patient of clinical psychologist Dr. Alan Gregory, happily married with a young daughter when he had a near death experience while skiing. He is fortunate to survive as his reflexes kept him alive, but as he explains to his shrink, he ponders an exit strategy struggling to decide the bankruptcy point in which death is superior to life. He signs a contract with the mysterious Death Angel Inc. in which he pays them in consideration for them to kill him when his lifestyle reaches the agreed-upon point of no return. --- When his health deteriorates, he soon learns about the hidden clauses in his contract starting with an incident caused by Death Angel agents that occurs while he drives with a passenger on I-70 in Colorado. His reflexes save their lives, but other drivers are hurt perhaps dead as nothing prohibits collateral damage. --- This thought provoking thriller will leave readers wondering at what point is life not worth living just like the nameless patient did and eventually acted upon to his regret. The fast-paced action story line never slows down yet propels the audience, even the err on the side of life crowd, to consider an exit strategy. Interestingly in what is probably his best work to date, Stephen White?s hero, Dr. Gregory serves as a support player to the anonymous star of the deep KILL ME. --- Harriet Klausner
Fact File
Name:
Stephen White
Current Home:
Colorado
Date of Birth:
1951
Place of Birth:
Long Island, New York
Education:
B.A., UC Berkeley, 1972; M.A., University of Colorado, Boulder, 1975; Ph.D., 1979
Biography
Anyone who has ever tried his or her hand at writing has surely heard the sage advice "write what you know." Stephen White has most-assuredly taken that bit of wisdom to heart in creating his thrilling series of Alan Gregory novels. A clinical psychologist, White has crafted a character with a similar background that has also benefited from his fifteen years of professional practice.
White has been keeping fans of psychological thrillers on the edges of their seats ever since he published his first novel Privileged Information in 1991. The book introduced his literary alter ego Dr. Alan Gregory and made ample use of everything he'd gleaned while working as a practicing psychologist. "There are two benefits of my previous experience as a psychologist that I consider invaluable to my life as a writer," White revealed in an interview on his web site (www.authorstephenwhite.com). "The first is that my work gave me a chance to observe and study the infinite varieties of motivation that human beings have for their behavior. The other is that being a psychotherapist exposed me to dialogue in its purest form. For eight to ten hours a day over a period of fifteen years I had the privilege of sitting and listening to a wide variety of people just talk. I can't imagine a better training ground for writing dialogue."
As for how similar he truly is to his most-famous creation beyond their shared profession, White says, "The similarities don't exactly end there but there's no need to exaggerate them, either. Although neither of us is a model of mental health, his neuroses are different than mine. And he has advantages that I never had as a psychotherapist. First, he has the benefit of all my years of experience. And second, I get to think about his lines as long as I'd like. Real patients never offer that luxury." The resulting debut novel won rave reviews from the likes of The New York Daily News, Publisher's Weekly, and The Library Journal and established White as a writer to watch.
White followed Privileged Information with over a dozen additional installments of the Alan Gregory adventures. The latest may very well be the most exciting and psychologically provocative episode yet. In Kill Me, a happily-married extreme sports enthusiast and patient of Gregory's makes a deal with a clandestine organization called Death Angels Inc. that may very well bring his life to an untimely end. As always, Dr. Alan Gregory is present, but he plays more of a background role than he does in most of White's other novels. Still, fans of White's previous work will surely be captivated by the novel that Booklist has deemed "Bizarre, thrilling, and oh so much fun" and fellow bestselling writer Michael Connelly (Blood Work, The Closers) asserts is "his best yet."
In any event, White has no immediate plans of abandoning Gregory to write a non-series novel. "My series is commercially successful, thanks to all of you," he says. "As important for me as the commercial success is, the fact [is] that the series is also creatively flexible.... [I] anticipate staying with the series as long as the readers are interested..." If that's the case, then readers can expect the Dr. Alan Gregory to have a long and psychologically healthy life.
Good to Know
Contrary to the rumor mill, the Stephen White who created Alan Gregory is not the same Stephen White who has written a series of books about...ahem ... Barney the Purple Dinosaur. However, White admits that he has occasionally signed the other Stephen White's Barney books when asked to.
