Psychology and Other Stories (34 page)

“Oh,” said Martie, “hello.”

Strickland got to his feet, but his wife was already climbing the stairs.

“Should I leave?,” Trace asked.

“No. I don't know. No. Finish your coffee …?”

“I'll take a rain check, how about.”

At the door she said, “See you tomorrow night, smiling face.”

Strickland leaned in the doorway, hands in pockets, and watched his wife brush her teeth. She raised her eyebrows at him in the mirror.

“Are you smoking again?” he blurted.

She spat in the sink. “What?”

“It's the middle of the day and you're brushing your teeth.”

Without looking at him she said, “They felt furry. I had wine at lunch.”

He stepped forward and put his arms around her.

“Oh-kay
…” she said.

He let her go.

“I've got to pick up Ben in … five minutes ago,” she explained.

He sat on the bed and watched her remove jewelry, change her shoes.

“I don't think we should keep secrets from each other,” he said.

“I agree. Why, do you keep secrets?”

“I think we need to talk.”

“You sound like a movie. Instead of announcing that you want to say something, why don't you just say the something that you want to say.”

“Very well. All right. Are you …”

She sighed. “I've really got to go, hon.”

“… Trace—she only gave me a lift home.”

“That was nice of Trace.”

“Well, you weren't going to ask.”

“What you do … Listen, I don't have time for this.”

“Then I'll come with you.”

They rode in silence.

From the back seat Ben said, “Penny was running around when teacher was out of the room and she fell but nobody tripped her. She had to go to the nurse and also she cried.”

Neither Strickland nor Martie replied, but glanced disapprovingly at each other for not replying.

Eventually Strickland said, “Listen … Do we have to go to this party thing tomorrow?”

After a long pause she said, “No. Not if you don't think it's important anymore.”

“‘Important'?”

“‘The therapeutic value'
et cetera
—those aren't my words.”

“You make it sound like I dragged you into it kicking and screaming.”

“As I recall, you were the one who—No,” she decided, “I'm not going to say what I was about to say.”

“Please, by all means. Say it. I implore you.”

“Mom,” Ben asked, “are you and Dad having a disagreement?”

“I was going to say that I am not the one who was nearly reprimanded for certain no doubt wondrously cathartic liaisons with one of my students now I really do think we've made enough of a negative impact on a certain young person's emotional psycho-development for one day.
Yes
, Benjamin, your father and I were having a disagreement but now we're having a time out. How do you feel about that? All right?”

Ben said, “The black man's here again.”

“Where'd you find it?”

“I know some people.” Mike grinned and fingered his teeth. “I got some connections.”

Strickland looked inside the car. The back seat had been slashed and cigarette burns covered the dashboard. The glove compartment held only a blackened soda can.

“Well,” he said.

“They bagged the shit out of it a little but it still goes.”

Strickland circled the vehicle. “Took the license plates,” he noticed.

“Sure. Gotta do that if you're gonna sell it.”

“Well. Thanks, Mike. I appreciate it.”

“Come on.”

“What?”

Mike tossed him the keys. “Take the motherfucker for a spin.”

“That's easy to fix,” Mike shouted over the rattling noises coming from the engine. “That's just timing, any asshole can fix that.”

Glancing at the cars backing up behind them, he said, “Better get off the express. Take Wilshire—I know a place.”

Mike slapped palms and knuckles with the bartender.

“How the fuck are you, Mike?”

“How the fuck
ain't
I, man.”

“I thought your fucking ass was in clink.”

“Naw. Not yet.” He leaned against the bar and surveyed the room like a man expecting to be recognized.

Strickland lowered himself onto a stool and peered at the bottles behind the bar. “Guess I'll have a little chat with Mr. Daniel.”

The bartender looked at him.

“Jack Daniel's,” he said in his normal voice. “Ice, no water.”

“Coming right up.”

“His friends call him ‘Mister,'” Strickland explained.

Winking over his shoulder at Strickland, the bartender said, “This guy your lawyer, Mike?”

Mike turned slowly around, as if afraid of forgetting something. “This guy,” he said, “is my fucking headshrink, man.”

“No shit.”

“I'm his fucking headshrink,” Strickland agreed.

“Gonna get this piece of shit off on an insanity plea?”

They all laughed.

“Before that,” Mike said, “it was the fucking pulp mill. Nasty fucking place, the pulp mill. I still get dreams. Fucker I knew had his arm ripped off in the fucking winch.”

“Jesus,” Strickland said. “Did you see it?—happen?”

“Naw. Different shifts. Still, that kind of shit … Before that it was Houston. Man, I did everything in fucking Houston. Construction, windows, sweeping up in a bolt factory. Chopping
meat, deliveries. Even selling socks with the fags in a fucking department store.”

“A lot of jobs.”

“And we were only in Texas six months that time!”

“Why so many?”

