by Michael Bray
“How are you feeling, Lorraine?” he asked.
This time, she didn’t fight the name. There seemed to be little point. She didn’t answer.
“I’m sorry we had to put you into solitary, but you were unstable and you know the rules on disruption.”
She glanced at him, wishing she could muster the energy to tell him she didn’t know the rules on disruption, that she was totally oblivious to how the place she was being held prisoner worked. Goodfellow took her silence as acceptance of the apology. He spoke again, his tone soft as if speaking to a child. “You’ve been here in solitary for three weeks now. Today, though, it’s a new month and a fresh start.”
“Three weeks?” she repeated, not thinking it possible
“Today I have good news for you. You have a visitor. Your daughter is here.”
She looked at him, the surge of emotion threatening to explode from within her. “She’s here?”
Goodfellow nodded.
“My daughter Courtney?” she asked, remembering the picture of the other woman she had been shown.
Goodfellow nodded again. “Yes. But because of the recent volatile nature of your outbursts, we will have to restrain you for the visit.”
She nodded, barely listening to him. She stood, trying to do something to make her greasy mop of hair look presentable. She had no idea how she must look, but if it was anything as bad as she felt, she didn’t want to scare her daughter away.
“How do I look? Is my hair okay?” she asked
“It looks fine.” Goodfellow said, smiling at her “Ben is going to come in and apply the restraints now, okay?”
She nodded again, anxious and excited to see her family. Now it seemed she was at last going to be discharged. She stood and allowed the restraints to be applied to her wrists.
“How did they find me? Did they prove who I was?” she asked as they walked out of the room and down the corridor.
“They did. It was a terrible mix-up I’m afraid. An administration error.” Goodfellow said.
She nodded, thinking about how hard she was going to go after the hospital. Compensation. False imprisonment, mental trauma.
Goodfellow glanced at her. “Are you alright?
“I’m fine, just nervous. It feels like forever since I saw her. Is Greg here too?”
“He’s signing your release papers. This way please.”
Goodfellow showed her into a small room. Unlike the one where she was questioned, this one had real furniture and a window – although that too still had bars. She took a seat at the empty table, and then looked at Goodfellow. “Where is she?”
“Patience, please. You need to be restrained to the chair first for your own safety.”
She would have asked why that was necessary when she was going home, but she was too excited and didn’t want to rock the boat. She sat and allowed the hand restraints to be connected to their counterparts on the arms of the chair. She felt sick, partly from nerves and also from excitement. She was desperate to go home, desperate to see her family after what felt like an age. She waited as the orderly checked she was secure, then nodded to Goodfellow, who in turn turned to her.
“Are you ready?” he asked.
She nodded. Goodfellow turned to the orderly. “Bring her in.”
The orderly left. Goodfellow checked his watch. He looked nervous and agitated, and she thought it was because he was stressing about how much trouble he was going to get into when she took her legal action. The door opened again, and she flicked her eyes towards it. Any notion that it was some kind of trick were dispelled. It was Courtney, her daughter. She looked frightened and confused.
“Thank god, thank god you’re here,” she was babbling, crying again as was the norm recently. That emotion doubled when Greg followed her in. They looked as stressed and exhausted as she did. There was a police officer with them, which she was elated to see. She could only imagine how furious he must be about the whole situation. They stood on opposite sides of the table, one side silent and watching, the other sobbing and trying to form the thousand things they wanted to say.
Goodfellow spoke, his voice taking on a new authority in the presence of civilians. “Are you able to identify the patient?” he said to Greg.
Greg glanced at Goodfellow, then across the table. “Yes. That’s her. That’s Christina,” he said.
Elation. She felt the pressure lift, the terror, the frustration melted away.
“Thank you, both of you for coming in,” Goodfellow said, then turned to talk to the officer. “Do you need anything else?”
The officer stepped forward, addressing Greg. The room grew silent. “Is this the woman who was stalking you?”
Greg looked at her, then at Goodfellow. “Yes. This is her.”
“Greg, it’s me. What are you saying?” Her voice felt distant as she said the words. She looked at her family. She realised that the expressions on their faces were that of fear. Fear of her.
Greg looked at Goodfellow, who nodded. “Go ahead. You can speak to her. Tell the officer what happened.”
“A couple of years ago she started following me. First at work, then standing outside my house.”
“No, that’s not true,” she said, fighting against her restraints. “Why are you saying these things?”
Greg went on. Holding Courtney close to him. “I reported her, told her to stop following us. Telling her to get out of our life. She started following my partner, Christina, home from work. Threatening her.”
“No, why are you saying this? You’re supposed to love me.” She was ranting again, but so completely broken she couldn’t muster the energy to fight. Greg continued to tell his story, gathering momentum.
“She got violent, threatened my girlfriend to the point where she left me. We were buying concert tickets for Courtney, she went out to the shops and we never saw her again.”
“That’s not what happened. I had a headache remember? You told me to go to bed.”
