A large, middle-aged woman smiled at him as he entered the building designated HEALTH CENTRE. If only she meant that. he muttered on, “The world would turn on a different axis.”
“Alabama for Doctor Alexander Pennsylvania.” the sorrowful example of humanity mumbled to the receptionist woman, name-tagged Virginia, “I have an appointment.”
“Alabama.” The receptionist checked down her list, “Alabama, Alabama.”
“Christian Alabama.” the man added, “11:45, Doctor Alexander Pennsylvania.”
“Found you.” the receptionist ticked off his name.
“Well done.” congratulated Christian Alabama.
“If you'd like to take a seat Mr Alabama, I’ll call your name out when the doctor is ready for you.” she simpered over her milk-bottle-lens prescription glasses.
He took the nearest of the dull-grey plastic seats to avoid locking with familiar eyes in the busy waiting room. No such luck.
“Christian Alabama!” a balding man tapped him an the shoulder from behind. Christian Alabama’s head dropped in despair. He fidgeted uneasy in his seat. Why was the receptionist, Virginia, staring at him?
“Christian, my old mate.” the balding man sitting down beside him chattered, “Hey, how’ve you been?”
“Fine.” Christian Alabama’s eyebrows elevated on his face; a clever trick; a sly deception, “How's yourself?” he chirruped. “Still at the foundry?”
“Naah! Paid us off. Got my own business now making fire surrounds. Money's better. Work’s rolling in. Bills getting paid.”
“Great…” Christian Alabama lied.
“So, Christian, what you been up to? It’s been, oh... Years. How many years.” the man asked himself, “Six? Seven?”
“Nine, I think.” Christian Alabama substantiated his reply with evidence, “The Nayler do.”
“The Naylor do. That was it. Ten years, last October. The Naylor do. Christ, what an almighty booze-up.”
“So…” Christian Alabama asked, “Why you here?”
His old mate faltered, “Well ... I ... you know ... old age creeping in ... wear and tear… This is one of those regular medicals they call you in for… You know.”
“Mister Abraham Georgia.” the receptionist came to his rescue, “The doctor will see you now.”
“Right, see you around, Abraham.” said Christian Alabama as his old mate left.
“Yeah, see you round…” Abraham Georgia got to his feet and approached the receptionist's window, “Go straight in?” he asked.
“Yes, straight through.” Abraham Georgia nodded another farewell to his old mate Christian Alabama and pushed on through a glass door, down a brown-carpeted peach-decorated corridor to a dead-end of four doors marked with four different names. He knocked at the door marked Doctor Alexander Pennsylvania.
“Enter.” a large voice eventually bellowed from within.
Abraham Georgia entered, greeting, “Morning Doctor.”
The doctor checked his wristwatch, “Just.” and allowed a big smile to meander raggedly across his bearded countenance like a disembowelling gash opening the flank of a grizzly. He indicated a chair for Abraham Georgia to sit in. “What can we do for you?” he asked when Abraham Georgia once he had settled himself.
Abraham Georgia prepared his speech, “I... er... think I’ve picked something up.”
“Like?” the doctor knew exactly where this is going but pressed his patient for further information.
“A rash. You know, an itch ... a sort of rash ... down there.” he pointed groinwards.
Doctor Alexander Pennsylvania's big, bearded face lights up, “A venereal disease?”
“Yes, well sort of, I suppose. I don’t know. I guess you could put it like that. Yes, a venereal disease.”
“Any seeping blisters on the penis?”
Abraham Georgia shook his head in the negative.
“Any discharge? Pain when passing water?”
Again the negative head shake, and, “Just little red spots on the ... end.”
Doctor Alexander Pennsylvania was already scribbling in his prescription pad, “Thrush. I’ll give you some Caneston ointment. Apply it to the glans, the end of the penis. Be sure you wash the last application off before putting more on. That’s twice a day for seven days. Okay?”
Doctor Alexander Pennsylvania handed Abraham Georgia the prescription slip expecting him to then leave his surgery so he could finally get at least one cup of tea down him before the mad rush of ailing hypochondriacs began their all-too-regular pilgrimage.
More manic-depressives and hypos in this district than in any other I’ve worked in. He should inform his learned southern colleagues in health and safety - must be something in the water up here.
