Kline considered. “Two million?” It had been a while since he had played this kind of game.
“No way. Ten.”
“Ten?” Kline tried to put some hurt in his voice, as if he were being duped on a mattress sale. “I’ll give you four, tops.”
“Seven.”
“Five.”
“Five and a half.”
Kline relented. For venturing into a cell with giggling Timmy Hollingshead, he thought 5.5 million dollars was probably a fair asking price.
When they became tired of discussing death-defying dares, the conversation moved to whatever Simmons had seen on television earlier that evening. If it was something the guard didn’t understand, Dr. Kline would try to explain.
Explanations required sustained speaking. These were the real tests, because Mr. Simmons was not an especially polite man, and he was not careful with his words. If Dr. Kline said something strange, or said it in a strange way, Simmons reacted immediately. “You sound funny,” he would blurt out suddenly. In Simmons-speak, this could mean almost anything. “Should I call someone? You need a pill or something?”
“No, Ben. Hold on.” And here Dr. Kline would check himself, examining what he had done wrong. “I’m all right now.”
“Yeah, okay,” said Simmons, the worry lingering in his voice. And then it was forgotten. “Anyway, you were saying about the fire on T.V.?”
“Yes. The fire from the explosion was so hot that it began melting the steel in the building.”
“Melting the steel?”
“Melting it, yes.”
And so Dr. Kline would continue, until the next time his friend noticed something awry.
“Have you seen the new Porsche they’re making?” Simmons asked one night.
Dr. Kline was in the middle of a deep, deep memory hole – an amnesia phase – and he was struggling to avoid the panic that accompanied such times. “I’m not sure,” he said slowly.
The response didn’t activate Simmons’s weird-sensor, and he plowed ahead. “It’s an awesome car. I wish I could have one. You ever have a car like that? A sports car, I mean?”
Dr. Kline concentrated. He recognized neither his surroundings nor the voice of the man talking to him, and the feeling of panic was closing in like a dark, asphyxiating cloud. He supposed that he might have owned a sports car once. Why not? He didn’t remember his own name; anything was possible. “Yes,” he said, trying to sound confident.
“No kidding.” Simmons was ecstatic. “What kind? What color?”
These questions were too difficult, and Dr. Kline felt himself beginning to lose his grip on reality. He summoned his last bit of strength. “I think I need to go to sleep, friend.”
Simmons reacted with his usual equanimity. “Okay, Nathan. Talk to you tomorrow. Sleep well.”
The next night, Kline asked Simmons to remind him what they had discussed the day before. It was difficult to make his voice sound casual. He wondered if he had blacked out, or had suffered a particularly severe paranoid episode, or what.
“Oh, this and that,” Simmons replied. “Then you got tired all of a sudden and went off to bed, remember?”
“Ah, yes.”
Kline did not remember, but he knew that his bouts of Transient Global Amnesia were frequently followed by fatigue. Dr. Levoir had told him that. So maybe he had just been having one of his forgetful spells. And if he had managed to get through an amnesia phase without Simmons noticing anything amiss, then that was cause for celebration. “What were we talking about before I went to bed?”
“The Porsche. Don’t you remember?”
No, he certainly didn’t. But Simmons didn’t seem worried. Good.
After two months of practice, Dr. Kline believed he was ready for the next stage. Ready, that is, to try his luck with people who were more critical than a night watchman.
Surely I can handle the idiots on a review board, he thought.
It was a little bit ahead of schedule – he had budgeted another four months before his targeted release – but the possibility of getting out was too exciting to ignore. There were so many old friends he wanted to visit.
So many… discussions… that needed to be had.
Just days before Kline was going to broach the subject of the review board, Dr. Levoir arrived at their morning interview session looking concerned. Looking almost upset. And Dr. Levoir never looked upset. “What happened last night, Nathan?”
Kline froze. He thought quickly, but could not resurrect any memory of the night before.
