Shame

story. The kind of twist your readers are going to eat up.”
    “I think you should go home to your family, Caleb.” Again, she offered him an out.
    “Are you telling me you’d walk away now? You, the Queen of True Crime?”
    “You’re distraught.”
    “That doesn’t make what I’m saying any less true. All this time I’ve been telling you that I was nothing like my father. Well, that’s not true. The biggest sin of all wasn’t my calling up the Sheriff’s Office and posing as my father. No, that’s not even close. My sin was that I enjoyed the whole thing. I got a thrill out of knowing I was responsible for his death. Even as a boy, I sensed how addictive that power could be. I knew how I could get pleasure from taking another life. So when it comes right down to it, I’m not much different from my father.”
    He expected her to react with horror, but instead she reached for his hands.
    “Oh, Caleb,” she said. “You look like your father, but you’re nothing like him. Just because you wanted to see your father dead doesn’t make you some depraved criminal. What child at some time doesn’t feel that way? You’re not an evil person, Caleb. You were glad when your father was removed from your life, but that became your secret shame. You took some pleasure in his death, and that became your shame as well, because you learned that your father cared about you. But that doesn’t make you a killer, Caleb. It only makes you human.”
    “You don’t know some of my thoughts....”
    “And you don’t know some of mine.”
    “I’ve wondered how it would be to kill.”
    “So have I.”
    “But I’m sure not like...” He stopped, confused. “When I listened to your recording, there were times I was attracted to the violence.”
    “It might have seemed seductive to you, Caleb, but I know the reality wouldn’t have been.”
    “But there have been times in my life when I’ve been so angry, and so afraid of what I might do.”
    “People get angry, Caleb. Everybody does. But you’re not Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.”
    “I’m still afraid of what I might be.”
    “Helen Keller said, ‘Life is a daring adventure, or it’s nothing.’ I think your life, your adventure, is about to begin.”
    “Whether I’m ready or not.” Then he surprised himself with a good memory and a little smile. “Lola said that the murderer really outed me. She was right.”
    “How does it feel now?”
    “I don’t know. In some way my secrets were my life. They dictated how I acted. I guess I’m still getting used to my freedom.”
    “You were a prisoner for too long, and you started thinking like one. You forgot that the bars were holding you in, not holding you up.”
    Caleb nodded. He still wasn’t sure whether he believed her. Maybe he would always feel tainted, one of Harry Harlow’s monkeys. Or maybe, just maybe, having experienced the bad in life he could now appreciate the good.
    Their coffee was cold, and the sun was setting, but neither made a move to leave. Caleb sat with a calm he could not remember ever having felt before. He felt so light.
    Elizabeth didn’t share his relief. She was fiddling with her spoon and napkin. She wanted to get up and leave but was afraid Caleb would take it personally. But staying, she knew, was dangerous. She knew about playing with fire and getting burned. This whole Shame thing was risky for her. She felt off balance, but most of all, she felt ashamed. She knew she had tried to dissuade Caleb from telling his story, had given him all sorts of chances to keep his secrets buried, but she hadn’t done it for him. She hadbeen afraid to hear what he had to say, afraid of what it might do to her. Honesty brings out its own madness.
    “There’s evidence that Farrell was writing a book,” she said. She tried to sound casual, but her voice was much higher pitched than usual. “His title for it was
Cain’s Children
. It was going to be about the children of serial murderers. His private detective—Coleman—had done anonymous background checks on some children of serial murderers.
    “It’s an interesting premise for a book. Maybe it’s a topic I might write about someday. But some books are better in concept than they are in print. I once tried to write a book called
The Club
. It was about smart women who made dumb decisions because they fell in love. These were women who involved themselves in terrible schemes that violated their own ethics and morals. In some cases