Flashback (1988)

by Palmer, Michael

  The drive from their house to the Ultramed-Davis Physicians and Surgeons Clinic took fifteen minutes. For most of the ride, Barbara Nelms kept up a determined conversation with her son—a conversation that was essentially a monologue.

  “This doctor’s name is Brookings, Toby. He’s new in town, and he specializes in helping people with attacks like yours.… We’re going to get to the bottom of this, honey. We’re going to find out what’s wrong, and we’re going to fix it. Do you understand?”

  Toby sat placidly, hands folded in his lap, and stared out the window.

  “It would make it easier for Dr. Brookings to do his job if you would talk to him—tell him what it is you see and feel when you have the attacks. Do you think you can try and do that? … Toby, please, answer me. Will you try and talk to Dr. Brookings?”

  Almost imperceptibly, the boy nodded.

  “That’s good, honey. That’s wonderful. We all just want to help. No ones going to hurt you.”

  Barbara Nelms thought she saw her son shudder at those words.

  She swung her station wagon into one of the few spaces left in the crowded parking lot, locked her door, and then walked around the car to let Toby out. It was a promising sign that he had unbuckled his safety belt himself. Instantly, hope resurfaced.

  Perhaps this would be the day.

  The only other time she and Toby had been in the Ultramed-Davis Physicians and Surgeons Clinic was for a brief follow-up visit with Dr. Mainwaring. Toby’s pediatrician worked out of an old Victorian house on the north side of Sterling. A directory, framed by two large ficus trees in the gleaming, tiled lobby, listed two dozen or so doctors, along with their specialties. Phillip R. Brookings, MD: Chad and Adult Psychiatry was on the second of the three floors.

  “Toby, do you want to take the stairs or the elevator? … Honey, I promise you, Dr. Brookings just wants to talk. Now, which will it be?.… Okay, well take the stairs, then.”

  Barbara took his hand and led him up the stairs, half wishing he would react, make some attempt to pull away. He was plastic, emotionless. Still, she could tell he was completely aware of what they were doing.

  A small plaque by the door to room 202 read P.R. BROOKINGS, MD: RING BELL ONCE AND ENTER.

  The waiting room was small and windowless, with textured wallpaper, an array of black-and-white photographs of mountain scenes, and seating for only four. At one side was a small children’s play area, consisting primarily of dog-eared Highlights magazines, multicolored building blocks, and puzzles, none of which, Barbara knew, Toby would be interested in. She ached at the image of her son before it all began, huddled on the floor with his father, pouring excitedly over his Erector Set.

  No, Daddy, this way … turn it this way … See?

  At precisely three o’clock, Phillip Brookings emerged from the inner office, introduced himself stiffly to her with a handshake and to Toby with a nod. He looked even younger than she had anticipated—no more than thirty-two or -three, she guessed, although his thick moustache made it hard to tell.

  As so often had happened over the preceding months, Barbara found herself wondering if she had aged so much, or if doctors were actually getting younger.

  “So,” he said, taking one of the two remaining empty chairs, “welcome to my office. Toby, I appreciate your coming to see me, and I hope we can help you to feel better.”

  He wore a button-down shirt and tie, but no jacket, and Barbara’s initial impression, despite his youth, was positive. If nothing else, he had started off on the right foot by not talking down to the boy. She glanced over at Toby, who sat gazing impassively at the photos on the wall.

  “Here’s the medical history form you sent us, Dr. Brooking,” she said, passing the paper over. “You have the other reports I sent you?”

  Brookings nodded and briefly scanned the sheet.

  “I think,” he said, “that if it is all right with Toby, I would like to speak with him alone in my office. What do you say, Toby? … We can keep the door open if you want, okay?”

  He stood up and stepped back to the doorway of his inner office.

  “Are you coming?”

  “Go ahead, honey,” Barbara urged. I’ll be right here. Remember what I said. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

  Slowly, Toby rose from his chair.

  “Wonderful,” Brookings said. “Come in. Come in.”

