Hi Five Page 4

  They looked at each other, death rays coming from Angus’s eyes. Isaiah didn’t react, his usual response to threats, his gaze steady and unrevealing, his face blank as unbuttered toast. Angus’s rage dissipated into what appeared to be sadness or despair. He turned away and looked out of the window. “Hugo?” he said. “Tell Sidero to drive him to Christiana’s place. She’s expecting him.”

  Seething, Isaiah went outside. Sidero was leaning against his black pickup truck, the hyena wearing a backward baseball cap and a swollen nose. It was slightly off center, wads of Kleenex stuffed in his nostrils.

  “Get in,” Sidero said.

  “You shot Beaumont,” Isaiah said, stepping closer.

  “Who’s Beaumont?”

  “Remember that drive-by? The Cambodians you shot at? You hit the man who owned the store. He’s in the hospital. He’s dying.”

  Sidero grinned and stuck his neck out so their faces were nearly touching. “The fuck do I care? Now get in the goddamn car.”

  Isaiah whipped an elbow across his nose. Sidero screamed and fell back into the truck and slid to the ground. He had his knees up and was rocking back and forth, his hands cupped around his face, blood spilling between his fingers. He tried to get up but Isaiah put his foot on his chest and pushed him down again. Sidero took his hands off his face and looked up, snarling. “I’m gonna put you in the ground, motherfucker!”

  “No, you’re not,” Isaiah said. “You’re too stupid to put me anywhere.” He walked off and heard the punk shouting.

  “A bullet in the head, nigger. Wait for it!”

  Isaiah went home, put on some music and tried to calm himself. He doubted Lok was Tyler’s killer. Ponlok called shots for the Cambodian street gang, TEC. If they wanted to kill Tyler, they wouldn’t shoot him in somebody’s shop. They’d spray him with bullets from a moving car or send a newbie to do a walk-up and blast him from three feet away. Isaiah resisted the urge to call Angus and tell him to fuck himself. He thought of Stella looking at her crippled hands, her crippled life. Go to work, Isaiah. Shut up and go to work.

  Chapter Three

  Alters

  Angus’s daughter, Christiana, lived in Newport Beach, not far from her father’s place. The drive there from Long Beach was depressing, the transition from want to bountiful, from struggle to ease, from peril to relative safety. Isaiah wondered what algorithm of race, history, economics, politics and law had led to a divide so deep and insoluble. Experts had explanations, but it was like describing the universe. Whatever your vantage point, there was so much more to wrap your head around.

  Christiana’s condo was in a posh building, marbled and mirrored, all potted palms and glittering chandeliers. A woman opened the door.

  “Hello, Isaiah. I’m Gia, Christiana’s mother.” She was in her sixties, short silver hair, genteel in her mannerisms, primly dressed in a sweater set and pearls. Isaiah was incredulous. This woman married that evil old man? “I’m assuming you spoke to Angus,” she said.

  “Yes, I have,” Isaiah said.

  “I apologize if he was—well, his usual self. We’ve been divorced for nineteen years,” she was quick to say. “All we have in common is Christiana.” She led him into the living room. Isaiah stopped and stared. “I know,” Gia said, embarrassed.

  The décor, if you could call it that, was chaotic. An Edwardian armchair, a poster of the Clash, a Turkish throw rug, a Chinese throw rug, a convincing reproduction of a Tiffany lamp, a convincing reproduction of Monet’s water lilies, an antique pine dining table, a porcelain bird clock and myriad other things that had no connection to one another. It was like a 7-Eleven and the prop room on a movie set had collided in the living room. Clothes were hung on the backs of chairs and piled on the furniture. Beer cans, fast-food debris, golf clubs, gambling chips, crumbs, a broken tennis racquet, pizza boxes, miscellaneous stains, and a bunch of other random stuff were scattered across the marble floor.

  “I’m sorry for the mess,” Gia said. She looked helpless, like a child lost in TK’s wrecking yard. “It’s hard to keep up with things,” she said.

  Why not get a housekeeper? Isaiah thought. Why not get ten? Angus could pay for them out of his penny jar. “May I get you something to drink?” she said.

  “No, thank you,” he said.

  “Please, sit anywhere.” There was irony in her voice. Isaiah found a spot on the black leather sofa, between the HOME IS LOVE pillow, a giant stuffed panda, a stack of tabloid magazines and a scuffed leather jacket.

