looked up at her through red, swollen eyes. “Don’t come near me,” he said, tapping the gun barrel against his scalp. “I’ll blow my brains out right here.”
Liza stopped, putting her hands up, showing submission. “Please don’t do that, Simon,” she said. “I just want to talk to you. I want to find out what made you so upset.” She took a step closer.
Simon let out a mucous-laden laugh, devoid of humor, using the hand not holding the gun to wipe his sleeve across his face. He made eye contact with her, and she could see that if he was medicated, it was not heavily. She hoped she could get through to him, and she didn’t have time to ask if his medication had been tweaked or changed while she was out. But if he was lucid enough to get that close to a security guard and remove his weapon, he might be lucid enough to reason with. Something had triggered this episode, and she was determined to find out what. But at the moment, she didn’t have time for diagnostics. Here, in this moment, she only had her instincts to work with.
“What made me so upset?” Simon repeated. He tilted his head, watching her where she stood. “At least you know my name,” he said. He wiped his nose again, the gun jostling with his movement. Liza held her breath for a moment. “I appreciate that.” He removed the gun, looking behind her to where the other staff stood and waving it at them.
There was a general intake of fearful breath behind her and her stomach clenched again.
“None of them do,” he said. “None of them know my name.” He placed the gun back to his temple and looked at Liza again. “It’s because I’m nobody. I’m nobody at all.”
“That isn’t true, Simon.” She took a step closer, and then another. “Your name is Simon Thomas Mullner. You’re nineteen years old, and you were born here in Cincinnati, Ohio.” His gaze narrowed. She took another step, and then another until she was only a few feet from him. “May I sit down next to you, Simon?”
Simon glanced behind her again and shook his head, the movement of the gun making Liza want to cringe. Breathe. Breathe. From this close, she could see his hand shaking. If he got more agitated, squeezed that trigger, even accidentally, she was never going to be able to forgive herself. Liza took a deep breath, suppressing her own trembling as well as she could, trying to appear in control for him. “You grew up with your mother after your father died in an auto accident.”
Simon let out a small sound that was somewhere between a laugh and a sob, swiping at his dripping nose again. Liza took another step toward him, going down on her knees. She heard Chad say her name again behind her and ignored him. Simon was talking to her, responding to her, and she was not going to leave him now.
“They don’t think you should be getting near me,” Simon said. “They’re right. You shouldn’t.”
Liza shook her head. “I don’t think they’re right,” she said. “I think they’re wrong. I don’t think you’re going to hurt me, Simon, and I don’t think you’re going to hurt yourself.”
His face screwed up for a moment and several new tears dripped down his cheeks. “You don’t know what I’m going to do. Sometimes even I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
She nodded. “I know what you mean. I do. It feels like other people have this idea of the world that doesn’t line up with your own. It makes you feel like an outsider. Almost like . . . almost like you’re an alien from another planet and you don’t belong.”
Simon sniffled, regarding her for a moment. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s it. Who told you that? Did you read it in a book?” His eyes darted behind her. When she glanced back, she saw that Chad had taken a few steps forward. Simon waved the gun at him and as he did so, his arm flew in front of Liza too. Her skin prickled. “Stay back I said!” he yelled.
Damn it, she’d just started to get somewhere with him. She looked over her shoulder. “Go on, Dr. Headley. Leave us alone to talk please.”
Chad’s gaze whipped to Liza and then back to Simon. “No way.”
“The guards are here,” she said, moving her eyes to the guards standing down the hall. “They’ll help us