For those who are wondering what ever happened to the seemingly long-lost book Saints and Sinners, which was excerpted in Private Practices, you may have already read it without even realizing. Shortly before publication, the title Saints and Sinners was changed to Higher Authority. Some interesting outtakes from our interview with White:
"Jonathan Kellerman and I were colleagues in the early 1980's before either of us were novelists. At a time when our nascent field was very small, we were both psychologists specializing in the psychological aspects of childhood cancer. Jon was at Los Angeles Childrens Hospital. I was at The Children's Hospital in Denver."
"My brother is a better writer than I am."
"One of my first jobs was as a tour guide at Universal Studios. I lasted five weeks. That's two weeks longer than I lasted as a creative writing major during my freshman year at the University of California."
"I worked at Chez Panisse in Berkeley in 1971-72, running the upstairs café, waiting tables, and occasionally doing some cooking. Two of my bosses were Alice Waters and Jeremiah Tower. They both cook better than I write. Jeremiah actually writes better than I cook."
"I learned to fly an airplane before I learned to drive a car".
"I'm a lucky man. I've spent much of my adult life in two terrific, rewarding careers. In the first, as a clinical psychologist, I spent eight to twelve hours a day in a room with one other person. In the second, as a writer, I spend a similar number of hours a day in a room with no other person, though sometimes I'm blessed with the company of a dog or two."
"A primary difference between the two experiences? As a psychotherapist, only one other person -- my patient -- typically observed my work. Virtually no one ever critiqued it. As a novelist, literally millions of people observe my work, and most feel no compunction whatsoever about critiquing it. Being a writer is a lovely thing. But adapting to the reality of being read has been a constant source of wonder for me."
Feature Interview
In the winter of 2006, Stephen White took some time out to tell us about some of his favorite books, authors, and interests. What was the book that most influenced your life or your career as a writer?
With rare exceptions, I'm not someone who looks back at life and sees transformational moments -- life for me has always been more about process than event. But I recall two separate epiphanies I felt while reading books.
The first occurred when I was a child, probably six or seven years old, when my father insisted that I had to read Jules Verne's Mysterious Island before he would permit me to watch something I desperately wanted to see on our family's new television. I still recall the wonder at Verne's ability to transport me to his reality.
The second reading epiphany took place much later in my life, as an adult, while I was reading John Fowles's The French Lieutenant's Woman. Prior to reading that book, I think I perceived novels as having an underlying form or architecture that was not malleable. But watching Fowles play with the novel form in a book that was -- and remains -- so alluring in story and character made a tremendous impact on me. I'm sure that some of the freedom that I feel to juggle structure, form, and time in the series I write has been inspired by Fowles.
What are your ten favorite books, and what makes them special to you?
How about ten quasi-contemporary novels that I admire for various reasons? If I were to go back prior to the mid-twentieth century or into non-fiction, it would be a whole different list.
In no particular order:
What did I leave off the list? In crime fiction alone, there's Gorky Park, The Magus, Presumed Innocent, Booked to Die, The Alienist, Free Reign, Word of Honor, Snow Falling on Cedars, The Horse Latitudes, The Devil's Teardrop, Mystic River, and many more. Oddly, although I've ignored non-fiction on the list, the book that I read over the past year that has stuck with me more than any other is Brian Greene's Elegant Universe. What an effort.
What are some of your favorite films, and what makes them unforgettable to you?
The second part of the question is much easier than the first. For a movie to be anything beyond entertainment (not that there's anything wrong with that) the writing must sing. For me, it's the "necessary" part of "necessary but not sufficient." The rest? What I love about film, as opposed to novels, is the collaborative nature of the creative process. When all the collaborators -- writers, director, actors, set directors, costumers, etc., etc. -- manage to make time stop for the ninety minutes that their work is on screen, the movie becomes enduring. Examples? Although I'm not much for "favorites," Chinatown, The Conversation, and the first two Godfather films come quickly to mind.
What types of music do you like? Is there any particular kind you like to listen to when you're writing?
