We Are Monsters (8 page)

Chapter Fourteen

“You're not going to want to watch this,” Alex said as he reached into his medical bag and began pulling out supplies. The sedatives had taken effect and Jerry was resting peacefully on the bed.

“Sure I do. I want to help,” Rachel said. She was standing at the end of the bed, holding Jerry's sock-covered feet and massaging their soles.

Alex pulled out the syringe and set it on the bedside tray. He moved aside so that Rachel could see the seven inches of gleaming steel.

“Oh.” She took a step back, releasing Jerry's feet as though they carried some contagious disease.

“Exactly. I'll call for you if I need anything.”

“Okay.” She took a last look at Jerry with those telepathic eyes. It was a sad expression, but Alex knew the intent. She was wishing him well. She eased the door closed on her way out.

Alex turned and inspected the machinery procured from the hospital storage room. The equipment, which was designed to scan and monitor brain activity during surgery, didn't receive much use under Eli's tutelage. Alex wasn't worried about anyone realizing it was gone.

His only concern was for the refinements he had made to the formula. That had been a much more complicated task. The chemical compound he had created was designed to regulate the release of neurochemicals that control the way we perceive reality. Branches of this compound, however, represented some of the strongest hallucinogenic chemicals known to mankind.

In previous tests, patients had experienced moments of total lucidity soon after receiving the medicine, followed by heightened hallucinations. Alex's hypothesis was that the malfunctioning brain of a schizophrenic was flooding the patient with hallucinatory neurochemicals in response to the compound's attempt to suppress their production. The compound simply wasn't strong enough. So he had made it stronger, upping the amino-acid profile against the tryptamine suppressors.

He was reluctant to test this more potent version of the formula on his brother, but at least he would be on hand to help if anything went wrong.

“How are you feeling, Jerry? Still with me?” Alex asked, happy to see that all of his vital signs were strong.

Jerry mumbled as if talking in his sleep.

“Good.”

The syringe sat empty on the tray, the long, sharp needle pointed in his direction. From this angle, it looked like the stinger on some alien wasp. And in a way it was. Only, he had developed the serum and it had yet to prove venomous. Ineffectual, maybe. But not harmful. Still, it felt strange to be using it on Jerry.

He closed his eyes, remembering, for a moment, the first time he'd been stung.

He was mowing the yard to earn his weekly allowance. Five dollars for forty-five minutes of hard work (his father required that he bag the clippings). It was mid-August; the air was hot and humid, but the ground was dry from a three-week-long drought. The mower kicked up plumes of dust as he pushed it in orderly rows. And the dull blade crushed twigs into splinters, stirred up rocks and flung them into the unprotected skin on Alex's shins, face and arms.

That's what he thought they were at first, the stings. Just shards of wood ejected from the blade. But then the wasps got under his shirt and began stinging his back. He stopped the mower then and screamed in pain, but the low drone of the engine kept on purring. It was the angry war chant of the wasps as they swarmed his body and attacked.

It felt like someone was stabbing him with an ice pick. He spun within a circle that he couldn't escape. He didn't realize what was happening, only that something was hurting him and wouldn't stop.

Then he heard Jerry calling his name, saw him running hunched over while swatting at his head and neck. He reached Alex and ripped off his shirt, tearing it straight down the middle like he'd seen Hulk Hogan do on TV. Right then, Jerry seemed just as strong, just as heroic as that muscle-bound pro wrestler whom Alex had idolized. Then he lowered his head and pushed Alex across the yard towards the house. Just bulldozed him away from the horde of wasps.

The pain intensified when they got inside, once the adrenaline drained. It was like his veins were filled with shattered glass. It dropped him to the floor, where he began screaming and flopping about like a fish on dry land.

His father came in, looking more upset than concerned. “What's the matter with him?”

But Jerry was there, by his side. “You're tough, Alex!” he said, trying to bolster his confidence and fill him with strength. “Toughest kid I know! Come on, show me how tough you are!”

And somehow it worked. Jerry's words acted like a salve, dulling the pain and pumping him full of some misbegotten pride. He wanted to be as tough as Jerry said he was. He at least wanted to try.

