Twisted (13 page)

39

I enter the cafeteria—or start to—when my legs feel soft, my stomach a little narrow. Checking my watch, I see it’s five past noon.

I scan the room.

And now my reasoning feels wooly. On any given day, the traffic at this hour is at its peak, but on this day, that’s not the case. While many tables are occupied, an unusually high number are empty.

My feet shuffle forward, but I barely feel the flooring beneath them. I swing my vision to the line of hospital employees and visitors that normally extends out toward the exit doors, but today it’s only about half that long.

I try to strike a deal with reason and tell myself that perhaps the nursing staff is rotating through an offsite training program. That there’s some kind of flu bug going around, vastly diminishing the hospital’s staffing power.

That it’s not what I think.

But none of those explanations work for me.

In line, I slide my tray along the track, eyes suspiciously shifting from side to side. Observing.

“Sir?”

I follow the voice and find a worker staring at me expectantly.

I clear my throat. “Just the soup, please.”

She dips her ladle into a recessed pot, dumps the brown liquid into a bowl, then slings it onto the raised counter. I reach for the soup, place it on my tray.

Don’t eat that.

Huh?

It’s laced with poison. What do you think is happening to all the people here?

I lurch back and, in the process, knock my tray off the track. The bowl goes flying. Glass breaks, soup splatters everywhere. Silverware slides across the linoleum.

I take a flustered look around me. Everyone is staring.

“I . . . I’m so sorry. I didn’t—”

Don’t!

Don’t what?

Don’t talk to these people.

Why not?

They’re in on it. They’ve been sent here to watch you.

I rocket from the line and dash toward the exit like my ass is on fire.

40

How can I pull my mind together, when all the pieces are not only out of reach but twirling around me like scattered windup tops? With the deadline for my evaluation just two days away, I’ve got no time for crazy. I have to focus on this moment. I’m so close to breaking through Donny Ray’s defenses, to figuring out whether he’s malingering.

On my way to the consulting room, I inhale a staggered breath, try to collect myself. Several feet later, I reach a point of clarity, telling myself that I work best under pressure, that I’m competent, that I know how to do my job.

Now I can think.

I have to think . . . In our last session, Donny Ray was teetering closer toward revealing a significant piece of his past—then he pulled back on me. Miranda was his hot button, and I pushed it. Hopefully, with this new day, those emotions won’t betray him, and we can try again.

When I walk into the room, Donny Ray is the image of ebullience. His skin isn’t just clearer—it glows, the color in full bloom, the light enhancing his squared chin and chiseled cheekbones. Even his lips, pale during our first meeting, have warmed into a full, rich pink. But it’s not just his face: Donny Ray’s overall presentation is stronger, chest muscles well-defined through the T-shirt he wears, posture firm, head held high.

And then there are those eyes.

Still penetratingly sharp, still indefinably familiar, and—to be completely truthful—hard to turn away from.

I observe as he takes a seat across from me. Never before has the contrast between body and mind—between the outer beauty and inner darkness—been more striking. With his arresting good looks and athletic physique, he could be anyone’s all-American boy. Throw a few textbooks under his arm, and he’s rushing off to his next class. Toss on a ball cap and sweats, and he’s heading to the gym for his afternoon workout. Then I remind myself that Donny Ray Smith is nobody’s all-American boy. Regardless of whether or not he remembers his crimes, Donny Ray Smith is a deeply disturbed young man.

A killer.

I try to keep that in mind, to look past his aura of purity, of innocence. To understand that everything about his physical presentation seems tailored to entice, to charm and seduce.

To manipulate?

I’m still not sure, and watching him now, it almost seems impossible to believe. In fact, Donny Ray appears completely unaware that his good looks even exist, let alone the power they might hold.

An undulating noise from overhead distracts me, then a shadow from above drifts across the table. I follow the tail end onto the floor as it zooms across my shoe before rapidly fading.

I glance up toward the ceiling: nothing there.

“Christopher? You okay?”

Donny Ray is staring at me.

Hold it together
.

I can’t afford to fall through the cracks of my mind right now. I have to do my job.

“You seem a lot better today,” I say.

He looks down at himself, then up at me.

“So . . . when you . . . When we first met you’d mentioned that you were from Texas?”

“Yes, sir. Born and raised.”

“The reason I bring it up is that I am, too.”

“Yeah?” His expression brightens a few shades. “Whereabouts?”

“Johnson City.”

“Hill Country, right?”

“Right,” I say, feeling relieved, on solid footing again. “But I’m actually not very familiar with Real, Texas. What was it like there?”

“It was a small town . . . Well, it still is, really.” He lets out a small laugh. “My mother used to say it was the kind of place where there’s nothing to do every minute, and every minute counts. But that was her.”