I can't, or at least don't, listen to music while I'm writing. I find that it interferes with my concentration. The disruption I feel is more intense for vocal music than for instrumental music. I was, briefly, a music history major as an undergraduate at Berkeley, and I've gone through long love affairs with classical, jazz, and rock 'n roll. Lately, to my great surprise, I've even begun to identify some hip-hop I get along with just fine.
If you had a book club, what would it be reading?
The question has an inherent premise problem -- the thing is, I wouldn't have a book club. Why? Saying it sounds petulant but -- at the simplest level -- I've never liked to be told what to read. I think maybe it goes back to that Mysterious Island incident.
What are your favorite kinds of books to give -- and get -- as gifts?
This one is more about philosophy than about books. The perfect gift -- to receive or to give -- is something that the recipient would truly want but wouldn't think to get for himself or herself. To give a book as a gift I would need to know someone well enough to know not only what he or she would like, but also to be able to identify a literary direction or at least a new author that the reader might not have previously considered.
The nice thing about books is that the right choice is always out there. One of the immutable truths that keeps the publishing industry alive is that every reader is eager to discover a new favorite writer.
Do you have any special writing rituals? For example, what do you have on your desk when you're writing?
When I was writing my doctoral thesis, my dissertation chairman, Dr. Bernard Bloom, gave me some advice I've never forgotten. He said that the most important thing a writer does each day is put his butt in the chair.
The single most crucial ritual I have each day is simple: I sit down to write whether I feel like it or not. What is on my desk is irrelevant. Quiet is good. Interruptions are not ideal. But the key, for me, is not to permitting distractions to become excuses. When I intend to write, I write.
And, oh yes, I read Strunk and White's Elements of Style at least once a year. Sometimes twice.
What are you working on now?
I'm currently working on my fifteenth novel. Much more so than Kill Me it is a traditional series book. The series protagonist, Alan Gregory -- who plays a supportive role in Kill Me -- finds that his past, something that I've intentionally avoided in the earlier books, is catching up with him with destructive force.
Many writers are hardly "overnight success" stories. How long did it take for you to get where you are today? Any rejection-slip horror stories or inspirational anecdotes?
I consider myself to be an incredibly fortunate working writer. Early in my career an agent told me that in publishing, "you can make a million, but you can't make a living." One of the things I am most proud of is that I've managed to prove her wrong; I've written fifteen books, and I've been making a living as a novelist now for a dozen years. How cool is that?
In the beginning, a completed manuscript in hand, I spent a year of concerted effort in an attempt to interest an agent in representing that first book. I accumulated a cascade of rejections -- some kind, some rude -- but ultimately failed to find an agent willing to take me on. Instead, through the kindness of some friends of my oldest brother (thank you, Patty and Jeff) I ended up selling Privileged Information un-agented to Viking in 1990. Prior to that, the last un-agented novel purchased by Viking was Ordinary People in 1979. To the best of my knowledge, they haven't bought one since.
Did I say I consider myself lucky? I do.
If you could choose one new writer to be "discovered," who would it be?
I left Baine Kerr's, Wrongful Death, off the above list of favorite books because I looked ahead and saw this question coming. When I have doubts about how to make difficult concepts and distasteful topics interesting in contemporary fiction, I go back to this exquisite story by an attorney from Boulder. It is accomplished in so many ways. It has certainly not found the audience it deserves.
What tips or advice do you have for writers still looking to be discovered?
During the fifteen years I was a practicing psychologist. I grew wary of giving advice. Why? As a clinician, I was often in a position to offer a patient direction on how to cross some emotional mine field. Over the years I learned that if it turned out my counsel was faulty I wasn't the one of us who got blown up, psychologically speaking. With that caveat in place, here's my advice to aspiring writers: Don't look to be discovered. Do something to get read. Then do it again. And again.
What does that mean? Every day, put your butt in the chair and write the best stuff you can write. Nothing is more important. Once the writing is done each day, do something that will help you put your work into a reader's hands. You are not going to get two readers until you get one.
