“Emily?” Brian was astonished. “What did she do?”
“We tried to start her on solid food, but she threw her breakfast tray against the wall. She then pulled out her IV and knocked over the stand. The nurse sent for me, and I tried to calm her down, but I had to threaten her with restraints before she would be still long enough to re-insert the IV.”
Brian could not conceive of Emily demonstrating such behavior. “I’ve never even known her to raise her voice,” he explained. “Could she have had a bad reaction to some medication?”
“The only medication she’s had is an antibiotic and a minimal amount of analgesic. She refuses even to talk to me. I’m hoping you can get to the bottom of this. I think it might well be prudent to call in a psychiatrist.” The neurologist left no room for discussion, so Brian excused himself and went with some trepidation to Emily’s room.
“Good morning, Emily. How are you feeling today?”
She reached into the drawer of her bedside table and drew out a section of newspaper. Through clenched teeth she said, “Why don’t you read this and tell me how I’m feeling?”
It was the write-up of her attack that had been run in the local paper Friday morning. It reported that police were investigating the brutal rape of a county employee believed to have been abducted from the library parking lot. It also described in graphic detail the conditions under which the unfortunate librarian had been found. Emily was not mentioned by name.
“Where did you get this?” Brian asked in a flat tone of voice.
“It doesn’t matter.”
Brian spoke carefully in a calm voice, “ I can understand that you’re angry about having to hear about this from the newspaper, but Dr. Vogler felt strongly that it would be best to wait to talk to you about it until you were stronger.”
“And since when does Brian McClellan ever listen to anybody on the subject of what’s best for me? Brian McClellan knows better than anybody, including me, what’s best for me. He is always in charge. He makes all the decisions. You picked a fine time to abdicate your role as the great dictator.” Her speech was clipped and each word flew at him in its own little cloud of rage.
Brian struggled to keep his composure, “It would be easier to talk about this if you would calm down.”
“I don’t want to calm down, and I don’t want to talk about it. The whole subject disgusts me. I disgust me. It’s no wonder you didn’t want to kiss me last night. I don’t want to be kissed by anybody ever again.”
There was a coldness in her anger that chilled, even frightened him. Usually he was unnerved most by her tears, but he would have vastly preferred tears to this cold fury. “Emily, I’m sorry. Obviously I was wrong not to tell you what happened. I think what’s important now is that we get to work putting this behind us and getting on with our life.”
“Right. Wave a magic wand and it didn’t happen. ‘Getting on with our life’? We don’t have a life, Brian, it’s over. It died a tragic death in the parking garage of the county library.” She stopped because she was overcome by a wave of pain. When she recovered her breath, she continued. “Go away, Brian, leave me alone. I don’t want to see you, and I don’t want Paul in here with his bag of psychiatrist’s tricks either. I can’t remember ever feeling so betrayed.”
There was nothing left for him to say, and he knew it. It would be pointless to try to have a meaningful conversation with her in her current frame of mind. It was painful for him to see her so hurt, so angry, and to know that he was in some measure responsible. Their relationship had always been built on honesty. All the progress they had both made in defeating old demons had come through facing hard truths, and he had deprived her of the ability to do that. He could have defied the doctor’s orders and told her the truth, but he didn’t want to have to see her pain when she found out how she had been violated. He had followed the path of least resistance, and it had led him to this disastrous pass.
He left a message at Dr. Vogler’s office explaining why Emily was so angry, he could have waited to see the neurologist, but was in no mood to deal with him. He felt more than ever that he should have told Emily the truth regardless of what her doctor said.
He followed his first impulse, which was to call Paul, if only to warn him that Emily didn’t want to see him. Paul was on duty at the hospital, and so the two agreed to meet for dinner at Brian’s house.
With a day to kill, Brian decided to check in briefly at his office and tidy up things there that required his attention. Co-workers were uncomfortable around him, unsure of what to say to a man who was supposed to be getting married in less than a week, but whose fiancé was the victim of an assault. Hallmark doesn’t make a card for it.
When he got home, he set about the small housekeeping tasks that pile up when neglected. Every thing he turned to seemed to remind him of Emily. The Monet print with its blue and purple overtones that Emily said made her feel peaceful, the couch where she loved to take a nap, the fireplace where she would stare for hours at the flames and think her deepest thoughts.
When Paul arrived they shared a quiet meal. When it was over they sat outside on the deck to enjoy the cool night air and the darkness that sometimes makes conversation easier. Paul was the first to speak, “So, what exactly did she say?”
Brian related Emily’s diatribe; he remembered it word for word with painful clarity. He described the icy-cold fury in her voice, the finality in the way she put things, the self-loathing she was obviously feeling. He felt the fear all over again as he described the conversation.
“Do you think she means it, that she really doesn’t want to see you anymore?” Paul asked.
“No, I think she was just lashing out because she was so angry about not knowing what happened to her. It was frightening to see her so upset, and in so much pain.” Brian answered.
