The Paper Shepherd

by Olivia Landis

  Up ahead of his patrol car, Jack saw a well dressed, middle aged man stumble out of a bar, a much younger woman under his arm, her blond hair spilling out over her coat. Under her coat, she wore impractically high heels and fishnet stockings. Neither seemed particularly stable as they picked their way between piles of snow, laughing flamboyantly to each other. Lowlife, Jack thought to himself. Probably a stripper from some corporate Christmas party. What kind of low life strips for money on Christmas eve?

  Renee looked over her grade report once again to boost her confidence.

  Brighton University

  Tiar AlfredFall 1997

  Sophomore

  GeneticsA

  Biochemistry IA

  Intro. to Philos.A

  SociologyA

  Amazing, Renee thought, putting it away in her bag. Now that she was only working two nights a week, she could loose four days of school to hospitalization on an inpatient psychiatric ward and still get her best grades so far in college. Going out on the stage would make her feel empty and dirty. But, going to class prepared felt so good. She knew she needed to concentrate on that feeling to make it through the night. Remember why you’re doing this, she thought. She had to forego any meaningful social life her freshman year and never really developed one now. All the time she saved not working at the coffee house went straight into studying. It was easy getting grades like this. Finally. Vet school here I come, she thought, pulling on her bright red, elbow length glove over her scarred left arm. Chuck had given her a new costume for the holidays. Instead of coins, it was tied with long strings of red and silver beads. Renee was suspicious that they had been intended as Christmas tree garlands and felt distinctly that she was defiling the whole season. Salome walked into the dressing room from the stage. A cloud of smoke and jeering followed her as she closed the door.

  “There’s quite a crowd tonight,” she warned Renee. “It always surprises me how many low lives there are that will actually go to a strip club on Christmas eve.”

  What about the low lives who work at a strip club on Christmas eve? Renee wondered to herself. Even with the prospect of lightening her work load for the future semester, she had not volunteered to work tonight. In fact, she had outright refused. But Chuck had been desperate and offered to pay her twice her usual rate. Most of his dancers, also cash strapped university students, were home with their families. Sal, whose family was not speaking to her now that they knew what she did to pay for all her generous gifts and expensive car, was one of the only other dancers around. They were both working every night of Christmas break.

  For Renee, the extra work meant $6500. The generous figure was more than just a number. Since Micah’s unfortunate illness, Renee was inspired to save up an emergency fund—at least six months’ worth of rent and food money in case she had to stop working. She wanted to make sure she would land on her feet and continue attending Brighton despite any potential disaster. Since summer, she had started making head way on her plan. Then her car needed repairs. And then, it needed more repairs. Then, it was stolen, stripped for parts, set on fire, and dumped in a lake. The insurance company told her it was only worth a total of $700 and that is what they doled out. That would have been nice to know before I spent $3000 to fix it, she thought, annoyed at herself. Fortunately, by October, she had found another car she could afford. But, she was back to square one with her emergency plan.

  Now, she nearly had it. Today was day 14 of 21. Just twenty one days straight of ignoring the jeers, cat calls, and whistles of capped teeth and toothless grins alike, twenty one days of dancing for the eyes of lawyers and tractor repairmen, of dodging spilled martinis and sloshed light beer. If she could stand one more week of it, she finally could face life again with a safety net.

  43

  It was a relatively bright day for February thirteenth. Pat had just finished 36 hours on call for internal medicine and was bleary eyed, hungry and grumpy. As he lifted his head into the brisk wind, he saw Renee whose wild, Technicolor hair was covered in a soft knitted cap. She was on her way to lunch with the tall, dark girl who visited her on the inpatient ward.

  “Hi,” she said cheerfully, pausing briefly as they passed. She woke him up with her smile as she walked by. Any hurt feelings over her changed name or phone number long since gone, he found himself feeling like a middle school boy with his first crush.

  “How are the outpatient sessions going with Dr. Matthews?” he asked politely. He wanted any excuse to stand on the quad and talk to her, forgetting suddenly how tired his legs were from a night of running from one patient’s room to another. Renee looked down at tiny imperfections in the snow next to the paths, embarrassed while her companion looked around the quad impatiently.

  “I haven’t been going,” she admitted.

  “Why not?” Pat prodded gently.

  “It’s just, he wants me to take medicine,” she reported, exasperated. “And, I’m sure it’s great for people with performance anxiety and social phobia and depression and all the things he thinks I have. But I don’t think that’s what’s wrong with me.”

  “Do you think there is anything wrong with you?” he asked gingerly.

  “Of course, there is,” Renee’s tall, seductive friend stated boldly. “She never wants to do anything fun.”

  “Is this true, Tiar?” Pat asked delicately. The shorter girl shrugged and looked away. The sun reflected off the snow into her sparkling green eyes.

  “We call that ‘anhedonia’”, Pat explained, his eyes still locked on Renee’s wayward eyes. “Sometimes medication does help people with that.”

  “If you ask me,” Renee’s friend chimed in. “What she needs is companionship.” Pat smiled at the taller women.

  “Yes, a social network is very important for a solid recovery. Tiar is very lucky to have you as a friend.”

