His eyes raise to meet mine, and for once they don’t look lazy with amusement. “Alright,” he says. “If that’s the case, then I’ll do whatever you want me to, Doc.”
Good Lord, why did he have to put it like that? My body heats as images of him doing things—very bad things that a patient should definitely not be doing with a doctor—flash through my mind. And suddenly the mood in the room doesn’t feel very familial at all.
Cheeks flushed, I clear my throat and force myself back to the cognitive treatment plan. “Okay then, let’s start with a few math problems…”
Our first informal cognitive rehab session goes pretty well. And by the end of it, I know the IQ test they gave him wasn’t a one-off. He has a solid grasp of math, and a much bigger vocabulary than I would have (perhaps unfairly) assumed due to his deep southern accent combined with his generous usage of the word “ain’t.” He also has great recall, and even managed to draw a map of the eighth floor in his journal for me.
By the time we’re through, I can see why he set off a few red flags with psych. Other than his persistent amnesia, he scored way above average on all the informal cognitive tests I gave him. Which means it’s most likely not his traumatic brain injury keeping him from remembering things, but something else entirely.
I leave the iPad with him and tell him to keep doing the brain exercises on it. “Especially the word associations,” I say as I gather up my “V”irkin. “See what comes up.”
“Hey, Doc,” he says as I’m about to leave. Then he once more waits until I turn all the way back around to finish his thought. “Thank you,” he tells me, his tone and eyes sincere.
“Sure,” I answer, feigning like I’m not completely locked onto his gaze with a casual smile and a shrug. “Really, it’s nothing. It’s a nice change of pace for me after dealing with kids all day.”
But he doesn’t release me from his gaze. “Yeah, well…it ain’t nothing to me,” he says. “I want you to know that. Understand it. You’re a real nice woman, and that’s new to me. So thank you.”
“You don’t know a lot of nice women?” I ask, stepping forward. Because I’m curious, I tell myself. Not because he’s drawing me toward him with a term I don’t think 99% of the straight guys I’ve met would ever use to label me. He thinks I’m nice.
“No,” he answers bluntly. The word falls into the space between us like a confession. “I don’t think I do. I mean, everyone on the floor has been real kind. But I don’t mean nice like hospital staff. I mean nice like you. I’m pretty sure I don’t know anybody else like you. You’re new. ”
I’m new. And he thinks I’m nice.
I rush out of there with the aortic nerve in my stomach full on pounding. Not sure if I should come back to visit a man who makes me feel like I’m waiting for the results of my Pediatrics Board Certifications to download on my computer screen.
Yet here I am again on Tuesday, walking in with two bowls of three-bean avocado salad, and already afraid of what will happen when I leave at the end of the hour.
But this time when I hand him his reusable container, he says, “Tell me how you got into this whole doctoring business. I’ve been trying to figure it out on this iPad, but I don’t see how you could be a Senior Pediatrics Resident.”
My heart freezes. Apparently he’s been using the iPad I gave him for more than the brain teaser apps. Did he Google my name? Does he know…?
But then he says, “From what I can figure, you ain’t anywhere near thirty, and it says here you have to do four years of college, four years of med school, then a three year residency on top of that. So you should be thirty, right? But if I had to guess, I’d guess you’re no more than twenty-five.”
“You’re exactly right. I’ll be twenty-six in July,” I say with a relieved laugh. Then I peek at him to ask, “And how old do you think you might be?”
He shakes his head. “I dunno. Can’t tell from looking at myself in the mirror on account of me being all broken up. Also, I get to feeling older than I look sometimes. Does that make sense?”
I nod, thinking of the months after Chanel’s death. How silly every other person my age seemed at my arts college. At least until I met my best friend, Sola, a Guatemalan Dream Act student who actually had real shit on her plate.
“Yes, that makes sense,” I tell him. “And as for my age, I came out here from California to attend the University of West Virginia on a special combined Bachelor/Med degree scholarship program for Regional Hospitals. It’s unusual because not only did I graduate in four years with a combined degree, I was required to do my residency at this particular hospital as part of a state grant I received to complete my education. So here I am at the age of twenty-five. Does that make sense?”
He half-winces, before admitting, “Kind of. Go back to the part where you came all the way across the country to work here... ”
We end up talking for the whole hour as opposed to doing the word association tree I’d planned. He wants to know what I had to do in med school. Why I chose peds—especially pediatric oncology—because “ain’t that a little sad for you, Doc?”
Then he listens intently as I explain how many doctors, including myself, feel called to their particular specialties. I don’t tell him about Chanel. I still can’t talk about her, even after all these years.
But I do tell him how I put in a semester at a performing arts college called ValArts, before I was accepted into UWV’s seven-year combined medical degree and residency program. How I’d planned to go into musical theater for a while, until I dropped everything in order to take this once in a lifetime opportunity to get my education half-paid for and be of help in a field close to my heart. How, yes, it can be more than a little sad, but also more than a little triumphant, when things work out for my patients.
His questions are so direct and precise, I have to ask, “Does any of this seem familiar to you? Like maybe it’s a profession you’re familiar with?”