Paul sat quietly for a minute as though contemplating whether or not to make an observation. Finally he spoke, carefully picking his words. “I could certainly be wrong here, but I think Emily has known what happened to her since at least yesterday when her head cleared out after the anesthesia wore off. I think reading it in the newspaper forced her to stop denying what she already knew.”
Brian immediately asked, “Do you think that she remembers the experience?”
“No, I think the trauma to the head really did cause those memories to be lost. But she had plenty of evidence from which to figure things out. There was a mirror on her bedside table yesterday. She could see her face, she could feel the bruises all over her body. She looked like a classic case of assault. And a when a thirty-three year old virgin is raped, there’s got to be pain that can’t be attributed in her mind to anything else. You know the first step in the grieving process is denial. Emily could deny the experience, but not once she read it in the newspaper. Now she’s been forced into the next phase of the process, anger.”
“She was certainly plenty angry. So, what do I do? If she ever calms down enough to talk to me, what do I say?” Brian asked.
“I’m going to sound like a shrink here, but what do you think you should do?” Paul said in response.
“Well, she’s still ignoring the physical pain. I think she’s got to admit that she hurts both physically and emotionally. I think I should stop trying to cheer her up and let her be sad until she’s finished. I’ve seen Emily cry over stories of lost children on the evening news, I’ve seen her cry over a stray cat, but I haven’t seen her shed a single tear since this whole nightmare started. I think I’ve got to make it okay for her to cry.”
“Sounds to me like you’ve got a pretty good handle on it. I would like to ask a nosy question. What did she mean when she said it was no wonder you didn’t want to kiss her? Did you not want to kiss her?”
“Of course I wanted to kiss her, but I didn’t want to hurt her. It didn’t seem right to be getting passionate right there in her hospital room. I was afraid that being so close to me might trigger some sort of fear related to her attack.” Brian�
��s answer rang true, and Paul explained why he had asked the question.
“I’ve seen men who were involved with rape victims pull away because, whether they were willing to admit it or not, they were repelled by women that they had previously been attracted to. If you feel that way to any degree, you need to deal with those feelings, because Emily will sense them and they could be devastating to her.”
Brian thought about what Paul had said very carefully, “I honestly don’t think I feel that way. Certainly I can relate to what you’re saying. I’ve seen women who were repelled by the sight of my arm, and it’s a deflating experience at best. It would have been awful if Emily had reacted to me that way. When I look at her now I feel as attracted to her as I’ve ever been, maybe more so because I’d like to try to replace the negative image in her mind and give her some positive feelings about her body.”
They spent the remainder of the evening largely in companionable silence. When Paul left it was with the assurance which he had made before, “She’s going to be all right, Brian, but you’ve got to give her time.”
The next day Brian went to the hospital and waited for an hour for the chance to speak to Dr. Vogler.
The confidence the neurologist carried with him as he strode into the office grated on Brian’s nerves, but he bit his tongue and simply asked, “How is Emily?”
“When she calmed down yesterday we did several tests and noticed a tendency to some trouble with eye-hand coordination, but I think that will pass. We are concerned about this new wave of despondency, and I’ve asked Dr. Harper to see her.”
“Dr. Harper, I take it, is a psychiatrist?” Brian asked the question in a flat tone of voice, masking the derision he wanted to express. Emily had made her opinions on the subject of psychiatry quite plain, the only exception that she saw being Paul, and at the moment she wasn’t speaking to him either.
“Yes, he’s a very competent therapist. He had a visit with her yesterday, and intends to see her again today, after which we will consult on the case.” Brian talked to many professional colleagues as part of his work, but studiously avoided the word “consult” as sounding pompous.
“I would like to talk to Dr. Harper, if that’s possible.”
“Well, I don’t think I’d have any objection to that. Why don’t you make an appointment with his secretary?”
Dr. Leo Harper was a small, thin man, five feet seven or so, with a fairly thin black beard and black horn-rimmed glasses. He had his first visit with Emily approximately two hours after her “temper tantrum.” Since Brian had left her room, she had refused to speak to anyone. When Dr. Harper entered the room and introduced himself, she had begun to calm down slightly. She was prepared to be civil, or at least try.
“I’ve read your chart and am aware of the extent of your injuries. I was asked by Dr. Vogler to come and chat with you. I think he felt that it might benefit you to talk about what’s bothering you.” As he spoke, he sat in a chair with his fingers intertwined in front of him.
“I see.” Emily responded non-committally.
“You’ve had a very traumatic experience.”
“So I read in the newspaper.” The acid in her voice was unmistakable.
“You recall nothing about it?”
“No, I don’t.”
“Well, why don’t you tell me something about yourself, Emily?” the doctor asked in a genial voice.
“Well, the first thing I’ll tell you is that where I come from a gentleman does not address a lady by her first name unless he has been invited to do so.”
“Does it bother you that I addressed you by your first name?”
“If it doesn’t bother you that you’re not a gentleman, I guess it doesn’t bother me, either.” The primness in her tone would have suited a charter member of the Daughters of the Confederacy.
“I seem to have gotten off on the wrong foot; perhaps we should start over. Would you please tell me something about yourself, Miss Stone?”