  “I mean the kind of companionship I can’t give her,” Renee’s friend said, raising one well tweezed eye brow. She elbowed Renee in the ribs.

  “I’m sure your friendship is more than adequate,” Pat insisted.

  “Jeeze, are all cute doctors as dense as you?” Renee’s friend asked pointedly. Renee looked at Pat with a combination of horror, embarrassment and empathy and then quickly averted her eyes back toward the snow while Pat’s already wind swept cheeks turned even more red. “Oh, come on,” she continued, seeming oblivious to their embarrassment. “Tomorrow is Valentine’s day. You’re not going to make this poor crazy girl spend it alone, are you? I’ll give you a hundred bucks if you take her out to dinner.”

  “Sadly,” Pat said. “I’ll be on call again. But, it’s a kind offer”. He had turned to Renee and finally caught her attention again. “If you want,” he offered. “Make an appointment with me in the outpatient clinic. Make sure you tell them it’s a continuity appointment from the ward and I was on your case.”

  “I’d really hate to bother you,” Renee protested.

  “It’s not a bother, Tiar. It’s standard practice,” Pat explained. “We don’t typically kick people out of the hospital and then expect them to go on without any help.” Renee seemed reticent to take the offer but eventually relented.

  “The next few weeks are going to be hard for me academically,” she said. “But I’ll call in mid March, I promise.”

  “Well, if you’re not going to feed her, I will,” Salome said suddenly and began pulling Renee gently by the arm. Renee gave Pat one more embarrassed smile and walked off with her friend toward the cafeteria.

  Pat walked away with ambivalent feelings brewing in his chest. After convincing Dr. Matthews to confront Dr. Rogers to discharge Renee, he had tried to set up ongoing therapy with a clinical psychologist. This poor girl, he argued, had no parents and no role models. The only mature authority figures she had to go to for advice were the prematurely experienced dancers at the Fox Tail and the priest at the Catholic Student Union who she was too ashamed to face without the benefit of a confessional screen between them. What she n
eeded was someone who would listen to her problems and help her gain some sense of proportion about them. What she needed was someone to give her practical advice about how to navigate in a world of adults. What she didn’t need, and what Dr. Rogers insisted she get, was inpatient drug rehabilitation. After a seething debate that Pat was sure was going to cost him a passing grade in the rotation, he negotiated six therapy sessions with Dr. Matthews if she would submit to a urine drug screen before each one. Pat was proud that he managed to secure some help for Renee. Only in retrospect did he realize that, as a second year resident, Dr. Matthews had lengthy training in how to medicate patients on an inpatient ward and nearly no experience or training in outpatient psychotherapy. Having gone straight to medical school from undergraduate school, the young doctor had spent the eight years since he reached the age of majority with his nose pressed into books, cloistered away from the real world with its practical adult problems. Sadly, the copious notes Pat had left for Dr. Matthews detailing all the major conflicts in Renee’s life were completely useless.

  But, now she’ll get some real help, Pat thought. Ever since this strange little girl had left the inpatient ward, Pat always felt somehow that he had failed her. If I only called her when we met in the emergency room the first time, he thought. If I only got in touch with her before she shut off her phone service… It was all fruitless, he knew in his mind. Yet, he would find himself thinking it more often then he wanted to admit. If I’d only been there for her, even as a friend, before that jackass of an ex-boyfriend of hers came back to swing a wrecking ball into her life… If only I had been there to tell her she was worth something in this world… If I had only been there to help her figure out some other avenue to getting an academic loan. I could have offered her something better then illegal drugs for stage fright… He knew he could not turn back time. And, even if he could, he could not guarantee any of his interventions would have mattered to her in the long run. At least now, she wouldn’t fall through the cracks yet again. There was only one problem. Pat wasn’t working for the Behavioral Health Clinic. He wasn’t entirely sure they trained fourth year medical students.

  I’ll find a way, he thought to himself, wondering if anyone would notice if he took over a broom closet and started bringing patients into it. I’ll find some way.

  Two days later, Pat Macleod stood in front of his advisor’s desk nearly at attention, staring at the curly, nearly indecipherable Latin words on the man’s medical diploma to avoid making eye contact.

  “That’s right, Dr. Millan. I’d like to change my tenth round rotation to outpatient psychiatry,” he said urgently.

  “And now you are signed up for....” the older man looked down at Pat’s academic file open on his desk. “Inpatient pediatrics.”

  “Yes, sir,”

  “Why the change, Mr. McLeod?” Dr. Millan asked looking up. “I thought you wanted to be a pediatrician.”

  “I’ve been thinking, sir, that maybe I have been too narrow in my focus,” Pat said hesitantly. “I’ve been accepted for a transitional internship starting in July. I figure I have until next October to make up my mind for sure what I want to specialize in.”

  “You don’t want to be a pediatrician any more?” his advisor asked pointedly.

  “Maybe I still do, sir,” Pat said apologetically remembering that was his advisor’s specialty. “But, I just keep thinking maybe I was too hasty when I made that decision. Maybe I should be exposed to more things before I make up my mind.”

