My Mam got a bit nowty with her brother then and as she got up to leave she told him, ‘That’s what I’m trying to find out, Jason, whether he is ill!’
Only I wasn’t ill. I was never ill! I was fed up! That’s what I was. Fed up because I had no friends; fed up and getting fatter all the time from doing nowt but sit in the house watching daytime telly and eating pizzas and pot noodles. I was fed up that my Mam was up to something and wouldn’t tell me what it was; fed up because I’d sometimes look up and catch my Mam staring at me, looking at me like she didn’t know who I was any more.
But I wasn’t ill at all.
I just wanted my Mam to look at me like she loved me. And I wanted her to hug me and be friends with me again and tell me that everything was all right. But it was like there was a wall had been built between me and my Mam. My Mam still talked to me and watched Blockbusters with me. But she didn’t sit beside me on the settee no more. She just sat on her own in the armchair. And I had this feeling that somehow my Mam had become frightened of me.
And then one day she didn’t go to work like she should have done. And she told me then that she was taking me to town. And when I asked her what for she said she’d arranged for me to see somebody. I didn’t want to see ‘somebody’. I didn’t want to see anybody, apart from my Gran. But I couldn’t see my Gran because my Gran had gone to Grasmere on a rambling holiday with the Positive Pensioners who my Gran said were a particularly po-faced lot but it suited her because there was no frivolity and she could spend many a happy hour in the house of William Wordsworth.
I asked my Mam when my Gran was coming back. But my Mam just told me to get a move on or we’d be late. And when I asked late for what, my Mam said late for seeing the doctor.
‘What doctor?’ I said. ‘I don’t need to see a doctor. I’m not ill!’
‘Not a doctor doctor,’ my Mam said. ‘He’s a special doctor. A private doctor.’
I said, ‘I don’t want to see a private doctor! What do I need to see any kind of doctor for?’
‘Come on,’ she said, ‘stop asking questions and just get ready.’
I started putting my shoes on. I said, ‘Is this because you don’t love me any more?’
My Mam looked shocked then and she said, ‘Don’t love y’? Of course I love y’.’
‘Then why are you making me go and see a doctor,’ I said, ‘if you love me?’
My Mam sighed and closed her eyes then and she said, ‘It’s because I love you that I am taking y’ to see a doctor. If I didn’t love y’ then I wouldn’t bother, would I?’
I wanted to be glad and happy that my Mam had said she loved me. But it didn’t really count because the way she said it, it was almost like she was shouting at me. I just carried on putting my shoes on. And my Mam said, ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of; nothing to be worried about at all.’
I looked up at my Mam. ‘Well, if there’s nothing to be worried about,’ I said, ‘why are y’ taking me to see this doctor in the first place?’
My Mam let some of her narkiness out then and she said, ‘Look! I’m your mother and I’m trying to do the best for y’. I’m your mother! I wouldn’t do anything to harm y’, would I? Would I?’
I looked at my Mam and I shook my head.
‘Right!’ she said. ‘So stop asking questions! You’re just a little lad. You don’t need to know every single detail of what’s going on, Raymond. All you need to know is that I’m taking you to see the special doctor. He’s nice. You’ll probably like him. So just get a move on and stop asking questions.’
I followed my Mam out of the house. And as we were walking down our path I said, ‘You think I’m stupid, don’t y’?’
My Mam just sighed and rolled her eyes and said, ‘God give me strength!’
She held the gate open for me and as I went through it, I said, ‘Well, if you don’t think I’m stupid, just stop calling him the “special” doctor. That’s what’s stupid,’ I said, ‘calling him that. You don’t need to say that because I know what sort of a doctor it is.’
‘What then?’ my Mam said, sticking her head out towards me.
‘A psychiatrist!’ I said. And I stuck my head out too.
‘Well, you’re wrong!’ my Mam declared, all triumphantly. ‘Because it’s not a psychiatrist! I wouldn’t take y’ to see a psychiatrist! Why would I take you to see one of those?’
I shrugged. And my Mam said, ‘Oh come on, look, there’s the bus. Run.’
