by Torey Hayden
“Cassandra, we just came from lockdown. Why were you in lockdown?” I asked.
She brought her shoulders way up and rolled her eyes in an exaggerated manner.
“Why were you in lockdown?” I asked again.
“Because they hate me.” She said this in a matter-offact, almost cheery fashion, as if it were the most obvious given.
“The staff told me you had been saying things to Selma that had frightened her and that’s why you were to go to time-out. Then you got very upset and so you were put into seclusion.”
Cassandra shrugged.
“What’s your version?”
“Silly-willy, peedy-poopy, biddily-boddily, ding-dong, nig-nog,” she replied and smiled.
Silence.
I looked at her.
She looked back at me, her gaze unflinching.
“Why’s this happening?” I asked. “Why, when I ask you something, do you say things like you just did?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“Why do you think it’s happening?”
“I don’t know.”
“Okay, maybe you don’t know, but why do you think? What’s your guess about why you do it?”
Again she drew her shoulders up in the exaggerated shrug. It wasn’t so comical this time, but it was off-putting. It gave her an aura of not really caring.
“Cassandra, things are pretty serious right now. You’re stuck here in the hospital. You can’t go to school. You can’t play with your sisters. You don’t have any of your belongings here. You can’t watch the TV shows you want. You can’t play on a computer or stay up late or have special food you like. You can’t see your mom or your friends or go places you like going. Life’s really messed up. I want to help you out of this. But for me to help you, you need to help me. You need to talk to me. Straight. Not tell lies. Not make up stories. Not say ‘I don’t know’ or ‘I don’t remember’ to everything.”
Silence.
“Do you understand what I’m saying?” I asked.
She averted her eyes and nodded slightly.
“So why do you think these things are happening?” I asked.
“What things?”
“These things. The things that have put you here. The lying. The silly answers to questions. The trouble on the ward. Any of them. All of them.”
“I don’t know,” she replied.
I looked at her.
She looked back. “I don’t know.”
“I believe you. But do you think about it?” I asked. “Do you wonder why this is happening to you? Do you wonder why you forget so many things?”
A pause. Her gaze went inward, and the pause lengthened. She started to shake her head very, very slightly, but it was hard to know if it was in answer to my question or if she was responding to some inner thought.
“Cassandra,” I asked, “do people say you’ve done things that you really don’t think you’ve done?”
She nodded immediately. Looking up, she met my eyes, and for once it wasn’t a challenging look. The silliness, too, was gone. “Yes,” she said. “All the time.”
“What do you think about that?” I asked.
“I tell them the truth.” Her voice was soft. “I tell them I don’t remember doing that.”
“Sometimes … do you know you do things but it feels like maybe it’s not exactly you doing them? Like maybe you’re looking at yourself doing things? Sort of the way you look at other people doing things?”
She nodded.
“Like when? Could you give me an example of that? Could you tell me the last time you felt that way?”
“Nurse Nancy came in when I was having a shower last night. She put her hand on my body. She was going to feel me up but I pushed her away.”
“I don’t actually believe that, Cassandra. For one thing, Nurse Nancy doesn’t work at the time the kids here are having showers.”
“Well, I was wrong. It wasn’t Nurse Nancy. It was Lyle, who works on nights.”
“Sometimes, when we don’t want to think of one thing,” I said, “we put something else in our minds instead.”
“I don’t,” Cassandra replied, and she started to say something else but stopped. There was anticipation in the moment. She sat forward in her chair, as if intending to continue. I could feel the expectancy. Then the moment passed. She relaxed back in the chair and was silent.
“Did you want to add more to that idea?”
“No.”
Silence.
“Yes.”
More silence.
“No.”
Silence again. Quietly, I watched her.
“Yes. Yes, I—” She broke off. Narrowing her eyes as if looking at me from a long distance, she said, “Can I tell you something?”
I nodded.
“But don’t tell my mom, okay? Don’t tell her I told you, because she said never to say it to anyone.”
I braced myself to hear another sickening lie.
There was a long hesitation. Cassandra actually opened her mouth to speak, then didn’t but stayed that way for several seconds. Finally she closed her mouth. A few moments more passed, and then she tried again. “It makes me sound crazy,” she said in quiet voice. “That’s why my mom’s said never to tell it.”
“I’m sure your mom means well, but sometimes people tell us things that aren’t helpful. This might be one of them.”
“She’s trying to protect me. She says they’ll take me away if I’m crazy. They’ll lock me up.”
I didn’t point out that that had already happened, so not telling hadn’t really worked either.
Perhaps Cassandra was thinking this herself. She gazed at me but not in the brassy, insolent way she normally maintained eye contact. There was an inwardness to it, as if, on one level, she were regarding me, and on another level, she were considering, weighing …
A pause.
