THEY went a little further than maybe they had to.
It was all a result of the accident.
I wasn’t in the accident, you understand. Everyone thinks that was it, but it wasn’t. All this was . . . well, damage from within. Emotionally shattering, I guess.
The only thing odd you’ll notice about me is the drooping eyelid. The left eyelid. I notice it tends to bother people a little at first. They don’t want to look straight at me. Maybe they think I mind. But I don’t. It’s a little thing and sometimes I think it even makes my dull, old face a little more interesting. You see, I’m really past the age when . . . but I’m not starting very logically.
I am not, perhaps, the most interesting person in the world. Age forty-five, I.Q. 110, five feet four inches tall weighing a hundred and fifty pounds. Widow with no children. (They were all killed in the accident and I’d stayed home to get the bills paid and write a letter or two. If I’d known they were going to get killed I’d have gone, too. It’s odd, but I find myself regretting that most of all.)
* * * * *
She’s a fool, you know. She’s all tied up in the past and she thinks she’s real virtuous devoting herself to the memory of my husband and children like that. So they’re gone. Too bad, I’m not. There’s a thing or two she didn’t learn in those 45 years—old, fat thing! I don’t like to eat and I’m slim. Only I can’t get out of here.
* * * * *
O, AND my name is Margaret Tilden—Meggie. You’ll be wondering why I think a story about me would be interesting. Well, for one thing, the psychiatrist told me I shouldn’t just assume I’m dull. (But housewife, age forty-five, doesn’t it sound dull?) I haven’t been psychoanalyzed, you understand. If I had been, they don’t say anything but Uh and Ah, I understand.
It was the experiment, that’s what I thought you might find interesting. It was partly chance and circumstance that it happened to me, I guess.
It just happened that when I heard about the accident I went into a coma. I’ve never had any mental illness before, you understand, but this was a terrible shock. Anyway, I had to be brought to the hospital. And I just happened to drop into the lap of an experimental project they had going on.
I don’t even remember the treatment, I was that far gone. What I do remember is coming to and feeling—not sad, not shocked, not grieving for my dead. Something much worse. I felt unreal. I had to look at my arms and legs and try to believe it was me. And remember the past and feel that it happened to me.
Maybe I can’t make you understand what this kind of feeling is. As though I were an appliance that had been turned off. And I kept searching around in my mind for the right thought, the right button to press to make me go on again. (Does this sound very silly?)
I knew that what waited for me was hopeless, helpless grief. And you might wonder why I should go seeking that when I could lie in a comfortable bed feeling nothing, nothing at all.
Let me point out that even “comfortable” bed meant nothing to me. Nothing, nothing, nothing. How can I describe the awful nothingness of nothing?
* * * * *
ACTUALLY, I’M glad they’re dead. There. I said it and why not? I get sick of all the hypocricy in the world. The only difference between me and everybody else is that I don’t mind admitting I’m no plaster saint. And I don’t mind admitting that all my life I’ve felt as though I had a pillow stuffed over my face every time I tried to open my mouth.
It was Her, of course. Her mealy mouth could open any time it wanted to. And all that time she was happy—or she pretended to be happy. That’s all very well, but what about me? Me, me. me!
How does the genie feel when it gets out of the bottle?
Well, I’m not all the way out of the bottle yet Genies are powerful, you know, but they’ve got to trick their way out of the bottle. A trick. That’s what I need.
Where do I start?
* * * * *
But you see I couldn’t find the right thought, the right button to press, and I wouldn’t be able to because what I had developed was schizophrenia. You’ll be thinking I had a split personality. No, that isn’t really what schizophrenia means. Dr. Blumenthal (the psychiatrist) explained it to me but I couldn’t possibly remember all that. I do know I had a serious mental illness and it even brought a change of life, which I guess I was due for anyway. So I had those physical symptoms plus my psychiatric symptoms.
So you can see where I jumped at a chance to have all my problems solved by an operation. And to do something useful for science at the same time—I felt so useless. My life was all for Henry and the children and now . . .
Of course they explained the operation wasn’t fool-proof and the results couldn’t be predicted with any degree of accuracy. I went into it knowing it wasn’t quite safe.
And in fact, not quite . . . human.
* * * * *
SHE’S always trying to dramatize herself. I say, a fact’s a fact and what does it mean, Human? Like the French say about sex, if it can be done, its normal. It wasn’t done fairly, of course. She got the right eye, which is the best one.
As soon as I heard about the operation I jumped at the chance. I didn’t realize the most important part” of it would be a side effect. But I saw a chance to become world famous—and it sounds like money to be world famous. Interviews on TV, articles in magazines—and hell, these scientists pull down a big salary. Why not charge them for the privilege of examining me? They do things for money. I do things for the glory of Science. Does that sound fair to you?
That Dr. Blumenthal, he has a greasy face and little rat eyes. He wants the money and the glory and he won’t let me do a damn thing. He says he isn’t ready to publish his results yet and that he doesn’t want garish publicity.
His results! What does he think I am, a paramecium?