  “Is Christiana around?” Isaiah said.

  “Yes, of course. I’ll get her.”

  She left. There had to be other people living here, Isaiah thought. scanning the room again. Rabid teenagers or schizoid decorators. Strewn on the coffee table were an empty bottle of Grey Goose, a tumbler imprinted with bright pink lipstick, assorted beer cans, a charred bong, a half-eaten container of sushi, a lacy pink thong, an open bag of peanuts and a paperback romance novel with a viking on the cover.

  Piled in a corner were shoes. Lots of them. Pumps, stilettos, oxfords, cap toes, basketball high tops, patent leather thigh-highs, ballet slippers, motorcycle boots and who knew what else. Usually Isaiah could get an idea of what someone was like based on their belongings, but this made no sense at all.

  Christiana came in. She’d inherited her mother’s looks—slim and pretty and she moved with an elegance Isaiah associated with swans. Her clothes were another matter, like she’d stolen them from a hooker. Short-short skirt, tank top that said LET’S PLAY, spiky heels with straps around the ankles. She smelled like booze and cigarettes.

  “Hello, Isaiah,” she said in a soft voice. “Thank you for coming.”

  She looked for a place to sit down, glancing wearily at her mother. Hard to believe she was responsible for this chaos. Her nails were bitten to the quick, he noticed. You’d think she’d be biting them now, though she didn’t seem nervous, more weary, more sad. She had peculiar scars, a thin line of raised skin around both wrists. Somebody had tied her up and not with rope. Christiana moved the stuffed panda off the sofa and sat down. Her mother pushed the laundry aside and took the Edwardian chair.

  “These aren’t my clothes,” Christiana said. She looked at her mother. “I think Marlene lost again. There wasn’t any money in my wallet.” She gently rubbed her hands together while she spoke. There was a spot of blue paint between her thumb and forefinger. Odd. Isaiah wondered why they weren’t her clothes or who Marlene was and why she was stealing.

  “Your father said you witnessed a murder,” Isaiah said.

  “Well, I—” Christiana hesitated, seemingly embarrassed.

  “It’s simpler if I do this part,” Gia said. “I’m sure you understand.” Isaiah didn’t, but let it go. “It happened at Christiana’s shop,” Gia continued. “She makes custom suits.” She smiled, trying to brighten the moment. “Christiana has a wonderful reputation and her reviews are always five-star. Most of her customers are regulars.” She tensed, getting to the hard part. “Last Friday night, Tyler Barnes was shot—killed—right in the showroom. Christiana and Tyler were the only ones there.” Isaiah didn’t understand why Christiana couldn’t tell him that herself.

  “Did you see the killer, Christiana?” he asked.

  Gia interjected. “No. She wasn’t aware there was a shooting.”

  “You didn’t hear the shot?”

  “No, she didn’t,” Gia said.

  “Tell me what happened,” Isaiah said. Gia started to speak but he raised a hand.

  Christiana looked down at her lap. “Tyler and I were in front of the mirrors for a final fitting.” Her brow furrowed, she pinched her lips together, straining, like she was kicking herself for not remembering. Gia was gripping her knees, restraining herself from speaking.

  Christiana sagged, exasperated, like the whole exercise was pointless.

  “I don’t know what happened after that.”

  Isaiah was puzzled. More harshly than he intended he said, “You d
on’t know? It happened in your shop while you were there.” Gia tried to say something but Isaiah raised his hand again. How could Christiana not know? he thought. Was she an alcoholic? Did she have blackouts? Transient amnesia? Christiana hunched her shoulders like she was cold. Then she bowed her head, closed her eyes and went perfectly still.

  “Christiana,” Isaiah said. “Are you all right?” She didn’t move. He waited for her to speak and realized something strange. All the shoes were the same size. Christiana lifted her head and looked at him sharply, sneering.

  “That stupid bitch doesn’t know anything,” she said. “You might as well talk to a donkey.” The change in her voice was startling—loud, abrasive and nasal like she had a cold. Her posture was different too, slouched and fuck-you indifferent. She put her hands behind her head, stretched her legs out in front of her and crossed her ankles. “You’re not going to find out anything. Not from that idiot.”

