Placebo Junkies (20 page)

Apparently, I fall into one of the more lenient of the “various levels of intensity” described in the Cedar Hill Center's brochure, because no one tries to stop me as I explore the facility further. Doors open freely, alarms fail to sound.

I start to feel like a character in a children's book: Audie goes in. Audie goes out. See Audie go upstairs? Go downstairs, Audie, go down!

I test my limits
here.
I test my limits
there.
I am (apparently) allowed to go damn near
anywhere.

This seems like very bad judgment on their part.

How fucking crazy do you have to be before they actually lock you up?

Only once is my freedom challenged. Several steps out one set of doors that open to within sprinting distance of the outside world—an unfenced, unchained outside world, no less—a frizzy-haired nurse wearing mismatched pastel scrubs chases me down. I'm sure I've been caught and I'm about to be reeled back inside, but she only wants me to sign out if I'm planning to leave the grounds at any point. She tsk-tsks mildly and hands the clipboard back to me when she sees that I've signed as Charlotte.

It surprises me, too, that I did that. Habit, I guess.

Even with my freedom granted I don't roam far, and I don't attempt to leave the grounds just yet. A clock on the wall tells me I only have another hour to kill before meeting Jameson.

As I explore, I take note of the studious demedicalization of certain areas of the facility. Prefabricated tranquility abounds, from the carefully curated art studio (nary a decapitation or animate phallus depicted in any of the artwork hanging on the wall) to the obsessively weed-free community garden, and right down to the belligerently peaceful scent of the eucalyptus/lavender air freshener permeating the building like olfactory Haldol.

The pretense fades gradually toward the west, however—westward being the direction of the main hospital. The
real
hospital, that is. The one that doesn't pretend to be anything but a hospital. The hospital not suffering from delusions, one could argue. (Sense of humor: intact, but hanging on by a thread.)

I feel more comfortable in these westward, nondelusional corridors, with their wafts of unapologetically alcohol-swab-scented air and the percussive rattles of unmuffled metal trays against unmuted metal bed rails. I peek into one room and see a young doctor irrigating a wound—an angry, open slash across the bicep of an uncomplaining man with a matted beard—and the sight actually soothes me.

I guess I prefer the kind of treatment where the pain comes up front.

It's only when I follow a hedge-lined walkway to its end and enter the lobby of a separate building, shiny-new and clearly more modern than the others, that I encounter any real obstacles—this time in the form of a receptionist who intercepts me apologetically. She's as wide across as three of me standing side by side, but she's skittish as she blocks me, and when she speaks it's in that high-pitched, saccharine-sweet voice that people save for babies, old people, and imbeciles.

“Now, Audie,” she coos. “I don't think you have an appointment with Dr. O'Brien today. If you need to speak with him, you'll probably be able to find him out wandering the halls, though. He has to be the most dedicated doctor I've ever worked with; we just love him around here. I'm sure you must know how lucky you are that he's taken such a shine to you.”

I half expect her to reach out and pinch my cheeks, the way she's simpering at me.

I ignore her and peer over her shoulder. The smile fades a few degrees, replaced by a tiny, nervous laugh that makes her fleshy face jiggle slightly.

It's an impressive building. The lobby is a soaring atrium with huge glass panes angled in such a way that it almost feels like you're standing in the middle of a well-cut diamond. Deep-set, overcushioned chairs engulf slack-faced patients in this jewel of a waiting room, many of whom are accompanied by watchful attendants, and the amplified sound of an artificial waterfall flowing through the center of the room drowns out any possibility of meaningful conversation. The lobby is ringed by offices with closed wooden doors, each bearing the name of the doctor holding court inside. I can't be positive, since I'm standing too far away, but if I squint I think I can just make out Dr. O'Brien's name on the third door from the left.

The first thought that jumps to mind is that old saying about people who live in glass houses. “Shouldn't throw stones,” I whisper, making the nervous receptionist jiggle and giggle even more.

Then, as I stand there, squinting against the almost intolerably sunny brightness of the atrium, another quote comes to mind—one that fits even better. The one the Professor—Dr. O'Brien—underlined in the copy of
1984
he left for me.
We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness.

Something about making this connection makes me shiver violently, and I wrap my arms around myself to quell my shaking.