“What was?”

“I don’t know . . . how she always saw things.”

“So she had a positive outlook.”

“No . . . that wasn’t it at all.” He looks down, shakes his head, and suppresses a grin as if trying to figure out how to explain something. “It was more like she
pretended
to have a positive outlook. You know the kind, right?”

I hesitate, because I do know all too well, but also because I’m trying not to let my past experiences, my personal bias, eclipse what could be an important communicative moment between us.

“How did that affect you?” I ask. “The way your mom was.”

“Sometimes it was okay.”

“Can you tell me about the times when it wasn’t?”

“Well, I guess it bothered me.”

“In what way?”

“How she liked to shove stuff under the carpet. You know, when things went wrong.”

“What kinds of things went wrong?”

Donny Ray turns his head toward a cheap painting that hangs on the wall. I look, too. Some generic street scene. A little girl wearing a blue dress stands in an open doorway, her expression pensive yet sad.

I give him time and space to sort through his thoughts, but his eyes seem slightly unfocused. A bit vacant, even. Much like our last session, he seems to be traveling back, revisiting a long-ago place. I observe his hands, opening up and falling gradually to his sides. I study his breathing, slower now, shallower. His face is expressionless. Though I’ve got no indication of his specific thoughts, my suspicion is they’re not particularly happy. I also have a feeling they might center on Miranda.

“Donny Ray?” I say. “Are you okay?”

He doesn’t respond.

I lean in closer, speak louder. “Donny Ray.”

He looks back at me, and as our eyes connect, I realize that whatever was on his mind is now gone, like he’s found his way out of it—or perhaps pushed his way out—and has no intention of going back.

Edging closer to what I suspect is his point of vulnerability, I ask, “What about your dad? How did he deal with difficult things? Did he avoid them, too?”

Donny Ray’s movements are slow and cautious. He seems more alert but also significantly more distressed.

“Uh-uh,” he finally says. “My dad wasn’t like that at all.”

“How was he?”

No answer.

I push a little more. “What was it like for you after he died?”

No answer for that one, either.

And now I realize we’ve uncovered the weak spot in Donny Ray’s armor. Not a complete surprise, considering what he spoke about during our last session. My job now is to take him down that rocky path.

“And your home life?” I ask. “How was that?”

“There wasn’t much to it.” Tension rushes his speech. “We lived in a double-wide. A trailer park. It was on the outskirts of town.”

“What was life like
inside
that trailer?”

“Not so great, but I don’t think I realized it. Not at first anyway.”

“Can you explain?”

“I guess it’s just that when you’re young, it takes time to figure out there’s more to this world than just what you see around you.”

“What did you see around you?”

No answer again.

“Donny Ray,” I say, knowing it’s time to guide him into that dark place. “What was your relationship with your father like?”

In a heartbeat, all the color I saw before in his face evaporates, and I’m again looking at the frightened young man who first presented himself when we met.

“A foreman,” he abruptly says. “My dad was a foreman.”

“Okay . . .”

“And we didn’t have much, but there was always food on the table. We were never hungry. We always had clothes on our backs.”

“It sounds like your dad was a very good man.”

Donny Ray doesn’t respond. He lowers his head, hands repetitively flexing into and out of tight fists.

“
Was
he a good man, your father?”

“I . . . I don’t really like talking about that part.”

“Can you tell me why?”

“If it’s okay, sir, I . . . ” Voice getting shakier, words coming out pressured. “I’d really prefer not to right now.”

I wait and watch.

With slow hesitation he looks up at me, as if the silence has given him much-needed courage to finally do so. And in his eyes, I no longer see the piercing intensity, the bluer-than-blue disconnect. There is vulnerability. There is deep inner fear.

Fear that I know so very well, have seen reflected back from countless patients. The kind that, from the moment of inception, never leaves, getting tangled and integrated into every thread of their physical being.

The kind of fear that I’m pretty sure still lives within my own eyes.

41

REFLECTIONS OF FEAR

The scales had finally tipped.

I no longer loved the man in our house because the man in our house was becoming a stranger. Now I only feared him.

That man wasn’t my father, anyway. Even when I caught familiar and fleeting glimpses of him, they were so fractured and shallow that I felt only a vague tug of recognition. It was like looking at a picture of a picture. A disturbing cardboard cutout. A fraud.

With his outbursts becoming more frequent and unruly—and despite Mom’s resolve to deny and detach—there was no other choice but to get him medical attention. Soon after that came the bombshell diagnosis: adult-onset schizophrenia. As for my mother, her early-onset now-you-see-it-now-you-don’t was progressing just as steadily, which only made things worse. She added pain on top of more pain, and I was the one feeling all of it.

