The Reluctant Healer

by Andrew D. Himmel

  He then shook his head vigorously. “I was never suicidal,” he said sharply, as if to rebut an accusation. “Let’s get that straight. I would never do that. Not to myself. Not to my family and friends. I never got close. But I thought a lot about the release from pain that doing something like that might provide. Can you understand that at all? It’s like it was always inviting, even though there was never a real chance that I would go through with it. But you happened to catch me at one of those times when all this was rearing its ugly head.”

  “You don’t have to explain it to me,” I told him. “I know I must have looked preposterous. I’m a serious person and a good lawyer, and I have to ask that you not draw any conclusions about me or the firm from my behavior in the conference room.” A shrill inflection crept into my voice, and I was embarrassed, but I had to complete my plea. “I would never . . .”

  “It’s gone,” he said, looking at me. “After almost twenty years. Twenty years of worry, anxiety, pain, and knowing all along, even during the best times in my life, that the companion was there, lingering. He could strike, or he could sleep, and I’d have no say over his decision. But now . . .” He paused to take in a deep breath. “But now, it’s . . . gone.”

  He studied my face, then said, “I knew pretty much immediately. From the moment I left your office building. Because this thing had weight. It had a tactile feel to it.”

  He placed his hand on my wrist. “Forget what they tell you, Will—forget what they say about the difference between psychological and physical damage. When this thing hit, I could actually feel a secretion, or flow, or something in my head.” Tears fell again, but he did not convulse or sob. “Even in my absolute best moments, I felt its presence. And I am not being metaphorical here. I mean feel in the normal, physical sense of that word.”

  He released my arm and used both hands to wipe the moisture from his face. “Now, it’s . . . gone, and I can’t explain it, but I feel like it may be gone for good.”

  I wanted to say something and was collecting my thoughts when Halter continued. “You don’t have to say anything more. Forgive me, but I’ve done some checking up on you. I understand your girlfriend is involved with some of the healing arts? Maybe some of it rubbed off on you. Maybe this is all one weird, cosmic coincidence. I don’t know. And I don’t care. All I know is this: Something happened to take away my pain, and you were somehow part of it.”

  “I haven’t . . . done anything that I’m aware of . . .” I stammered.

  But Halter shook his head dismissively and held up his hand.

  “Nothing’s going to change. I’m not going to act differently toward you or the firm. How my case is staffed, how the legalities are handled, I’ll leave it, as I always have, to the powers that be at your firm. But I did think that it would be somehow wrong if I didn’t express my gratitude. Even if you didn’t do anything.”

  “I didn’t do anything.”

  “Maybe,” he said, without conviction. He then faced me directly. “But I’m feeling better, Will. I hope this lasts. And if it doesn’t, I’ll remember that I experienced a time, even if it’s fleeting, when I was able to throw my companion off my back.”

  We came to a stop, and the driver shifted the car to Park. I was astonished to see that we were in front of Erica’s building.

  17

  The Importance of Presence

  I withheld the Halter episode from Erica at first. It speaks poorly of me, I know, but I was concerned that her conviction about energy channeling in general, and my supposed gifts in particular, would be amplified beyond the breaking point of our relationship. And I had to work through in my own mind what any of this meant, if indeed it meant anything at all. I suppose this should have been the point in time when I slowly, begrudgingly, embarked on the path to belief, to the realization that medicine and science cannot explain all phenomena. But I was simply too baffled to lean toward any conclusions.

  On a weekend evening following dinner at the Gramercy Tavern, we walked back to Erica’s apartment. When we reached her bedroom, I could no longer push away the lingering sense of betrayal, so I fumbled through the story. She sat quietly, made occasional comments, asked a few questions. “I want you to sit in my waiting room when I meet my patients,” she said.

  “Why?”

  “Your presence will help.”

  “Help what?”

  “Help me. My patients.”

  “How?”

  Erica looked down momentarily, as if she wondered whether there would be any point in continuing. Then, she looked up with renewed conviction.

  “Your auric field will help,” she said. “Your field is expansive. It creates a protective bubble that wards off negativity and promotes healing. It continues to emanate even after you leave the location.”

  It had not been so long ago in my life when I would have expected such a comment to be accompanied by a glimmer of playfulness. I searched Erica’s eyes and found an unsettling gravity. “This has to stop,” I said.

  “What has to stop?”

  “This . . . co-opting, this intrusion, this . . . nonsense.” I went to the refrigerator, took out a sixteen-ounce can of Fosters, and began to drink it quickly. I came back to the living room, sat down on the couch, and faced Erica.

  “I don’t know what an auric field is, and I’m quite sure I don’t want to know. And I don’t believe that either you, or others, or myself for that matter, have any special, magical ability to improve the lot of others.”

  “Your presence helps people. I’m sure this is why I was so drawn to you when we met.”

  “Erica, this is not me.”

  She came over and sat next to me on her couch. “I wish I had what you had,” she said. “I am helping people, and I have learned to harness universal energy. But I’m limited.” Her voice was shaky. I drew her near me and tried to comfort her, without effect. “We spoke about this once before, but it’s becoming clearer by the day. I have the desire. But maybe not the gift.” She then leaned back to view me more fully. “But you,” she said. “You have the gift.”

