by Gene Brewer
I implored him to help me find her. To give me a name or an address. He said, again after a few moments of silence, "Her name is beatrice. That's all I can tell you."
Before I woke him up I tried one more blind shot. "What is the connection between a lawn sprinkler and what happened to Robert on August seventeenth, 1985?" But he seemed genuinely befuddled by this reference (as had the unhypnotized prot), and there was no sign of the panic elicited by my wife's turning on ours at the Fourth of July picnic in our backyard. Utterly frustrated, I brought him back to reality, called in our trusty orderlies, and reluctantly sent him back to Ward Two.
THE next day Giselle reported that she had spent most of the previous week, along with her friend, at the Research Library tracking down and reading articles from small-town (those with slaughterhouses) newspapers for the summer of 1985, so far without success, though there were still two large trays of microfilm to go. I passed on the meager information I had managed to obtain. She doubted that Robert's mother's name would be of much help, but it led her to another idea. "What if we also search the files for 1963, when his father died? If there's an obituary for a man whose wife's name was Beatrice and who had a six-yearold son named Robert ... Damn! why didn't I think of that before?"
"At this point," I agreed, "anything's worth a try.".
CHUCK had collected all the "Why I Want to Go to KPAX" essays over the weekend. Most of the patients had submitted one, and a fair number of the support staff as well, including Jensen and Kowalski. As it happened, this was the time for Bess's semiannual interview. During that encounter I asked her why she hadn't entered the contest.
"You know why, Doctor," she replied.
"I would rather you tell me."
"They wouldn't want somebody like me."
"Why not?"
"I don't deserve to go."
"What makes you think that?"
"I eat too much."
"Now, Bess, everyone here eats more than you do."
"I don't deserve to eat."
"Everyone has to eat."
"I don't like to eat when there are so many that don't have anything. Every time I try to eat I see a lot of hungry faces pressed up against the window, just watching me eat, waiting for something to fall on the floor, and when it does they can't get in to pick it up. All they can do is wait for somebody, to take out the garbage. I can't eat when I see all those hungry faces."
"There's nobody at the window, Bess."
"Oh, they're there all right. You just don't see them."
"You can't help them if you're starving, too."
"I don't deserve to eat."We had been around this circle many times before. Bess's battle with reality had not responded well to treatment. Her periods of depression had been barely managed with ECT and Clozaril and, more recently, by the presence of La Belle Chatte. She perked up a little when I told her that Betty was planning to bring in another half dozen cats from the animal shelter. Until further progress was made in the treatment of paranoid schizophrenia and psychotic depression there wasn't much more we could do for her. I almost wished she had been among those who had submitted an application for passage to K-PAX.
The kitten, incidentally, was doing fine with Ed. The only problem was that everyone in the psychopathic ward now wanted an animal. One patient demanded we get him a horse!
ON Tuesday, August fourteenth, prot called everyone to the lounge. It was generally assumed he was going to make some kind of farewell speech and announce the results of the essay contest Chuck had organized. When all of Wards One and Two and some of Three and Four, including Whacky and Ed and La Belle, had gathered around, along with most of the professional and support staff, prot disappeared for a minute and came back with-a violin! He handed it to Howie and said, "Play something."
Howie froze. "I can't remember how," he said. "I've forgotten everything."
"It will come back," prot assured him.
Howie looked at the violin for a long time. Finally he placed it under his chin, ran the bow across the strings, reached for the rosin that prot had thoughtfully provided, and immediately broke into a Fritz Kreisler etude. He stopped a few times, but didn't start over and try to get it perfect. Grinning like a monkey he went right into a Mozart sonata. He played it pretty badly, but, after the last note had faded into perfect silence, the room broke into thunderous applause. It had been the greatest performance of his career.
With one or two exceptions the patients were in a fine mood all that day. I suppose everyone was on his best behavior so as not to jeopardize his chances for an allexpense-paid-trip to paradise. But prot made no speech, no decision on a space companion. Apparently he was still hoping to talk Robert into going with him.