Very few writers ever get "discovered." Fewer still will get anointed. Very few. For the rest of us, success boils down to some difficult to decipher amalgam of craft and determination.
And a little luck. Luck is good.
From Barnes & Noble
The Barnes & Noble Review
The newest installment in Stephen White's Dr. Alan Gregory series asks the question: If you could choose when to die, would you? After a wealthy entrepreneur -- who has a brother with Lou Gehrig's disease and a friend in a permanently vegetative state after a diving accident -- decides to enlist the services of a shadowy company (a.k.a. the Death Angels) to covertly end his life if his physical and/or mental capacities deteriorate below a certain level, he realizes too late that every second of existence, regardless of its perceived quality, is invaluable.
Colorado psychiatrist Alan Gregory faces his most challenging case ever when "an anonymous rich white guy" schedules sessions with him. The man has become deeply unsettled by an accident that has turned a close friend into a brain-dead husk; determining that he never wants to live like that, he pays the Death Angels a million dollars to give him peace of mind -- then promptly forgets about his policy, until a brain aneurysm threatens his life and he is informed that "the client-derived parameters have been exceeded."
Kill Me is much more than a stay-up-all-night psychological thriller. The novel's deeply introspective themes revolve around profoundly serious topics like death and dying, coping with unforeseen tragedies, grief and healing, etc. But considering the amount of dark plotlines running through the book, Kill Me has a surprisingly uplifting message: While one foot may be in the grave, the other definitely is not. Fans of authors like Stephen King and Dean Koontz will absolutely love this unique and unsettling novel. Kill me if I'm wrong. Paul Goat Allen
From the Publisher
Throw out everything you think you know about twists, turns, and surprises.
Get ready for the next big thing.
Get ready to meet the Death Angels.
We've all been there. A loved one or a dear friend becomes desperately ill or is tragically injured. Someone - maybe even you - says, "If that ever happens to me, I wish someone would just . . . kill me."
What if you could choose when to die?
But once you decide, you can't change your mind.
Ever.
No matter what.
Welcome to the next step in the evolution of suspense fiction, to an in-your-face/what-would-you-do? topical thriller. Kill Me is a brilliantly conceived roller-coaster ride that zeros in on some of the most contentious issues of our time, the human yearning for connection between the choices we make about our lives and deaths.
Kill Me brings Alan Gregory face-to-face with the most challenging case of his career. As always, White's characters are indelible and the dialogue is dead-on, but Kill Me is fresh and thought provoking in a way that's so uncommon in crime fiction. Kill Me delivers on all the promise of White's earlier work and then raises the bar in an unforgettably inventive tale of life and death. This is the book that you won't be able to put down, but more to the point, this is the book that won't go away. Listeners will be asking each other: "What would you do?" "If you could sign up — really - would you?"
Publishers Weekly
Bestseller White (Missing Persons) takes an endlessly debatable question-at what point would a decline in your quality of life cause you to want to end your life?-and leverages it into a clever, absorbing thriller. The anonymous narrator is in his prime, a happily married father of a young girl given to high-risk sports. An assortment of grim fates and a near-escape of his own make him consider the question. A shadowy group called Death Angel Inc. contracts to guarantee that if the life of the "insured" should reach a certain agreed-upon level, they will terminate that life. Fascinated and impressed by the Death Angels' knowledge and reach, he eventually negotiates terms with them. This Faustian bargain doesn't take long to reveal its dark side, and White pays almost equal attention to the philosophical and the physical as his hero has to both approach the conditions that would trigger his contract's death clause yet remain healthy enough to fight back. Some finely scripted action scenes build to a telegraphed ending that weakens the book only slightly. (Mar.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal
