“She’s not doing well,” the graduate student, whose name was Alex, said to Dr. Geoffrey a few days after their first group session.
They were in the doctor’s office on the top floor of Dix that had the most privacy from patients. Dr. Geoffrey frowned as he looked past Alex and into nothing, collecting his thoughts.
“Tracy didn’t sleep the night after the group session, and even on medicine, it’s been hard to make sure she got any sleep the last couple of nights.”
“Sedate her,” Dr. Geoffrey said.
The student nodded.
“I hope she’ll be better for the next group, I wanted to do it tomorrow.”
The student stood to leave the office.
“I’ll go do it now so she’ll be well rested by the morning.”
When he was alone, Dr. Geoffrey sighed and eyed the file of the patient named Vances. At the group session, Vances had mentioned the man she believed was responsible for the fire at her home and the death of her family. She had described this man to police and a sketch was included in the patient file. Her previous doctors had made notes about the sketch, noting that the man Vances described bore a striking resemblance to Vances’ father, her ex-husband, and her son.
“When confronted with this observation,” the notes of the previous doctor explained, “the patient denied any resemblance. Photos obtained of these three men show that the patient has created a villain who has looks that are a conglomerate of these three men.”
Dr. Geoffrey analyzed all of the pictures very carefully and after about an hour staring at the pictures of the men and the police sketch all tacked to a wall, the doctor was angry and a little frightened.
“You called, doctor?” Alex asked as they entered the office.
The two looked at the photos together and when they were done Dr. Geoffrey was sure.
“Her previous doctor was a white lady,” the doctor growled. “In her opinion, the man Vances described was a made up composite of three men, but they don’t look that much alike. I would expect for her son and grandfather to share more resemblance, her ex-husband isn’t the father of this son, but none of them look alike except for their skin color which isn’t even the same shade on all three. The doctor and maybe even the police disregarded this woman’s story because of racism.”
Alex was inclined to agree, but said, “she still could have made it all up.”
The doctor nodded.
“Of course. Just because she was the victim of racism doesn’t mean she’s not delusional. But she doesn’t have a history of delusion. Plus, I feel like I know this guy.” The doctor held up the sketch.
“From where?” Alex asked.
“You’re never gonna believe this, but another patient described him,” the doctor said, shuffling through the file of another patient. He handed a piece of paper from the file to Alex when he found it. “It’s a physical description of the man that Jeff says confronted him after his release from prison claiming responsibility for the death of his family. Jeff believed that his family died due to a natural disaster, the hurricane that caused all that flooding in South Carolina. He still believes that and he thought the man that he described to police, the man that said he killed them, was trying to scam him or something.”
Alex read through the description that Jeff had given to the police. As they read, Alex glanced at the sketch.
“Vances is originally from Virginia,” the doctor said, “and she’s been in North Carolina for about ten years. Never met Jeff before. They weren’t in college at the same time. But they described the same man.”
Alex had a look on their face that broadcast their fear, or discomfort.
“What does this mean?” Alex asked.
The doctor shrugged.
“Maybe we need to reconsider what we’re doing here.”
Alex left Dr. Geoffrey alone to contemplate what he would do with the bizarre information.
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