An Idiot in Love (a laugh out loud comedy) (28 page)

              ‘I see.’

              It wasn’t going well so I quickly moved on. I explained that this morning I showed up naked at her house in an attempt to impress her. I hinted that I had a lot to impress with, which was also a lie, but I didn’t think they had recorded penis size on the reports.

              ‘Where did you leave your clothes?’ she asked.

              I hadn’t anticipated that one. ‘A friend’s house,’ I said unsurely. ‘He lives just up the road.’

              ‘He knew about your plan?’

              ‘He’s on holiday. Ibiza. Italy. I was watering his plants.’

              ‘Ibiza is in Spain.’

              ‘I know, but
he’s
in Italy.’

              She frowned and stared at me for a while. I didn’t flinch.

              ‘And the leg?’ she asked.

              ‘A present,’ I said, in lieu of anything else.

              She nodded, as if she knew. ‘Where did you acquire it?’

             
Where do people buy legs?
I wondered.
Debenhams? Boots?

              ‘I got it from my grandmother,’ I said hesitantly. ‘She has a prosthetic leg as well.’

             
Perfect.
I proudly told myself.

              ‘As well?’

             
Shit.

              ‘Yes,’ I nodded surely, I didn’t know how else to respond.

              ‘As well
as
?’

              I nodded again. ‘Yes.’

              She put her pen down and looked at me sternly.

              ‘Do you know somebody
else
who only has one leg?’ she enquired.

              I plastered a look of bewilderment on my face. ‘Of course not,’ I assured her. ‘What makes you think that?’

              She opened her mouth to reply, then promptly closed it. ‘Never mind,’ she said, picking up the pen again.

              I ran over what had been said and realised I sounded mad, but not
insane
. Mine were the actions of a socially clueless, lonely idiot, not of a man who needed psychiatric help. I decided to kick it up a notch.

              ‘You see, I’ve been feeling really down lately,’ I lowered my head as if in contemplation of my own intolerable suffering. ‘Things just seem, pointless, you know?’

              ‘How long have you been feeling like this?’ she enquired.

              ‘I don’t know, a few years maybe,’ I mumbled into my chest.

              ‘Have you ever thought about harming yourself?’

              ‘All the time,’ I said, perhaps a little too cheerily. ‘
All the time,
’ I repeated in a slightly deeper tone.

              ‘I see.’

              I peeked up and noted she was writing something down with a sombre and interested look on her face. I smiled and ducked back into my chest when she finished.

              ‘Do you take any medication; recreational drugs?’

              ‘No.’

              “Have you ever?

              “No.” I paused, lifted my head. ‘Yes,’ I amended. ‘I took Ecstasy once.’

              She nodded as if she understood. ‘To help you feel and connect, right?’

              ‘Yes,’ I said meekly.

              I was at a friend’s house, I had a headache and I thought it was aspirin, but I liked her answer better.

              ‘Are you a heavy drinker?’

              ‘Only when the pain gets too much to bare.’ I was on a roll.

              ‘Do you have any compulsive habits? Gambling? Sex?’

              I didn’t want to push it. ‘No.’

              ‘Do you hear any strange voices, or noises?’

              I opened my mouth to repeat the negative, but quickly decided against it. ‘Yes,’ I said confidently.

              She wrote this down, I was onto something.

              ‘What do they say?’

              ‘I--I--I--’ I stammered, hoping a spark would ignite in my mind. It didn’t. ‘I’d rather not talk about it,’ I finished.

              ‘Do they say helpful things?’

              ‘No.’

              ‘I see.’

              ‘No, wait,’ I stopped her before her flurrying pencil scribbled more rapid words. ‘That was a lie.’

              She paused, raised her eyebrows. ‘You don’t hear voices?’

              ‘Not at all.’ I shifted in my seat again, the sheet nearly fell, I clasped it and pulled it tightly. ‘I just wanted to sound more interesting.’

              She placed the pen down carefully. ‘I see.’

              ‘Yes, you say that a lot.’