Greg glared at her and she saw it. No love. Worse than that, no recognition. Just absolute hatred.
Greg faltered, looking at the floor.
“Please continue,” Goodfellow said. “It’s perfectly alright. She needs to hear this as part of her therapy.
Greg cleared his throat and went on. “She still didn’t leave us alone. I reported her, had restraining orders taken out. But she was determined. She said she was part of the family. One day she…she….”
“Go on,” Goodfellow said.
“She tried to abduct my daughter from school. They found a knife in her bag.”
“That’s not true. I’d never hurt you, I’d never hurt any of you.” She was sobbing again, fighting the restraints despite the pain it was causing.
Goodfellow took over then, addressing everyone in the room. “That was when we took Lorraine in. She was unfit to stand trial, deemed delusional. For two years we have tried every course of therapy possible, but this idea that she is a part of your family refused to go away. We fear that she can never be cured.”
“I don’t care about a cure, I just want to know we’re going to be safe,” Greg said.
She stared at him, unable to comprehend what was going on.
“You will be quite safe. Her daughter recently approved a course of extreme treatment which we hope will help.”
“This is insane,” she screamed, able to taste blood in her throat. “We’ve been together. You’re my family. Look at me, just look at me?
Neither of them would.
“Why won’t you make eye contact with me? You know I’m right. You know I don’t belong here,” she screamed.
“Do we have to stay any longer?” Greg said, looking at Goodfellow.
“No, thank you for coming in to do this. We appreciate the circumstances are unusual but necessary. You and your daughter can rest assured we will make sure your safety is never threatened again.”
“And what happens when she gets out of here?” Greg said. “What if she comes back?
”
Goodfellow smiled. “That won’t happen, sir, I assure you. The treatment she is about to undertake means that she will never again leave this hospital.”
“Treatment? What are you going to do to me? What are you going to do? Don’t touch me, you don’t have the right, you don’t have the right.”
“Mike,” Goodfellow said to the orderly. He grabbed her arm and injected the sedative, her vision fading along with her screams. She saw something as she lost consciousness, something that would have made her scream forever if the medication hadn’t overwhelmed her so quickly.
FOUR
She remembered little now, and what she did came in flashes. There were tears, those never went away. Nor did the sense of betrayal. Something, though, had changed. There was a white light, and Doctor Goodfellow standing above her in surgical scrubs, his face covered by a blue mask. He was explaining something about the procedure she was about to undertake. She knew the word he had used, but could attach no meaning to it.
Lobotomy.
It was just a word now. A collection of letters. She suspected once, she knew what it meant. Not anymore. Now she was a shell, a drooling incontinent thing that existed in the space between sanity and madness. She liked it there. She didn’t have to think, didn’t have to worry. When it was mealtime, someone spoon fed her whatever flavourless mush passed for food. She ate because she was told to. Most days, she would just sit and look out of the window at the gardens. Watching the birds without even knowing what they were. The lobotomy had taken almost everything, but even in such a broken state, there was still something left. A memory. That of a fourteen-year-old girl being ushered out of a room where a woman was screaming as a doctor and a policeman looked on. She remembered the quick glance, the lock of eyes between child and adult.
It was the look of recognition.
If she were able, she would have vocalised it, complained and argued, but she had been reduced to nothing but a fleshy bag of bones drooling and sitting in its own mess as it ate its Jell-O and looked out of the window. The sun caught the window pane, enabling her to see her reflection. Her face was thin, the scar on her head still fresh, eyes glazed and vacant. But she still knew who she was. She had a name.
She was Christina.
SUBMITTED FEAR: WRONGFUL INCARCERATION
BONUS STORY ONE
WITH THESE HANDS
Helen was dead.
Brixton felt the scream coming from deep in his core and unleashed it into the warm December Tobago night. He had been thrown clear of the car when it had rolled, and escaped with only a few minor cuts to his hands and face. Some might call it a miracle until they saw the pulpy mess that still sat in the passenger seat of the mangled Mercedes. It was hard for him to believe that the lifeless pulped meat was once his wife. A woman he had loved, a woman who he had shown his innermost self, the one normally hidden away from people he knew. He sat in the road, vaguely aware of the growing crowds, locals mostly, their rusty, old-fashioned cars abandoned as they surveyed the scene. It was a clear night, and glass shimmered on the ground, miniature diamonds of artificial light surrounding his dead wife and the remains of their hire car. He stood up, unable to believe the contrast in their fortunes and hating the bitter cruelty of the trick God had played on them. Christmas abroad, a way to try and repair the fractured foundations of the relationship. He looked into the car, blonde hair split, brains exposed to the humid night, and was dimly aware there would be none of that. No bickering, no compromises in order to find common ground. She was now a shell, a lifeless thing made of flesh. A puppet without strings, a marionette without its master. Everything that she had been was now gone. He clenched his fists, looked up into the cloudless star littered sky and screamed again.
TWO
“What happened?”