“Benjamin Simmons came to me this morning,” Dr. Levoir said slowly. “He seemed shaken up. I wasn’t able to get anything specific out of him, but he did say that you two had been talking.”
Silence, as the patient searched his leaky brain. If it was another amnesia phase, that was one thing. But there were other possibilities. A more acute form of the paranoia phase, for example. Or maybe it was something else.
Maybe it was something I couldn’t control.
“What did you talk about, Nathan?”
“I swear I don’t remember.”
Dr. Levoir nodded, but his dour expression did not change. “All right, Nathan. Mr. Simmons will be taking some vacation, starting today. Nurse Bailer has agreed to stand in for him.”
Kline had difficulty hiding his disappointment. With Simmons gone, he knew he would never find out exactly what had happened the night before. And he would have to revert to self-assessment from now on.
Also, Nurse Bailer was not his favorite employee.
She came to him without warning that night, just minutes after the call for lights out.
“Kline.” Her flat voice at the door.
He was nearing the end of a dog phase, and he could smell the detergent on the nurse’s freshly laundered white uniform. The soap overwhelmed most of her natural odors, but nothing could block out the oil on her skin, the grease in her hair. Dr. Kline had decided that Nurse Bailer did not bathe often enough. He brought his plastic chair to the front of the room, just as he always had with Mr. Simmons. “Nurse Bailer?” he whispered. “How nice to hear – ”
“Drop it, mush-brain. I don’t get paid enough to listen to nut-fucks like you.”
Kline’s mouth snapped shut. He could not have been more surprised if she had come striding into the room and hit him over the head with a wrench. Nurse Bailer was usually unpleasant, but this was a new level of spite.
“I don’t know what you’ve been feeding Simmons,” she said, “but I’m not hungry, got it?”
Kline did not respond.
You don’t interrupt an angry dog, he thought. You keep still, and hope that the barking, drooling thing will continue on its way.
“And don’t confuse me with Dr. Levoir, either.”
No danger there.
“I don’t know why that man is so taken with you, but there it is.” She sounded disgusted. “I’d have you strapped to a bed around the clock, if I ran this place.”
Then I guess I’m glad you’re not a doctor.
“I don’t want to hear one more fucking word out of you tonight, understand?”
Absolutely.
“I can hardly wait until you come up for review. I’m going to have so much to say.”
Kline’s breath stopped in his chest. Insults were one thing, but he didn’t like to hear her talking about the review board.
He didn’t like it at all.
“You may have made Dr. Levoir your little pal,” the nurse went on, “but I can see what you’re doing. You’re like one of those ‘reformed’ child molesters who can pick up a little girl, smile for the cameras, and put her down again. But you’re nothing but rotten underneath. I can see the crazy in you like a bull-turd in a glass jar.”
Dr. Kline took a deep breath. It was too early for this, but he knew what he had to do. Nurse Bailer had crossed the line. “I’m so sorry you feel that way, ” he said.
“Don’t you say one more goddamned… what?”
&
nbsp; Kline had felt the Voice phase approaching, and he had been planning to keep his mouth shut. But then the nurse had started threatening him with this review board nonsense. And that was unacceptable.
His plan was risky. The Voice had not been field-tested, not even with Simmons. If it didn’t work the way he hoped, Bailer would rat him out. Then Dr. Levoir would start asking questions, which would be a disaster. If the doctor got wind of his special abilities, he would never get out of this place.
So Kline closed his eyes and tried to speak in a tone that was both firm and clear. “It’s just that I thought we were getting along so well,” he said.
“We were not getting along,” the nurse said. “What are you talking about?”
Kline hadn’t won her over yet, but her tone had softened a few notches. She didn’t sound so sure of herself anymore. He pushed on.
“You’re right,” he said. “Of course you’re right. We weren’t really. Not at first. Maybe we started off on the wrong foot.”
“Wrong foot…?” She was hesitating now. Her breath was unsteady.