White narrates a special introduction that provides the origin of this search into the meaning of life and into quality-of-life issues that could make one's death preferable to continued existence. The listener learns a lot about psychologist Alan Gregory's patient, a live-life-to-the-fullest multimillionaire who enters into a contract with the "Death Angels," a secret death insurance company, to end his life should his health decline below a client-defined threshold. We learn his likes, his loves, everything in his life but his full name. As a brain aneurysm threatens to precipitate action by the Death Angels, he finds a strong reason to live, even a life diminished by threat of imminent stroke and possible loss of brain function. If this seems to describe a book that requires a lot of thought, be assured that there's tons of action, suspense, and intrigue along the way. Well read by Dick Hill, this well-engineered audio is a superior candidate for adult mystery collections; very highly recommended.-Cliff Glaviano, Bowling Green State Univ. Libs., OH Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
Crime-prone Boulder psychologist Dr. Alan Gregory doesn't have to do anything but listen to one of his most troubled patients: a man sentenced to death by killers he hired himself. After getting rescued from a skiing mishap that could have been much worse and hearing the news that a friend has been turned into a vegetable by a scuba accident, the anonymous narrator, a wealthy med-tech developer, realizes he's never worried what will happen if illness or accident leave him incapacitated, unable to communicate his wish to die if he can't Live-with-a-capital-L, or make sure that wish is honored. A sympathetic friend puts him in touch with a shadowy group he dubs the Death Angels who offer a unique service. For a cool million, they'll ask you enough questions to construct an individualized profile of your likely future wishes, then monitor your health, keep an eye out for accidents and step in without further notice if you cross the quality-of-life line you've drawn yourself. The big advantage to this arrangement, of course, is that you get to make decisions about the end of your life while you're still in the pink of health. The big disadvantage is that once you've made the final payment, your contract with the Death Angels is irrevocable-even if you soon develop an aneurysm that produces symptoms so serious you know the Death Angels are watching, even if in the meantime you've developed an emotional bond to a son you never knew you had that's so vital it's absolutely essential you stay alive at least long enough to find the missing boy and bid him farewell. White, no stranger to suspenseful but wildly implausible plots (Missing Persons, 2005, etc.), wisely front-loads this thriller with aflatly incredible premise that pays off down the road despite a cargo of further improbabilities.
Loading...Product Details
- ISBN:
0451220714
- ISBN-13: 9780451220714
- Format: Mass Market Paperback, 512pp
- Publisher: Penguin Group (USA)
- Pub. Date: March 2007
- Edition Description: Reprint
- Sales Rank: 26,373
- Series: Dr. Alan Gregory Series, #14
Table of Contents
Read a Sample Chapter
Kill Me
By Stephen White
Dutton Adult
ISBN: 0-525-94930-5Chapter One
Where to start with this guy? This shrink?Honesty?
Eventually, maybe. Soon, hopefully.
Not the first day, though. Certainly not the first hour.
Not with a stranger. The stakes were way too high.
The first day? The first day-it was a fine autumn day-he'd have to settle for the truth.
Not the whole truth, not nothing-but-the-truth. But the truth.
We'd both have to settle for that.
"You ever get massages?" I asked him.
Yes, that's how I started the first session with him. Un-frigging-believable.
What the hell? I thought. Where on earth did that come from?
"You ever get massages?" Did I really ask him that? I certainly hadn't planned to start out that way, but that's exactly what came dribbling out of my mouth, even before I'd sat down in the chair across from Dr. Alan Gregory.
His eyes narrowed a little in response to my question. Maybe he raised his right shoulder enough that I could have considered it a shrug. Maybe not. I took the combined movements to mean "sure," but they could just as easily have meant "what difference does it make?" Most likely the gestures constituted a vague editorial about the peculiar manner that I'd chosen to begin the first psychotherapy session of my life.
"I find that they help," I said. "Massages. I've been getting a couple a week." As an afterthought, I tagged the word "lately" onto the end of the sentence.
Help with what? He could have asked me, maybe should have asked me. But he didn't. He sat silently, waiting for something. Was he demonstrating patience, or indifference? Time would tell. Time, though, was something I didn't have in abundance. At that moment I was feeling neither patience nor indifference. Were our roles reversed, I know I would have asked the "help-you-with-what" question.
No doubt about it. I would have asked. Yep.
If he had asked I would have told him I meant help with the fact that I was dying, though I wouldn't have told him yet exactly how complicated my dying was turning out to be.
Truth, yes.
Honesty, not quite yet.