We sat there in his room, me in front of his desk and my Mam sat on a chair behind me. And he wasn’t a bit nice. He wasn’t nice at all, like my Mam had said he was. He had a bald head and a big bushy beard so it looked as though his head was on upside down. And the first thing he said to me was, ‘So, Raymond, do you know who I am?’
I just nodded. It was a stupid question. I didn’t even answer it. I knew who he was and he must have known who he was so what was the point in answering him?
‘So,’ he said, like he was starting to get impatient with me and we’d only been there two minutes, ‘who am I then?’
My Mam nudged me. And I didn’t like her nudging me and I didn’t like him. I said, ‘Psycho The Rapist!’
When I said that he looked at me like he was all shocked and surprised and my Mam put her hand to her mouth and whispered, ‘Oh my God!’
‘Psycho The Rapist?’ he said, frowning at me as if I’d just said something really stupid. ‘What could possibly lead you to believe that I’m called Psycho The Rapist?’
I pointed at the card that was stood on his desk and I said, ‘Because that’s what it says on there!’
He lifted the card up then and turned it round and looked at it. Then he turned it back so it was facing me and he pointed at the word with his finger like he was an infants teacher teaching ‘A’ for Apple and ‘B’ for Ball.
‘Raymond, this word,’ he said, ‘it says, “psycho … therapist”. “Psychotherapist”. You say it. You try it, “psychotherapist”.’
I just shrugged and I said it, ‘Psychotherapist.’
And he nodded then and he said, ‘Good. Good.’ But then he frowned and he said, ‘But I’m wondering why it is, Raymond, that you erm … interpret such a word as reading “Psycho The Rapist”?’
He was getting on my nerves. And if he’d ever read any Marvel comics he would have known because in ‘Fantastic Four’ (issue 5) that’s where Psycho-Man first appears and that’s why I’d seen ‘Psycho The Rapist’ in ‘psychotherapist’. And perhaps I shouldn’t have said it but I was still mad at my Mam because she’d sort of lied to me. She said she wasn’t taking me to see a psychiatrist but he was a psychotherapist anyway so that was like denying that the wallpaper wasn’t red because what it really was was crimson!
He was looking at me. And he put his hands together with his fingers touching his nose as if he was saying his prayers as he said, ‘I’m also wondering why it is that you seem rather … obsessed really … with matters of a sexual nature.’
I turned and I looked at my Mam. But my Mam wouldn’t look at me. And when I turned back and looked at him, Psycho The Rapist, he said, ‘Yes, I have spoken with your mother, Raymond. Your mum came to see me earlier in the week. So I do know a little bit about you, Raymond. I know something of your family history and … about your father.’
I was really mad at my Mam then. Because my Mam hadn’t told me she’d been to see anybody! And she’d told him about my Dad! She’d said things about my Dad.
I turned round to her again and I said, ‘What sort of things about my Dad? What have you been saying about my Dad?’
‘Raymond!’ he said, Psycho The Rapist. ‘Would you turn this way please?’
But I didn’t turn round and I said to my Mam, ‘He wasn’t daft, my Dad. He wasn’t daft at all! And there was never anything wrong with him and you should tell my Uncle Jason that when he tries to make out that my Dad was a bit demented because he wasn’t demented at all!’
‘Raymond!!’ Psycho s
aid again. ‘Please. You’re here to talk with me, Raymond, not with your mum.’
I turned back to face him again. And it was like they’d got together about it all, him and my Mam. It was like my Mam was more friends with him than she was with me! He tried to smile at me. But because his beard was so bushy you couldn’t see his lips, so the smile was like suddenly seeing a set of dentures in a privet hedge.
‘We can talk about your father later,’ he said. ‘For now I think we should concentrate on matters such as … the things you did at the canal, Raymond. And the kind of things you’ve been saying to your little cousin.’
I couldn’t believe it! I couldn’t believe that my Mam had told him about those things.
‘Because …’ he said, ‘I think we may possibly have the beginnings of a pattern here, don’t you, Raymond?’
I didn’t say nowt. I just sat there with my head down, staring at the feet of his desk.