Oddly, no one seemed particularly disappointed. Everyone knew it was only a matter of days-hours until "departure" time, and his selection would have to be made by then.
Session Sixteen
DESPITE facing what should have been a very long and presumably exhausting journey prot seemed his usual relaxed self. He marched right into my examining room, looked around for his basket of fruit. I switched on my backup tape recorder and checked to see that it was working properly. "We'll have the fruit at the end of today's session, if you don't object."
"Oh. Very well. And the top o' the afternoon to ye."
"Sit down, sit down."
"Thankee kindly, sir."
"How's your report coming?"
"I'll have it finished by the time I leave."
"May I see it before you go?"
"When it's finished. But I doubt you'd be interested."
"Believe me, I would like to see it as soon as possible. And the questions for Dr. Flynn?"
"There are only so many hours in a day, gino, even for a K-PAXian."
"Are you still planning to return to your home planet on the seventeenth?"
"I must."
"That's only thirty-eight hours from now."
"You're very quick today, doctor."
"And Robert is going with you?"
"I don't know."
"Why not?"
"He's still not talking to me."
"And if he decides not to accompany you?"
"Then there would be room for someone else. You want to go?"
"I think I'd like that some day. Right now I've got a lot of things to do here."
"I thought you'd say that."
"Tell me-how did you know that Robert might want to go back with you when you arrived on Earth five years ago?"
"Just a hunch. I had a feeling he wished to depart this world."
"What would happen exactly if neither of you went back on that date?"
"Nothing. Except that if we didn't go back then, we never could."
"Would that be so terrible?"
"Would you want to stay here if you could go home to K-PAX?"
"Couldn't you just send a message that you're going to be delayed for a while?"
"It doesn't work that way. Owing to the nature of light ... Well, it's a long story."
"There are plenty of reasons for you to stay."
"You're wasting your time," he said, yawning. I had been told that he hadn't slept for the last three days, preferring instead to work on his report.
The moment had come for my last desperate shot. I wondered whether Freud had ever tried this. "In that case, I wonder if you'd care to join me in a drink?"
"If that's your custom," he said with an enigmatic smile. "Something fruity, I suppose?"
"Are you insinuating that I'm a fruit?"
"Not at all."
"Just kidding, doc. I'll have whatever you're having."
"Stay right there. Don't move." I retreated to my inner office, where Mrs. Trexler was waiting sardonically with a laboratory cart stocked with ice and liquor-Scotch, gin, vodka, rye-plus the usual accompaniments.
"I'll be right here if you need anything," she growled.
I thanked her and wheeled the cart into my examining room. "I think I'll have a l
ittle Scotch," I said, trying to appear calm. "I like a martini before dinner, but on special occasions like this one I prefer something else. Not that there are that many special occasions," I added quickly, as if I were applying for the directorship of the hospital. "And what about you?"
"Scotch is fine."
I poured two stiff ones on the rocks, and handed one to prot. "Bon voyage," I said, raising my glass. "To a safe trip home."
"Thank you," he said, lifting his own. "I'm looking forward to it." I had no idea how long it had been since his last drink, or if he had ever taken one at all, but he appeared to enjoy the first sip.
"To tell you the truth," I confessed, "K-PAX does sound like a beautiful place."
"I think you would like it there."
"You know, I've only been out of this country two or three times."
"You should see more of your own WORLD, too. It's an interesting PLANET." He took a deep slug, bared his teeth and swallowed, but his timing wasn't right and he choked and coughed for several seconds. While watching him try to get his breath I remembered the day my father taught me to drink wine. I hated the stuff, but I knew it signified the beginning of adulthood, so I held my nose and gulped it down. My timing wasn't right either, and I spewed some burgundy all over the living room carpet, which retains a ghostly stain to this day. I'm not sure he ever forgave me for that....