  “Very well, Mr. McLeod,” Dr. Millan said flatly. “If that’s what you want. But, don’t take forever deciding. You have to apply for residency in a few months. In the meantime, I’ll call Dr. Rogers and tell him you’re coming.” Pat smiled, despite the mention of his recent nemesis.

  “Thank you, sir,” he said, and turned toward the door.

  44

  Max lay under an apple tree on the quad outside St. Andrew’s seminary. It had been a good semester so far. He was content. There were no holes in his life—not in knowledge, not in body, not in spirit. He hungered for nothing. He felt no pain. He felt nothing. He was perfectly content. Perfect. It was an objectively perfect day with warm sunshine and low humidity. Perfect. He traced the path of the thin, black branches of the apple tree through the pure white blossoms as they swayed gently in the early April breeze. Other people had also noticed the objectively satisfying day. The quad was full of students playing Frisbee and enjoying the first few rays of spring. Under the apple tree, however, Max was alone. He alone could see how the branches were like slender black snakes sliding gracefully through a bed of virgin white snow. How ironic, he thought to himself esoterically. Snow, the literary symbol of purity and snakes, the biblical symbol of evil side by side in nature. Opposites, yet one thing. Max shuttered at the ambiguity this created. Ambiguity left the door open for the sinister to enter disguised as the good. I guess that’s why apples are the fruit that get mankind kicked out of paradise. A shiver gripped him as he thought about the apple tree outside St. Jude’s rectory, a tree he used to stare at and admire as a child. Thank God I’m not going back there.

  Still lying in the soft grass, Max lifted up the dainty card he held in his hand. He couldn’t put off this decision any longer. He had to RSVP by tomorrow or it would be rude. It was an invitation to Jay’s wedding. It wasn’t a surprise by any means that the invitation had come. Jay had told Max he was engaged to Jen Caponata a few days after Christmas. This news was the only event punctuating another painfully slow holiday at home. Since then, Max tried to be happy for Jay and Jen. They were undoubtedly happy together. He was sure Jay would be good to Jen. It was marriage itself he wasn’t sure he believed in. Maybe St. Paul’s was right, Max thought. Maybe human beings shouldn’t marry for love. After all, Max himself had thought he loved someone once. He had thought of getting married. But now he couldn’t even remember what love felt like. Now the object of his love was dead. He wondered if what he had felt was just an illusion, a childish fiction that he could easily dismiss with memories of his teenaged years. After all, he thought. There’s no such thing as love. Not among humans. Maybe for God, but not for us.

  Max reflected objectively that he would not make a good wedding guest in his present state of mind. But neither did he want to let Jay down—Jay, one of the few people in Hectortown Max could still tolerate. Logically, Max reasoned, he simply had to use his own highly praised philosophical rhetoric skills on himself, to sell himself on the idea of Jay getting married. St. Paul had advocated men and women marrying for lust. Jay was surely attracted to Jen, as well as thinking he loved her. Did it matter, then, if they thought they were getting married for love but were really getting married for lust, so long as they had enough lust to keep their marriage strong? As long as they had lust for only one another, wasn’t it okay to let them keep their romantic delusions? I guess I can keep my mouth shut, Max decided for his friend’s sake. If they believed strongly enough in this silly notion of love, in time, they would surely learn to lust after each other enough to make everything work out as Paul had hoped. I suppose I can carry off the charade, Max reasoned. For Jay.

  There was really only one catch. That Alfred girl, who had been Jen’s best friend in high school, would surely be there. She had to be. The thought of seeing her again, her sweaty, pale torso—her outrageous hair… it stopped all other thoughts short. What should I say to her? He could ask himself a thousand times and never come up with a suitable answer. He didn’t want to talk to her. She disgusted him. She had made it clear that she didn’t want to talk to him. But, can I just give up on her? he debated. Yes, I can, he reminded himself. Tony even said I can… that I have to. I can’t control what she does, so I also can’t feel guilty about it. Max dropped his arm over his eyes to shield them from the bright sunlight. What business was it of his if she did get hurt? She could cause him nothing but trouble. And yet, at any reminder of Hectortown, he worried about her compulsively—this counterfeit, this inferior copy
of his best friend—the horrible mutation of the little girl his father had told him to keep an eye on so many years before. Is that what this is all about? Max wondered, his own voice chastising himself sarcastically inside his head. Misplaced family loyalty? Still trying to please my father? Max sat up and put his arms around his knees. He looked across the quad at happy pairs of people sharing blankets out on the soft grass.

  Max looked at the invitation again. It did say and guest. Surely this was mistake as Jay and Jen both knew Max would have no date to bring. But they had written it. He could bring his mom. If his parents wanted to save this stray animal so badly, they could do it themselves. Max could alert them of the danger she was in one more time, just as he had years ago. Let them save her this time. Eleanor loved that silly girl and thought of her as a daughter. Max wouldn’t even have to tell Eleanor why he was bringing her along. She would instinctively seek out the hopeless girl like a penguin finding its own child among thousands of identical chicks. Max didn’t need to be a hero, he didn’t need to face this fake Tiar at all. He got up and dusted off his shorts, then ran to his dorm where he filled out the card and sealed the envelope.