In the Deep by Loreth Anne White

Author:Loreth Anne White [White, Loreth Anne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781542019699
Publisher: Montlake
Published: 2020-10-26T16:00:00+00:00

THE MURDER TRIAL

Pretrial forensic evaluation session.

We’re back on the subject of my mother’s death. It’s my second appointment with the forensic psychologist in his Sydney office. I walked out on the last one when I felt he was trying to trick me. After sleeping on it I decided to return and follow through with the next appointment.

I need this trial to go the right way. My way. And after all, mental trickery goes both ways, right?

“You were nine, Ellie,” he says. “You were in the house alone with your mother. At what point did you realize she was in trouble that day?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Let’s try and go back, shall we? What do you remember doing right before you realized your mom was in trouble?”

“I . . . I think I was drawing in my room.”

“You’ve always liked drawing?”

I nodded.

“Do you recall what you were drawing?”

An image flares through my mind. Vines strangling a little girl who was walking through a forest searching for her dad, who was a big strong woodcutter with magical powers.

“No.”

He studies me. I hold his gaze.

“Did you mother call out to you?”

“I . . . No. I just heard a thump and something break. I went to see what happened. I found her lying on the floor in her bedroom.”

“Where exactly on the floor?”

“Between the bed and the wall. Near the nightstand.”

“What did you do?”

“I tried to wake her. I shook her. There was foam coming out of her mouth. Nothing would wake her.”

“Was it the first time you’d found her like this, Ellie?”

I feel heat in my head. “No. I’d found her like that twice before already.”

“What did you do those times?”

“I phoned my dad.”

“And this time—did you call him?”

“I . . . I can’t remember. I just remember him arriving. Later. After the ambulances and a fire truck. Lots of people with big boots in the house and lots of equipment.”

Slowly he says, “So did you call the emergency responders—dial triple zero?”

“It’s 911 in Canada.”

“Did you call 911, then?”

I swallow. My face goes hotter. I can’t remember. I really can’t. “I think so. Yes. How else would they have gotten there?”

He writes something in his notebook and nods. He opens a folder and reads some kind of report. I wonder if the lawyers somehow got hold of the old coroner’s report. It would all be in there, what happened and when with my mother. The only reason he’s asking me must be to see how I react.

He looks up. “How did your father treat you afterward—when you learned she’d died?”

I rub my knee. I feel nine again. I feel so small, and sad, and scared. I feel tears coalesce in my eyes. I feel all these things, but the memory of the events is not clear. Just the feelings.

“Did he make you feel safe, Ellie? Did he make you feel loved?”

“No,” I say quietly, and I think of the little girl in my drawing, looking for her woodcutter father in the forest. Her father,

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