“Aw, shit. You ever known a boss that wasn't a fucker? Anyway, I like variety.” He gulped at his drink and said, “No, that's one thing I can't ever stand is super—you know, superior fuckers telling me what to do. I never was able to stand that shit. Not even in high school. Our football coach—now there was a disrespecting super-superior motherfucker if you ever saw one. I showed him.” He grinned at the memory. “I was good, too. No shit. Halfback. Fucking solid, you know.” He jumped into a pillar-like stance above his chair. “But fuck it, man. Can't push a guy around. Can't tell a guy what to do.”

“What about the army?”

“What about the fucking army, man?”

“You must've taken orders there all right.”

“You talking about Nam. Nam was different.” After a pause he said, “It was like being in clink.”

Strickland waited.

“I mean it wasn't like clink but it was like clink because you can't say what it's like, either. It's like living a different life. A different planet. Nothing connects up between nothing in it and the real world, so how do you … Shit, I don't know. It was like a movie.”

“Like a war movie?”

“Never mind. Like going to a fucking movie. Never mind. Fuck it.”

“Was it—were you ever in danger?”

“Was I ever not?—You mean was I ever in the shit?” His grin disappeared. “Twice.”

“Ever … hurt?”

“You mean psychologically?”

“I meant physically.”

“I'm here, ain't I?”

“… Ever get hit in the head, fall down, lose consciousness? Ever been in the hospital?”

“Naw.” He struck the pillar pose again and chuckled. “Solid.”

“Ever done any drugs?”

“No,” he said quickly. “Why?”

“Oh, you never know. Just asking.” After a minute, Strickland said, “I do a little coke from time to time.”

Mike was impressed. “No shit. You get high?”

“You know. Once in awhile.”

“… Wanna get high now?”

Strickland pursed his lips, then laughed.

Q. Is this the kind of disorder that would be treatable, by drugs for example?

A. That question I think indicates a rather unfortunate assumption about the state of the pharmaceutical art today. To be frank, drug treatment is not a very advanced form of therapy—more akin to faith healing than science. We have a lot of different chemicals that seem to have a lot of different effects on a lot of different people but most of the time we don't even know how they work, let alone why. The brain is an incredibly, unimaginably dense and complicated lump of circuitry. A great physiologist once compared it to the Milky Way—so try to imagine a galaxy of little stars doing an incredibly complicated yet very meaningful dance at almost the speed of light. Then try to imagine a bunch of humans trying to choreograph that dance with nothing but microscopes and prescription pads at their disposal. Pharmacology is trying to return to equilibrium this amazingly turbulent electrochemical galaxy by smuggling a few more
chemicals across the blood—brain barrier, adding a few more ingredients to the soup haphazardly. It's like copyediting a million-page manuscript by randomly inserting five percent more vowels—or trying to improve the fuzzy picture on your television by adding, you know, five percent more red or blue.

Q. Dr. Strickland, do you get paid by the hour?

A. Why—yes, I do.

Q. Uh-huh. What do you make, sixty dollars an hour?

A. That is my rate, yes.

Q. Is the meter running while you are in court?

MR. MASSICK: Now I'm afraid I'm going to have to object, your Honor. That's argumentative, the way it's framed.

THE COURT: All right, sustained.

A. The fact is that I earn what is—

THE COURT: Now just a minute, Doctor. The objection was sustained.

A. Oh. Sustained. Thank you.

THE COURT: Perhaps you could rephrase the question, Ms. Lattimann.

Q. Do you get sixty dollars an hour, Professor, for the time you sit here on the witness stand and testify?

MR. MASSICK: Now I do apologize Your Honor but on second thought I'm also going to have to object to the substance of this question on grounds of relevance, I think.

MS. LATTIMANN: I'm willing to strike that last question, Your Honor.

MR. MASSICK: Well, thank you.

THE COURT: The jury will kindly disregard Ms. Lattimann's question.

Q. Professor, you yourself as a psychologist are not allowed to prescribe drugs, are you?

A. That's a little like asking the candlestick maker if he is allowed to sell pastries. It's not my line of work. It's not what I do.

Mike sniffed and said, “Speed. STP. Crank. Goofballs. PCP once and never fucking again. Here.” He held out his powdered knuckle to Strickland.

“No, no thanks. I'm good.” He patted his stomach and laughed. “I'm stuffed.”

Mike snorted what was left and went on, “Mescaline, at least I think it was mescaline. LSD, all that hippie shit. Weed.”

Strickland looked around the room. The surfaces were all mirrors and light. “Marijuana?” he said. “I've never smoked marijuana. This is a beautiful environment.”

“There it comes.” Mike rolled his head around on his neck and rotated his shoulders. He slapped Strickland on the back and said, “Vamos, amigo. You can't get shit like we got in the army anymore but we'll find you some kind of shit somewheres.”