“No,” he answers. Then he thinks about it and says it again, “No.”
He still doesn’t sound all that sure about his answer, so I ask, “Does becoming a medical professional sound like something you’d want to do? Like maybe something you considered doing before?”
He thinks about it again. “More like something I’ve gotta do. I don’t know how else to explain it.”
His gaze goes to the window and he glares at the parking lot below. “This is hard,” he mutters.
I can only imagine, and I struggle to come up with some encouraging words. Kid patients are easy in their own way. I’m allowed to both ignore their tears and bribe them with the promise of ice cream.
But I put in my rotations in med school before breaking off into my specialty. So I already know: adults are much harder. I feel frustrated with my uncharacteristic lack of a good comeback.
I’m actually really good with words, I want to tell him in that moment. But there’s something about you. You take my words away.
But obviously, I can’t say that. I’m a doctor who shouldn’t be here. And he’s a patient struggling with a TBI and what might very well be some type of psychosis.
“You mind getting out of here?” he says, his eyes still on the parking lot. “I’m kind of done visiting right now.”
I remind myself of all the things I read while researching his type of amnesia. About how amnesia patients, for understandable reasons, often get agitated. How they can easily become depressed. That TBI does, in fact, stand for Traumatic Brain Injury.
I’ve been trying, but still can’t imagine, what it must be like to wake up one day with no memory whatsoever of who you are. I still can’t wrap my head around what it would be like to have to piece my life back together with the small amount of information John has. Or having to sort everything I encounter into “old,” “new,” and “confusing.”
God, this John Doe makes my heart ache. And in the moment right after he asks me to leave, I want to do all sorts of unprofessional things. Like go over to t
he bed and hug him, crooning everything will be all right, even though I can’t possibly know that.
But I remember lying to Chanel in the exact same way, and I clamp my lips shut, refusing to do it again. Also, my lunch hour is already five minutes past over…
“Sure,” I say. “See you…later.”
I don’t say tomorrow, because I’m not brave enough to in the moment.
He doesn’t answer. Just continues to stare out of the window.
So I’m forced to leave him stewing in his frustration. Which makes me feel the opposite of my good intentions. Like I’ve made things worse for him, instead of better. Tuesday started off great, and ended up sort of depressing. As I gather my things and go, I seriously don’t know if I’ll be back on Wednesday.
But I am. We’re both awkward and polite until I hold up the pad Thai I made for us on Sunday and say, “So I know you’re good to go on soy. I figured we’d see if you’re allergic to peanuts today.”
“This is new,” he tells me after the first bite, “but I like it.”
Then he eats the rest with such gusto, I know he was only being polite when he finished the tofu and quinoa on Monday.
Wednesday is a good day. Comfortable like the food. I ask him if he’s scared about having to go to a shelter soon.
He thinks about it and answers, “No.”
“Why not?” I ask, because just the thought of it terrifies me.
He shrugs. “I don’t think I get scared easily.”
“What do you mean?”
Another shrug. “People keep asking me if I’m scared because of all this brain stuff, but I’m just, I dunno, really fucking annoyed. I think maybe I’m like Ken.”
“Ken…” I repeat, wondering if I’ve totally misread which team John plays for.
But then he says, “You know. Real calm.”
“So you’re saying you’re a very calm person?” I ask, muddling my way through his meaning. “And you don’t often get upset.”
“No, I do get upset,” he answers, almost automatically. “But if you’re mad, you don’t need to let everybody know about it. It’s something you handle on your own. Inside yourself.”
I blink, since that perspective is the exact opposite of the one I grew up with. “Is that a memory or a conviction?”
“Conviction.” Again his answer is automatic, with no tripping over my relatively big word. Then he pins me with that blue stare of his and repeats, “Yeah, it’s definitely a conviction.”
And I’m struck by a very real feeling that we’re not actually talking about Ken or John’s convictions or anything else, but are instead focusing on the thick sexual tension crackling like a heat fence between us.
This whole professional medical distance thing isn’t going well at all, I think on Wednesday night, as I make pasta linguine and a couple of other dishes to get us through the week.
Thursday we get back to the cognitive exercises. And it’s all very professional and on plan, right until he hands me back the phone I gave him towards the end of my lunch hour.
“No, no,” I tell him. “That’s yours to keep.”
“Thanks,” he answers. “I appreciate it, I do, Doc. But I want you to put some more music on it. I’m thinking about what I’ll need when I’m living at the men’s shelter.”
“You want me to pick music for you to listen to at the men’s shelter? I mean, shouldn’t you do that?”
“I don’t like the stuff I’ve been picking out as much as the stuff you’ve been picking out. When you’re not here, I listen to the music you chose and it feels like everything’s going to be all right.”
Okay, I’m trying. I’m really trying, but how the hell am I supposed to keep my heart out of this when he says things like that?
“You know that’s a song, too…” I tell him. Then I sing him a few lines of the Bob Marley classic.
And he says, “You’ve got a good voice, Doc. I’ve been noticing that downstairs. That performing arts school probably missed you after you left.”