  Silently, but with every fiber, Barbara Nelms cheered her son on. He was being more cooperative, more open to this man than he had been to anyone she had taken him to in some time.

  Perhaps, at last, he was ready. Perhaps …

  She watched as Brookings disappeared into his office. From where she sat, directly opposite the doorway, she could see a roomy, comfortably furnished office with a large picture window, and plants arranged on the floor and hanging from the ceiling.

  Go on, darling. Go ahead in. It’s okay. It’s okay.

  After a brief hesitation, Toby followed Brookings in.

  Then, after a single, tentative step inside the door, he stopped, his gaze riveted on the broad picture window across from him.

  “Come in, Toby,” Barbara heard Brookings say. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  Barbara could see Toby’s body stiffen. His hands, which had been hanging lifeless at his side, began to twitch.

  Dear God, she thought, he’s going to have an attack. Right here. Right now.

  “Toby, are you all right?” Brookings asked.

  Toby took several backward steps into the waiting room, his face chalk white, his eyes still fixed on the window.

  “Honey, what’s wrong?” Barbara felt her muscles tense. No one but she and her husband had ever witnessed one of the attacks before. Frightened as she was, she sensed a part of her was actually grateful for what was about to happen. At least someone else would know what they had been going through all these months.

  Instinctively, she glanced about for any objects on which Toby might hurt himself.

  Then, suddenly, the boy turned, threw open the outer office door, and raced out into the hall.

  “Toby!” Barbara and Brookings, who had come out of his office, called out in unison.

  The psychiatrist was across the waiting room and out the door before she had left her seat. Barbara reached the corridor just as he disappeared through the stairway door. Her pumps were almost impossible to run in. At the head of the stairs she kicked them off and skidded down to the first floor, (ailing the last three steps and skinning her shin.

  As she limped into the lobby, Barbara heard the horrible screech of an automobiles tires and froze, anticipating the sickening thump of the car hitting her son. There was none. Instead, through the glass doorway, she saw him weaving through the parking lot, running as she had not seen him do in many months. Phillip Brookings was a dozen yards behind and closing.

  Barbara raced across the drive, narrowly avoiding being hit by a car herself.

  “Toby, stop! Please stop!”

  The boy had made it beyond the parking lot and was sprinting across a stretch of thirty-or-so yards of lawn, toward the dense woods beyond. Brookings was now no more than a few steps behind him. With only a yard or two to go before the forest, the psychiatrist launched himself in a flying tackle, catching Toby at the waist and hauling him down heavily.

  “Thank God,” Barbara panted, hurrying across the parking lot. This was the first time, in all of his attacks, that Toby had done anything like this. Even at a distance she could tell that, although he was pinned beneath the physician, Toby was struggling. As she neared she could see his efforts lessen.

  “Toby, stop that,” she heard Brookings saying firmly, but gently. “Stop fighting me and I’ll let go.”

  Barbara approached cautiously, expecting to see the familiar lost, glassy terror in her sons eyes. What she saw, instead, was a fierce, hot mix of anger and fear. It was almost as if he were snarling at the man.

  Carefully, Brookings pushed himself away, although he still main
tained a grip on the boys belt.

  As Barbara knelt beside her son, she realized that this was not one of his attacks after all—at least not a typical one. He was awake and alert. Whatever had set him off was in this world, not in the world locked within his mind.

  “Toby, are you all right?” she asked. “What happened? What frightened you so?”

  The boy did not answer.

  “I’m going to let you go, Toby,” Brookings said. “Promise me you won’t run?”

  Again, there was no response.

  Slowly, Brookings released his grip on Toby’s belt. The boy, still breathing heavily, did not move.

  “What was it?” Barbara asked.

  “Pardon?” Brookings’s shirt and the knees of his tan trousers were stained with grass, and he, too, had not yet caught his breath.

  “Dr. Brookings, Toby saw something out your window—something that frightened him. This wasn’t one of his attacks.” She turned to her son, “It wasn’t, was it, honey?”

  Tears glistening in his eyes, Toby stared up at her. Then he shook his head.

  “Can you tell us what it was?”

  This time there was no answer.