‘You see, I’m rather intrigued, Raymond,’ he said. ‘Interested that … these things your mum’s told me of … they’re … well, do you think there’s any connection between those things?’
I just shrugged.
Then he said, ‘And you walk in here today, Raymond, and here you are, within seconds of meeting me, you’re referring to me as something called “Psycho The Rapist”. Now, come on. Don’t you see any kind of a connection there?’
I still didn’t say anything. I couldn’t believe that my Mam had told him about the flytrapping! And he was sitting there like he knew things about me now. But he didn’t! He didn’t know anything about me! All he’d heard were some facts. And they weren’t even the right facts.
‘Come on, Raymond,’ he said, sounding like he was trying to be all pally and chummy, ‘your Mum tells me you’re quite a bright lad. So surely a bright lad, an intelligent lad like you, you’d have an opinion on something like that, wouldn’t you?’
I did have an opinion. And my opinion was that my Mam had deceived me and betrayed me! My Mam had gone talking to my Bastard Uncle Jason again and that’s probably why I’d been taken to see Psycho The Rapist in the first place.
‘Raymond!’
I suddenly realised he was talking to me again. He said, ‘Raymond, there’s not a lot of point in you sitting there and refusing to say anything at all. If I’m going to be of any help to you, Raymond, then we have to talk; and even talk about things that you might not want to talk about. Like some of the things your mother’s already told me.’ Then he said, ‘Do you have any idea why your mother has brought you here?’
‘Yes!’ I said, ‘I’ve got a very good idea why I’ve been brought here. I’ve been brought here because of my Uncle Bastard Jason!’
My Mam shouted then, shouted, ‘Raymond! Your poor uncle …’
But I didn’t care and I said, ‘Well, he is a bastard and I don’t care because he always upsets you! And their dog never needed a new gall bladder in the first place! And he’s always saying my Dad was daft and my Dad wasn’t daft! And I’m not daft neither,’ I said.
‘Raymond,’ Psycho interrupted, ‘please!’
I just looked at him and he was holding up his hand. ‘Raymond,’ he said, ‘nobody is suggesting that anybody is daft!’
‘Apart from my Uncle Bastard Jason!’ I said. ‘He’s always saying that my Dad was daft and my Dad wasn’t daft, he just had all the sweetness of sun-ripened oranges about him, that’s all! But my Uncle Jason was always jealous because he’s only a grapefruit!’
He just looked at me, Psycho The Rapist. And he cleared his throat.
‘My Dad wasn’t daft!’ I said. ‘And I’m not daft neither.’
He said, ‘Raymond, we don’t believe in words such as “daft” here. None of this is about “daftness” or silly words like that,’ he said. ‘I’m just here to try and help you, Raymond.’
But I didn’t need to be helped, not like he was trying to help me; asking his stupid questions and talking to me like I was an infant child. He said, ‘Do you understand what it is that a psychotherapist does, Raymond?’
‘Yes!’ I said. ‘I know exactly what a psychotherapist does. He neuters people!’
My Mam put her hand up to her mouth again then and said, ‘Raymond, for God’s sake.’
So I swivelled round in the chair and I told her, ‘Well, they do! Because my Gran said! She said that when Twinky McDevitt got sent to see the psychotherapist he got neutered and when she sees him in Sainsbury’s now he never pirouettes past the pizzas no more. He just pushes the trolley passively for his mother.’
‘Raymond!’ my Mam said and she was talking through clenched teeth and glaring at me with her eyes. But it was true. Because my Gran said she always loved seeing little Twinky McDevitt foxtrotting down the aisles in Sainsbury’s and doing his pirouettes. And my Gran said Twinky McDevitt should never have been sent to see a psychotherapist in the first place because he was just a homosexual, that’s all, and what he really needed was a stage and a nice costume and some good bright lights, not sent to see a sodding psychotherapist! And my Mam had agreed when my Gran had said that! And here she was, taking me to see a psychotherapist now and apologising to him, shaking her head and saying, ‘This is how he’s become, doctor. He just … just comes out with these things. And does these things. I barely recognise him any more.’
