by Jack Phoenix
“Well, you know that I mean it,” he said.
“I don’t feel so strong, Wade,” she whimpered. “I don’t feel strong or brave at all. I feel weak and stupid.”
“No, you’re…”
“No, let me say this, let me finish, please,” she put a hand up. “I really did love him. I still do somewhere deep down, but that’s no excuse for staying with him. It was never a good enough reason to turn my back on the damage he was inflicting on Sam and me. I knew he was cheating on me, and I ignored it. I knew that I was unhappy, that I was miserable, and I stayed in this marriage. Why did I do it? I made up every excuse there is-because I still cared about him, because I wasn’t a quitter, because I was financially trapped, because I didn’t want our child growing up in a broken home. But this home was already broken. What she’s facing right now is a hundred times worse than a divorce, it’s fucking murder. She may have to face the fact that her father is a murderer…and…and…”
“Ssshhhhh, it’s okay, Liz,” he comforted, as he reached over and embraced her.
“…and it could’ve been one of us,” she continued. “For fuck’s sake, it could’ve been one of us! My daughter, could’ve been…Oh, God, I just can’t believe I didn’t see it. I never thought he could do something like this, but the way that he’s been acting lately…We could’ve been killed.”
“I know you’ve already heard it, and you’ll see what I mean in time, but you have no right to blame yourself. You’re not the one who has done something wrong here, okay?”
The phone rang. It derailed Elizabeth’s thoughts of shame that she was now stringing together, wondering how she’d ever forgive herself. She wasn’t really listening to her friend’s words anyway. She got up from the couch and found the phone on the kitchen counter. It was the home phone again. The caller identification read, “Thornfield.”
“Hello,” she greeted, wiping her nose with a tissue.
A voice said, with a heavy southern accent, “This is Doctor Flint at Thornfield, is Elizabeth Whithers in?”
“Actually it’s Mrs. O…this is Liz.”
“Oh, hello, I’m calling on behalf of a patient of ours, Rebecca Whithers, I believe she’s your sister-in-law?”
“Yes, what is it, is everything alright?” Elizabeth couldn’t take any more stress. She dreaded the reply.
“Oh, yes, Ma’am, everything is just fine, quite wonderful, actually. Rebecca asked me to call you specifically, she…”
“Wait, what? Asked you to call?” she interrupted, knowing that Rebecca Whithers hadn’t spoken a word in years.
“Yes, Ma’am, that reaction is exactly what I expected. Rebecca asked me, vocally, to call you.”
“This is…um…I don’t quite understand.”
“If you please, Ma’am, I’ve been asked to call you because she’d like to have an audience with you. She requests that you come to see her here at your earliest convenience, and she’d like you to come alone. She says that she has some things that she’d like to discuss with you.”
“Ummm, my God, this is just…unbelievable,” Elizabeth muttered, “yes, I’ll, uh, I’ll come there immediately.”
“Very good, I’ll tell her. Thank you, and we’ll see you soon.”
“Thank you, Doctor, goodbye.”
Without inquiring where she was going or why, Wade agreed to stay with Samantha but only if he could help himself to the ice cream in the freezer.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Elizabeth lifted her purse strap onto her shoulders to shake hands with Doctor Flint at the reception desk. He smiled from ear to ear, and she could barely keep up with his enthusiastic pace as he led her to Rebecca’s room. Elizabeth had never seen a doctor show such unprofessional emotion. Though the sun was setting outside, the entire building was imbued and enhanced with new life force.
“It’s truly remarkable, Ma’am, truly it is,” he grinned. “Now, of course there’s no way of knowing how long it will last, and we can’t just put a ‘cured’ sign on her forehead, but it’s nevertheless remarkable. We’ll still have to keep her for quite some time for further observation, but, still, never in all my years have I seen such a rapid improvement.”
“I see,” said Elizabeth. “And why does she want to talk to me?”
“Ask her yourself,” Doctor Flint replied, opening the door to Rebecca’s room.
Elizabeth entered and saw the form of a tall and thin woman, with her back turned. She was standing over a desk, gathering papers and sorting through them, which were covered in artistic images. Her dark hair was long and she was barefoot under her robe. She stopped what she was doing and turned quickly around when the doctor closed the door behind Elizabeth. There indeed was the face of Rebecca upon this strange woman’s body. But this face had expression, color, a glow to it, and a redness in the cheeks that accompanies bashfulness. This face actually smiled at her.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you come in,” she said gingerly. “My brain is still a bit jumbled I think, I sometimes get lost in things.”
Elizabeth just stared blankly, bewildered. She had visited this girl before, but this woman before her hardly seemed like the same person. She realized, with a stab of shame to her heart, she had never really thought of Rebecca as human, but just a silent, emotionless entity.
“I know this is strange. I know that you’re Liz,” Rebecca stated with a hint of a question, wobbling awkwardly back and forth on her ankles, part shyness and part atrophy.
“Yes,” Elizabeth replied quickly.
Rebecca held out a stiff hand in an awkward attempt to shake hands. “I’m sorry we’ve never formally met. I’m Becky, of course. I’ve never been able to introduce myself.”