              She smiled and shook the comment off. ‘Do you often find yourself lying to make you sound more interesting Mr McCall?’

              I shrugged a weak
yes
.

              ‘Maybe you think more people will pay attention to you if you lie?’

              ‘You’re right,’ I said, feigning a mask of depression.

              She seemed delighted with this. She picked the pencil back up and began to jot more words down. It took her awhile, halfway through she glanced at her watch and then hurriedly finished the rest, turning the paper, jotting something on the flip-side and then stashing it away in a sparsely occupied folder.

              She greeted me with a smile when she had finished.

              ‘Is that it?’ I wondered.

              ‘For now.’

              ‘Does that mean I have to see you again?’

              ‘I’m afraid so.’

              A little voice inside me began screaming in jubilation.

              ‘Can I go home now then?’

              She was putting the folders back in the bag, but she stopped. She looked at me sympathetically. ‘I’m afraid not.’

              ‘They’re keeping me in here?’

              ‘Not here, no,’ she lowered the bag again, caught my stare in hers, ‘I think it would be best for everyone if you came with me.’

              I loved that idea; I was already standing up, moving forward to join her. ‘Where?’ I asked happily.

              ‘The hospital. St Peter’s.’

              I sat down sharply, suddenly glum. I knew that hospital, I had heard stories, everyone had. ‘The loony bin?’

              St Peter’s psychiatric hospital was on the outskirts of town; it sat imposingly on the top of a steady incline and could be seen for a mile in every direction. It was shut off from the world and was completely self-contained.

              Necessities could be bought at a small local shop, owned and run by a family that had catered for the hospital for over fifty years. They sold everything from newspapers and magazines to sweets and bread.

              There was small onsite cafe attached to the back end of one of the wards, it was run by a small number of select patients and it catered for visitors and those patients with an equally loose rein as those cooking the food and operating the till.

              For those who didn’t like the idea of the inmates running the kitchen, there was a small, sleek, newly built restaurant just over the road, where a sane chef served expensive meals to customers who weren’t due back on the wards after they paid their cheque.

              The hospital was also staffed with its own GP and dentist, it had its own team of security guards who monitored the grounds and controlled any aggressive patients, and it had more recreational rooms and activities than the average town.

              As a child I had heard many horror stories about the complex, and had stayed well away. It was the stuff of nightmares, campfire stories and games of truth-and-dare which I had never fully committed to. As a teenager I had taken a school trip to the onsite facilities to learn more about the history and sociology of the hospital. I had retained a sense of childhood apprehension and had been somewhat disappointed to discover that not only was the hospital not run by a team of sick, sadistic doctors who tortured murderous, insane patients on a daily basis, the entire complex was actually a fresh and enjoyable place. I even mentioned that I could imagine myself living there, and, as it turned out, as an adult it became my temporary home.             

              The police were polite enough to take me home to pack a few belongings and put some clothes on. Then they took me to the psychiatric hospital and left me in the care of a friendly male nurse who, when showing me to my room, gave me a happy soliloquy about the hospital.

              I had never knowingly encountered anyone suffering from a mental illness, therefore visions of the mentally ill come from television and films. I imaged these to be false and prepared myself to ignore any preconceptions they may bring, but Donald came right out of a Hollywood script.

              He was standing in the centre of the room when I saw him; I froze in the doorway, surprised. He grinned at me with the wide-eyed stare of a stimulated drug user. Both of his hands were pressed to his face, the palm of his left firmly on his cheek, the fingers of his right in his mouth, rapidly being chewed.

              He was dressed in a blue dressing gown which trailed the floor around his feet; it was open down the centre and exposed loose fitting pyjamas. His penis was also hanging out of the fly in his pyjama bottoms. He either hadn’t noticed or didn’t care.

              ‘Donald,’ the friendly nurse spoke quietly. Donald's attention darted across to him. ‘This is your new roommate,’ He laid a hand gently on my back, gesturing me inside.

