Chapter 2 - The Shockwave Hits BuckheadAt 2:45 p.m., the first tremor arrived.
I was standing in the therapy gym, guiding an eight-year-old boy with cerebral palsy through a series of balance-beam steps, supporting his hips with my hands while his mother watched from a bench, her eyes shining with quiet hope.
My phone, sitting on the equipment cart five feet away, lit up.
Briana.
The phone buzzed against the metal tray, vibrated for thirty seconds, went dark, and then immediately lit up again.
Briana (2).
I didn't break my stride. "Keep your eyes on the blue cone, Leo," I murmured gently to the boy. "Heel first, then roll to your toes. You've got this. Perfect."
When the session concluded at three o'clock, I walked Leo and his mother to the reception desk, wrote two notes in his chart, and returned to my office.
My phone had six missed calls from Briana, three from my mother, and two text messages that read like escalating distress flares from a sinking vessel.
Briana [2:47 PM]: CLARA PICK UP THE DAMN PHONE SOMEONE JUST STOLE MY CAR.
Briana [2:51 PM]: IM NOT JOKING SOME FLATBED JUST HOOKED UP MY HONDA AND DROVE OUT OF THE COMPLEX. THE LEASING OFFICE SAYS THEY HAD A LEGAL REPO RECOVERY ORDER. CALL YOUR INSURANCE RIGHT NOW!
Briana [2:58 PM]: WHY AREN’T YOU ANSWERING ME?! TRAVIS IS COMING OVER IN AN HOUR TO PACK FOR THE LAKE AND MY CAR IS GONE!
Patricia [3:02 PM]: Clara, your sister is hysterical. Call her immediately. What on earth is happening with her automobile?
I sat down at my desk, uncapped my favorite fountain pen, and signed two clinical insurance reimbursement forms. Then, I picked up the phone and dialed my sister’s number.
She answered before the first ring completed.
"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?!" Briana’s voice was an ear-splitting shriek that distorted the tiny speaker of my iPhone. "I have been calling you for fifteen minutes! A tow truck literally came into the Lindbergh parking lot, dragged my CR-V onto a flatbed, and drove off! When I ran out to the leasing office, the manager handed me a cardboard box with my gym shoes and my sunglasses and said the vehicle was repossessed by the legal owner! What kind of administrative screw-up did your idiot accountant make with the loan payments?!"
"There was no administrative screw-up, Briana," I said. My voice was low, slow, and measured, dropping into the register I used when explaining a complex neurological diagnosis to anxious parents.
The shrieking on the other end hitched, caught in her throat. "What... what do you mean? Did the bank mess up?"
"The vehicle was never financed through a bank," I said. "I bought that car with a cashier's check drawn from my corporate reserve account. The title is in my name. The registration is in my name. The insurance policy is mine."
"Okay... so call them and tell them they took the wrong car!"
"They took the exact car they were instructed to take," I said. "I hired Vanguard Asset Recovery to retrieve my property. The Honda is currently sitting in the secure lot behind my clinic on Northside Drive. The keys are in my safe."
A dead, suffocating silence fell over the line. I could hear Briana’s ragged breathing, followed by the faint rustle of clothing as she likely sank onto her white boucle sofa—the sofa she had purchased with a credit card that I had paid off for her last Christmas.
"You... you took my car?" she whispered, the words coming out cracked and thin. "Why would you do that? How am I supposed to get to the grocery store? Travis and Madison are coming here at four! We’re supposed to pack the trunk and drive up to the lake house tonight!"
"You're not going to the lake house tonight, Briana," I said pleasantly.
"What are you talking about?! We have the reservation! Mom said you booked the Grand Pine Lodge through Sunday!"
"I did book it," I replied, leaning back in my chair, looking out through the vertical blinds at the golden November sunlight filtering through the oak trees. "And at ten thirty this morning, exactly twelve minutes after Mom informed me that my seven-year-old autistic daughter was too much of a nuisance to be permitted in your presence, I canceled it."
A sharp, violent intake of air echoed through the receiver. "You... you canceled the lodge?"
"Eighty-percent refund returned directly to my corporate card," I confirmed. "The lodge is back on the market. In fact, knowing how busy Lake Rabun gets over Thanksgiving weekend, someone has probably already snapped it up. If you want to spend the holiday in the mountains, you should check Airbnb. I believe there are a few two-bedroom fishing cabins left near Clayton. Though you might have to take an Uber, considering you don't have a vehicle."
"CLARA, YOU PSYCHOPATH!" Briana’s voice broke into an animalistic roar. "ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND?! TRAVIS’S DAUGHTER HAS BEEN TALKING ABOUT THIS TRIP FOR THREE WEEKS! I TOLD TRAVIS MY FAMILY HAD AN ESTATE ON THE WATER! I PROMISED HIM A PRIVATE DOCK, A FIREPLACE, A CHEF'S KITCHEN! HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO ME OVER A MISUNDERSTANDING?!"
"It wasn't a misunderstanding," I said, my tone turning to pure obsidian. "Mom called me from your speakerphone, Briana. I heard the television running in the background. I heard you whisper 'tell her' right before she said Ivy wasn't welcome. You didn't want an autistic child around because you were terrified she might flap her hands when she gets excited, or hum when the noise gets too loud, and embarrass you in front of a man whose approval you are desperate to purchase."
"She’s weird, Clara!" Briana screamed, completely abandoning any attempt at remorse or diplomacy. "She acts weird in public, and Travis is an executive! He expects elegance! He expects normalcy! Why should my entire future be ruined just because your kid can't handle sitting at a dinner table like a normal human being?!"
I felt a cold thrill of absolute liberation wash over my ribs. There it was. The raw, unvarnished truth, stripped of my mother’s polite euphemisms about "serenity" and "adult environments."
"Thank you, Briana," I said softly.
"For what?!"
"For reminding me that you are not worth a single penny of my labor," I replied. "Enjoy your Thanksgiving."
I tapped the red end-call button.
Before I could even lay the phone on the desk, the screen flashed with an incoming call from Robert Hensley—my father.
I didn't answer. I let it roll to voicemail.
Ten seconds later, the transcription popped up on my screen:
“Clara, pick up this phone right now. What have you done to your mother? She just got a notification from the leasing office that our December rent check hasn't been queued up, and our gas bill bounced! Have you lost your senses?! Call me this instant!”
I picked up my pen, wrote a final clinical note in Leo’s file, closed the manila folder, and placed it neatly into the outgoing rack.
Then, I powered down my laptop, slipped it into my leather tote, grabbed my coat, and walked out to the parking lot.
May you like
The air was brisk, smelling of woodsmoke and dried leaves. Across the gravel alleyway, parked safely inside the eight-foot chain-link security enclosure of my clinic, sat the dark gray Honda CR-V.
I looked at it for two seconds, felt absolutely nothing, climbed into my own dependable Volvo XC90, and drove toward Ivy’s school to pick her up.
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