I still have no idea who this John Doe was before he landed at UWV/Mercy, but I swear he must have taken a course in how to make girls blush. “I’ll put that Bob Marley song on there for you, too,” I all but croak before rushing out of his room, away from all that dangerous sexual tension.
On Thursday night, I take a forty-five minute detour to pick up a pair of Beats headphones at the Wal-Mart in Ohio. Because they’re good headphones, I tell myself, even as my aortic nerve hums with a vision of John surrounded by the Bob Marley track as he rests in his shelter bed.
And on Friday, the song is still playing on a slow and lazy loop in my head as I get off the elevator onto the eighth floor and round the corner of the hallway that leads to his room—
Only to walk into complete chaos.
“Get away from me! Get the hell away from me!”
In the middle of the group, I can see John. He’s swinging the cane he was only recently given at a resident—a fellow third year I easily recognize as the one who asked if me getting into UWV’s program was a joke on my first day of med school.
“Somebody get psych down here!” Dr. Pawar yells toward the nurse’s station, while a flock of young medical students stand around with their mouths agape.
There are two kinds of doctors in this world. Those who stand there surprised when something outside their expected range of duties happens, and those who spring into action. Dr. Pawar is a spring into action kind of doctor for sure.
And I guess I am too, because I charge through the crowd of white coats to get to John, yelling at him, “It’s okay! It’s okay!” even though I have no idea what’s going on.
My poor John Doe is a mess. His blond hair, which looked strange before with it being half-shaved and all, is even wilder now. And his blue eyes are no longer lazy, but completely incensed. Like he’s not just going to hit the med student with his hospital issue cane, but plans to use it to beat him to death.
Yet John weakens when he sees me standing in front of him with both my hands raised.
“Doc, no…” he says, with a pained shake of his head. “You’re not here. I don’t want you here. I don’t want you to see me like this.”
His voice cracks on the last sentence, and that breaks my heart even as I keep repeating, “It’s okay, John. It’s okay.”
“That’s not my name. Fucking hell!”
He raises a free hand to his forehead, and takes a step toward me. All the med students gathered behind me jump like a volcano just belched. Like they know this patient is going to explode.
Somehow I manage to stay exactly where I am. For him. I read about this. I read about all of this. It’s completely normal for amnesia patients to get agitated. But John is tall and burning bright. I can feel the fear of everyone in the hallway, and I’m pretty sure security has already been called to handle the situation.
But my expression stays neutral and completely focused on the man looming in front of me. Not the crazy John Doe, but the man I’ve gotten to know and like over the past week. There’s nothing but him, that insane voice in my head says before I can quell it with logical thought.
“I know that’s not your name,” I assure him in a gentle voice. “We’re going to figure out your real name, I promise. But until then, I need you to calm down. You’re like Ken, remember?”
I remind him of the conversation we had yesterday, even though I’m thinking now, just like I was thinking then, that he is absolutely, positively, nothing like Ken.
However John nods in agreement. Like the crazy words coming out of my mouth make total sense. Then he stands there, as if awaiting my next command.
Maybe he was a soldier, I think as I slowly lower my hands, my body relaxing from the pretense that I could have actually done something to stop him if he decided to charge me or someone else in the room.
“What happened?” I ask the senior neuro resident with a killing look, because I already know this is more his fault than John’s.
“I don’t know,” he answers, defensively. “We came into his room for rounds, and he jumped out of the bed and started yelling at me. Chased me into the hallway.”
My eyes go to John, silently asking him to explain this to me.
“He smells like something,” John answer, his voice just as confused as I must look. “Something I don’t like. No, that’s not the word. Want. Something I don’t want.”
The med students and Pawar all turn to the resident, and I swear you can hear them sniffing the air around him like a pack of bloodhounds in white coats.
“He’s been smoking!” a student with a ponytail yells out. “It must have triggered John Doe.”
Then, probably remembering how John just said he didn’t like being called by that name, Ponytail blushes. “I mean the patient. Maybe he’s associating something bad with the smell of cigarettes? I don’t blame him. I hate cigarettes.” She darts a mildly disgusted look at the resident.
My eyes go to John. “Cigarettes. Old or new?” I ask him.
“Old!” He shakes his head, as if he’s trying to get away from something inside of it. “Old! Fuck…old!”
He’s getting agitated again. He drops the cane, and slams the balls of his palms into his forehead, doing his brain violence it doesn’t need.
“It’s okay,” I tell him. But it’s too late for okays.
He yells “Fuck!” again, and unleashes all of his anger and frustration in one burst. Smashing a fist into the nearby wall like it’s done something to him. I can hear the crack of bone against the solid wall, and I gasp out, “John!”
“Don’t call me that! Don’t fucking call me that!” he yells back, as if I, and not the wall, have physically hurt him.
The elevator dings in the distance and I can hear the thunder of boot clad feet. “No, let me…” I start to say.
But my words are lost in the clamor of bodies shoving past me. Two large orderlies and a security guard. All yelling words at John Doe.
I watch them haul John back into his room and strap him to his bed. Then the needle comes out, and that’s it for this episode of Amnesia Horror Story.
His Revenge Baby: 50 Loving States, Washington Page 31