“Exactly. The wrong foot. The thing is, I didn’t realize how important you were around here. How much responsibility you had.” The words were slow, delicious.
It sounds right, he thought. And the smell was there too, just as it had been when he was practicing on his own. It made him think about sex. His dog phase was over, so he couldn’t smell the nurse anymore, but he hoped she was being affected through the slots in the door. He knew she had a master key, and he considered inviting her into his little room for some play-time. God knew it had been a while.
But he had a better idea.
The nurse sighed. “It’s true,” she said. “I have a lot on my plate.”
“That’s right. I can see that now. You’re the real engine of this place. You keep the wheels spinning.”
“I do oversee most of the staff.”
“Levoir would be lost without you.”
She let out a little laugh. “He doesn’t know the first thing about running a ward.” Now her tone had changed completely. She was speaking easily, as though to a good friend. Or to a very attractive man at a bar. “I take care of everything,” she said.
“Naturally. And you make every patient’s comfort your business.”
“Yes… that’s right.”
“But do you know what I like best about you, Nurse Bailer?”
“What? Best?” Her voice was light. Almost giddy.
“I like how you’re always talking to the patients. I love these visits of yours.”
“It’s my job,” she said, the sound of pride welling up in her chest.
“And you do that job so well. Could you do me a favor, Nurse Bailer?”
“Anything. And call me Charlotte.”
“Charlotte, yes. Could you give Timmy Hollingshead a visit?”
Charlotte Bailer turned to look in the direction of Timmy’s room, two doors down. Even in her dreamy state, she seemed cautious at the sound of that name. “Timmy?” she said, and paused. “Oh, I’m not sure I should.”
Kline kept talking. “Charlotte, come on. I don’t want to monopolize your time. Couldn’t you just go into his room and say hi? It would mean so much to me. And to Timmy. He and I are good friends, you know, and he told me that he’s been feeling neglected lately.”
“Has he? Well…”
“Please?”
“I suppose it’s part of my job.”
“Exactly right,” Kline purred.
He heard her move away from the door, heard her sneaker footsteps padding down the concrete hallway. There was the ringing of a set of keys being pulled from a pocket. He held his breath and waited.
How long do the effects of this little parlor trick last? Kline wondered. Is she actually going to let herself into Timmy Hollingshead’s room? Does the Voice really work that well? Does it really?
He heard the groan of hinges as a heavy door opened and closed, and then the click of a latch snapping shut.
Yes, it really does.
There was the sound of Nurse Bailer talking quietly, waking Timmy up. Dr. Kline walked over to his bed and eased himself slowly down onto the thin mattress. He could feel a vertigo phase coming on, and he didn’t want to fall and knock his head against anything.
Seconds later, Charlotte Bailer screamed. There was a clarity to the sound, as though the first broken bone had made the nurse suddenly understand her mistake. She screamed, desperate and pleading, for Timmy to stop. The next bone snapped, and her voice went up an entire octave, into a register that woke the few patients who had not already been jolted from their beds by the first yell. Nurse Bailer took great, gulping mouthfuls of air and screamed, screamed as one who could see her own death suddenly so near, and was not, not, not ready. The sounds she made filled the Clancy Hall ward and pressed up against the concrete walls. The metal doors trembled.
Beneath Nurse Bailer’s terrified wailing there came another sound, much softer, this one like the bells in a child’s toy. It was the sound of Timmy Hollingshead’s laughter, delighted and musical. Like a girl’s.
Lying in the dark, the room spinning around him as his vestibular sense began to fail, Dr. Kline closed his eyes and smiled.
He was ready.
3
From Getting to Know Patient Nathan:
I have said publicly that I felt pity for Dr. Kline, both during his stay at Clancy Hall and afterwards. It is easy to understand why this sentiment is not a popular one. Kline’s name has come to symbolize many things, but pity is not one of them.
The whole story of Patient Nathan, though, is one that I do think deserves pity. He lost his family. He lost his job, his coworkers, and many of his closest friends.