  Phillip Brookings rubbed at his chin. “Mrs. Nelms, I don’t know what to say. I saw Toby staring out my window, and I followed his line of sight. But there was no one there, nothing.”

  “Nothing?”

  Brookings shook his head. “Just a big oak tree, a parking lot, and beyond it the emergency ward of the hospital. Nothing else. I’m sure of it.”

  The emergency ward. Barbara Nelms saw her son stiffen at the words.

  “Toby, was that it? Was it the emergency ward?”

  The boy remained mute.

  “Dr. Brookings, what would you suggest?” she asked. “Can you help us?”

  The psychiatrist looked down at Toby. “Perhaps,” he said. “Perhaps with time I can. But I would like to insist on something before I begin.”

  “Anything.”

  “I want Toby to have a CT scan and a clean bill of health from a neurologist. As near as I can tell from reviewing the material you sent me, he has had neither. Correct?”

  “I … I guess so.”

  “Well, if his attacks are some sort of seizure disorder, I think a neurologist should be involved, don’t you?”

  “Doctor, I told you when I first called, we’re willing to do anything. Absolutely anything. Is there someone you can recommend?”

  Brookings nodded. “There’s a new man in town. Yale Med. Trained at Harvard hospitals. He’s a neurosurgeon, actually, but he’s doing neurology as well. His names Iverson. Zachary Iverson. I’ll give him a call and then get back to you.”

  Barbara stroked her son’s forehead. There was nothing in his expression to suggest he had followed any of their conversation. For a moment, studying the sunken hollows around his eyes and the tense, waxy skin over his cheeks, she felt as if she were looking at a corpse.

  “Please, Doctor,” she said, “just one thing.”

  “Yes?”

  “Do it quickly.”

  Brookings nodded, and then rose and returned to his office.

  Barbara took her son by the hand and led him back to their car. Desperately, she searched her thoughts for any unpleasantness or difficulty he had encountered at Ultramed-Davis or in any other emergency ward. There was none. Nothing but a gashed chin when he was five and, of course, the incarcerated hernia operation last year.

  But Barbara Nelms knew—as the surgeon, Dr. Mainwaring, had told her—that the whole hernia affair had been as routine as routine could be.

  7

  Suzanne Cole and her six-year-old daughter, Jennifer, shared an isolated, narrow two-story north of town with a fat, yellow cat named Gulliver (“… because,” Jennifer explained, “he likes to travel”) and a black Labrador retriever who seemed oblivious to any name.

  The rooms in the modest place were cluttered and warm. Snow shoes, ski poles, tennis rackets, and even a pair of old stethoscopes hung on the smoke-darkened pine walls, interspersed with prints and original oils representing all manner of styles. There was a Franklin stove in the living room and a loom in one of the back bedrooms, as well as a battered spinet (“Mommy used to play a lot, but now she can only play ‘Deep Purple’ ”) and dozens upon dozens of books.

  The spaghetti dinner, Zack had been proudly informed, was largely Jennifer’s creation, and she served it with a charm and enthusiasm that made almost as deep an impression on him as did her mother. She was a tall girl for her age, with an elegant nose, straight auburn hair that hung midway down her back, and Suzanne’s magical eyes and smile. She talked of school and animals and ballet, and seemed quite pleased to show off her collections of rocks and stuffed animals.

  In return, Zack had promised to introduce her to Cheapdog and to teach her to fly his radio-controlled plane. He even completed a relatively smooth, Italian-style thumb palm and transfer, although when he was finished, Jennifer had smiled earnestly and said, “That one could use a little more practice, Zack. I could see the coin.”

  By dessert—chocolate brownies with ice cream—what self-consciousness he had arrived with had long since vanished, and he found himself feeling more like a friend of the family than a guest.

  If there was an uncomfortable edge to the evening at all, it was due to Suzanne, who seemed, at times, distant, distracted, and content to let Jennifer keep the conversation afloat.

  But unwilling to find any fault with the woman, Zack read into her mood swings an introspection and vulnerability that only made her that much more interesting and attractive.