  “What idiot?” Isaiah said. “Who are you talking about?”

  “Are you an idiot too?” she said. “You act like one.”

  “I’m not sure what’s happening,” Isaiah said. He looked at Gia. She was mortified, her hand over her mouth.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I thought Angus told you.”

  “Told me what?”

  “Christiana has multiple personalities.”

  Isaiah was stunned into silence. Christiana was grinning, enjoying his confusion. She laughed like a squawking blue jay.

  “Woo-hoo!” she said. “This is fucking great! Look at him! He’s fucking lost!” She picked up the beer can. It was empty. She frowned and tossed it aside.

  Isaiah tried to stay calm and recalibrate, see if this was real. “You’re not Christiana?”

  “You gotta be joking.”

  “Then who are you?”

  “Jasper. Jasper Hicks,” she said as if Isaiah should already know.

  “Jasper is from Arizona,” Gia said. “He’s eighteen years old. He dropped out of high school and—”

  “I can talk for myself, okay?” he snapped. “Why the fuck are you still here, anyway? Why don’t you go home?”

  “Were you there that night, Jasper?” Isaiah said. Jasper was so different from Christiana, Isaiah started thinking of him as an eighteen-year-old dropout from Arizona. Jasper yawned.

  “Yeah, I was there,” he said. There was something oddly theatrical about him, like he was trying to be an asshole, like an actor who hadn’t mastered the part. Christiana had seemed quite authentic. “Too bad,” Jasper went on. “That idiot comes in to get a suit and ends up dead.”

  “I’d like you to answer a couple of questions.”

  “Why should I?” Jasper was grinning again. “Gimme one good reason.” He grabbed the bag of peanuts and began tossing them in his mouth.

  “I’ll give you a reason,” Isaiah said, tired of this bullshit. “If Christiana goes to prison, so do you.” Something got stuck between Jasper’s teeth. He hooked a finger into his mouth and tried to dig it out. “You were telling me about that night,” Isaiah said.

  “Gimme a second, will you?” Jasper said. He took his finger out of his mouth and frowned, his eyes crinkling into a wince. He looked like he was getting carsick. “I need a beer,” he said. He bowed his head, took a deep breath, and when he lifted it again, Christiana the swan was back. It was uncanny, like shape-shifting or a special effect. She pressed the back of her hand against her forehead.

  “I’m getting a migraine.” Her voice was soft and fluid again.

  “All right, dear,” Gia said gently. “Take your pills and lie down. I’ll be in in a minute.” Christiana left. Isaiah didn’t know what to think. Should he believe this? It bordered on the ridiculous, but as far as he knew the phenomenon was real.

  “She actually has multiple personalities?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Gia said. “She was six or seven years old when the first one appeared. As she got older, more came and went.”

  “How many of them are there now?”

  “Including Christiana? Five.”

  “Five,” Isaiah said flatly.

  “Christiana, Jasper, Marlene, Pearl and Bertrand,” Gia said. “It’s not an unusual number. There have been some cases where the alters are in double figures. Alter is what we call an individual personality.”

  “Jasper didn’t like Christiana,” Isaiah said. “How is that possible? They’re the same person.”

  “They are but they aren’t,” Gia explained. “To them, they’re entirely different people. Different lifestyles, memories, experiences.”

  “Is Christiana aware that Jasper doesn’t like her? I mean, do the alters communicate?”

  “Some do, some don’t,” Gia said. “Think of the condition as a house. Each alter has their own room. Some doors are open and others are closed. With Christiana and Jasper, it’s open but not very often. One alter might hate another and be friends with someone else. They might be jealous or protective or completely indifferent. One may not know another even exists.”

  “What happened to Christiana when Jasper took over?”

  “It’s as if she were unconscious,” Gia explained. “She’ll have no memory of what happened after the switch out. If Jasper or any of the others got into a traffic accident, Christiana could wake up in the hospital with no idea how she got there.” Isaiah had another question but was dreading the answer.

  “Did any one of the alters witness the whole thing?” he said. “The shooting from beginning to end?”

  “I can’t say for sure,” Gia said, “but probably no.”

  “So each alter only saw part of it?”

  “Yes,” Gia said. “If they saw anything at all.”