He lost his mind.
“But Dr. Levoir,” I can hear someone say, “Kline himself was responsible for the losses you describe.”
To this observation, I can only respond, “Good point.”
And still I find it sad.
4
Nurse Bailer had been dead a week, and Kline was delighted to find that no one suspected anyone other than Timmy Hollingshead.
Delighted, but not really surprised.
When Kline was told what had happened, he managed to look appropriately shocked. It wasn’t hard for him. He had been putting on an act of one kind or another for months now.
As far as Dr. Levoir was concerned, Kline was still the model patient.
Kline’s Escape
1
The review board was not what he had expected. Kline had been picturing a long table of men and women dressed in suits. They would face him with stern, thoughtful expressions. He would sit in a single wooden chair, and if he had owned a cap, he would be holding it in his hands. A large fan would turn slowly overhead while the men and women asked him probing questions. He would nod thoughtfully, and then he would describe all the progress that he and Dr. Levoir had been making. All the neurological demons that had been found, catalogued, and quarantined.
Afterwards they would smile wisely at him, write a few notes with expensive pens on official stationary, and then he would be on his way.
But that wasn’t the way it happened.
Exactly forty-five weeks after Nathan Kline’s arrival at Clancy Hall, Dr. Levoir brought another doctor into the daily interview session with him. “Nathan, have you met Dr. Bender?”
Kline spoke without hesitation. “From the third floor? University of Pennsylvania, I believe. Then Stanford.”
Dr. Bender’s eyes opened wide. He reached out to shake the patient’s hand. “Dr. Levoir prepared you?”
“The nurses discuss everyone,” Dr. Kline said smoothly. He winked. “I think you’re one of their favorites. I hear about you all the time.”
But of course this wasn’t true. Kline was in the middle of a mnemonic phase, one of several that he had not discussed with Dr. Levoir. For the next hour, his memory would be perfect. Every stray sentence that had ever been uttered within hi
s earshot; anything he had seen, touched, tasted, or smelled; it was all right there in front of him. He could have named Levoir’s necktie choices for the past 288 days. He could have recited the recipe for meatloaf his mother had taught him 20 years ago. But he stuck to pleasantries. He knew it was what the doctor expected. “Are you here to meet the fearsome Patient Nathan?” Kline said, trying to sound amused. “I worry that I may disappoint.”
Dr. Bender sat back, a man at leisure. “Not at all. We often observe one another’s interviews. Helps for collaboration. Nothing to do with you.”
“Of course.”
Liar.
The next day, Dr. Bender did not return. Kline was pleased; he took this to mean that the doctor had been satisfied with his visit. In Bender’s place, Levoir brought Dr. Haven. Dr. Haven arrived in the middle of one of Kline’s dog phases, when he could smell absolutely everything.
Dr. Haven put out his hand to greet Kline, who struggled to return the favor. The man reeked so strongly of semen that it was difficult to concentrate.
“Pleased to meet you, Nathan.” said Dr. Haven. “How are you feeling?”
I was feeling all right, Kline thought. That is, until I noticed the fresh sperm on your breath. Your companion seems also to have dripped sweat on you in the process. Tom Harwell, is it? I can smell that man from two hundred yards away – he’s a greasy one. Is this part of Tom’s treatment, doctor? Or do all the patients in your wing get that kind of special attention?
“I’m feeling very well, thank you,” Dr. Kline said. “Although my stomach is a little uneasy this morning.”
“Probably the breakfast meat,” Haven said, smiling.
Dr. Kline tried to breathe through his mouth for the rest of the interview.
There were more. Each morning, a new doctor joined them for an hour or so. No special reason, they said. Just stopping by. Kline could tell by Levoir’s reactions that the process was going well. The first goal – getting released – was close. Which meant that phase two – the list – was approaching. It all made his heart race, and he began to have difficulty sleeping.
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