Diseased (2 page)

After getting a shovel, I walked back to the duck pond where the massacre had occurred. I gently lifted Mrs. Duck and placed her on my shovel. I carried her over to the edge of the forest where Mr. Duck lay. I dug a deep hole that both could fit into together, along with their crushed babies. As I was filling in the grave with dirt and leaves, I didn’t think about the person responsible for committing this heinous act on these beautiful creatures. I had been blindsided by sorrow. Then, as I recalled the morning events, I began to realize whom it was that had done this. In my mind, there was only one person vicious enough to do such a thing. I returned the shovel to the storage building and went back inside to celebrate my birthday the only way that I knew how.

Everything was much the same when I reentered the living room of the ward. Clarence and Daryl were still watching TV, both in their drug-induced stupors, with their drool and slobber and saturated pajama bottoms. Walking back to my room, I couldn’t help but think about the family of ducks that I had buried. I couldn’t help but think about the little ducklings that never had a chance to fly, or swim or live. As Manuel would say, this was indeed an abomination.

I sat on the edge of my bed thinking about my dead feathered friends when Tommy stood at my open door, knocking. I invited him in with a casual head motion.

He walked in quietly, with a disposition of a child who knows he’s about to receive a harsh scolding. His crime against the Duck family shamefully filled him with guilt. I could see it plainly on his face.

“Hiya, Carter,” he said sullenly without making eye contact.

“Come in and sit down,” I said, noticing his hesitation at entering my room.

He walked to the card table and sat in his usual chair and I remained on the edge of my bed. “Is there something I can help you with?” I asked, trying to mask my rage.

He sat staring down at his lap, with palms flat on the table.

“I wanted to come by and tell you something.” I said nothing. I waited for more. Finally, he looked up and said, “I’m sorry,” and then went back to staring at his lap.

Hearing his apology, I waited longer in silence, waiting for an all-out sorrowful confession to the murder of my friends, an all-out testimony to the crime he had committed. I wanted him to say what a horrible, despicable person he was. I wanted him to confess to it all.

I waited longer and the silence prompted him to look up again. When he did, there wasn’t an ounce of understanding or remorse upon his murderous face.

Then I said, “Just what is it that you’re sorry for?”

He shot me another confused look and I stood from my bed. His lack of sympathy for the ducks made my skin crawl and gave me that uncomfortable, jittery feeling like when I’d had my bad episodes of anxiety attacks many years ago—that being a major reason why I’d come to Ryker’s in the first place.

This was my first attack in ages, and I felt it coming on with massive intensity.

“What are you sorry for, Tommy? Just say it, damn it!”

“I’m sorry for calling you a d-bag,” he finally said.

“What else?” I demanded. I had to hear him say aloud that he was the one who’d killed the Duck family.

“That’s it, Carter,” he said. “I’m sorry for calling you that name and cussing you out. I’m truly sorry.”

“You killed them,” I said plainly and evenly.

“Carter, you’ve lost your peanuts. I haven’t killed anyone.” He hesitated. “Are you feeling okay? Should I get the nurse?”

“You killed them. You killed my friends!”

Enraged, I sprang like a lioness going for her kill.

“Good god, Carter. You’ve lost it!” He tried to escape, but I darted around the card table and blocked his only viable means to a speedy exit.

“I know you killed them,” I said again.

I gave him little time to react. I wrapped my hands around his neck and applied a grip that caused his face to redden and his forehead to erupt with protruding bluish-green veins. His mouth spat and sputtered trying to heave a breath of air. He grabbed my arms in an attempt to break my grip. We struggled around the room, beating against the walls, my bookshelves, and then finally tumbling over the card table, upsetting it and the chairs on either side.

My attempt at vengeance was stopped when Dozer, a large orderly wearing one of the white uniforms, busted into my room to separate us. With little effort, he brought me to my feet with one of his tree trunk arms.