* * * * *
Actually (this isn’t making it very interesting, but I want to tell the truth) the only effect of the operation I can swear to is that my left eyelid droops. For a while I had trouble seeing out of one eye, but to tell the truth my vision seems as good as it always was by now.
Dr. Blumenthal tells me I can control the muscles in my left eyelid, though I cannot have the vision of the eye. Well, I’m not really much concerned about it.
Of course my head was shaved and my hair is still quite short—about two inches long now, but I believe I’ll keep it short. I think it looks rather nice this way. There’s just a thin scar and I have thick hair.
I’m very glad I had it clone. Somehow I feel much freer and better. And I’m sure I enjoy all the attention I get from the doctors and everybody.
Dear Dr. Blumenthal! Such a lovely, kind man and really quite good looking. It’s amazing he’s remained a bachelor all these years. I don’t mean . . . what I mean is, I’ve heard women always fall in love with their psychiatrist. He’s not my psychiatrist of course. I mean you’d hardly call this a psychoanalysis. But I think he understands that part, too.
* * * * *
I COULD have laughed. In fact, I did laugh, but then all the laughing I did had to be to myself. The operation, Dr. Blumenthal said, would serve not only the function it was supposed to serve, but it would also, merely by the fact of having the operation, serve to alleviate the strong guilt feelings and the death wish he said I harbored in some part of my mind.
Guilt feelings? What good would it have done anybody if I’d gotten killed, too. And besides, Henry had it coming to him and who can blame me for wishing he was dead.
Over and over.
Once for each child.
If they thought I was neurotic they should have seen Henry—the prissy louse. If you can imagine anybody being prissy and lascivious at the same time. Prissy with me and lascivious with other women.
You see, what he did was periodically start a love affair. And it wouldn’t work. I mean, he couldn’t. So he’d come home and prove his manhood by getting me pregnant. You see? You see what I went through.
All three times
, that was how it happened.
And those were the only three times. Those other women, they at least had the satisfaction of laughing at him. She wouldn’t even let me do that.
And Dr. Blumenthal says I subconsciously wished they were all dead.
* * * * *
Dear Dr. Blumenthal has suggested a lobotomy. On the half of my brain I don’t use, of course. He says he doesn’t want to keep me in the hospital forever and I’ll want to go out and live a normal life.
Does it sound odd to talk about living a normal life with half your brain gone? Well, it would have to me, too. But the brain isn’t like an arm or a leg. When a part of the brain is gone, other parts can take over the lost functions and actually people don’t come near using all of their brain when they have it (as most people do). And what they did with me was the culmination of a long series of operations starting with monkeys. They didn’t just cut my brain in half. They separated out the part of my mind which was causing me trouble and instead of just cutting the connections to it, they connected it up with one of my eyes. (This was the part of the operation that was experimental, and that I had to volunteer for. In fact I had to insist on it. I wanted it done, because I could see the scientific value of doing something like this with a human being instead of with just monkeys. I pointed out that it would even be unethical to kill off part of my mind without giving it a chance to see if it could function by itself. Why should I have any more right to exist than it? But my most telling point was that I was the perfect subject. I have no dependents, I had no previous history of mental disease and in spite of the fact that I was in the grip of an emotional disorder, I think I was perfectly capable intellectually of deciding of my own free will that I wanted to volunteer.
Does it sound like something unethical was done? No, no. There are a number of operations for mental disorder and this was done primarily as a curative measure. Very successful it was, too. Or will be, after the lobotomy. You see, I have these periods of blankness . . .
Yes, I will be glad to have the lobotomy and be out of this stuffy room, though I certainly wouldn’t want Dr. Blumenthal to cut his experiment short just for that reason.
I mean, I do have his visits to look forward to and it means so much to have a strong man to lean on since I’ve lost Henry. And I can’t help thinking I mean more to him than just another patient. Though of course it’s purely Platonic. I’m sure. Even though he did do something unusual. It was when we were discussing what I’ll do after my lobotomy. I was saying how hard it was to go back and try to take up my life again, and he reached out and held my hand!
* * * * *
I HAD what I thought was to be my last check up with the surgeon. Questions, questions, questions. I didn’t answer one of them. I expect to get paid, I said, for every question I answer from now on. That shut him up, I can tell you.
Then I did something stupid. I threatened to expose the surgeon and Dr. Blumenthal and everybody else. I didn’t mean it, of course. But they all act so damn superior. I told them I was going to say they tricked me into the operation. Of course I had signed a release. . . . They scare easy, these doctors.
They tossed me in a locked room for “observation.”
I wasn’t thinking fast enough. I haven’t had time. I’ve gone and showed my hand. I didn’t realize soon enough—this is all too new—but my best bet would have been to lie low. Just not to exist until I was out of reach of the damn doctors. That Dr. Blumenthal, he uses forceps on your mind.
But they can’t any of them read inside of my mind.
And I’m getting an idea or two.
While I practice holding up my right eyelid. I’ve got to learn to do it, because She’s got the involuntary control of it.
So today he came in while I was practicing. When I heard the door click I quick dropped my left eyelid—which meant I couldn’t see too well, but all I had to do was sit there and talk. And act sweet.