Brixton looked across the table, locking eyes with the police officer. His name was Peters, and he was a large man, narrow sloping shoulders giving him an apish appearance. His skin was dark, eyes curious and unsympathetic. Brixton glanced at the man's hands and the gold wedding ring on his finger. He, at least, would be going home to someone at the end of his shift. For him, it would be business as usual.
“Mr. Brixton?” Peters repeated
He blinked, and tried to focus his attention on the officer and his questions. There was a noise, an annoying buzzing that was starting to irritate him. He glanced to the strip light overhead, the foggy ghosts of long dead flies inhabiting its outer casing. “We were on holiday,” he croaked, forcing his attention back on the officer. “Christmas in the sun. We thought it would be good to leave the cold of home behind.”
“We recovered your passports from the car. You’re English?”
Brixton nodded.
“Mr. Brixton, I need you to verbally respond for the benefit of the recording.”
He glanced at the tape recorder on the table, then at the Peters, who was unreadable. “Yes, sorry. We – I’m from England. Both of us are. Were. This is so hard.”
“I understand how difficult this is, but I need to know what happened, Mr. Brixton.”
“I know you do. I’m trying.”
It wasn’t the answer expected of him, but it was the best he could manage. He was aware that he would have to discuss it, and as much as he was desperate to put it off, knew it would only work for a while.
"We were arguing," he said, placing his hands flat on the table, marveling again that the few grazes and scratches were his only injuries from the crash.
"Go on,” Peters said, shifting position.
"We'd been out for a meal on the other side of the island. We'd been having problems at home, and this was supposed to be us getting back on track. Funny thing is, she didn't even want to come here. She wanted to stay closer to home, go to the coast maybe. It's all-"
“Mr. Brixton.”
Brixton stopped speaking and stared at Peters, trying to make him understand how difficult it was for him. “Sorry, I’m getting side-tracked.”
“I understand. Please, tell me what happened with the accident.”
Brixton cleared his throat, and then stared at his hands. Unable to handle looking at how little pain he suffered from the crash, he moved them under the table out of sight. “We were arguing. I get jealous, paranoid sometimes. Anyway, I thought she had been having an affair with a guy she knows at work. That was why we came out here. A last ditch attempt to fix things. Anyway, I was sure she had been looking at this guy in the restaurant. I lost it and we were asked to leave.”
“Which restaurant?”
“I can’t remember the name. Does it matter?”
“We need to know. For the investigation.”
“I wasn’t drinking if that’s what you wanted to check. I didn’t have a drop.”
“We know. We tested you at the crash site. Do you not remember?”
Brixton frowned and looked at the table top. “Of course. Sorry, I forgot.”
“We can get the details of the location later. What I want to know is what happened that caused you to crash.” The officer said, still calm and patient.
“As I said, we had argued in the restaurant about her looking at this guy. We were asked to leave, and the argument continued in the car on the way back to the hotel. It got heated. She was screaming at me, I was screaming at her. I suppose I must have been speeding. Maybe because I was angry. Anyway, I lost control of the car on a bend. It happened too fast for me to react. I felt it start to flip over, then…nothing. Next thing I remember I was lying in the dirt surrounded by people.”
“Is there anything else you can tell me?”
“I don’t know what else I’m expected to say," Brixton muttered. "Will I go to jail?"
Peters shook his head. “No. You were sober, of sound mind to drive. This looks like nothing but a tragic accident. You are free to go Mr. Brixton.”
Brixton made no effort to move. He stared at Peters, trying to force out the words.
“Was there something else?”
For the first time, Peters looked uncomfortable. He shifted position and looked at the clock on the wall. "I don't think that's a good idea, Mr. Brixton."
“Please, I just…. I need to see her.”
“Don’t put yourself through it. Perhaps it would be better to remember your wife the way she was?”
“I can’t,” he choked on the words, and felt the hot sting of tears. “Whenever I think about her, all I can see is her sitting the wreck, all broken. That’s not her.”
“Mr. Brixton-”
“I can’t remember her. Don’t you understand what I’m saying? I don’t remember what she looks like.” He wiped the palms of his hands under his eyes and stared at Peters.
“I understand, Mr. Brixton, really I do. But trust me when I tell you I’ve been doing this a long time. It’s better for you to remember your wife as she was in life, not in death.”
“Are you saying I can’t see her?”
“Legally I can’t stop you, Mr. Brixton. All I can do is offer advice. Will you please get some rest first? Go to the mortuary tomorrow? Much better to do such things with a clear head.”
Brixton considered for a moment, turning his attention inward. He was exhausted. The problem was, he couldn’t imagine where sleep might come from. “Okay,” he said, slumping in his seat. “I’ll go tomorrow.”
“Good idea. Would you like me to have someone take you to your hotel?”
Brixton shook his head. “No, I’ll walk for a while then get a taxi.”
“Are you certain?”
"Yes. I'm sure. Can I go now?" Brixton said. He couldn't breathe, was too hot. He didn't like being so close to Peters. He hated the shifty way his eyes moved like he was always looking for a lie.