“What I’m not suppose to tell …” she said softly, “is that I’ve got people talking in my head. Like Selma does. I’m crazy, like Selma, because I hear people saying things to me, too. And I can’t always tell when what they’re saying is true or not.”
“What kind of people?”
“I don’t know. Mostly I just hear their voices. I don’t see them. Sometimes they’re talking to me. Sometimes they talk to each other. Like Minister Snake. That’s one of them. That’s his name. When I was sitting in seclusion, Minister Snake was saying, ‘You gotta pray now. You done something so bad. You sucked his cock and you’re so bad.’ And Cowboy Snake, he likes that kind of music. You know. That cowboy music that sounds like someone howling. Kind of Ow-ow-ow-ow.” She gave a wobbly imitation of the yodeling sound common in some old country music. “And when Minister Snake gets talking, Cowboy Snake sings real loud so that I can’t hear what Minister Snake’s saying anymore.”
“I remember you talking about Cowboy and Minister Snake before. And there were other Snakes, too, weren’t there?”
Cassandra nodded. “Fairy Snake. She’s little. She’s, like, three and she’s really pretty. I take care of her. I don’t let them hurt her because she’s just little.”
“And these are voices? You hear them in your head?”
Cassandra nodded.
“Are they pretend, do you think? Part of your imagination?”
“I don’t know,” she said. A pause. “They’re friends. My friends. That are just inside me. But they’re real. Well, sort of real. I mean, there’s different kinds of real. Most people think there’s only one kind of real, but actually, there’s more. There’s this other kind, too, where you can’t touch things because they’re in your head. But they’re real, too.”
I nodded. “Yeah, I know what you mean. I understand that kind of real.”
She looked at me. It was a soft look and, for the first time, she seemed unguarded.
“It’s useful for me to know about your friends,” I said. “I’m glad you told me, because knowing about them lets me find ways to help you.”
“I don’t think so. Your mom’s worried about you. She just doesn’t really know what to do.”
“She’s trying to take care of me the best way she can,” Cassandra said solemnly.
I nodded.
There was a small pause and Cassandra pursed her lips. “My mom’s not so good at taking care of me. She let my dad get me.”
“Sadly, sometimes bad things happen, even when we do our very best. What happened to you was very scary, though, wasn’t it?”
Cassandra nodded.
A long silence came then. Cassandra’s eyes were unfocused and she appeared lost in thought. The room went deeply quiet, so much so that I could hear the very faint whirring of the video camera beyond the one-way mirror.
At last she let out a long breath. Dropping her head, she said, “I’m tired.”
“I understand.”
“Can I go back to the unit now? I can’t think on this any more.”
“Okay.”
Chapter
20
When Harry Patel came into my office the next day, he was holding a sheaf of papers. Reaching out, he gently pitched them onto my desktop. “Well, make what you will of this,” he said.
I craned forward to see it. It was the report on Drake’s assessment from the Mayo Clinic.
“It seems thorough. Audiology and Ear, Nose, and Throat. All perfectly normal. Neurology, EEG, MRI. All perfectly normal,” Harry said. “So I guess I can understand the family’s not wanting us to put the boy through all this again. But … it does pass the buck squarely to us.”
I looked at him.
“And leaves us with a few difficult questions. Like: Why doesn’t the boy talk? What’s wrong with him? And why are we making no progress?”
I stared at the papers on the desk.
“They’re coming on Monday,” Harry said. “We’re going to have to tell them something. Tell them we’ve found something or tell them we’re doing something or …” He grimaced. “Or something.”
After Harry had left, I pulled the papers around in front of me to read them. It was a photocopy of the official evaluation, and it was nothing if not thorough:
This 3 year 9 month child has been seen for the first time at the Child Development Center by Dr. J. R. Pennell and Dr. D. Beretti. He had been referred by Richard Davis, MD, pediatrician, because of failure to speak.
The report outlined how Drake had been seen not only by the medical team who investigated his hearing but also a pediatric neurological team and a psychiatric evaluation team. In all cases, Drake was judged healthy and at a normal stage of development. Nonverbal intelligence testing indicated he was at the higher end of the “bright normal” ability range, with an IQ of a 130.
I stared at it, trying to take it in. Reading the report made me aware how entrenched my gut feeling was that Drake’s lack of speech was due to physical causes. Despite my momentary misgivings about whether or not he was manipulative during our outing to the ice cream store, my overall belief remained: Drake was not withholding anything from us. He genuinely couldn’t talk. It so felt that way to me, even without knowing why.
Yet, here it was in black and white. If all the investigative power of the Mayo Clinic hadn’t found a physical reason for lack of speech, it was very unlikely I was going to discover one. So this did point squarely at psychological problems being the cause.
I realized I needed to adjust my attitude. It was arrogant to think that simply because I hadn’t seen an elective mute like Drake, he therefore could not be an elective mute. More than that, I had to accept the nasty fact that responsibility for successful intervention did lay squarely with me.