The memory faded as Alex grabbed the syringe, hefting it in his hand.
Not near as tough as you,
he thought, then dipped the needle into the vial and filled the chamber to the designated mark. Jerry's words echoed in his mind as he leaned over, placing the needle's tip against the inside of his brother's eye socket and angling it upward. “You may feel a little pressure, but it shouldn't hurt.”
I hope,
he thought.

He could sense the faintest tremor threatening his fingers, so he pressed forward and pushed the needle through.
Be tough, brother.

It only took a few seconds and the needle was out. Alex returned it to the bedside table and plugged the puncture wound with a ball of cotton. Jerry's vital signs remained strong. Now, the only thing to do was wait.

Alex was rising from his chair when Jerry began to convulse violently, his body thrashing against the bed. Alex grabbed Jerry's head and held it steady, clamping his jaw closed. It took all of his strength to hold it in place.

“Okay, I could use a little help in here,” he called out, trying to sound calm.

Jerry's back was arched high overhead and his legs were pumping like pistons, causing the pinewood bedframe to screech against the floor.

The door burst open and Rachel rushed through. She stopped as soon as she saw Jerry's condition and spun back around. “Jesus, what'd you do!” It was the panicked voice from the night Popeye died.

“Grab his feet. I need you to help restrain him.”

Rachel peeked over her shoulder and winced. She thrust clenched fists down by her side and stomped. “Please! Make it stop!”

Jerry's throat became tight, bloated; he wasn't getting any air. His body went rigid, his hands curled in and his toes pointed down. He began to gurgle—a protracted
nnnnnhhhhggggg
—and his mouth began to foam. Then the convulsions returned, more fearsome than before.

“Goddammit, get over here!” He had to insert a breathing tube. He needed to help Jerry get air. He looked around the cluttered bedroom, the walls closing in, the seconds slipping away.

Maybe it'll look like natural causes.
Even his internal voice sounded scared.

“Rachel! Now!”

She turned. Her face crumpled in disgust. She shook her hands as though they'd been stung. “Just fix him! Hurry! Hurry!”

Alex stared at her in disbelief.
He's going to die because of her.
Then the realization hit him.
No, he's going to die because of me.

He released Jerry's head and used his hands to pivot, swinging his legs up over Jerry's body, straddling his hips and pinning him against the bed. He placed his palm against Jerry's forehead and pushed it back to open his airway, but his tongue was clogging his throat.

Alex looked around, searching for his cache of medical supplies. But this was not a hospital room or even a test lab. It was just the small, dingy bedroom where his brother was about to die.

Jerry's face was turning purple. Spittle continued to foam from his lips. Alex pried open Jerry's mouth and shoved his fingers through his teeth, grabbing the tongue and pulling it forward. A reedy gasp escaped. Then another. Alex dug his thumbnail deep into the tongue tissue to maintain his grip as his brother struggled to breathe. Shallow and hitched at first, catching in his throat, and then deep and unrestricted.

Alex let go of Jerry's tongue and it fell back into its natural place. His breathing became regulated. Then his body began to relax, so Alex slid off and stood beside the bed.

Jerry's eyes fluttered, revealing two crescent moons, and then they sprang open all the way. The eyeballs rolled backwards, and Jerry squeezed his eyes shut. When he opened them again they remained in place. They found Alex and fixated on his face. There was life behind them, a spark of lucid recognition.

Rachel released a ragged wail, and Alex and Jerry both turned their heads. She was bent over, hiding her face behind both hands. Her shoulders hitched as she silently cried until her next exhale, when she released another loud, wavering wail.

Jerry sat up, a concerned look on his face. But Alex stayed him with a hand on his shoulder. He propped a pillow behind his brother's back so that he could sit upright against the headboard. He checked Jerry's vitals, slightly nodding his head. “Just take it easy,” he said.

Jerry looked at Alex, swallowed and winced in pain, pointing to his throat. “Water,” he croaked.

“Rachel, go get Jerry a glass of water,” Alex said.

Rachel nodded and left the room.

Alex exhaled. His collar was damp with sweat, his hands tingling. He wiped them on his khaki pants as he continued to monitor his brother.

Rachel returned with a glass of water sloshing in her unsteady hands and set it beside Jerry. He mouthed the word
thanks
, then grabbed the glass and took a sip. He winced again and set it back down.

Quiet descended, thick and oppressive, save for Rachel's sniffles. They grated on Alex's frayed nerves. “Do you mind waiting outside?”