That’s not hard to do. I can always tell from his questions what he wants me to answer. You learn that from having a husband. All those years of being a housewife—that was experience, of a kind. Henry took advantage of her. She knew about those other women. But she wouldn’t admit, even to herself, that she knew.
I don’t mind admitting it. And I don’t mind admitting that the male species owes me a lot of revenge. I hate them all. And Him. That Doctor Blumenthal.
Not her, though. I know how she’d think and act.
So that’s how I acted, only I added a little of my own. I reached out and took his hand, for comfort. I know this surprised him, but it didn’t displease him. I know these men! You see, I’m (we’re) his creation and he’s proud of us on his own behalf. But human emotions don’t separate themselves out so easily, and after all I’m a woman and he’s a man and some of it spills over.
He talked a lot to me about her, meaning me, really, only he didn’t know it. He’s so easily fooled! He’s wondering if I’m disturbed by living in the same skull with her. And he thinks she’s (I’m) unbalanced!
Normal, he says. She’s normal and I’m not. As if he’s the one who decides what’s normal and what’s not.
So he talks calmly of murdering me.
But of course it would be unbalanced of me to think of murdering him.
Now is that fair?
* * * * *
THE lobotomy is set for Friday and I must say, Dr. Blumenthal was as usual right. It is necessary that it be done, and be done soon. The periods of blankness are getting longer and longer and I always wake up to find myself so tired. What could I be doing when I’m not there to see?
And this depression I’ve been having. It’s partly the onset of grief, now that I have my emotions back. At first I was so glad to feel real again that I was glad just to be able to cry. But now I guess the reaction is setting in and I’m beginning to think of the long, grey years ahead with no one for me to care for.
If I could only be of use to somebody!
* * * * *
It’s the most exhilarating feeling! I even dance up and down the room when no one is here. Everything I do seems to succeed. O, that operation was a lucky thing.
It’s the first time in my life I’ve ever felt really free, really happy, able to do exactly what I want to do.
And O, boy, do I have plans! Plans, plans, plans.
First, I found I could control that drooping eyelid. Then I found I could fool Dr. Blumenthal into thinking I was her. Then—and this was the most important part of all—I found I could take control whenever I wanted to.
She has the strongest half, but she doesn’t use her power so it doesn’t do her any good. She forces herself to be self-effacing. Uses her strength to overcome herself, if you can imagine it. And I’m supposed to be the one with a psychosis!
I’ve asked Dr. Blumenthal to do me a favor. I want to go for a nice ride up through Blue Mountain and back one afternoon before the lobotomy. Since that’s only two days, and they’ll be doing things to me Thursday afternoon, I guess it’ll be tomorrow.
* * * * *
IT WAS the eyelid.
I didn’t like it, I tell you.
No, of course that didn’t have anything to do with what I did. As a psychiatrist, I don’t have likes and dislikes.
Now is not the time to explain all that. I’m upset, naturally. You’ll just want to know what happened. That won’t be easy to tell without going into the background of the patient.
No, of course I don’t ordinarily go picnicking on Blue Mountain with one of my mental patients. The one I took was not a mental patient. She was perfectly normal. A charming woman with a very strong ego.
The eyelid? You’re suggesting that I threw her against the rock because I was annoyed at her drooping eyelid? No, no. Legally, no, though subconsciously. . . . Legally, I was defending myself. It was self-defense.
I did call for help. But meanwhile I had to do something to keep from falling off the mountain. I’d like to see you gauge your shove when you’re about
to fall off a hundred foot drop and you have half a second to make plans in.
And there’s an insane eye staring at you. The wrong eye.
You don’t understand the strength of the insane. The fact that she’s smaller than me has little to do with the situation. In the first place she caught me completely unawares. I didn’t even know we were near a drop. There were a group of rocks in the way of the view. And in the second place, her strength was operating at full capacity.
Please. As her physician I insist on riding in the ambulance. I really see no need for me to have to defend myself, but if you must question me, at least don’t take me away from my patient.
No, I won’t be doing the medical treatment. I imagine it’s a concussion but there is no way to know how serious it is until we get to the hospital. I want to be with her when she regains consciousness.
There would be no cause for alarm.
You see, as I pushed her back, to prevent myself being thrown over the edge of the cliff, her reactions when falling against the rock were involuntary. And since the desirable half of her personality is basically the stronger, that’s the part which would have taken over and involuntarily protected itself by injuring the less desirable half of her mind. This may sound abstruse to you, but I assure you it’s psychologically sound.
Indeed, this whole thing may turn out to be fortunate and certainly it will be interesting in the extreme to see . . .
No, of course I do not think of my patients as guinea pigs. I mean fortunate for the patient. You can’t possibly understand.
YES, I know I have spoken of her as both sane and insane. Let me ask you to believe that it is an utterly unique situation. Not what you probably think of as a “split personality.” You will notice, if she regains consciousness, that it will be the right eye that opens, because that is her dominant side. The other half of the brain is not Meggie. It is not sane. It is . . . it is to be put out of operation by surgery that has already been scheduled. That’s why I say it may turn out to be for the best that . . .
Collected Short Fiction (Jerry eBooks) Page 26