“I also have these nightmares…” Abraham Georgia, on his feet, continued the intimate divulgence, “This is stupid…” he turned to leave.
“Please.” Doctor Alexander Pennsylvania beckoned the man back to the chair, thinking there was some other ailment he could write a prescription for.
“When I'm in bed at night. I have these waking dreams. Recurrent. Really lifelike you know, like all that latex stuff in all the films these days. But for real. I awoke in front of the bathroom mirror the other morning and for just a split second I could have sworn that all my bones … he touches his head, shoulders, chest, everywhere… all of them were like sticking out of me or were in the middle of sticking out of me.”
The doctor's wide face had darkened all through the confession, washing his hands at the basin, he asked Mr Georgia to, “Go behind the screen and take off all your clothes.”
“I swear I still have the scars.”
“That we’ll soon find out about, won’t we?”
Once undressed, the patient was joined by the doctor, “On the table with you then. Just lie back.”
Abraham Georgia did as he was told.
The doctor examined his hairy rather obese body, humming a little tune to himself.
“But it was what happened to me last night that really got to me…” Abraham Georgia still had a confession or two
The doctor made a mental note of the numerous white marks under Mr Georgia’s matting of body hair, almost strategically concealed.
“My dream. It was the dream I had made me come here today...”
The doctor had stopped examining his patient, “Sit up, please. You can get dressed.” He returned to the basin.
“But my dream. It was Lily from the White House up on Standishgate. The barmaid.”
The doctor huffed, “Popular girl.”
“You what? What d’you mean? Popular girl?”
“Someone else was in here just the other day with the same complaint and a similar story; mentioned the same woman.” wiping his hands.
“But in my dream she wasn't a woman. She was a lot of different people. All disfigured. I could recognise some of them. But they all had bits missing. All grotesque. Bits of a face here. An arm there. A back. Hands. Even things I couldn't make out. Horrible. Stretched. Skinned. the revelation gained a frenzied pace, Some had no eyes. Some were swollen beyond all human ... proportion! he found the word. Just flesh. Big blobs of rolling blubber. Boulders made of real people. All like one big landslide. A ... community ... oh, I don't know. They all spoke at once with her voice, said things she'd never say. Silly things. Gibberish. he stammered, Un..un..unspeakable things about life and the power of LUST. An end to a MEANS. And a calling to WAR. I woke up with her mad words ringing in my ears. It's really freaking me out, doctor. My wife is beginning to suspect.”
“Indeed. Mr Georgia ... Abraham. You don't mind me calling you Abraham?”
Abraham Georgia shook his head.
“Now,” the doctor found it, “I have just the thing for you. A tonic. I don't give this to all my patients.. just the convincing ones.” Doctor Alexander Pennsylvania showed all his teeth as he presented Abraham Georgia with a small glass vial containing a yellow, oily liquid, “This will help alleviate
the waking terror. Take it at mealtimes like a medicine, and one quick swig before retiring to bed.” He handed him the vial, bade him a fond farewell.
As Abraham Georgia passed through reception, wishing his old mate Christian Alabama all the best, the receptionist noticed the bottle of yellow syrup in his hand. When Abraham Georgia had left and she had told Mr Alabama to go through, she picked up the telephone and dialled 213 466. After four rings a drowsy reply greeted her, “Bedford Delaware. Speak softly and slowly into this startling piece of technology after the tone. Remember to smile.” This was followed by a lengthy beep.
“Bedford. It's Virginia over at the Health Centre, remember? Well, that's the second patient this week to take Doctor Alexander Pennsylvania's little bottle of yellow stuff. You said I was to keep you informed. Miss you ... bye.”
SESSION V
There she was. Over me. Her alabaster face a guiltless smile. The nametag pinned to her Lincoln-green tunic's breast pocket proudly states – Staff Nurse Lily Veyne. The albino I had just so spectacularly fantasised about held in her smooth pink hands a large, yellow bath sponge.
“Good afternoon, Mister Deniz.” she greeted my resurrection. She inspected her handiwork, flitted her almost invisible eyebrows. “You’ll do, cowboy.”
Someone poked their head in at the open door, “Lily, can I see you a moment?”
“Shan't be a sec’” she replied; sailing down at me before attending to the request.