Having read the Mayo report through very thoroughly, I went into my session with Drake armed with determination. I set him and Friend in chairs side by side on one side of the table in the therapy room. I set the tape recorder on the table. I went around and sat down across from him.
“It’s time for us to get serious,” I said pleasantly but firmly. “Time for us to work really hard. I’m sure you’re ready to go home, huh? Your mom and dad are coming on Monday, and we want you ready to leave with them and go home, don’t we?”
Drake nodded.
“So let’s work really, really hard today, okay? Let’s get this big bad problem right out of the way.”
He nodded again.
I turned the tape of Lucia and Drake reciting nursery rhymes on.
Drake burst into tears.
“Oops, no. Let’s not get upset,” I said. “I know this is hard. I know it’s scary, but we’re going to just get right in there and get this out of the way. And I’m going to help you.”
Pulling Friend over, Drake buried his face in the fur.
I rose up and came around to his side of the table. Standing behind him, I eased him away from Friend. Taking hold of both his arms just above the wrist, I said, “I’ve made a special version of this tape. I’ve copied this part over and over so that we can play it and say the rhyme along. You’ll hear how I’ve done it. I’ll start the tape playing and we’ll all say it. You, me, your mom, and you again. Like there’s four of us here. A chorus, hey?”
I had rerecorded the tape Lucia had sent so that the “Hickety, Pickety” nursery rhyme played over and over and over—and I was taking no chances—so, it played over and over for a full thirty minutes.
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
I started to say the rhyme along with the voices on the tape. Standing behind Drake, holding his hands, I clapped them together to the rhythm of the words.
Drake was crying in his funny, breathy way. He didn’t struggle against my moving his hands, but he made no effort to stop crying either.
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
“You say it, too. Come on. We want to get through this, don’t we? Get this awful task out of the way. It’s really hard to start, I know. But once the first time happens … It’ll be easier after that. It’s just the first time that’s the hardest …”
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
Drake was sobbing.
I didn’t want to stop. Indeed, I was quite determined not to stop. Things were much clearer to me now—the degree to which Drake relied on charismatic behavior to get him what he wanted, while using dependent, piteous behavior to stop what he didn’t want. Such an uncompromising approach was awful, but we needed to break through this wall of silence.
“I’m sorry you’re upset, but we’re going to do this. Just like you’ve done on the tape. Just like you’ve done with your mama. Because we want you to go home with your mama on Monday. It’s very important we get this done.”
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
Drake was starting to struggle. I could tell he wanted Friend, so I lifted the enormous tiger up and set him on Drake’s lap.
“Here, Friend can help us, too. You take Friend’s hands. You hold his hands to clap along; I’ll hold your hands, and we’ll all clap along to the rhyme.” Which wasn’t terribly easy to do when a three-foot-tall tiger was sitting in the lap of a kid who wasn’t any taller. Especially when the kid wanted to do nothing more than bury his face in the tiger’s back.
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
Drake wasn’t going to cooperate. He continued to cry. I paused. Kneeling down beside the chair, I took a tissue and wiped his face. He had been crying most of the session, so he was soggy and reddened, wisps of his long girlish hair plastered to his cheeks and catching in his mouth.
“Here. Let’s take a moment to relax,” I said gently. Pulling out another tissue, I continued to mop up. “I know it’s hard. I know it’s scary. A lot for me to ask of you, isn’t it?”
Drake nodded fervent
ly.
“But I also know you can do it. If you really try. Just like you’ve done with your mama on the tape. I want to hear your voice, too, just like on the tape.”
This started him sobbing again.
“No. No, no, no. I know you’re upset. It’s all right to cry, but we’re still going to have to do it. I’ll help you. We’ll do it together. And you and I, I know we can.”
I waited a little longer, helped Drake blow his nose and wipe his eyes, and then we started off again. I continued on as I had, standing behind his chair, clasping my hands over his over Friend’s to clap along to the rhythm of the nursery rhyme. This seemed the most feasible way of going about the task because it kept us from having to make eye contact, it kept him close to the security of Friend, and the actions helped displace some of the intensity.
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
Over and over I did the rhyme, clapping the small hands and tiger hands together, hoping that the rhythm, the movement, the repetitiveness would prove a calming influence as well as an inducement to speak. Come on, I was thinking. Pleading, actually. Come on, come on, come on. You can do it. Come on.
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
He was crying again. He hadn’t ever completely stopped, but it was in a tired, hopeless way now.
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
Come on. Join in. SAY it, Drake. Come on. Please.
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
I heard him gasping, drawing breath in. Was this it? Were we almost there?
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …
Instead, he threw up. He’d eaten canned Spaghetti-Os for lunch, and there they were. All down his front, all over Friend’s back, everywhere.
I let go and stepped back.
The tape droned on.
Hickety, pickety, my black hen
She lays eggs for gentlemen …