  She was returning to the table with some coffee when Jennifer hopped up and announced that she was leaving to watch M*A*S*H and wash her hair.

  “There’s only one thing that troubles me,” the girl said as she shook Zack’s hand.

  “What’s that?”

  “Well, it’s your dog. I’ve heard of sheep dogs, but never a name like Cheapdog.”

  “Well,” Zack said, “they’re sort of the same thing.” From the corner of his eye, he saw Suzanne stop and lean against the wall, watching. “You see, I was walking on the beach one morning in a place called San Diego. Do you know where that is?”

  “In California?”

  Zack nodded. “They have a great zoo out there and a killer whale who does advanced calculus and prepares his own tax returns. Well, there was this man on the beach—he was Mexican, but he was sort of … sleazy. Do you know that word? Well, it means, like, sneaky. Not all Mexicans are that way, by any means, but this guy sure was.

  “Anyhow, there he was, with this big cardboard box, and in the box were a bunch of puppies—scruffy little mongrel puppies. He reached in and pulled this little fur ball up by the back of the neck. Like this. And hé held him up for me to see.

  “ ‘Señor,’ he said, ‘how would you like to buy this leetle fellow. I geeve you my word, señor, he is purebred, ol’ Een-gleesh cheapdog. His papers are een my safe at home. Buy him now, and I breeng them to you tomorrow. Si?’”

  “That means yes,” Jennifer said.

  “Si.”

  “And you said? …”

  “Si.” The three of them said the word together, and laughed.

  “And that’s how Cheapdog got his name.”

  “Isn’t there any old English sheep dog in him at all?” Jennifer asked.

  “There must be some,” Zack said, “because every time Princess Di or Prince Charles comes on the television, he stands up.”

  “That’s silly.” She thought for a moment, and then added, “I like that story.” Again, she formally shook Zack’s hand. Then she turned and raced up the stairs.

  “Thanks again for dinner,” he called out after her.

  “I like that story, too,” Suzanne said after the footsteps overhead had died away. “And I really liked the way you talked to Jen. Person-to-person, not grown-up to child. No condescension. And believe me, she appreciated it, too.”

  “T
hanks. That girl doesn’t encourage anything approaching kid talk, believe me.”

  Suzanne nodded somewhat sadly. “She’s had to do a lot of growing up in a fairly short time. My marriage and divorce were a bit—how should I say—turbulent.”

  “Oh?”

  For a moment, she looked as if she might want to expand on the remark, but then she shook her head. “Fodder for another evening,” she said.

  She chewed at her lower lip, rested her chin on one hand, and stared into her cup of coffee. There was a sadness in her eyes, but there was also, Zack observed, something else—a restlessness, perhaps; a tenseness in the set of the muscles in her face and neck.

  “Is anything the matter?” he asked.

  Suzanne hesitated, and then pushed away from the table and stood up. “I think we’d better call it a night,” she said. “I have a really busy day tomorrow, and I have a lot of things to sort through before I go to bed. You’ve been great company—for both of us—but I guess I just need some time alone.”

  Nonplussed, Zack glanced at his watch. It was not yet quarter to eight.

  “That’s it?”

  She shrugged and nodded. For a few seconds it seemed as if she were about to cry.

  “I’m sorry, Zack,” she said finally, “but I guess this just wasn’t a good night for me to be charming and entertaining. God, it seems like all I ever do around you is apologize. Well, forgive me, anyhow. I’ll make it up to you some other time. I promise.”

  She waited until he had stood up, and then locked her arm in his and guided him across the screened-in porch and down the wooden front steps. The subtle scent of her and the touch of her breast against his sleeve made his sudden dismissal that much more confusing and painful.

  He shuffled along beside her, wishing he were less inexperienced in understanding women, and feeling totally inadequate and foolish for not knowing what to say.

  At the camper, she once again apologized for cutting their evening short and promised him a rain check good for one after-dinner conversation sometime very soon. He reached for the handle and then stopped and turned back to her.

  “Yes?” she asked, eyeing him appraisingly, as she had that first night.