  Christiana lay on the bed, the migraine throbbing. She didn’t mind. The voices of others were jabbering at her, asking questions, scolding and making fun of her. Sometimes she could turn down the volume, sometimes not. Everything in her life was sometimes. She was supposed to be on top of things, in charge, but that was far from true. From her perspective she had all the responsibility but none of the control. She felt both angry and defeated. She should have tried harder to keep Jasper from switching out. If only she knew what the jerk had said. Did he give something away? She groaned, less for the migraine and more for her predicament. If Isaiah succeeded one way, they were home free. If he succeeded another way, they were doomed.

  Chapter Four

  Stopping Power

  Isaiah left Christiana’s and went home. He was stunned by what he’d seen. Anxious too because he knew so little about her condition. Isaiah wasn’t a speed reader but he was close. His facility for understanding and remembering was exceptional, even as a schoolkid. His teachers remarked on it all the time. He also had the ability to hone in and conceptualize the central ideas, foregoing the details until they were needed.

  He read articles online and downloaded several books. Multiple personality disorder has its beginnings in childhood. If a child is severely abused for a sustained period of time, the physical and psychological damage can last a lifetime. In rare cases, the abuse is so unbearable the child’s psyche fractures into different personalities. As Isaiah understood it, the fracturing was a way to break up the memories so no one personality had to endure the horror of remembering the whole experience. These personalities, or “alters” as Gia called them, can be completely different, as different as Christiana and Jasper: age, ethnicity, sexual orientation, personality, mannerisms, even eyeglass prescriptions, can vary wildly. Christiana was apparently the “host” alter who functioned day to day, the alters changing or “switching out” depending on circumstances.

  The dry, technical language didn’t describe the overwhelming awe and fear you felt watching someone transform into an entirely different person or your revulsion imagining what had happened to that helpless child. The monstrous images made Isaiah hate Angus all the more.

  Mental illness was a grim reality these days. Isaiah had dealt with its ugly guises since he be
gan his career. Lester Collins stabbed a hallucination that turned out to be his girlfriend. Missy Laws drowned her baby girl in the toilet because she thought it was trying to poison her milk. Jake Lamont jumped in front of an Amtrak train because he thought he was Iron Man.

  Multiple personalities was way beyond Isaiah’s experience. The case had only started and he was already feeling overwhelmed. Angus wanted to get this resolved before Christiana was arrested. He knew though, that if Christiana went to trial, her attorneys would likely claim not guilty by reason of insanity. At best, a long, bumpy, uphill road. For the most part jurors didn’t look favorably on the insanity defense, thinking it might be a scam, easily faked. Everyone all had relatives who were nuts but didn’t commit crimes.

  The defense was not helped by cases of actual fakers. Vincent “The Oddfather” Gigante, head of the Genovese crime family, was often seen shuffling around Greenwich Village in his pajamas and slippers, talking to parking meters, muttering incoherently and drooling on himself. He was a former boxer and a lot of people thought he’d taken a few too many straight lefts to the head. He was declared unfit for trial and it kept him out of a courtroom for a decade. But another jury didn’t buy it and Gigante was busted for racketeering. Later, he admitted it had all been a ruse.

  Sometimes the insanity defense worked. John Hinckley Jr., who’d nearly killed President Reagan, was declared legally insane. So was Andrea Yates, who’d drowned her five children in a bathtub. Steven Steinberg’s lawyers argued Steinberg had been sleepwalking or in a “dissociative state” when he stabbed his wife twenty-six times. It worked for him, but for the vast majority of cases it wasn’t a good strategy. Only one out of four people using the insanity defense was able to convince a jury.

  Isaiah had seen a couple of his cases go to trial. He had watched defense attorneys and prosecutors alike trying to explain the legal standards for the insanity defense. They were difficult to understand and even more so to apply. Was Mr. Smith’s behavior the result of a mental disease? That is, was it involuntary, something he couldn’t control, like coughing when you have a cold? How were you supposed to know if Mr. Smith’s neurochemicals had shorted out when he hit his grandma with a hatchet? Did Mr. Smith know right from wrong at the time he committed the crime? What does that mean? That before he hit Grandma with a hatchet, Mr. Smith said to himself, “I know this is wrong but I’m going to do it anyway”? Sorting through the arguments was confusing and often heated for twelve strangers, each with a different understanding of what it all meant.