“I’m thirty-three years old, single, a librarian, born and reared in Raleigh. I’m a Christian. I like classical music. ”
When he realized that no other information was forthcoming, he asked, “Do I understand correctly that you’re engaged to be married?”
“Yes, although I obviously won’t make it for the wedding planned for this Saturday.” There was a slight unbending of the stiffness at this point, but it didn’t last.
“Tell me about your intended.” There was a studied nonchalance in his attitude, as if he was simply passing time rather than asking impertinent or nosy questions.
“I fail to see any possible reason why he need be a subject of our conversation.”
“I thought that perhaps he might be part of what is upsetting you.”
“I am...annoyed that he chose not to tell me the circumstances of my injuries, but I understand he was operating under limitations imposed by Dr. Vogler.”
“Is there any reason why you don’t care to discuss your fiancé with me?”
“I’m still not entirely sure why I should discuss anything whatsoever with you.”
At this point the psychiatrist surprised her by grinning and saying, “What could it hurt?”
Emily was rather disarmed at this approach. There was a tone in her voice that implied that the best way to deal with people like this is to humor them. “His name is Brian McClellan. He’s a pathologist at the School of Medicine. He likes impressionist art and baseball. What else do you want to know?”
“What does he look like?”
“Well, he’s tall, six feet two, and he has red hair and blue eyes. He’s sort of thin. He’s very attractive.”
“How old is Dr. McClellan?”
Emily’s already thin patience finally gave out completely. “What difference does that make? What difference does any of this make? A person becomes the victim of a random act of urban violence and is upset about it, so they say she needs a psychiatrist. Does that make sense to you?”
“What do...”
“Oh, please, don’t ask me what I think. I think you’re an idiot, I think this is a terrible hospital, and I think I’ve had enough of this conversation.”
The psychiatrist smiled his best professional smile and stood to go. “Perhaps you’ll feel more like talking tomorrow.”
And so while Brian was talking to Dr. Vogler the next day, Dr. Harper had his second visit with Emily.
“Good morning, Miss Stone.”
It was a good thing that Dr. Harper had a tough hide, because the look of deflation at the sight of him that passed across Emily’s face would have wilted a more sensitive man.
“I thought perhaps this morning we could discuss your childhood. Of course, that sounds like a stereotypical thing for a psychiatrist to say, but it is true that childhood experiences often have an effect on the way we react to situations in adulthood.”
Emily did not hide the disdain she felt, “I had a dreadful childhood. Now if I had grown up at Sunnybrook Farm, do you suppose I would have a different reaction to being attacked and left for dead?”
“If you had, as you say, grown up on Sunnybrook Farm, do you think you would have thrown your food against the wall and pulled out your IV yesterday?” Emily didn’t answer. She knew that he had scored a point. He continued, “What was dreadful about your childhood?”
Emily was very tired and more in a spirit of resignation than cooperation, she answered his question, “My father didn’t like me. He went out of his way to make that abundantly clear.”
“How did that make you feel?”
“Terrible, worthless, embarrassed. Nothing I did pleased him, I felt like a failure. I’ve outgrown all of that.”
“How did you manage that?”
“I became a Christian, for one thing,. Then I met Brian, and I looked at myself in a different way. I feel very secure about myself now.”
“Does what happened in the past week change that feeling of security?”
“The only way I even know w
hat happened last week was to read it in the newspaper. I still know who I am, and I like who I am. And if I’ve learned nothing else in the last week, I’ve learned how much I’m loved.”
“Dr. McClellan must be a very special person, a very wise man. How old is he?”
“He’s forty-seven.” Emily began to suspect that she knew where this was going.
The psychiatrist now shifted to another line of questions which seemed totally unrelated. “One of the things I’ve been hearing in your comments about the last week is your frustration. Would it be a fair statement to say that you’re feeling powerless?”
“Yes, I suppose so. Perhaps overpowered as well.” she answered warily.
“Is that the way you felt as a child when your father didn’t like you?”
“Yes, I was powerless.”
“That’s an interesting parallel, don’t you think?” Emily thought there was something inane in the way the psychiatrist acted as if his mind was wandering, when it was obvious to her that he had an agenda,
“I’m going to clue you in on a little secret, Dr. Harper, I don’t like you. I don’t like the way you ask questions, and I don’t like the way you impute significance to things that simply don’t matter. I consider this interview over, and I have no intention of having any further discourse with you. Now go away.”
When Brian called Dr. Harper’s office later that day to ask for an appointment in reference to Emily Stone, the nurse said that Dr. Harper was assigning Miss Stone to another psychiatrist. Dr. Vogler was out for the rest of the day, and there was no one left around who was either willing or able to explain to Brian exactly what was going on. There seemed nothing to do but wait until Emily calmed down enough to talk to him.
Brian went to bed early that day and was sound asleep by ten o’clock when the phone rang. He reached for it in the darkness, saying a little prayer that it wasn’t bad news.
“Hello, Brian, it’s Emily. I hope I didn’t wake you.”
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