Dad’s speech was frequently disjointed, rambling, and nonsensical. He had also developed a peculiar giggle that began as a barely audible grunt and culminated with a high-pitched titter.

“What’s so funny, dear?” my mother asked one day as we all drove from the grocery store.

He gave no answer, but from my place in the backseat, I could see his reflection smiling in the window glass. Then the grunt started, and I knew what would soon follow.

Apparently, so did my mother. “Oh, Christopher!” she said, loud enough to cover my dad’s cackling, “look at all the pretty heliotrope on that fence! I do love the heliotrope. They have a glorious aroma, just like cherry vanilla pie. Brings back so many happy memories of my life as a girl. Nature has such a wonderful way of showing us beauty!”

And sometimes irony, too.

My father quietly stared out the window and watched his world go by—whatever that was—smiling and shaking his head.

I couldn’t have smiled, even if I’d wanted to. I felt too torn over which was more worrisome, his madness or Mom’s continued and unshakable avoidance of it.

Just as I was about to look away, I saw my father’s reflection change in the glass. His smile disappeared, and his eyes narrowed as they stared directly at me, mouth moving silently with slow precision, as if he wanted me to read his lips.

Get out, or I’ll kill you.

Terror shot up my spine as we turned onto the next road. Outside, the scenery changed, a dark row of trees further clarifying my father’s reflection. There was no mistaking his sentiment: angry, hostile, and filled with vitriol.

A few seconds later, his smile returned, but this one raised goose bumps all over me. Never before had I seen him look at me with anything other than kindness and love. Now this impostor, this alien, glared at me with hatred and contempt.

As our car continued down the road, I tore my attention away from his evil gaze and stared instead at my sweaty palms. Tears rolled down my cheeks, prompted by fear and heartbreak.

I looked up and out through the front windshield, but all I could see was the unavoidable truth.

Danger ahead.

42

I try to reject the empathic feelings that Donny Ray is prompting.

I’m not supposed to have those. They compromise objectivity, stand in the way of diagnostic progress, which is crucial if I’m going to do my job effectively. And this particular patient, more than any other, is an extremely important one.

But it’s difficult to ignore what I’m positive I saw, and yes, what I felt. Everything I witnessed from Donny Ray—the implicit fear he showed when his father entered the conversation—rang true as a product of deep, intrinsic, and profound mental suffering. Human emotion, pain so commanding, so visceral, and so very powerful. Pain I can relate to on a personal level. While the fear Donny Ray had of his father was likely very different from the fear I had of mine, I can still understand it. I know how it feels.

But maybe I can make our commonality work in my favor and uncover what others might have missed. I just have to climb outside of myself, to separate my own feelings from his. To use my personal experience as a stepping-stone to facilitate a better and more complete understanding of what’s happening inside Donny Ray’s mind.

I pass through Alpha Twelve, and it’s like the mental clarity I worked so hard to regain earlier has tripped a fuse. My steps fall out of synch, then awareness jerks them to an abrupt standstill. At first I wonder if I’m seeing double because, at this point, it would not be the unlikeliest of scenarios, but a quick survey of my surroundings sinks the theory, and I know that I’m staring at not one, but two open doors. Nicholas’, and now Stanley’s.

Something very bad is definitely going on.

I move toward Stanley’s room, look inside, and it feels like an instant replay of the other day. Same scenario, different patient. The place is stripped, not a single sign of human habitation.

Another one, gone.

That sleep of death, Christopher.

I practically fly to the nurses’ station. Melinda managed to knock me off guard last time, but this time she’ll be no match for my resolve.

She looks up from her computer screen, appearing more startled than compliant, but, once again, oddly detached.

“What happened to Stanley?” It’s not really a question—it’s a demand.

Melinda gives the hallway a negligible glance, then goes back to her work. “He went to St. Mary’s Hospital.”

“What for?”

“He had a heart attack.”

“Two patients gone from this unit. In just a few days.”

She offers nothing.

“And again, I haven’t been notified.” Obvious, I know, but I’m making a point. “Why is nobody telling me these things?”

Still typing. “It just happened this morning. Maybe the news hasn’t reached you yet.”

“Like it didn’t reach me the other day?”

No answer.

“What time did you say this happened?”

“I didn’t,” she mutters and punches more keys. “About three a.m.”

“I feel like information is being intentionally kept from me.” Anger burns through my throat. “This isn’t right. I want answers.”

“I don’t have any.”

“Find them,” I say, getting louder. “And while you’re at it, find out why Nicholas was sent all the way the hell out to Montana.”

Melinda reaches for a notepad and scribbles something.

I storm away.

But when I head back through Alpha Twelve, those two open doors stare back at me like menacing signposts. I’ve got no idea where they’re pointing, but I do know one thing.

It’s no place good.