My stomach rumbled loudly. The room swayed a little, its soft-green facade of three dimensionality cracks just a little allowing me to see the true nature of its laser-licked television-static before slamming back solid again with a great air blast of electrical discharge and the stench of burning solenoid. A loud crackling and a stiff thwacking sound simultaneous in their sadism invaded my consciousness.
Staff Nurse Lily Veyne reappeared, peeling off her pink surgical gloves.
“Hello in there.” she mocked my queasiness.
My smile came out like a sneer.
“Ooo… We are in the wars.” she chuckled while I choke to death on some thoracic obstruction. Staff Nurse Lily Veyne took me in her robust right arm and gave me a good, hard thwack on my back. That did it ... broke four fucking ribs! Still, it's always a joy to have your face pressed into a big pair of tits, ah mother.
“Mucky pup.” she commented on the string of drool I left down her nurse's uniform.
Laying me back into the pillow, she pulled my blue-stripe pyjama bottoms back up for me.
“Doctor Bradburg said she’d pop in to see you today. Personal visit. That'll be nice for you, won't it?” she grinned sadistically.
I grunted my comprehension.
“So we had to get you all cleaned up and looking thoroughly..” she beamed nastily, “...mothered.”
A quaintly psycho-therapeutic jibe, I'm sure. The bed covers were pulled over me once more.
“Now, my little deformed monster..” she smiled again, “You just lie there while I fetch you some Soup of the Day.” Tucking me in to the throat, “I think it's chicken today. No. Pea and ham is Wednesday.” she giggled to herself, “Don’t know where I am, silly me.”
My eyes follow her as she exited my private room clutching the sponge and towel and big bar of coal-tar soap to her breast. Such a wonderful pair of … jugs, if you’ll excuse my obvious vulgarity.
I had again dozed off after my personal spoon fed bowl of lukewarm OXTAIL soup (must remember – Thursday, Oxtail) the effects of whatever the fuck they had injected into my behind that unfortunate day gradually wore off. Did I hear someone mention Dopamine or Pentathol? Thought Pentathol was the truth drug, not a tranquilliser.
One minute I'm in drowsy semi-real Mogadon cityscape. The next I'm being hustled into the thoughtless world of the rudely awoken.
“This is mister Djin Deniz, everyone. Twenty-eight Day Section. Obz.” Doctor Fanny Bradburg, despectacled, escorted a number of plain clothesed female student types into my room with juvenile hustle and bustle.
“Now, if you'll study your notes, you'll see the patient suffered from Polio as a child and here, as a result, we have the expected compound disabilities of...” she gestured for one of the students to pull back the bed sheets.
The student; a tiny; sweet faced; straight brown haired; drably attired in brown; post pubescent; coyly approached the bed and drew back my covers; careful not to lock eyes with me.
“Thank you.” Dr Fanny Bradburg thanked the girl, replacing her glasses before returning her attention to me. She asked me to turn over onto my front for her.
Slowly, I turn over for inspection. My pyjama top was lifted to a muffled conspiracy of gasps.
“The epidermal boils and pustules we will come to later on but here... as you can see...” Dr Fanny Bradburg traced the meandering line of my spine with a cold finger. “We have massive spinal malformation. Lumber vertebrae 12 and 13 have become fused and up in the thoracic region we have discovered a degrading of the cartilage separating vertebrae 5 and 6 so that these bones are basically rubbing away at each other, causing considerable pain and rigidity of posture. Thank you.” She replaces my pyjama top.
“Could you please turn back?” she asked.
This time her cold hands held me a little as I squirmed against the damp constriction of the bedclothes.
“Now.” she referred to her notepad, “We get onto the other more bizarre physical anomalies.” Dr Fanny Bradburg pulled down my pyjama bottoms; in full sight of all those innocent ladies’ eyes.
In despair, I began to sob, like the soft whine of a commercial jet engine as it taxis up the runway before take-off for a well-practised mission of death.
SIX
By the time Bedford Delaware heard the message, it was late that same evening. He had returned in a drunken stupor with a young Chinese boy going by the name of Clive Idaho and his albino flatmate Lily Veyne in tow. The three of them had been getting on like a dream back at the White House up on Standishgate and Clive Idaho had thought no harm could come of stopping off at theirs for a quick coffee before heading off to his family home.
