Then she was herded in line to get her clothes. An attendant handed her a bra, pants, flat loafers, skirt and blouse. To her amazement, they were her clothes, all name taped. She hadn’t packed them. Anne must have sent them by messenger during the night.
That meant Anne knew she wasn’t taking the sleep cure!
Her fear made her numb. She dressed slowly, trying to get some order out of her jumbled terror. She followed Carole into the large recreation room. The sun flooded through the windows, creating a false air of cheer. She looked at the clock. God, it was only seven-thirty! How could she get through this day?
Miss Schmidt had been replaced by a day nurse, Miss Weston. She was built on the same lines as Miss Schmidt, and the five or six young nurses leaped at her commands with the same alacrity. Neely joined everyone for breakfast. The dining room was bright and cheerful, with four women to a table and scurrying waitresses. She had decided not to eat, but the first whiff of the bacon and eggs reminded her she was hungry. She ate a large breakfast and trudged back with the others to the recreation room.
They were obviously well-bred kooks, she decided. She knew they recognized her, but they smiled at her politely and warmly, without making her feel self-conscious. She looked dreadful. The skirt needed a belt—there had been a belt, but they had removed it. Her hair was in strings and her knees were scraped, mementos of the night in the bathtub. She wished she felt the warm camaraderie and good humor the other girls seemed to share. They acted as if they liked the place!
Carole introduced her around. Geez, everyone seemed so sane and normal. She sat down, wondering what happened next. A nurse entered, and everyone surged around her. She was holding a box, and she called out every name, even “Miss O’Hara.” Neely went over. Geez, were they organized—even her package of cigarettes was labeled. The nurse handed each girl two cigarettes, and another nurse stood by to light them. Neely settled back and puffed gratefully at the first cigarette she had had in over twelve hours. The first draw made her dizzy, the second was satisfying and the third cleared her head. Imagine going without a cigarette since yesterday afternoon, she who smoked over two packs a day. She got up slowly, stabilized by the cigarette, and walked over to the desk where Miss Weston was sitting.
“I’d like to make a phone call,” she said. “Where do I go?”
“Phone calls aren’t allowed,” Miss Weston said pleasantly.
“Well, how do I reach my friends?”
“You are allowed to write letters.”
“Can I have a pen and some paper?”
The nurse looked at her watch. “I think it had better wait. The doctor is coming to see you in five minutes.”
“Dr. Hall?”
“No, Dr. Feldman. This is just a routine checkup.”
He was a medical doctor, not a nutcracker. He took some blood from her finger and her arm and checked her heart.
She asked a nurse to light her second cigarette. An attractive, dark-haired girl came over. “Don’t let the checkup bother you. They do that to make sure you’re healthy. It would be embarrassing to have you die of cancer or something while they were taking care of your brain.”
Neely looked at the girl. She could be beautiful with proper makeup, she felt. Her bone structure was good and her black eyes flashed. She must have had a good figure once, though now she was quite heavy. Neely judged her to be about thirty years old.
The girl sat down. She was holding a square box. “I’m Mary Jane. Let me break you in—when you get to gym, buy a box of writing paper. It costs a dollar.”
“But I have no money.”
Mary Jane smiled. “You charge everything—it’s put on your bill. But you can use it as a kind of pocketbook.” She opened her box. There was writing paper in it—and a pack of cigarettes.
“Where did you get—”
The girl silenced her with a quick gesture. “On visiting days, you’re allowed to sit with your visitors and chain smoke. Get whoever visits you to bring a carton. Then you hide it, and in smoking periods you can smoke a dozen.”
“But they light you up. They’ll notice if you smoke more than two.”
“The nurses are wise. You can always cadge a light from someone else’s cigarette. That’s allowed. It’s just matches we loonies aren’t allowed to have. But the nurses don’t care how many we smoke. They figure we have to have some pleasure in life.”
Neely smiled. “You’re not a loony, are you?”
“No, I came here to get even with my husband, only it backfired. He’s a bastard—loads of money—and he got himself another girl. He wanted a divorce, so I pretended to go ape—you know, have a nervous collapse. It was the biggest mistake of my life.”
“Why?”
“All I did was take a few pills—three pills—and leave a phony suicide note. The next thing I know, I’m in Bellevue. Boy, you could really go crazy there. Real nuts around you, screaming and carrying on. I guess then I actually flipped from fright. I began to scream and wound up in a straitjacket. So, since my husband could afford it, I came here. Signed myself in. Then, when I wanted to leave, he had me committed. I’ve been here five months. I was at Elm House officially, which was pretty good. You can smoke there and wear belts, even use more makeup. But when I learned he had committed me, I got hysterical, threw a tantrum. So here I am at Hawthorn. And I warn you—play ball with them. I didn’t. I threw tantrums every day, refused to eat, refused to cooperate. I spent three weeks in the damn bathtub. You have to play along. There’s only one way—their way. I’m being an angel, and soon I’ll get moved to Fir. A while there, then Elm, then Ash, then the out-patient cottage . . . then out for good.”
Neely was suddenly cold with fear. “But that sounds like months.”
“It’ll take about a year,” Mary Jane said cheerfully.
“And don’t you mind?”
The girl shrugged. “Sure I mind. I cared enough to scream and shout for a week. But you can’t fight them. They show the record to your lawyer, or husband, or whoever is responsible for you. It looks bad on paper—’Patient had hysterics. Patient had to be restrained. Twelve hours in the tub.’ Then they say to your lawyer, ’Now just sign her in for another three months. Don’t you want a bright-eyed, healthy girl returned to you and to society?’ Sure, for fifteen hundred a month they can afford to take their time. So I’ve decided not to fight it. I’ll sit it out. Besides, what have I got to lose? I’ve got no place to go. Hank—that’s my husband—he’s with his girl. But at least he can’t marry her. And it costs him fifteen hundred a month for me.”