  I’m convinced that we often make the most fateful decisions for the most mundane reasons. Looking back, I know that I was afflicted with an inability to tolerate any sadness from Erica. I could rail at her, challenge her, and she would stand her ground, and I wouldn’t be too concerned about how harshly I treated her. She was confident and committed, and I admired those qualities, if not the reasons that bestowed those qualities upon her. But I lost all perspective when I felt she was despondent. Did she know this about me? Did she manipulate me, pushing me from one level of participation to the next by feigning sadness?

  That was an easy question for me to answer. She was not manipulating me, but I allowed myself to be drawn in deeper all the same. So yes, I agreed to sit in her waiting room for a few hours per week. I was able to conduct billable work on my laptop while a steady stream of well-dressed, determined patients came and went. Sometimes they would pause and cast me a glance as they walked into Erica’s office. Other times, they whisked by me without acknowledging my presence. I’m not sure how Erica identified me. Perhaps I was her assistant. Her adult intern.

  I used a number of plausible excuses to absent myself from my firm. I would take a little more time going to and getting back from court. I told my partners that I needed to visit the bar library more frequently. And I used the extra time resulting from these absences to lend my “auric field” to Erica’s office. No one from my firm complained. In fact, my productivity increased. The change of scenery alone improved my writing and lessened my procrastination.

  Erica generally did not speak to me about her clients, which was preferable in any event. Putting aside notions of confidentiality, I also did not want to know about her patients or any impact that I might be having on Erica’s treatments. And once this new level of involvement was reached, we calmed down again. After a few sporadic episodes of trying to convince me of the wonders of spiritual healing, Erica fell
silent about her practice and beliefs, and our relationship progressed in an almost conventional path.

  But with the benefit of hindsight, I can graph my involvement as a series of upward lines, interrupted by occasional plateaus, which at the time I mistook for a settling of the storm. These flat lines, though, were simply the universe’s regrouping for the next upward thrust.

  When I came into Erica’s office on a humid June day and saw on the table where I worked an envelope with my name on it, right there and then I should have assigned more significance to the event.

  The envelope itself was plain, with no postage on it. My name was scrawled diagonally across the back in blue ink. The handwriting was neat, the placement on the envelope haphazard. I scrutinized the envelope, looking for clues to its contents, although no process would be as successful as simply opening up the damn thing. Still, I wanted some advance warning, however irrational. And the only clue was that the envelope was thin.

  I tore the envelope open, and at first it seemed empty. But then a small rectangular piece of paper came loose from the envelope and spiraled downward. I snatched the paper out of the air and stared hard. Its contents were simple, but I recall denying the reality of what I was looking at.

  The paper was a check from Erica’s account payable to me in the amount of $50,000.

  18

  Computation

  I did the math. I understood that the check was supposed to be some kind of compensation for my involvement, but the figure was preposterously disproportionate to anything I could fathom. Was spiritual healing big business? Maybe Erica worked on some kind of cosmic fee-for-service arrangement. The client shall be responsible for an hourly fee of $200. In addition, the following values shall be assigned: For the successful cleansing of negativity, $10,000. For the opening of chakras, $20,000. And for the establishment of a direct connection to God, $50,000. The client shall additionally be responsible for any costs incurred in connection with the attainment of spiritual well-being, including but not limited to strobe lights, meditation mats, and any leafy vegetables and herbs consumed during the sessions.

  I was still staring at the check when Erica walked brusquely into the office suite. She glanced at me holding the check, then continued to walk past me toward her office. “Sorry, can’t talk right now, want to prepare for a patient.”

  I placed myself in front of her, since at this point no words would have slowed her down. Not for the first time, I felt her manic energy.

  “How is it even remotely possible that you can write out a check like this for me?”

  “It’s fair. You helped.”

  She looked down and feigned a movement to her left, then pivoted quickly to her right to get around me. Her movements were nimble, and I would have been outmaneuvered if I hadn’t grabbed her by her arms and held her still. She offered no resistance.

  “What percentage is this of . . . of . . . what you’ve been paid?”

  “Is this an audit?”

  I let go of her. “Erica, how are you able to pay me this?”

  “You earned it. All of it.”

  “You’re not answering my question.”

  She walked past me into her office and sat down behind her desk. I followed her and sat in the chair facing her.

  “One of my clients is particularly wealthy, and I was able to accomplish a great deal for her. Actually, both of us did.” She took a deep breath and stared hard at me. “The fact is, I’m quite sure that you did this, because . . . because I doubt I could have done this on my own.”

  Erica paused. “I’m beginning to think,” she said hesitantly, “that most, if not all, of what I’m able to accomplish lately is because of you.” My head collapsed forward, as if the hinge muscles in my neck had disintegrated. I closed my eyes and felt dizzy.

  “I’ve come in here almost every day for quite some time. I’ve spoken not one word to any of your patients. I’ve not done one goddamn thing.”

  “Will . . .”

  “And do not explain to me the wonders of my auric field or my natural gifts.” I tore the check furiously into small fragments and threw the pieces on her desk.