Bedford Delaware ordered the quite tipsy couple into the living room of his first-floor apartment over the butcher's shop and set about listening to the messages on his machine ... beep. “Mister Delaware. This is Matt over at Sheildykes. Your car's ready.” beep. Click ... beep! Click ... hiss ... beep. “Bedford? Lily. If I don't see you later, I’ll call you.” beep. He smiled. Click ... hiss ... clunk ... beep. Click. “Bedford? It's Virginia over at the Health Centre, remember? Well, that's the second patient this week to take Doctor Pennsylvania’s little bottle of yellow stuff. You said I was to keep you informed. Miss you, bye.” Beep. “Bedford? Virginia. Call me.” beep! beep. beep.
“Silly Cow.” Bedford Delaware huffed, rewinding his answer machine and resetting it all so as not to be disturbed; that's the last thing he’d want tonight: any disturbances. Oh, how Bedford just adored a bit of chinky ... just found those golden buttocks so enticing. The way those glutes flex and flex their fuckin rhythm. A sheer delight to the eye. And Lily Veyne had always known just how to soften up the victims for the kill - that rectal injection. Bedford Delaware was getting hard just dwelling on past exploits and present potential as he swayed into the living room.
“Nothing urgent.” he intoned to his guest sat alone on the cream leather couch by the stereo system.
“Won't be a sec’, Clive Idaho.” he showed the young chinaman a finger, “Lily Veyne’s getting you something to drink?”
“Yes, thank you.” Clive Idaho politely smiled.
“Scandalous...” remarked Bedford Delaware.
Bedford Delaware swooped into the kitchen saying Scandalous to himself just one time as he came up behind Lily Veyne and grabbed her arse. She jumped with a shrieking surprise. “You like?” he asked her.
“You have excellent taste, Bedsy.” Lily Veyne replied in her drowsy way, “As you already bloody know.”
“And y
ou think you can soften him up for me?” he leered.
“Putty.” she assured him, making a masturbatory gesture in Bedford Delaware's face, then licking her palm. Kissing him on the mouth before carrying the two whisky-sodas through to the living room.
Bedford Delaware followed, carrying his own and sat on the adjacent cream-leather easy-chair by the fireplace. Leaning over the arm and winking at Lily Veyne, he turned on the gas fire, “Cold in here, don't you think?”
Lily Veyne leant her ample frame on Clive Idaho, who was suddenly looking dwarfed and highly uncomfortable. She told Bedford Delaware to, “Fuck off, eh. You’re in our way. Don't you have any skin-mags to wank over?”
“Touchy.” Bedford Delaware commented, resettling himself.
“Don’t let him get to you.” she whispered into Clive Idaho’s ear.
“I think he is very ... colourful.” Clive Idaho smiled at Bedford Delaware, “But a bit full of himself.”
“That’s not all he's full of, lover.” Lily Veyne mocked.
“There's no photographic evidence.” Bedford Delaware retaliated. They all have a good belly-laugh at Bedford Delaware's dubious sexual identity.
Clive Idaho asked, “Why do you have your hair like that? Don’t you think it's a bit passé?”
“Passé?” Bedford Delaware huffed, “It’s contemporary. Vivid. Alive.” he gesticulated with his arm the wash of ginger hair a mini-Hiroshima snaking down his back.
“Tell him about the make-up, Bedsy.” Lily Veyne interjected.
“My foundation?”
“Yeah. Tell Clive Idaho how long it takes you to get out of the bathroom when we’re going to Max’s.”
“You're just a jealous bitch. A sad little miss plain.” Bedford got up from his chair and jumped down on the couch beside Clive Idaho. “Ever been to Max’s, Clive?” he asked.
“Who's Max?” Clive Idaho asked Lily Veyne.
“Max’s is owned by a young man with far too many connections in the world of cerebro-stimulant chemicals and S&M cinema productions, but don’t let that put you off, my lover boy. He runs the nightclub of the same name. Town centre just off Standishgate.” she played with his heavy black hair, studies his beautiful, brown eyes, “You should let me and Bedsy do you up. You'll go down like a real hero. Be like a bomb's hit the place when you walk in. We'll have them rich bastards sniffing after you. You won't ever have to spend your own money there, my lover boy.”
Twilight's Last Gleaming Page 5