Rachel looked insulted. “What? No, I want to help.”

“Help, huh?” Alex shook his head. “A little late for that, don't you think?”

“Oh, screw that, Alex. You didn't tell me that that was going to happen. You said you'd worked out all the kinks. You could have killed him.”

Alex stood and stepped in front of Jerry to block his view. “That's enough,” Alex hissed. Spittle flew and a few strands of hair fell across his forehead. Rachel glared at him and he glared back, red heat rushing to his face.

A dog began barking in the distance, the high-pitched yap of a small terrier. It continued for several seconds and then stopped with a sudden yelp like the sound of a screeching tire. Silence returned to the room.

Rachel blinked and looked away, confused, eyes cast down in contemplation.

Alex cocked his head, then turned.

Jerry was looking up at him, a wan smile on face. “Streak,” he said, his voice barely a whisper.

Alex returned to Jerry's bedside. He stared down into his brother's eyes. One pupil was fully dilated; the other was constricted down to a tiny pinprick. As he watched, they switched places, the dilated eye constricting while the constricted pupil expanded wide. They went back and forth several times before becoming the same normal size.

“How are you feeling?” Alex asked.

Jerry scanned his body as though assessing himself. He looked over at Rachel, then back up at Alex. He lifted his left hand off the bed and closed it into a fist. His thumb shot up in the air. “Good,” he said softly. His lopsided smile expanded. “I feel good.” He looked up at Alex, his eyes bright and full of wonder. “What happened?” he said.

“I administered some medicine. It should help you to feel…” He searched his mind for the right word.

“Like me,” Jerry answered for him, smiling wider still.

Alex smiled back down at his brother. “Yes,” he said. “Like you.”

Chapter Fifteen

The window was no longer a window. It had become a tableau, its surface etched in staggered lines of golden Sanskrit, luminescent letters that produced a radiant glow in the gloom of the group-therapy room. This one was named Serenity.

The message was encoded in an ancient language that Crosby had never learned, yet it was easy to decipher its meaning. The translation came to him in a calm and resolute voice heard in the center of his head, offering a dire warning. He scowled as he scrutinized the people sitting in chairs arranged in a circle, hiding behind their placid masks.
The battle wages on,
he thought.

“What else can we do to help ourselves when we begin to hear voices?” Angela said, smiling as she scanned the faces before her.
She knows,
Crosby thought, but kept silent. He looked at the floor behind her, but she didn't cast a shadow. No one did in the dimness of this gloomy room.

The flabby retard with the wobbly teeth raised his hands. Randall, Crosby thought his name was, but wasn't sure. He hadn't paid attention during introductions. He wasn't interested in a support group comprised of loons.

Angela nodded her head in Randall's direction.

“I've come to just think of it as a kind of radio station that only plays in your head. That way I can just listen without getting all wrapped up in what it's telling me. And it makes it easier to tune out. Kind of like changing channels, you know?”

“Yes, that's an excellent technique,” Angela said. Her smile was the second brightest object in the room, only outshone by the window and the radiance of its divine word. “Has anyone else tried to think of the voices as if they're coming through the radio?”

“What if the voices you hear
are
coming from the radio?” The patient's nicotine-stained fingers were frayed with hangnails that he compulsively picked and nibbled with his teeth. “What do you do then?”

“Well…” Angela rubbed her knees as she considered the question, “…first, you would need to be able to distinguish between a real radio announcement and one that you're imagining.”

Crosby thought the old man sitting next to Angela was sleeping, until he exploded in a fit of laughter. “That's right, that's right,” he jibbered. “You be all thinking the radio's not the radio, then the radio's the radio and you're thinking it's not the radio, and then it's the radio that's the radio. Whoo-eee!” His chin dug back into his chest and he appeared to return to sleep.

Hangnail brought a finger to his lips and peeled away a strip of skin. “Sometimes the radio tells me I got a worm in my stomach, and the only way to get it out is by electrocuting my intestines.”

“Hmmm…” Angela pondered, “…that would probably be an example of a time when you're imagining what you're hearing.”

“I got a worm in my stomach too,” said a burly man whose bushy beard nearly joined his eyebrows. “Its name is José and it makes me drink tequila.”

