TRIAL SUBJECT FOUR, SINCLAIR HARTFORD, SEVENTEEN, lives on the Upper East Side of New York City with his ob-gyn father and work-from-home mother. He’s a senior at one of Manhattan’s most prestigious private high schools, and his therapist is one even I’ve heard of: she’s always on CNN giving her opinion on mental-health-related news stories.
Sinclair’s summary is brief: chronic insomnia that affects his schoolwork and extracurricular activities (tennis, boating, lacrosse). There is a list of pharmaceuticals that he has tried, but all have had negative side effects. There is even one account of him taking Ambien, and then commandeering a waiting taxi and driving across town without knowing what he was doing.
He has been in therapy since a young age, but all files from the last five years are sealed by a court order. There’s a police file, but only the barest of details are listed: underage gambling, bookmaking, blank checks, and other things that don’t seem very exceptional for a superrich kid. The footnote, “Additional files accessible by warrant only through the NYPD,” mystifies me.
What could this privileged white boy have gotten mixed up in that would call for sealed records? Could whatever it is be a clue to the source of his insomnia? He doesn’t have narcolepsy or PTSD or depression like the other subjects I’ve read about. There isn’t a good explanation of what is stopping him from sleeping. Maybe the missing court file contains more information on his mental health.
I look up from the file and Google his parents. Hundreds of pages about charity work, museum sponsorships, and club memberships pop up. There are photos of Sinclair and his parents posing in formal clothes, arms draped casually around politicians and celebrities, champagne glasses raised.
I take a look at the subject four window on my screen, and there he is, looking similar enough to the rich kid in the photos to recognize. But in a hospital gown, and with sensors attached all over his body, he could be the poster boy for Money doesn’t buy happiness.
Zhu and Osterman burst into the lab. “What the hell happened?” Zhu cries.
With a pained expression, Vesper responds. “Subject three went into cardiac arrest, no warning.”
“Did any of the others show signs of cardiac stress?” Zhu asks.
Vesper shakes his head.
Osterman combs his fingers through his nonexistent hair. “For fuck’s sake, this is all we need right now. And a minor as well.”
“She was nineteen,” Vesper mumbles.
“Well, thank fuck for that!” the director roars.
Zhu steps down into the testing area and walks over to BethAnn. As she checks the sensors, she detaches them one by one, peeling off the electrodes and pulling out the IVs until the girl is just a body lying on a bed in a white hospital gown. She looks more pitifully fragile than before.
Zhu tests everything manually, feeling the girl’s pulse on her throat and her wrist and pressing her ear to her chest to listen to her nonexistent heartbeat. “Okay,” she says finally, turning to Vesper. “You can call the morgue. And have the bereavement team notify her parents.”
Vesper makes the two calls. In the meantime, Osterman has stepped down into the testing area and is walking around gazing at the subjects. “I know that what you’re doing here is very important,” he states to Zhu, “but I still don’t understand why we had to include minors in this test study.” He leans in to get a better look at Beta subject one . . . Catalina.
“Because this test only works on subjects whose brains have not completed myelination,” Zhu says, holding BethAnn’s limp hand like she never wants to let go. “That’s why we only used trial subjects under the age of twenty.”
Osterman shakes his head like he doesn’t want the words to sink in. “High risk. Bad publicity,” he murmurs.
All of a sudden he looks up at me, and stares back and forth at Zhu and Vesper. “What is this . . . person . . . still doing here?”
Zhu looks at me like she has totally forgotten I was here, but Vesper says, “Jaime, premed student at Yale, doing a required internship, was the only witness besides myself to the death of subject three. Jaime is taking detailed notes of everything that happens, which could be quite beneficial if any legal situation were to arise.”
Osterman’s expression changes from one of scorn to looking like he wants to adopt me. “Jaime . . .” he says, in a buttery tone.
“Salvator,” I fill in.
“Jaime Salvator . . . of course. I remember you. You came recommended by one of our most prestigious donors, Ms. Walton-Masters.”
I plaster on my smarmiest smile, and that seems to please him. Unsurprisingly, since smarm feeds on smarm.
“If I remember correctly, your mother works for her,” Osterman comments, stepping up to the workstation platform.
“Yes, sir,” I respond.
“Ms. Walton-Masters told me your story. You won a full-ride scholarship coming from one of Detroit’s worst neighborhoods.” I can tell from his look that he’s wondering if I got it thanks to affirmative action or merit. I feel my smile slipping.
“Jaime is also at the top of this year’s premed track at Yale,” Zhu adds supportively.
“Well, Jaime,” Osterman says, standing before me, hands clenched behind his back, “you just let me or my secretary, Jonathan, know if you need any additional information or materials for your research. We have nothing to hide. Everything is open to a promising young rising star like yourself.”
“Thank you, sir,” I say, giving a weird little seated bow, though I didn’t even know my body could do that.
He turns and strides out of the room.
Vesper and Zhu look at each other.
“Who have you talked to?” Vesper asks softly.
“Only three of the parents and legal guardians who had decided to stay . . . the parents of the youngest one, the mother of the narcoleptic, and the aunt of the African boy. We’re still trying to contact the others,” she says. Hanging her head, she wipes away tears.
“It’ll be okay,” Vesper reassures her. “This is just a temporary setback.” But as his glance sweeps the room and meets my gaze, I see that his eyes are as empty as his words.