  “Do you know my patient Sondra Whitfield, the only one who comes in with her child?”

  I knew the woman. She was impeccably dressed, quite attractive. I had formed an opinion, however, that it would be difficult to imagine her smiling, as if the act itself would crack the facade she had imposed on her features.

  “Her son, the one she comes in with, has stage-four lymphatic leukemia.”

  “You have no business handling that kind of condition,” I said. In the silence that followed that remark, I tracked the arc of my emotions responding to Erica’s practice. Perhaps, like the Kubler-Ross model for grief, there were five stages that applied here. Tolerance, amusement, skepticism, ridicule, and now, the final stage, anger. Enough. You want to handle minor skin conditions and vaguely defined psychological deficits, fine. But you cannot cure cancer. You cannot lessen cancer. Stop, already, stop.

  At some point, I must have been speaking out loud. “I’m not talking about me,” she said. “Josh has had remarkable improvement.” She grabbed my hands. “Will, he was wasting away, and now, he’s doing well.”

  “That means nothing,” I said, freeing my hands from her grip. “I’m no physician, but the cancer is probably in remission.” I ran my hands through my hair and grabbed my skull tightly. “This is what you do, isn’t it? You take something you can label ‘effect.’ Then, you hunt around for something you can call ‘cause.’ Then, you draw a straight line from one to the other and say, ‘Look what I’ve done.’“

  “Will, that’s not . . .”

  “It’s the height of narcissism. Look at me. Notice me. I’m special. I’m not invisible. I can do things. I can improve life.”

  I stood up, and Erica remained seated. “Are there limits to this? Is there anything you won’t take credit for?”

  “I’m not taking credit for anything. I think the credit belongs to you.”

  “Right. It would be too grandiose to believe that you can cure deadly ailments, but if you pass the ability on to someone else, you can still bask in the aura of greatness. I’m in the picture. I have involvement. I have meaning. I matter.”

  “This is so unfair,” Erica said.

  “You cannot cure cancer. You cannot have an impact on cancer. And I can’t either.”

  I started to walk out the door. “I need some air.” I turned around and faced Erica. Her eyes were welling up, but I could not bring myself to approach her. “Erica, I love you.” Why was this so clear to me now, only when the absurdity of her beliefs had reached fever pitch? I wanted to say more, to place my comment in context, to lend assurance to its truth without waiving my entitlement to frustration, but nothing else came. I left, walked down the three flights to Broadway, rushed out into a day of punishing daylight, and drifted aimlessly toward my office.

  19

  Multitasking

  I stumbled into Stefan’s office and collapsed on his couch. “Have you been busy lately, Stefan?” His laptop was surrounded by neat piles of papers and stuffed three-ringed binders. He continued typing.

  “Well, I have been trolling through thousands of pages of documents . ..”

  “That doesn’t sound busy to me. I, on the other hand, have been busy. I finished my reply brief on Halter’s summary judgment motion. And I’m curing cancer, by the way, a small child with leukemia. He’s doing quite well.”

  Stefan closed his laptop and looked at me over the bridge of his glasses. “You finished the summary judgment motion? Are there no limits to your newfound productivity?”

  “I cured cancer, Stefan. Bow before me. I think it may have happened while I was researching the Halter brief. This is what we in the healing community call multitasking.”

  “An overrated skill, as far as I am concerned.”

  I picked up a legal hornbook on the side table next to Stefan’s couch, Arthur Karger’s Th
e Powers of the New York Court of Appeals. I flipped through the pages randomly. “Questions of fact or law . . . still open for consideration by the original tribunal . . .” I shut the book and looked directly at Stefan. “I’m at a breaking point,” I said.

  Stefan walked over to his door, asked his secretary to hold his calls, then closed the door slowly. “You know, perhaps this is not such a big deal after all.”

  “Of course not,” I said.

  “Perhaps Erica helped the child. Perhaps you helped Halter.”

  “I think the proof is undeniable,” I said.

  “Would you like to hear my theory?” Stefan asked. “It is all so conventional. And yet perhaps equally profound.”

  “Stefan, you’re my lifeline. If you go over the edge, I’m lost.”

  “This is probably nothing more than a placebo effect, although perhaps one on steroids.” Stefan returned to his chair, picked up a pen, and began clicking it repeatedly. “The placebo effect is really quite remarkable. One’s condition can be improved simply based on the expectation of improvement. And they have done studies on this. The more a person believes or expects improvement, the greater the likelihood that improvement will be realized.”

  “So Erica is a fraud, but if her patients don’t know this, she can help them. In fact, she has an obligation to perpetrate her fraud, because fraud is good, or rather, fraud can be good if harnessed properly.”

  “You do not believe that Erica is a fraud, but more importantly, her patients do not believe this. They believe, on some level, that she has the ability to do something, to transmit healing energy.”

  I snorted. “The power of positive thinking, right?”

  “That may be an oversimplification, but let’s try this.” Stefan stood up, gathering momentum. “Halter was in psychic pain. He lifts his head off the conference room table and sees you with your hands outstretched toward him, with your eyes closed. What do you think he concluded?”