"You don't hate your father," prot said. "What?"
"You've always blamed your father for the inadequacies you perceive in yourself. In order to do that you had to hate him. But you never really hated him. You loved your father."
"I don't know who told you all of this, but you don't know what you're talking about."
He shrugged and was silent. After a few more swallows (he wasn't choking anymore) he persisted: "That's how you rationalized ignoring your children so you could have more time for your work. You told yourself you didn't want to make the same mistake as your father."
"I didn't ignore my children!"
"Then why do you not know that your son is a cocaine addict?"
"What? Which son?"
"The younger one. 'Chip,' you call him."
There had been certain signs-a distinct personality change, a constant shortage of funds-signs I chose to disregard until I found time to deal with them. Like most parents I didn't want to know that my son was a drug addict, and I was just putting off finding out the truth. But I certainly didn't want to learn about the problem from one of my patients. "Anything else you want to get off your chest?"
"Yes. Give your wife a break and stop singing in the shower."
"Why?"
"Because you can't carry a tune in a basket."
"I'll think about it. What else?"
"Russell has a malignancy in his colon."
"What? How do you know that?"
"I can smell it on his breath."
"Anything else?"
"That's all. For now."
We had a few more drinks in total silence, if you don't count the thoughts roaring through my head. This was interrupted, finally, by a tap on the door. I yelled, "Come in!" It was Giselle, back from the library.
Prot nodded to her and smiled warmly. She took his hand and kissed him on the cheek before slipping over and whispering in my ear, "It's Robert Porter. That's about all we know so far." Then she plopped down in the corner chair. I brought her a drink, which she gratefully accepted.
We chatted about inconsequential things for a while. Prot was having a fine time. After his fourth Scotch, when he was giggling at everything anyone said, I shouted, "Robert Porter! Can you hear me? We know who you are!"
Prot seemed taken aback, but he finally realized what I was doing. "I tol' you an' tol' you," he snorted unhappily. "He ain' cumin' out!"
"Ask him again!"
"I've tried. I've rilly rilly rilly tried. What else c'n I do?"
"You can stay! Giselle cried.
He turned slowly to face her. "I can't," he said sadly. "It's now or never."
"Why?"
"As I a'-ready 'splained to doctor bew-bew-doctor brewer, I am shed-shed-I am 'xpected. The window is op'n. I c'n only go back on August seventeenth. At 3:31 inna norming."
I let her go on. She couldn't do any worse than I had. "It's not so bad here, is it?" she pleaded.
Prot said nothing for a moment. I recognized the look on his face, that combination of amazement and disgust which meant he was trying to find words she could comprehend. Finally he said, "Yes, it is."
Giselle bowed her head.
I poured him another drink. It was time to play my last trump. "Prot, I want you to stay too."
"Because we need you here."
"Wha' for?"
"You think the Earth is a pretty bad place. You can help us make it better."
"How, f'r cryin' out loud?"
"Well, for example, there are a lot of people right here at the hospital you have helped tremendously. And there are many more beings- you can help if you will stay. We on Earth have a lot of problems. All of us need you."
"You c'n help y'rself if you want to. You just hafta want to, thass all there is to it."
"Robert needs you. Your friend needs you."
"He doesn't need me. He doesn't even pay 'tention to me anymore."
"That's because he's an independent being with a mind of his own. But he would want you to stay, I know he would."
"How d' you know that?"
"Ask him!"
Prot looked puzzled. And tired. He closed his eyes. His glass tipped, allowing some of his drink to spill onto the carpet. After a long minute or two his eyes opened again. He appeared to be completely sober.
"What did he say?"
"He told me I've wasted enough time here. He wants me to go away and leave him alone."
"What will happen to him when you go? Have you thought about that?"
The Cheshire-cat grin: "That's up to you."
Giselle said, "Please, prot. I want you to stay, too." There were tears in her eyes.
"I can always come back."
"When?"
"Not long. About five of your years. It will seem like no time at all."