My sudden(ish) movement pushes the nervous receptionist too far, and she springs surprisingly fast back to her desk and picks up a phone. “Audie, dear, I'm just going to call someone to come get you. Is that okay? Hmmm, dear?” Her voice is still sugar-pitched, but her pink-painted fingernails drum a staccato beat on the desk as she waits for someone on the other end to pick up. “Just stay right where you are, okay, sweetie?”

I do as instructed. Now that she's moved out of my way, I can see one more door, this one different from the rest. This one is metal and secure—I see both a keypad and a card reader controlling access—and instead of a fancy brass nameplate, this one bears only a small institutional plaque. White letters on a dark-green background:
LOCKED WARD
.

There's no reason this should trigger anything at all in my head. I mean, the presence of a locked ward in a mental health facility is hardly surprising, but trigger something it does. One last quote—this one more clichéd, less literary, and straight out of Jameson's mouth.

“She's in a better place,” he'd said of Charlotte.

At the same time, it occurs to me what Jameson has never said, not once:
Dead.

The receptionist is still on the phone. She's huffing and puffing from being put on hold, as far as I can tell, and my presence has her skittish as a horse. I'm not interested in staying there any longer, though. I've seen enough.

I arrange my face into its most wholesome configuration—wide, smiling eyes, deferential tilt to the head—and reassure her in a voice almost as syrupy as her own. “Oh, I'm okay, really. I just got my appointment dates confused. I'm such a space cadet!”

She looks at me for a long moment, then replaces the receiver. “That's okay, honey. It's no problem at all,” she says, but her hand stays close to the phone and her eyes follow me out the door.

It's a problematic definition, if you stop to think about it. I mean, how many things in life are truly impossible to question or doubt?

Your health? Your wealth? Your relationships? Your safety?

Your hairline, your waistline, your paycheck, your plans? I'll shut up about it now—you get the picture. The list is endless.

I, for one, am capable of questioning anything and everything.

Here is how I know I am not yet “well,” by any stretch of the imagination: The whole time I'm walking around the hospital, I'm looking for Dylan. I can't help it—it's like a reflex. A habit. I'm a goddamn placebo junkie, addicted to the fake-out cure of my factless, delusional world.

Just close your eyes and click your heels together three times…

And now on top of all the rest of it, I'm also questioning everything I thought I knew about Charlotte. Is she really dead, my bright-light, hot-sauce, scheming-twirling-singing friend, or is she just locked away in the hospital equivalent of an attic somewhere?

But I entertain these questions without any real sense of hope. If she's locked away, there's a high likelihood that she's functionally, if not factually, dead. Charlotte would never consent to life in a cage.

But then again, nothing is truly indisputable.

It makes my head hurt just thinking about it. Or maybe my head was already hurting. Things are still a bit jumbled in the wasteland north of my shoulders.

I make my way to the back parking lot, still surprised not to be stopped or even questioned. Jameson is already there, waiting in his car—something shitty and dented and red. I use it as a test.
Have I ever ridden in this car with Jameson?
I ask the newly awakened part of my brain.
No,
says the less crazy part. It sounds reasonably confident.

“Have I ever driven anywhere with you?” I ask Jameson when I slide into the passenger seat.

“No,” he says. “Can't say that I've had the pleasure.”

Score one for a correct answer. I need to learn which sectors of my memories I can rely on, particularly before I start asking Jameson the important questions. I need to be able to judge whether he's lying to me.

He looks me over, head to toe, before he starts to drive. He nods, satisfied, like he knows exactly what he's looking at. “Mm-hmm, I thought so. You're pulling out of it again. Good for you.”

“How can you tell?” I ask him.

He grins. “Audie, I know you better than just about anyone. Definitely better than fucking Dr. O'Brien, that quack, knows you. Who do you think watches out for you when you're deep in it?”

“Deep in
what
exactly?” I'm hoping he has a word for it—something to call what I'm going through. Something to call what I
am.
I need an anchor.

He shakes his head. “Nuh-uh. You're not going to get me with that. Every new doc who comes through this place has a different diagnosis for you. Conveniently enough, it usually coincides with whatever drug their pharmaceutical sponsor of choice is hawking. But you're a bit of a moving target. There's no one obvious thing, like there is for most of the people here. But, hey, that's what makes you interesting, right?” He winks at me.

