“I’ll start the timer now. When it sounds, the session is over.”

Mel nodded.

“So, Mr. Saunders, why don’t you start by telling me why you’re here.” the therapist adjusted her posture and clicked the end of her pen. Her eyes focusing on the uneasiness of the man’s face.

He paused. Thoughts lingered for a moment before his mouth finally opened.

“My daughter, Rosie—“ he started,

“You were the last person to see her before—“ Mel felt the fullness in his throat tighten, putting a strangle on his voice box. His eyes fell to his lap and tears blurred his vision without flowing onto his cheeks. He promised himself he wouldn’t, but the wounds were still fresh.

A low-spirited exhale escaped his lungs in shaky, uneven spurts as he sat wrestling with the emotion.

“I’m going to be frank with you, Mr. Saunders—” she figured she’d cut in. “Although I’m dreadfully sorry for what happened to your daughter, she was very…unwell. To put it mildly.” She lifted the notepad from her lap and placed it squarely on the table. She uncrossed her legs and leaned forward, hoping to intercept his gaze.

He stood and distanced himself, walked to the window and peered outside. The gentle rain trickled and fell like streams down the glass. He thought of his daughter’s smile along with all the happy times they’d spent together. Not too long ago his world seemed normal. Today, he was probing for the truth. Mel felt his heartache turn to anger like the flip of a switch. He suddenly felt compelled to take this head on, enough was enough.

He turned to the therapist, blinking away the held-back tears and returned to his chair. He leaned forward with his elbows on his thighs and exhaled a deep, strong gust of hot air.

“She was fine before they switched to the stronger dosage. But you—“ he lifted his index finger in her direction. “She would only talk to you. I’m her fucking father, and she hardly recognized me!” The vein in his forehead was noticeably pulsing. He was becoming irate.

“Calm yourself, Mr. Saunders, I—“

He interjected, “MEL!” He said forcefully, then ran his fingers through his hair. “Call me Mel, for Christ’s sake.”

“Okay…good, Mel.” She felt the tension slowly subsiding. “I don’t mean to upset you, but you DID sign the forms, all of them. You knew the implications, they were gone over with you by more than one doctor.”

The painful sting of that reminder made him feel like a child being reprimanded by his mother. Although yes, it was technically true, it was still a difficult pill to swallow. As a father, you take care of your own, and the thought of failing at that made him feel sick.

She placed her hand on his knee.

“There was nothing I could’ve done to prevent her from—“ she paused. She didn’t want to sink the knife deeper. “She was sick, Mel. We tried something different and…and…it didn’t go as planned.” She winced as the end of her sentence came out, like the thud of a dropped hammer.

“Didn’t go as planned?” His face turned cherry red. “Is that how a fucking clinical psychologist would describe this whole thing?” The wheels came to a screeching halt.

“Mr. Saunders, I—“ But before she could continue her throat was constricted by a meaty hand. At first it squeezed so hard her eyeballs felt like popcorn kernels over a fire. Her nails dug into his wrist with great frustration as she tried to loosen the fleshy noose. But she was no match. She was staring into the eyes of a man who had nothing to lose, she could feel it.

He tightened his grip as he forced her back against the high-standing bookshelf along the wall.

“Your little ‘experiment’ with my daughter cost me everything. The day she died was the day I died.” Her eyes widened as he drew his face closer. “What? Are you scared of me?” He noticed the fear in her eyes for the first time. He let go and she crumbled lifelessly to the floor. Coughing and deep breathing ensued.

Mel took a couple steps back, examining the woman with a radiating glare.

“That drug, whatever-the-hell it was, made my girl do things this town will never forgive.” He began to simmer as an influx of guilt and encumbrance flooded his mind. His shoulders slouched and the strength in his body revolted, exhibiting a feeble shell of a man. He stood before her, humiliated and weak.

“She loved animals. You knew that, right?” He whimpered. The words falling from his mouth like driblets of water from a kinked hose.

“Tell me why. T-tell me why instead of petting her cat, she drowned it in the fucking bathtu—.” His voice deteriorated to a shortened whisper. He raised his palms to his reddish, teary eyes like a child trying to hide. He wiped the wetness from his cheeks and fought back his desire to cry with more acrimony.

“She put a screwdriver through the ear hole of our family dog. Did you read about that in the papers?” His temperament grew.

“She skinned, scalped and hanged the Bunderson twins down on Laurel Avenue. Was that listed as a fucking side effect?” he yelled.

As she slowly began to stand, she braced herself against the bookshelf. Her eyes scanned the floor for her glasses.

He lunged at her and forcibly grabbed her shoulders.

“Why? Tell me why she started killing everything, everyone she loved?”

As she tried to wiggle herself from his clutches, her brain couldn’t conjure up an explanation. She felt like melting into the carpet. Her mouth was moving, but the only thing that came out was, “We tri—, we tri—“

“You tried what! Speak!” But before the concussed woman could mutter another word, the man grabbed a hardback book from the shelf and rammed the spine into her jawline in a wild, heaping flurry. She dropped with a thump and lay motionless.

The monitor on the therapist’s desk showed the active recordings of cameras placed in the hallways. A stampede of doctors and campus security officers made their way down long passages, all seemingly headed in the same direction.

Thinking quick on his feet, Mel started to empty the bookshelves and gather all books and furniture in a single pile towards the center of the room.

The sounds of echoing footsteps could be heard from the hall and voices shouted for him to open the door. Mel gathered himself and reached for the travel-sized mouthwash container in his left pocket, he’d replaced its contents with that of gasoline. He popped the cap and slushed the liquid all over the readied assortment of paper and cloth-covered cushions.

The hostile group of workers pounded and kicked, buckling the doorframe. It was only a matter of time before—

Mel reached into his right pocket and pulled out a small family of red-tipped matches.

Without hesitation, he lit a single flame and went to the window and opened it. He hung one leg over and straddled the windowsill. He looked down, noticing his F150 in the lot below.

He flicked the match.

The spark was caught by Dr. Jeanie Gladstone’s 12 Steps to Fighting Cancer (go figure), and the center of the room went up like a backyard bonfire.

Just then, the door’s hinges were shot off by a barrage of bullets. The tall, wooden door was forced off by a series of loud, thudding kicks and it fell like timber, almost into the fire.

Stepping through, the leading officer met eyes with Mel through the flames that separated them. The officer began his journey towards the window when a loud timer bellowed repeatedly in his ears, snapping his head in its direction.

Turning back to the window, only a split second later, Mel Saunders was gone.