              I took a step forward and offered my new roommate a meek smile. ‘Hello Donald,’ I replicated the nurse’s soft tone, wondering if anything higher would spark a fit of aggression.

              I held out my hand, he didn’t take it.

              His eyes bore into mine, he didn't blink. ‘What’s your name?’ he asked, lifting his fingers temporarily out of his mouth; a thin line of drool trickled down his chin and soaked into the collar of his dressing gown.

              ‘Kie--’ I tried to reply, but the nurse startled me.

              ‘Donald!’ he said abruptly and sharply. ‘If I’ve told you once I’ve told you a million times: Put. Your. Penis. Away.’

              Donald looked down and grinned at the dangling member. He was well endowed, no doubt part of the reason for his cheeky smile, or his insistence on letting it hang out.

              ‘Keith. Maybe Keith. Likes it. I thought,’ He replied, his words were quick and stuttered. ‘Keith. I thought Keith would want to see. Keith may not have a big one. Keith’s may be small. Mrs Embleton says I have a big one. I should be proud.’

              ‘It doesn’t mean you should wave it around for everyone to see.’

              He reached down and grabbed it like a wild snake. ‘Keith. Want to see?’ he said, pointing it at me like a curious question mark.

              It took me a few seconds to realise he was talking about me, and a few more to reply. ‘I--I--’ I realised I was staring, wondering why he seemed so intent on twisting it like it wasn’t attached to his body and wasn’t an incredibly sensitive organ. ‘It’s lovely,’ I said, feeling like a parent praising a child's scribble; glad I didn’t have to pin it to the fridge. ‘Very nice.’

              ‘He’s seen it, now put it away.’

              He tucked it into his pants like his was stuffing a scrap of paper into his pocket. Then he beamed at me. ‘Keith. Show Keith’s penis now.’

              I didn’t show Donald my dick. Nor did I hang around so he could try to talk me into it.

              I went on a walk, taking a small tour of the hospital. After a few laps around the sterilised hallways, passing a number of dole faced patients who flashed meek smiles, and equally sour faced staff that didn’t, I decided that the place wasn’t so bad. It had everything I could possibly need and more. There were snooker tables, dartboards, a fully stocked library, a television room, a computer room, and outside, in the expansive grounds, I was informed there was everything from tennis courts and a football pitch to a trampoline.

              I was going to be well looked after by qualified nurses. I would be fed three square meals a day and I had a comfortable bed to sleep in. It would be like a holiday, and one which didn’t cost me a penny.

              I contemplated this whilst I tucked into the final meal of the day. They had served up roast beef with all the trimmings; I ate it like the starving man I was. It felt so good to finally get some food into my stomach and I instantly felt better, the remnants of the hangover and the atrocities that had followed, dissipated.

              I spent the evening talking to two young men in the television room. They seemed normal enough, certainly more so than Donald, and I got on well with them. I went to bed that night delighted that I had made two new friends on this exciting new holiday of mine.

              That night things soured slightly with Donald. He talked at me for three hours straight. He mentioned my name, or what he thought was my name, over three hundred and sixty times in the first hour, after that I stopped counting and tried to turn my brain off. That night I dreamt that a man called Keith was attacking me with a six foot penis.              

              The following day I showered in the communal area, changed into a new pair of clothes and went to my second appointment with the beautiful Doctor Peterson.             

              ‘I believe you may be suffering from a case of auto-phobia,’ Doctor Peterson said plainly. She raised her eyebrows questionably, gauging my reaction and understanding.

              ‘Fear of cars?’

              ‘Fear of
yourself.
’

              ‘Oh,’ I nodded slowly, hoping to give the images some time to sink in, ‘you mean like mirrors and stuff?’

              ‘It’s more of a personal thing,’ she explained, shifting in her seat and looking at her lap momentarily, hiding a grin with the tilt of her head. ‘A fear of loneliness, of abandonment. I think that is why you refused to let Ally go after your dates, why you went to the extremes to win her back when you thought you had lost her.’