“What's wrong with Scratch?”

Jameson honks at someone who cuts him off, swearing softly. “Oh, he's a kick, isn't he? Morgellons. Delusional parasitosis. He thinks he's infested with alien fibers. Like, fully convinced of it. You wouldn't believe what that poor guy has done to try to get the imaginary critters out of his skin—the dude'll use anything he can get his hands on to pick, or scrape, or worse. Have you seen the scars on his back? He tried to burn the fibers out with acid. That particular stunt is what finally earned him his entrance ticket here.”

“He did all that to himself?” My stomach turns just thinking of the peeling skin, the oozing sores, the pockmarks. The fact that it's self-mutilation just makes it all so much worse.

But then my mind zip-lines back to the magazine I found in Dr. O'Brien's briefcase—the piercing and stitching and impaling I saw in the photo spreads, and how much it upset me to be compared to the people who chose to do those things to their bodies—and all of a sudden I see it differently.

Now I see poor, altered souls in search of just the right adjustment. A prescription, a doctrine, a nose ring, a diploma, a plane ticket. We're
all
always a step or two away from being a finished product.

“Sure did. But his new meds are working pretty well, so he may get out soon. Hey…” Jameson turns and looks sharply at me. “Now that you're lucid again, or whatever you want to call it, you know you can't tell anyone that I talk to you about the other patients, right? I'm one more write-up away from a suspension as it is.”

“I won't tell anyone,” I say. Who would believe me, anyway? I sure as hell wouldn't. “Where are we going, incidentally?”

“We have a few stops to make before we get to the testing center.”

It's a nonanswer, but I don't push for more. I don't really care where we're going, or how long it takes to get there—it's not as if I have anywhere better to be. I lean my seat back and stare at a star-shaped chip in the windshield. But then I sit up straight again, only to be practically garroted by the seat belt. My muscles twitch, fighting involuntarily against the familiar feeling of restraint.

“Wait a minute—you said the testing center. Are you telling me that testing is real? That's really how I make money? I mean, it's actually a thing, getting paid to take meds?” I had convinced myself that this was another Dylan. A distortion of reality designed to make my shitty life more palatable.

Jameson sighs. “I'm just going to write this down for you one of these days. Save me the trouble of having to explain it every time.”

“Tell me again. Please.”

So he explains. Again.

The guinea pig thing, bills for pills, is real. Sort of. It's another one of those facts-braided-with-lies things. Sometimes I get paid to take medicine. Sometimes I just think I do.

He laughs when he describes it. “Girl, you know I love you, but you can be a real pain in the ass sometimes when you don't want to take your meds. And just try to drag your ass into a treatment room when you don't want to go—you've given me more than one black eye.” He turns and winks at me. “So, you can't really blame me if sometimes I let you believe you're getting paid for it. I mean, I don't out-and-out
lie
to you about it. You do all that yourself. But maybe I do encourage you a little more than I should. Like your fake blog thing. I like reading it, though. And you
are
a good writer.”

I feel myself shrinking in the seat. “But sometimes I do get paid. Right? At least something?”

“Oh, sure. You all do it—I think the whole system would implode if you didn't, since the university would be shit out of luck for getting human subjects for their research. And no research results would mean no more corporate funding. No more corporate funding, no more fancy new hospital wings. So it doesn't really matter if O'Brien doesn't like it,” Jameson says. “The hospital makes the rules, not him, and they sure as hell don't want to lose their handy-dandy stable of in-house volunteers. Plus, he can't really stop you unless he restricts you to the ward.”

He honks as another car cuts him off, and then his voice turns catty. “And if he restricts you to the ward, your file automatically comes up before the quarterly review panel. He definitely doesn't want
that.
You want to talk about some seriously shady experimental methods…” He winks at me again, like I'm in on the joke. Which, of course, I'm not. “Anyway, since you're already right there on the hospital grounds, then it's easy enough for you to sign up for studies. And Lord knows, they're not picky about who they get. Case in point…” He puts the car in park and points at the line of people snaking around a building.

It's a thready, undisciplined queue—the type of line formed by people who
have
to wait, not by people who want to wait. There are four men to every woman, most of them hiding underneath pulled-up hoods or pulled-down hats. I'm not surprised in the least when I finally spot the sign and see that we're parked outside a methadone clinic.