"The massage therapist I see? Her name is Cinda. She's good. Very good. Little-known fact: Some massage therapists do the bulk of their work one-handed. They do; it's not like with a baseball pitcher, or a cook, though. A painter, whatever. The dominant hand changes depending on what she's working on, where she's standing. Sometimes it's left, sometimes it's right. But what makes Cinda so good at what she does-truly special-is what she does with the other hand, the one that's not doing the heavy lifting."
I felt suddenly exhausted. The lassitude came on in an instant and floored me, like I'd been idiotic enough to turn my back to the ocean and had ended up getting flattened by a twelve-foot curl of breaking indolence. If this guy in front of me had been an analytic shrink with a cracked-leather Sigmund chaise and was sitting in front of me dripping old Viennese attitude, I might have stretched out and rolled over onto my side to be contrary. But he was a pedestrian Colorado Ph.D. in a pedestrian old Victorian in downtown Boulder and it was apparent that he'd organized the furniture in his office so that our time together was going to be face-to-face.
I asked, "Do you mind if I put my feet up?"
What was he going to do? Be a jerk, say no? He opened his hands in a be-my-guest gesture. What is this guy, I wondered, a mime? I lifted my heavy legs and rested my beat-up sneakers on the scratched wood of a table that said old, not antique. The change in posture eased my fatigue a little. Every little bit helped.
The dramatic increase in fatigue I was feeling was a new thing. The doctors couldn't explain it. I was still adjusting to it.
Other than his brief introduction in the tiny waiting room-"Hello, I'm Alan Gregory. Please come in"-he finally spoke his first words to me. He said, "The other hand?"
I'll give him credit for something: He made the short phrase sound somewhat consequential. And he let me know he'd been paying attention.
"I actually think of it as her 'off hand,' not her other hand," I said. "The working hand is the reason we're there, of course. It's the business hand, and she knows her business. Cinda's intuitive-she finds tightness I don't even know I have. She kneads it. Traces it. Stretches it. Finds the origin of a muscle like she's an explorer looking for the headwater of a river. Then nine times out of ten, she gets the tension to release. What I'm saying is she does the job that needs doing, but she does it mostly with one strong hand at a time. Sometimes the off hand helps-does some of the same work-but most of the time ... no, not. It's one working hand, and one off hand."
How did he reply to that little speech? His eyes invited me to go on. That was all. It was a subtle thing, but to me the invitation was as clear as if a calligrapher had penned it on good linen paper, sealed it with wax, and had it handed to me by a liveried messenger.
Thea could do that, too-talk to me in complete sentences using only her eyes.
He and I would talk about Thea later.
Why, I wondered, was I babbling on with this guy about my massage therapist's hands? I still didn't have an answer to that one, but I went with the momentum, mostly because fighting it and doing something else would have required stamina I didn't have.
"Despite how good her working hand does its job, her off hand is the reason I go back to her." He sent me another invitation with his eyes. Or he repeated the same invitation. I wasn't totally sure which.
The rhythm of the therapy dance was becoming clear: I would appear to lead. He would appear to follow. The reality would, of course, probably turn out to be something altogether different. I reminded myself that I'd decided to be honest with him. Otherwise, what was the point?
I said, "Sometimes she'll just rest it a few inches from where she's working with her business hand. If she's doing my lower back, she might rest her off hand on my hip. If she's working my shoulder, she might rest it on my neck. No real pressure. That's not true, maybe some pressure. A light stroke, a gentle squeeze. But no real work. The other hand is doing the work. Most of the time her off hand doesn't join in-it's not there for that. It's there for ..."
Could he think I'm talking about sex? "I'm not talking about sex. In case you're wondering. When I talk about sex, I'll talk about sex. That's not one of my things-discomfort with sex. This is about something else entirely." I glanced at his left hand. He wore a ring. "You married?"
He grazed the ring with the soft pad of his thumb. Involuntary? Maybe. He didn't answer me. Or maybe he did. If he did, I missed it.