“Yes, I know,” Elizabeth said hesitantly, taking her hand cautiously. “I see that things have changed.” There was a hint of a question in her voice, too.
“Please, have a seat,” Rebecca pointed to the bed.
Elizabeth obeyed, saying, “This is pretty amazing. I’ve…we’ve been told that you’d been making progress, but, I have to admit, I never expected this.”
“Neither did I,” she told her, pulling her desk chair up and seating herself in front of her guest. “But here I am. It feels so free. I don’t know how to explain it.”
“Well, I’m…I’m just so happy that you’ve gotten better. This is so exciting and so wonderful.”
“I was trapped, you see?” Rebecca continued. “I was trapped inside myself. I couldn’t say all the things that I wanted to say—I lost the ability. My memory is still fuzzy to say the least. I don’t quite remember seeing you or meeting you, but I still knew who you were. Did you visit me a lot?”
“Yes,” she said, “your brother and I both did. We never brought our daughter, and I’m sorry for that.”
“You do have a daughter,” Rebecca said as if an uncertainty had just been confirmed, her face becoming heavy. “What’s her name?”
“Samantha.”
“That’s beautiful.”
“Thank you.”
A long pause passed between the two, and it seemed to bother Rebecca far more than Elizabeth. However, for a woman who had lost years of social and lingual skills, Elizabeth found her to be far more articulate than she had predicted. She decided to break the awkward silence, Rebecca’s face still serious and looking to the ground.
“So, you wanted to talk to me?” she asked.
“Yes, we have a lot to talk about.”
“Oh, I’m sure we do. You don’t even know where we live or what we do. You’ll have to meet Sam, she’s very…“
Rebecca cut her off, “No, no, I’m sorry. I would love to play ‘catch-up,’ and learn all about you, I really would but I can’t really tempt fate, I mean the way that this happened is so bizarre, so who knows how long it’ll last, and I have someth
ing very important to tell you.”
“Are you saying you know what’s happened to you?”
“I do. I think I do.”
“You know what’s making you better?”
“I think I do, but that’s not important right now.”
Elizabeth leaned forward on the bed. “Okay, Becky, I’m listening.”
She took a deep breath. “You can’t trust my brother. You need to know what kind of man he really is.”
* * * *
What is madness? Is insanity what the Modern Age of science, medicine, and psychiatry would have us believe and just faulty brain chemicals, or electricity firing in incorrect patterns? Or is the Modern Age wrong? Suppose that those in the Dark Ages were correct and it was bewitchment, and there were no people suffering from disorders, but curses. Could it be that everyone who shared the psych ward with Roderick was indeed cursed, in a state of altered perception, battling demons of their own, that the world diagnosed as insane? If Roderick weren’t so concerned about the setting sun, he would have wondered about such things.
It was Monday. He would be transferred to Twin Creeks Hospital tomorrow. As he lay on his cot in fetal position, he knew by internal clock that it was night. He didn’t need a window. Any minute now, his visitors would arrive and, soon after, nurses would come in to administer his sleep medication. He covered his eyes.
“The sinner predicted the moment of our arrival, Sisters,” stated a voice like a bell, “Have we become predictable?”
“This environment does not promote spontaneity,” said another. “There are limited tricks to be done in this cube and within that rather small space that he calls a mind.”
“Look at us, child,” the third voice said directly to him, cooing. “Look at us.”
He closed his eyes even tighter, squeezing his knees harder.
“Look at us, or we’ll fetch our friend the snake,” the voice said softly.
His entire body involuntarily sprang up, backing into the corner, and he looked at them as they had commanded. This time they were three beautiful nurses, one short, one tall, one in-between, the red crosses on their white uniforms matched the color of their hair, their eyes were an inhuman shade of jade.
“What a loathsome creature,” one of them said, smiling, and Roderick could see that behind their fare facades were mouths full of rotting teeth, “wasted away to practically nothing.”
“Yes, though he isn’t completely broken yet, is he?” asked another, playfully twirling her red hair.
“Indeed,” said the third, “but it won’t be long now. His mind will shatter into nothing. Though, it is surprising he’s even lasted this long.”
The first approached him, his head backing against the wall as she caressed his cheek with the back of her fingernail, “These sinners can be so stubborn. If he is determined to prolong his suffering, then so be it.”
Roderick muttered under his tears, “I…I…didn’t do anything wrong.”
They cackled as their decaying mouths stretched to impossible proportions.
He repeated. “I’ve learned. I’ve…I’ve…learned my lesson. Please…leave me alone. I’ve learned my lesson.”
“Obviously, you have not,” one of them hissed.
“You have buried your guilt so deeply, child. Remarkable, it is,” the tall nurse said.
“And now murder compounds his crimes,” said the shorter.
Roderick fell to his side. “No. No, I didn’t kill her. I didn’t kill her. It was…it was a dream.”
“Was it?” asked the one in-between.
“You did it. You…did it, didn’t you? You did it,” he accused.
Said the third. “Perhaps it was you. How would you know the difference? You appear to be, after all, a master of denial.”