“Here, help me out, would you? You start at the back of the line, I'll start from the front, and we'll meet in the middle.” He shoves a handful of flyers at me. “Just make sure they understand they need to hand in this paper when they get to the testing center. Look, it's coded, see? Otherwise, we don't get our referral fee.” He points to a tiny string of numbers printed at the bottom of every page.

On the flyers are short, simple words—an easy-reader message for the quasi-literate. More space is dedicated to the address and directions than the actual point of the flyers: New Drug Study Seeks Volunteers. “Cash Compensation” is advertised in bold colorful print—once at the top of the page, then again at the bottom.

It takes several more stops until I fully appreciate the scope of our task: we're passing out invitations to the world's least exclusive party.

Jameson's route takes us to all the wrong parts of town. Homeless shelters. The city bus terminal. A shabby medical clinic. It's a tour of the down-and-out; add in a mental institution and you'll have a royal flush.

Oh, wait…

We'll split the finder's fee seventy-five/twenty-five, Jameson tells me. The more people we get to sign up, the more money we get.

It's a good deal for them, Jameson tells me. They get the meds they need, plus more cash than they've seen in a long time.

We're doing a good thing, he says.

All the doctors do it, he says, even the ones who don't like to talk about it. “Just look at Dr. O'Brien. That smug bastard acts like he's above all this, but he's raking in the grant money left and right. Where do you think that comes from? Who do you think puts up the money for those big research projects? You think his regular salary bought him that shiny new Lexus?”

The pharmaceutical companies need to test their new medications on
someone,
he says. And this is a big one. A big study. It could do a lot of good for a lot of people someday. There's only one way to know.

It makes my veins tingle, just listening to him. A buzzing sound low in my brain hums along with his words.

Our last stop, an underpass just outside the city center, is the worst of the bunch. It's the tail end of the tent city that meanders around the wrong side of the tracks—a post-apocalyptic stomping ground for people barely hanging on. We park next to a scrubby bush that's been decorated Christmas-tree-style with empty plastic bags and used condoms.

As we step out of the car, a bedraggled gray-haired woman shuffles up to us with a lopsided grin. The left side of her face droops uselessly as she greets Jameson.

“Mary!” Jameson calls out, like he's genuinely pleased to see her. “How're you doing? Up for another round? Same pay, as long as you've waited the thirty days.” He winks at her when he says this—
has he always been such a big winker?
—and I get the impression that whatever rules govern this system are loose at best.

She grabs one of the flyers with a clawed hand and walks away. “Oh God. Jameson, look.” My hand flies involuntarily up to my mouth. She's wearing only a bathrobe, and she's wearing it backward. It trails open behind her, revealing filthy bare skin and evidence that she's soiled herself, probably more than once. Slept in it, too, it looks like. “Oh God,” I say again.

“I have a few blankets in my trunk,” Jameson says to me, handing me the keys to his car. “I gave her some clothes last time, but what're you going to do? We can't force her in off the streets. She's been in and out of the system for years—she's a tough old bird. Talk about a survivor.”

I run to his car, grab a stack of blankets, then hurry after Mary. She's easy to catch—she doesn't seem to move very quickly. Plus, she's only wearing one shoe—a man's boot. Her other foot is protected by a thick layering of dirty socks.

“Just one, honey. Weather's getting warmer. It'll be hot as fire soon enough, you'll see,” she says to me with her slanted grin as she pulls a single blanket off the pile I offer her. “Keep the rest for yourself. Least I got me some padding—you're just skin and bones. Heat's coming, but that don't always stop the cold. I know you know what I mean.”

She cackles softly, then spits, and when she turns and walks away from me I see the tattoos crawling up her back. Circles made from snakes, four of them, rising above the dried shit caking her skin. Four serpents destroying themselves atop her knobby, bruised spine.

They're the same tattoos I saw on Charlotte's back just before she died.

If, in fact, she died. Neither side of my brain feels certain about that yet.

“Mary?” I want to ask her about the snakes, but she waves me off without even turning around. She's muttering to herself about the weather, and she can't be bothered with the likes of me. “Hot as fire,” she's saying again as she walks away. “I know you know.”