Flamethrower Read Free

Psychiatrist had finally used profanity in front of her.
    “Is it real?” Ruby asked even though she knew the answer.
    “It’s my husband’s leg,” the Psychiatrist said, casually indicating a birthmark on the side of the calf.
    Ruby started wishing she were home, in bed, with the covers pulled over her head. Instead, she was standing there, watching her psychiatrist vomit. Dr. Jody Ray had evidently eaten Chinese food for lunch.

2.    FIREBALL
    J ody went into the bathroom to clean herself up, leaving Ruby to stare at the leg and the small pool of vomit near it. Ruby’s body felt very heavy. She wanted to close her eyes and slump down to the floor. Instead, she started looking around the room, scanning for clues. Which is when she saw a piece of paper on the edge of the fish-tank table. Something was handwritten on the piece of paper: “No police. Just wait.”
    Again, Ruby felt like the whole thing was a bad joke. Who in his right mind would leave a note like that in the middle of a shared waiting room? What if someone else found it? The leg was real though. Presumably the note was too.
    So the leg has been kidnapped
, Ruby thought. No. That’s wrong. The rest of the husband has been kidnapped. The leg is right here.
    Ruby felt dizzy. She started riffling through the front pocket of her jeans, looking for a Fireball, which was the only thing other than a cigarette that would help her cope. Ruby kept Fireballs in her pockets for emergencies. This counted.
    Ruby popped the bright red candy out of its wrapper and put it in her mouth. It had an odd, perfumy taste.
    Ruby looked from leg to note to fish. She hoped the fishhadn’t been poisoned by leg viscera. She had a stab of self-doubt. This was a crisis, and she was thinking about her Fireball problem and the fish.
But people think strange things in a crisis
, she told herself. Self-involved things. It was only natural. Ruby had been standing on the Brooklyn Bridge when the World Trade Center towers had crumbled. Her first thought had been
I can’t believe I’m actually getting to watch this happen firsthand
. Her first thought had been for her own horrible thrill. At least she admitted it. And anyway, the second thought had been for her friend Patty, who worked in one of the towers. Patty, though a little roughed up, survived.
    Dr. Jody Ray emerged from the bathroom. Her face was skim-milk blue, and she looked twenty pounds thinner.
    “I’m very sorry, Ruby,” Jody said without looking Ruby in the eyes. “I’m sorry you’ve had to see this. But please go now.”
    “There’s a note.” Ruby motioned toward the note, which Jody immediately picked up.
    “You probably shouldn’t have touched that. Or the leg,” Ruby said. Before becoming a workaholic horse-trainer, Ruby’s boyfriend had been with the FBI. But it didn’t take having an ex-Fed for a boyfriend to know you weren’t supposed to touch evidence.
    Jody Ray kept staring at the note, completely ignoring Ruby.
    “Why don’t you let me call the police?” Ruby said.
    “No.”
    “Then I’ll stay here while you call them.”
    “The police will not be called,” The Psychiatrist said.
    Ruby thought this was stupid.
    “That’s just stupid, Jody.” She had never talked to her psychiatrist like this. She had cursed up a storm, ranted, and raved, but she’d never accused The Psychiatrist of being stupid for the simple reason that she wasn’t. Until now. This was stupid. Ruby sucked her Fireball.
    “Are you
eating
something?” The Psychiatrist asked, finally looking at Ruby.
    “Fireball,” Ruby shrugged. She’d talked about her Fireball problem in therapy. Had mentioned that even while putting in fifty miles on her bicycle, she sometimes sucked on a Fireball. She had tangentially speculated aloud as to whether Lance Armstrong, the Secretariat of bike riders, had ever had a Fireball. She preferred speculating about Lance Armstrong’s possible familiarity with Fireballs to confiding what