The second nurse leaned across his bed, “This can all stop, child. Confess your sins. Accept worldly punishment and be spared ours.”
“Or continue denying your guilt,” continued the third, “and we shall see how much longer your fragile mind and body will last. We would greatly prefer it.”
He muttered again, “I…didn’t…kill her.”
“Bah,” the first nurse exclaimed, throwing her polished hands into the air, “it’s been so long since we’ve encountered one so unyielding.”
“And dense,” commented the second.
“Yes, I must confess it has made him a most satisfying subject-such a rare delicacy for us. His despair is nothing short of exquisite,” said the third, licking her lips.
“Yes, with justice, the pleasure is in the pursuit, and I can’t recall when last we had this much fun,” stated the first, “though, it was far more interesting before this dismal place.”
“Well, the enjoyment need not end so quickly. I’m sure we can still squeeze more out of this one,” said the second.
“What are you suggesting, Sister?” asked the third.
“Only that we bend the rules just this once. There is no telling when we will relish in such a frolic again.”
The other two nurses peered at each other and at their sister with inquisitive eyes, a decision being formulated in their red heads.
The two then said in unison, “Agreed,” and all three snapped their fingers.
And with that they were gone. Roderick didn’t move from his spot. He knew the ways of the tricksters far too well. It was only when the door to his room suddenly unlatched and opened by unseen means that he, after several more minutes, finally stirred. He approached the open doorway slowly and cautiously and, stepping through, he found the hospital to be completely still. It was full of people, but they simply weren’t moving.
All was calm. Stepping lightly by an attendant, he saw that the woman was completely motionless like a mannequin. There was a doctor talking to a nurse, his finger stopped in the air as though in mid-sentence, a nurse appearing to have trouble with his patient’s wheelchair down the hallway, and a receptionist’s fingers paused just above the keyboards. It was as though time had simply stopped, and amazed as he was, Roderick knew he had been given his chance to escape.
He ran through the hospital, out of breath, and it wasn’t until he exited through the entry doors and crossed the parking lot that he remembered who it was that granted him such an opportunity. He stopped to catch his breath and assemble his scrambled thoughts, but then the world around him sprang back to life. Motion picked back up, he could see movement within the building and he felt a cold breeze blow across his skin through his blue robes.
Then he heard the screaming coming from above and gasped. Looking to the sky, he saw in the moonlight three winged figures circling like he was a dying animal. The dread gave him the boost he needed to run again.
Chapter Thirty
Elizabeth derailed Rebecca’s intended topic of discussion with, “Becky, does what’s making you better have something to do with what’s happening to Rod?” Elizabeth wasn’t sure from where within her the question had come.
“Yes. Yes, I’m sure it does.”
“Then listen to me. I need you to tell me exactly what’s going on. I need to know what’s happening to my husband.”
Rebecca sat in silence, her lips quivering, and took deep breaths. Elizabeth sat patiently, and stared. After some time, her sister-in-law’s eyes met hers. They were tearing up.
“Okay,” Rebecca began, “but it sounds, well—I hate to say it—crazy, what I’m about to tell you. You won’t believe a word of it.”
“Try me.”
“Okay. Like I told you, my memories aren’t really that great since my mind was pretty much mush, but I do remember this pretty vividly. There was another patient in this building, just down the hall. She would come into my room and stay with me for hours on end during the day. She kept me company. She would talk to me, sing to me, and she neve
r seemed to get bored that I couldn’t respond. This went on for a few months or so.
“Then one night I woke up, and she was here in my room. I realize now that this should have struck me as odd since our doors were locked at night, but at the time I didn’t, you know, process it. I just remember what she asked me.”
There was another long pause. Finally, Elizabeth coaxed, “And what did she say?”
“Do I want justice? Somehow, I can’t really explain it, but she was able to get deep inside my head—deep inside to the part of me that was still me. She asked her questions and got her answers from there—from my sub conscience or maybe it was my soul.
“She asked if I wanted the ones who abused and betrayed me to be punished. I said yes. She said that she could feel my pain and suffering and that she could make me well again. She promised me a reversal of fortune.” Rebecca didn’t flinch.
“I asked her who she was, and she said she was a seeker of people like me, people who had been wronged or decimated while the wrong-doers live prosperously. She said she would teach them suffering and that they would know my despair. “ Rebecca’s eyes were arrows into Elizabeth’s soul.
“I agreed.” Rebecca finished.
Elizabeth straightened, and looked away. “I see,” she said.
“I told you it sounds crazy.”
“No, it’s okay. Please, go on.”
“Then she said that she knew just the ones for the job. They came right through the wall, like ghosts. It was amazing, and they were so beautiful. I didn’t think anything could be that beautiful. They called me ‘child’ and told me that they could sense my pain too. They promised that my enemies would be brought to justice.”
“And what were they?” Elizabeth questioned
Rebecca replied, “Three women with red hair.”
Elizabeth’s face turned white, and she stood up, muttering. “That’s how he described them,” she then turned back to Rebecca, “And Rod is one of your enemies?”
“Yes, which is what I have to…“
Elizabeth interjected, “And your father? He was one too, wasn’t he?”