“Ms. Montgomery ain’t gonna like this,” said Dozer with his cross-eyed look and simpleton grin. “You two are in big trouble.”

“He’s a murderer,” I said through gasping breaths.

“I didn’t kill anyone,” said Tommy. “He’s nuttier than a fruit cake!”

I tried lunging at him once more, but there was no getting around Dozer and his super human power.

“You’re lying,” I said.

“Who’s lying?” asked a voice behind me. “What’s going on here?”

In walked Ruth Ann Montgomery, the head nurse and manager of our ward.

“Tommy and Carter were having themselves a little go-around, Ms. Montgomery,” said Dozer.

“That crazy a-hole tried to kill me,” said Tommy.

“You killed the ducks. I know it was you,” I said.

“What ducks?” said Tommy. “Ms. Montgomery, I haven’t killed anyone.”

“He killed them,” I said. “Killed them dead. I buried them out on the edge of the forest and—”

“That’s enough, Carter,” said Ruth Ann. She picked up one of the folding chairs and with her shoe scooted a few of the cards into a pile. “Dozer, get Pat in here to clean this mess. Tommy, go to your room and cool off. Carter, come with me.”

I was taken to the holding room where I would wait until evaluated. Many years had passed since I’d last visited the holding room with its padded, white walls and encompassing terror. I had told myself that I would never go back to that hell again. But here I was, deep within the belly of the beast, a place that no one at Ryker’s wanted to go.

Sitting in a corner, I was unsure of the passing time. Dozer must have stuck me with a sedative. I was groggy and my anxiety was simmering. As my nerves calmed, I heard the sliding of the door’s lock move from left to right. I remembered that particular sound well.

Walking in was Ruth Ann, with her ever-present casual, confident swagger. Unlike the others who worked at Ryker’s, donning the white uniforms, she wore a flowery shirt with a black skirt, which didn’t permit the slimming and sleek illusion as the color is generally known to do. Instead, when she walked, her enormous hips rocked side-to-side with each step.

Dozer followed closely behind with a chair and placed it not far from me. Ruth Ann sat, resting comfortably, on the verge of instructing me as to what she intended to do next. I knew the routine. I’d been here before.

I watched Dozer walk back over to the door to stand, as if he were watching over the tomb of the Unknown Soldier. He knew his role. Ruth Ann saw to that.

“So, Carter,” she said. “Tell me more about your outburst with Tommy.”

I brought my attention from Dozer to Ruth Ann, except, I didn’t make eye contact right away. I stared at her swelled ankles and followed up her calves, which were protruding with varicose veins, past her exploding muffin top, and finally looked into her serious eyes.

“I couldn’t help it,” I said. “Mr. and Mrs. Duck…they’re gone.”

“Yes, I heard,” she said. “But that doesn’t give you the right to attack Mr. Jenkins, does it?”

She was using one of her trick questions, and I knew exactly what she wanted me to say. I held my position on the matter. I had to…for Mr. and Mrs. Duck and their unborn babies.

“He’s a murderer,” I said. “He deserved it.”

Ruth Ann crossed her fat legs and said, “Maybe it was an accident. Maybe Mr. Jenkins didn’t mean to harm the ducks.”

“He assassinated them based on revenge,” I said. “Tommy was angered because I had laughed him out of my room this morning. That’s all this amounts to—plain and simple.”

“I see,” said Ruth Ann. She uncrossed her legs and stood from her chair. I noticed her give a nod to Dozer who then walked to where I sat and without effort lifted me to my feet. “Come with me, Carter,” said Ruth Ann. “I want to show you something.”

I wasn’t sure of where I was going, but I was glad I was getting out of the holding room. A person could really go crazy in there.

Walking through the living room, I followed Ruth Ann, and Dozer followed me. When she opened and walked out the front door, I had a good idea of where she was taking me, and I didn’t want to go. I tried turning around, but Dozer stopped me, blocking my path.

“I’d rather not go out there,” I said in a panic.

