Sex. Murder. Mystery(187)

For Leslee Browning, however, Mary Kay was a woman of contradictions.

She was guarded and cold and effusive and outgoing.

“But I don't mean that in a derogatory way,” Leslee said many years later, while fabric and plastic moons and stars hung over her healing room—the back bedroom of her mother's condo at Carriage Row. “I mean it in an abused way.”

Mary was unhappy with the Catholic church, yet she made every effort to get her husband and kids there every Sunday. She told Leslee that when she became a certified teacher she'd never work for a parochial school, though she had standing offers to do so. She'd never put her kids in Catholic school, either. But after she left Carriage Row that is exactly what she did.

“I was just floored when she sent those kids to Catholic school. She had been so against it,” Leslee said.

Even when Steven was just an infant, Mary Kay had a difficult time adjusting to new people, maybe even to the role of motherhood. People who saw the pretty blond mother getting the mail would see a different person in the confines of her own kitchen. They saw the shy smile, the reserved presence of a mask.

“She did tell me at that time that she was unhappily married and would do just fine without Steve.”

As the years passed, it surprised Leslee that Mary Kay and Steve Letourneau were able to hold it together as long as they had. Unhappy marriages were a dime a dozen at Carriage Row. Natalie Bates had failed in hers, as had her daughter, Leslee. Fran Bedix, Teri Simmons's mother, was making a go of her second time around. But there was something about the Letourneaus.

The house was chaotic all the time with laundry strung from the kitchen to the living room like a Maytag ticker-tape parade, but when Mary Kay emerged from the front door she was perfect. From her shoes to her hair, Mary Kay was perfect. So were her children. Leslee Browning never saw any of Mary Kay's children dressed in anything less than catalog-perfect attire.

All the kids in the complex loved Mary Kay. The Fish twins were often joined by Brooke, Leslee's daughter, as the pretty young mother spread a craft project out on the kitchen table or led the kids on a backyard nature walk. After Steve went off to work, Mary would come outside to play. When Steve was around his wife was more rigid, more self-controlled, soft-spoken.

When she was teaching, she shared a laugh about her housekeeping with Leslee.

“You know if I had a student like Steven and could see how they would live, I'd really have to have a talk with their parents—they're being dysfunctional.”

Chaotic on the inside and perfect on the outside. That was Mary Kay.

“I think she's highly intelligent, but emotionally crippled. I think she had problems early on and she cracked.”

Leslee Browning was a healer and psychic and had a business card to prove it. It was in that capacity that she first thought she'd reach out to former neighbor Mary Kay Letourneau to see how she was doing. She didn't care what the media had reported—though it was only the second week in March, there had been plenty of reports.

Maybe Mary could benefit from having someone care for her?

The voice on the other end of the line was Mary. Not a shattered, devastated Mary, but the upbeat woman who would spend all day and night on a papier-mâché project and look like a million bucks when she finished it.

Leslee asked how she was and Mary said she was doing all right, getting along in a tough time. Mary thanked her, and when Leslee offered to come to Normandy Park to give her a “healing,” she agreed to the offer.

The house was a shambles, just as it had been at Carriage Row. Leslee offered to clean up the place, but Mary declined. When Leslee noticed a hole the size of a fist pushed through the wall, Mary sighed and said Steve had punched through the drywall.

The idea of Steve being violent was surprising. Leslee had never known him to show any kind of temper. Never. But she knew these were difficult times in the Letourneau household.

Mary settled onto her pride and joy, the new couch. She caught Leslee's eyes looking at the volumes of psychology books spread in small piles around the sofa. Mary pointed to them and said she had been doing some reading.

“I think I might fit the manic-depression diagnosis,” Mary said, “so I'm going to look for somebody to diagnose me.”

“Well, you know, Mary, I think what you need is to get through a counseling program.”

Mary stiffened slightly, surprised at the remark.

“No,” she said firmly. “I'll go to prison before I go through counseling.”

“Everyone can benefit from some counseling.”

Mary shrugged off the remark.

Leslee was convinced Mary's reluctance to get help had more to do with shame associated with events from long ago than the affair with the schoolboy.