But Psycho just nodded and lifted up his hand as if to calm my Mam down. And he said to me, ‘You see, there we have it again, don’t we, Raymond: “neutered”.’ He looked at me. ‘And all these things, Raymond, these episodes and outbursts, the flies at the canal, the sort of things you’ve been saying to your little cousin about … sexual intercourse; things you’ve been saying to me, Raymond, “Rapist”, “neutered”. Do you see, do you see how these things might be connected?’
But they weren’t connected! They weren’t connected at all. The only thing that connected them was me. Because they were things that I’d said and things that I’d done. But all he was doing was just picking a few things out of all the hundreds of thousands of other things that I’d said and done. And anybody could connect things up like that if they wanted to. So I just picked out the first thing that came into my head.
‘Water!’ I said.
He frowned at me.
I said it again, I said, ‘Water! I drink water. I get washed in water. When I wee, I wee water. And when it rains I get wet in water. Water!’ I said. ‘There’s all them connections, but it doesn’t mean I’m a goldfish, does it!’
I only said it because I thought it might shut him up and he might let me go home then. But he just nodded and he sort of smiled again and said, ‘That’s interesting, isn’t it? That’s extremely interesting, Raymond: water. The canal! That’s where this all started, didn’t it, Raymond, alongside a stretch of water!’
He was looking at me, waiting for me to answer him. He started saying something else but I wasn’t listening any more. Because it was like my mind had suddenly slipped away somewhere. I wasn’t in that room any more, with my Mam and Psycho The Rapist. I was back at the side of the canal; that day when Albert had fallen in and I’d dived down and rescued him. And then I was in the deputy head’s room later that same day, after everything had been discovered and the New Headmaster had made it all turn bad and dirty. And I’d just had to sit there on my own and wait for my Mam while she was being summoned from the supermarket and told all about it. I’d had to wait for ages; ages and ages and ages, before the door had opened; and my Mam had stood there, looking at me. But looking at me with disappointment and disgust in her eyes. Looking at me like she didn’t know who I was any more.
‘Raymond!’
I looked up, at Psycho The Rapist. He was trying to tell me something about attending his clinic where he did his research. But I wasn’t really listening. Because I knew now. I knew why my Mam had looked at me like she didn’t know who I was any more. I knew why I’d sometimes catch her staring at me with a puzzled sort of look on her face. I understood it now.
Psy
cho The Rapist was showing us to the door and telling my Mam something about making the necessary appointment. Then we were walking down the road and back towards the bus stop and my Mam was really mad with me and saying she was disgusted at some of the things that I’d said to Psycho. But it didn’t really matter any more because I knew now what I had to do; I knew how to make everything all right again. My Mam didn’t need to worry any more. She didn’t need to waste her hard-earned money taking me to see people like Psycho The Rapist. He was just stupid! He didn’t know anything. I suppose it was good that we went to see him though because if I hadn’t sat there and said what I’d said about the water then I might never have realised. And it was all so obvious now, as we got off the bus and walked up towards our house, with my Mam still all peeved and narked with me and saying that she didn’t know what to do with me any more. But I knew exactly what to do. It suddenly seemed so easy and so straightforward. And I wondered why I hadn’t thought of it before. It was all so simple, me being the wrong boy! That’s who had come back up out of the canal, the wrong boy; and that’s why my Mam was always looking at me like she didn’t know who I was any more. Because I wasn’t who I should be; I wasn’t myself! I’d never been myself, not since that day; that day when I’d dived in and rescued Albert Goldberg. All I’d ever been before that was a nice boy, a perfectly ordinary nice young boy who’d never have done things like telling his little cousin about shagging and prostitutes and Princess Leia being dead when she wasn’t. I’d never have done things like that; not if I was still the boy I’d once been. But he’d disappeared, the nice boy. And now I knew where he’d disappeared. He was still in the canal!
When we got into the house my Mam was still narked and not speaking to me. She said she didn’t know how she could face that poor doctor again after the sort of things that I’d been saying to him.
So I told my Mam, I said, ‘It’s all right, you won’t have to face him because there’s no need. And I don’t have to go to his clinic.’
The Wrong Boy Page 13