“This will only take a few minutes,” Ruth Ann said.

I followed her to the duck pond, to the place where the massacre had occurred earlier that morning. My stomach churned, and I felt like vomiting. But I was trapped, no way of turning back, no way of escaping this horrible scene that I was about to relive.

Ruth Ann stopped at the edge of the duck pond.

“Have a seat, Carter,” she said, pointing to the weather-beaten bench on which I normally sat.

I eased gently on the bench and turned my head from the water in front of me. I couldn’t look, knowing that Mr. and Mrs. Duck would never be there again. I squeezed my eyelids tightly.

“Do you see that?” asked Ruth Ann.

“No. I don’t want to,” I said, keeping my eyes shut.

“Open your eyes, Carter,” she said, sternly.

“No,” I said again.

“Do it now or you’ll go back to the holding room.”

I didn’t want to go back to the holding room. I didn’t ever want to go back to that awful place. So, I did as Ruth Ann demanded. I slowly opened my eyes.

“What do you see?” she asked.

I hesitated. Out in front of me the water rippled tiny waves in the direction of the bank where Mrs. Duck had kept her nest of unborn ducklings.

She asked me again, “What do you see, Carter?”

And again, I couldn’t answer. The wrenching of my intestines worsened and I did indeed vomit, in front of me, beside Ruth Ann. Unfazed, she backed away only a step or two.

I wiped my mouth on the sleeve of my robe and said, “I see the duck pond.”

“Look again,” she said, grabbing a handful of my hair, tilting my head. “What is it that you see, Carter?”

“The duck – duck pond,” I said, looking and shutting my eyes again.

She said, “There is no pond, Carter. There never has been. You need to stop this, this pretending. It’s not good for you.”

I wasn’t pretending. I knew what I saw. I’d come out here to this same bench every morning for the last week with my bagel to feed the ducks, and to enjoy the pristine water and the wonderful morning air.

“I’m not pretending,” I said. “Stop saying that. Why are you saying that?”

Ruth Ann bent over a little and spoke directly in my ear.

“Carter?” she said and waited for my response.

“Yes,” I said.

“How long have you been a resident at Ryker’s?”

I wasn’t exactly sure, but I gave the most logical answer.

“A long time.”

“Have we always had a duck pond?” she asked, again directly into my ear.

I stalled with my answer. I was unsure. The question prompted me to probe deeper into the archives of my mind, but I still couldn’t give an honest answer.

I pinched my eyelids tighter and said, “I – I don’t know. I’m not exactly sure.”

She said, “I’m going to ask you to open your eyes one more time and then you’re going to tell me what you see, okay?” This time I nodded. “Good. Now open your eyes and tell me and Dozer what you see.”

I didn’t want to, but I also didn’t want to return to the holding room. The lids of my eyes slowly parted and I stared out, straight in front of me. In my peripheral view I noticed Ruth Ann motion to Dozer with a pointed finger in the direction of the duck pond. From behind me, the large man walked around the bench.

He walked out into the water, ten feet or so from the bank, and spun to face Ruth Ann and me. Now, I thought
he
was the crazy person, not me.

“Jump up and down,” Ruth Ann instructed.

Dozer did as he was told, splashing and rippling the water around him.

“See,” said Ruth Ann, “no water.”

By now, I was really starting to question her sanity as well.

“But I do see water,” I said.

“Look closer, Carter. Concentrate.”

Again, Dozer jumped. This time, I saw something, something I hadn’t noticed before. The rippling water around Dozer slowly faded. I watched the farthest, tiniest wave and followed it backwards, where instead of getting larger, it slowly erased. And, I no longer heard the splashing sounds.

Agitated, I blinked. I rubbed my eyes until the blurriness went away. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. No longer jumping, instead, keeping perfectly still, Dozer appeared to be standing in a vacant lot or on some sort of cement slab. He was clearly not in the duck pond as he had been only seconds ago. I rubbed my eyes again.