The old man awoke to fresh laughter. “That's right, that's right, that's right, that's right,” he said for a full minute, until the others joined in and took up the chant.

Crosby watched as Angela attempted to restore order, pressing down with her hands as though closing an imaginary box. She was so small and fragile looking, with her highlighted hair and china-doll face. He knew, though, that demons often disguised themselves in angelic forms. He wouldn't be tricked again.

His mother came to mind.

She, too, had been beautiful. Tall, with long, thin legs and a tiny waist. A slender, swanlike neck supporting an oval face with a shallow cleft in her chin. She had thin lips, brittle, blonde hair and a severe smile, but her pale-blue eyes could make men shiver, as from ice. And she always had one by her side.

But what Crosby remembered most about his mother was her hands. Bony, clawlike talons that crushed his little fingers and skinny arms as she dragged him along behind her, or yanked him out of a chair or from the bed or off the floor. She had sharp, knotted knuckles, like bone spurs, that would flame white when she made a fist, and burn like cold fire when she crashed them into his spine. And short, sturdy nails that would gouge red lines of raw flesh whenever she raked them across his skin.

Her hands appeared prim and delicate until she got mad, and then they would curl into vicious claws with thick, wriggly veins that snaked up her spindly arms.

“You need to learn to pull your own weight,”
she'd say as she dragged him through the back alleys leading to their many motel rooms across countless towns.
“I need you to act like a man.”

He supposed that's what she was trying to teach him whenever she brought another man to his room. He wasn't sure what he was supposed to learn from those lessons, but they always ate better for a day or two after, so he thought he must be doing something right. Finally pulling his weight.

And the training had come in handy after he had finally been set free. After he'd left her dead on the floor, the life choked out of her. He always knew how to bring in a few extra bucks to keep from being evicted from his ramshackle motel room, or whenever he'd missed too many meals.

Still, he knew now what his mother was. Knew what lay hidden behind her pretty façade. That's why he'd had to escape.

The room was still a cacophony of laughter and shouting voices, but the sound faded to the background as Crosby leaned forward. He squinted, forcing his eyes to focus, trailing them down Angela's long, athletic arms to where they ended. Her hands. Prim and delicate with short, sturdy nails and sharp, knotted knuckles. A few wriggly veins were beginning to emerge as she clapped them together in an attempt to establish control.

He sat back in his seat and crossed his arms. Finally, the group settled down, gasping and wheezing like an old engine on Empty.

“That was good, that was good,” Angela said once the room grew quiet. She directed her brilliant smile towards Crosby. “How about you, Crosby?” she said. “We haven't heard from you yet. Do you have anything to add?”

He tilted his head to one side and sucked in air. He held it, then released it in a whoosh. “Do you ever hear voices inside your head?” he asked.

“No, I can't say that I do.”

Crosby grunted. “You don't ever hear a voice when you're in the shower, maybe singing a little melody, or when you're driving, shouting at the car in front of you, or when you're at the grocery store, reminding you that you're low on milk?”

“Okay, yes. Sure, we all have an internal monologue expressing our thoughts. There's a difference, though, between the voice our mind uses to articulate our thoughts and auditory hallucinations. Those are the ones that we're discussing now.”

“So it's fine for you to hear voices in your head but not us?”

“I'm not saying that there is a right or a wrong, just that there is a difference. Oftentimes, hallucinatory voices create unwanted stress and lead to destructive behavior. We would want to minimize that, wouldn't we?”

“You mean control it. Yeah, I know how certain thoughts can be scary for people in positions of power. It's a form of censorship. Everyone hears voices in their head, but some are considered crazy, others sane. Depends on what the voices are saying, it seems.”

“That's an interesting point,” Angela said. She checked her watch and then slapped her palms against the top of her thighs. “Unfortunately, we're about out of time. We'll pick back up tomorrow where we left off.”

Angela showed her smile, but it had lost its light; the darkness in the room deepened. Crosby looked back at the window, which had become a window again. But he had received its message loud and clear.

I know why you keep your lights so low,
he thought as he scanned the floor again for shadows.
You may appear sweet on the outside, but I know what you are underneath.

Angela stood and started to direct the patients towards the orderlies who had come to escort them to the next item on their itinerary. When she walked past Crosby, she placed a firm hand on his shoulder and squeezed.