"Five years?" I blurted out in surprise. "Why so long? I thought you'd be back much sooner than that."
Prot gave me a look of profound sadness. "Owing to the nature of time. .." he began, then: "There is a tradeoff for round trips. I would try to explain it to you, but I'm just too damn tired."
"Take me with you," Giselle pleaded.
He gave her a look of indescribable compassion. "I'm sorry. But next time..." She got up and hugged him. "Prot," I said, emptying the bottle into his and Giselle's glasses. "What if I tell you there's no such place as KPAX?"
"Now who's crazy?" he replied.
AFTER Jensen and Kowalski had taken prot back to his room, where he slept for a record five hours, Giselle told me what she had learned about Robert Porter. It wasn't much, but it explained why we hadn't been able to track him down earlier. After hundreds of hours of searching through old newspaper files, she and her friend at the library had found the obituary for Robert's father, Gerald Porter. From that she learned the name of their hometown, Guelph, Montana. Then she remembered something she had found much earlier about a murder/suicide that had taken place there in August of 1985, and she called the sheriff's office for the county in western Montana where the incident occurred. It turned out that the body of the suicide victim had never been found, but, owing to a clerical error, it had gone into the record as a drowning, rather than a missing person.
The man Robert killed had murdered his wife and daughter. Robert's mother had left town a few weeks after the tragedy to live with his sister in Alaska. The police didn't have the address. Giselle. wanted to fly out to Montana to try to determine where she had gone, as well as to obtain pictures of the wife and daughter, records and documents, etc., in case I could use them to get through to Robert. I quickly approved a travel advance and guaranteed payment of all her expens
es.
"I'd like to see him before I go," she said. "He's probably sleeping."
"I just want to watch him for a few minutes."
I understood perfectly. I love to watch Karen sleep, too, her mouth open, her throat making little clicking noises. "Don't let him leave until I find her," she pleaded as she went out.
I don't remember much about the rest of the afternoon and evening, although reports have it that I fell asleep during a committee meeting. I do know that I tossed and turned all night thinking about prot and about Chip and about my father. I felt trapped somewhere in the middle of time, waiting helplessly to repeat the mistakes of the past over and over again.
GisELLE called me from Guelph the next morning. One of Robert's sisters, she reported, was indeed living in Alaska, the other in Hawaii. Sarah's family didn't have either address, but she (Giselle) was working with a friend at Northwest Airlines to try to determine Robert's mother's destination when she left Montana. In addition, she had gathered photographs and other artifacts from his school years and those of his wife-to-be, thanks to Sarah's mother and the high school principal, who had spent most of the previous night going through the files with her. "Find his mother," I told her. "If you can, get her back here. But fax all the pictures and the other stuff now."
"They should already be on, your desk."
I cancelled my interview with the Search Committee. Villers was not pleased-I was the last candidate for the directorship.
There were photos of Robert as a first-grader on up to his graduation picture, with the yearbook caption, "All great men are dead and I'm not feeling well," along with pictures of the wrestling teams and informal snapshots of soda fountains and pizza parlors. There were copies of his birth certificate, his immunization records, his grade transcripts (A's and B's), his citation for top marks in the county Latin contest, his diploma. There were also pictures of his sisters, who had graduated a few years before he had, and some information on them. And one of Sarah, a vivacious looking blonde, leading a cheer at a basketball game. Finally, there was a photograph of the family standing in front of their new house in the country, all smiles. Judging by the age of the daughter, it must have been taken not long before the tragedy occurred. Mrs. Trexler brought me some coffee as I was gazing at it, and I showed it to her. "His wife and daughter," I said. "Somebody killed them." Without warning she burst into tears and ran from the room. I remember thinking that she must be more sympathetic toward the plights of the patients than I had thought. It wasn't until much later, while paging through her personnel file at the time of her retirement, that I learned her own daughter had been raped and murdered nearly forty years earlier.