"I am," I said. "Sometimes-maybe most of the time-when my wife does things for me they're part of the deal, the marriage deal. She does x, I do y. She makes dinner; I make money. But sometimes she does something for me and I know it's meant to be a gift, something special. Something that's not part of the deal. That's what Cinda's off hand does during the massage; it's the one that says that whatever's going on at that moment isn't just a job, isn't only part of the deal, that she cares a little, that I'm not just another blob of flesh on her table, that it's not all about my muscles yielding to her fingers. That we're not only trading my money for her time."
I inhaled and exhaled before he replied. He said, "That's important to you?"
His words stopped me. Isn't that a universal truth? Wouldn't it be important to anybody? "Of course," I said.
Of course.
"Her off hand provides ... tenderness?" he said. "Is that a good word for what you're describing?" I crossed one ankle over the other, and the change in posture offered some temporary relief. "I think about it more as a caress, but 'tenderness' is a good word for it. Yes."
"And it's the reason you go back to her?"
"Cinda's good at what she does, but plenty of people are good at what they do. Yeah, I guess the truth is that the reason I keep going back to her is because of how she manages her off hand. For the kindness, the tenderness. It's important. Essential even." I tacked on, "For me."
The shrink was silent for most of a minute. At first I thought he was waiting for me to start up again, but I saw something in his face that told me that maybe he was working on something. So I waited, too. Finally, he seemed to find whatever he'd been seeking. He said, "And ... you're wondering whether you'll get it here? The tenderness? Whether I'm going to turn out to be all business, or whether I have an off hand, too?"
Actually, that wasn't what I'd been thinking at all.
What I'd been wondering was what it was about this bland little room, and about this unfamiliar, relatively bland man, that had somehow got me babbling about Cinda and the seductiveness of her off hand.
"Maybe," I said.
He let me digest my response. When he thought I'd had enough time, he added a coda. "You told me your massage therapist's name, but not your wife's."
It wasn't a question.
Not at all.
Chapter Two
I hadn't told him much on the phone when I set up the appointment.My last name, as common as dirt, revealed nothing. I'd introduced myself using the nickname my oldest friends had hung on me decades before. I'd told Alan Gregory, Ph.D., that I'd gotten the referral to him from a business associate, which was only a bit of a stretch, that I had some things going on in my life that I was eager to discuss-that part was absolutely the truth-and that on the first day I wanted to see him twice, with some time in between. One session-or appointment, or whatever the hell he called it-in the morning, one more mid-afternoon on the same day. That would be ideal.
He initially balked at my request for dual appointments, but relented when I explained that my schedule was in a "difficult phase." We worked out the times we would meet. Ten in the morning. Then again at two-thirty the same afternoon.
I didn't tell him I'd be flying into the nearby Jefferson County Airport solely for the purpose of seeing him, nor did I tell him that I'd be flying back out the same day as soon as we were done. I didn't moan that it would have been much more convenient to use the Boulder Airport, but that my plane needed just a little bit more runway than the Boulder field had to offer.
Nor did I tell him the two appointments could be considered an audition. In my mind, when you meet somebody new it's always an audition. You don't always know which one of you is auditioning, or for what. But every introduction is an audition.
If this shrink had earned even half his doctorate, I figured he already knew that.
I left his office after the first session that morning without revealing that I'd made a decision that I thought I could work with him. I was worried that if I'd told him he'd passed the test, he would have asked me what the test was.
I didn't know the answer. I only knew he'd passed.
Or he'd have asked why I needed a test.
I didn't know the answer to that, either.
Therapy was already turning out to be more complicated than I'd anticipated.
In between my two appointments with Dr. Gregory, I took a taxi across Boulder to the local Toyota dealership, asked the cabbie to wait a few minutes, and managed-as I knew I would-to get accosted by a salesman before I made it all the way to the front door.
All fake friendliness, the salesman-I pegged him as an ex-frat boy who liked beer more than he liked just about anything else-thrust out his hand and said, "I'm Chuck Richter, and you are ..."
Not in the fucking mood.
His handshake was too firm by half, too robust by a factor of three.
I considered retracing my steps to the waiting cab, sighed, and steeled myself with a promise that this experience would soon be over.
"Chuck?" I said with my most ingratiating smile plastered across my face-the smile I used to use when, before I had more money than I needed, I would be trying to finagle or seduce a first-class upgrade from a clerk at the check-in counter at the airport. Chuck and I made good eye contact, and he reflexively matched my smile with a grin that registered like a fingernail on a chalkboard in my soul.
"Yeah?" he said.
"I need to be out of here in fifteen minutes, thirty tops. When I leave, I want to drive away in a new Prius, any new Prius. 2006? 2007? Doesn't matter. Color? I don't care. Equipment? Whatever you got. Demo? Fine. Here's what I'd like to happen next, right now even. You go to your sales manager and get me a number. If I like the number, I pay cash for the car and I'm on my way in my new Prius in time to make my lunch appointment.
"If you're not back here with a number for me in five minutes, or if the number you bring back makes me think you and your sales manager are trying to take a lot of advantage of me, rather than just a little advantage of me, I'm going to get back into that taxi over there and go to the Honda dealership on Arapahoe and make some salesman just like you the exact same offer on one of their hybrids. You have a single chance to do this deal. No negotiating. Are we clear? You and I? A hundred percent clear?"
Chuck nodded in little narrow jerks. His eyes were wide at the challenge, as though I was a stranger in a bar who'd walked up to him and offered to buy him and his buddies beers and shooters all night long if he'd simply munch down a fresh habanero.
I thought he was wondering if he could pull it off. But maybe, just maybe, I'd misread him and he had more balls than I was giving him credit for and he was wondering how to play things to his advantage with his sales manager.
"Chuck?"
He nodded again-those same quick little jerks of his wide chin-his eyes still big as nickels. "I'm not screwing with you. One chance to get this right."
"Yes, sir."
"Don't screw with me."
"I wouldn't do that."
"Yes, you would. But dovn't."
It took the various players thirty-five minutes to get the paperwork together and finally to give up trying to sell me all the extra crap-extended warranty? You've got to be kidding-that car dealers hawk to pad their profits. While I waited for this form and that form to be prepared, I strolled out and sent the taxi on its way."
When I returned, Chuck actually asked me if I had anything I wanted to trade.
I told him I had plenty of cars, but nothing I wanted to sell. I was just making conversation to keep him at bay.
"You a collector? Old cars?" he asked. It was either a lucky guess, or Chuck had the inborn Doppler radar of a born salesman.
"No. I have an old Porsche, but I still drive it. An eighty-eight 911."
"Wow. What color? Red?"
"Yeah, red." Two good guesses for Chuck.
"The coup, not the Cabriolet, right?" he said.
I nodded. Chuck was three for three. Note to self: Don't play poker with Chuck. "I bought it in 1993."
"Shit," Chuck said. "This Prius ain't no Carrera."
"More honest words have never been spoken by a car salesman," I replied.
To get away from Chuck I strolled over to the parts department and picked out a car cover for my new 2006 Prius-the 2007 models hadn't arrived yet. When I got back to Chuck's desk, he was ready for my money. He led me down the hall and I sat obediently in the designated mark's chair in the finance manager's prison cell of an office while I called my banker on my mobile phone and authorized a wire.
In order to pry the keys out of the clutch of Chuck's fist, I actually had to convince him that I didn't want his personal, extra-special new-car orientation any more than I wanted a colonoscopy without anesthesia.
A few minutes later I drove away in the new hybrid and found my way back across downtown Boulder to a flat that was on the second floor of a lovely old house on Pine Street just east of the Hotel Boulderado. I parked the Prius in back, and let myself inside with a key I'd begged from the friend who kept the apartment as a pied-à-terre for the rare occasions he was in Colorado. He owned a company in Boulder with which I'd done a lot of business over the years, and I could tell-when I had asked him if I could use his apartment occasionally-that he thought I had something going on the side. I let him believe it. As long as he didn't gossip about it, his suspicions were fine with me.
I collapsed onto the bed in the flat's only bedroom and fell asleep wondering if I'd live long enough to figure out what the fun graphic display meant on the little screen in the middle of my new car's dash.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Kill Me by Stephen White Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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