“But I only came here for eight days—for a sleep cure.”
“A what?” Mary Jane looked at her strangely.
Neely explained the sleep cure. Mary Jane smiled. “They never give it here. They won’t even give you an aspirin.”
“They gave me something last night,” Neely said proudly.
Mary Jane laughed. “Boy, we had to hand it to you. Did you really tear the canvas? Everyone heard you did.”
Neely nodded. “And I’ll get out of here, too.”
Mary Jane smiled. “Okay, I’m all for it. Show me how it’s done. Look at Peggy—they’ve brainwashed her husband.”
Peggy walked over. She was twenty-five, blonde, attractive. “Telling her all our gruesome case histories?” Peggy asked.
“Why are you here?” Neely asked.
“Because I was nutty as a fruitcake,” Peggy said cheerfully.
“No she wasn’t,” Mary Jane said. “She lost two babies in a row, stillborn. Anyone would go into a depression.”
Peggy managed a smile. “All I know is I’d begin to cry if I saw a doll in a store window. When I got here it was worse. I’ve had forty shock treatments. I’m just beginning to feel human again.”
Neely’s throat swelled in horror. Shock treatment! Mary Jane read her thoughts. “Don’t worry. Even if they think you need it, they still have to get permission. Whoever is your nearest of kin or is responsible for you.”
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Neely relaxed. “Anne would never give permission.”
Mary Jane smiled. “Unless they brainwash her, like they did Peggy’s husband. When Dr. Hall and Dr. Archer start to work on them, the first thing you know they agree to anything. Peggy’s husband arrived the first visiting day. She was fine—just wanted to get out. He was so thrilled. He said he would go right to the office and sign her out. Ha! That was it! He didn’t come back for two weeks. And the following day Peggy started her shock treatments.”
“But why?”
Peggy sighed. “I don’t blame Jim. At first I did, but now I can understand. They showed him my chart. I was depressed, I didn’t sleep, I cried a lot—all signs of a manic depressive. Who wouldn’t cry after losing two babies and being stuck here? But they convinced Jim that if I went home I’d crack up again, and maybe for good. Naturally Jim wants a happy wife, so he signed the papers and committed me.”
Neely listened. Everyone had a similar story. No one was nuts; in fact everyone seemed more normal than the people she knew on the outside. She was in the middle of listening to the seventh life story when the nurse called, “Come, ladies!”
“Now what?” Neely asked.
“Gym,” Mary Jane explained.
They followed the nurse in a double file. They went through corridors; doors were unlocked and relocked; they finally entered a large gymnasium. There was a badminton court, Ping-Pong tables—even a pool table. A group was leaving when they entered. Mary Jane waved to a few girls.
“That’s the Fir group. They use the gym from eight to eight-thirty. Those girls I waved to—they were just promoted last week, from Hawthorn to Fir.”
Neely sat on the sidelines while the others chose sides for badminton and Ping-Pong. She bought a box of writing paper, but she refused to be fitted for gym shoes. She was not staying long enough, she told them. The writing paper? Well, she had to write to Anne. She must not get panicky. Mary Jane said if she showed fear, they’d mark it against her.
They left the gymnasium at nine-thirty as another group entered. They were led to another building—occupational therapy. All the girls rushed to their projects, and the teacher explained that she could do mosaic work, or knit, or anything she wished. She wished to do nothing! She sat in a corner. Oh, God, how did this happen? She looked out the window. Patches of grass were beginning to get green. She saw a little rabbit bound across the grounds. At least he could go where he chose. He was free. The feeling of confinement was more than she could bear. She stared at the teacher, who was patiently helping the girls. Sure—at five the teacher was free to go, to do as she wished. She needed a cigarette. She needed a doll! Oh, God, anything for a doll. She felt the perspiration come to the back of her neck. Her hair was damp and her back was aching, really hurting now. She was going to black out! She moaned softly. The teacher came rushing over to her. “My back,” she complained.
“Did you hurt it in gym?” The instructor was all attention.
“No, I have a history of a bad back. It’s acting up now.”
The instructor immediately lost interest. “You’ll have a session with your psychiatrist this afternoon at two. You can tell him.”
So the day went. By two, when she saw the doctor, she was ready to scream.
He was a thin, red-faced man named Dr. Seale. He wrote as she talked. She poured out her wrath—the injustice of the double cross, the promised sleep cure, the way she was being pushed around. She chain smoked cigarettes. During sessions with psychiatrists patients were given all the cigarettes they wished.
“My back really aches,” she pleaded. “Please give me a few Seconals.”
He kept writing. Then he said, “How long have you been taking Seconals?”
She lost her patience. “Oh, come on—don’t make a federal case out of that. If everyone who took them was in a loony bin, you’d have half of Hollywood and all of Madison Avenue and Broadway in here.”
“Do you think it’s normal to take sleeping pills in the middle of the day to ease pain?”
“No, I’d much prefer a shot of Demerol,” she said. She was pleased at the angle his eyebrows shot up. “Yes, Demerol.” She smiled. “In Spain I got it all the time. Two or three times a day. And I functioned just fine. I even made a picture. So you see, two lousy little Seconals are like appetizers for me. Now come on, get me a few. If I can have two every hour, I might be able to get with it around here.”
“Tell me about your mother, Miss O’Hara.”
“Oh, shit! Don’t tell me we’re gonna start with that Freudian jazz. Look, I went through all that way back in California. It took me five years and twenty thousand dollars to convince him I didn’t remember my mother. If we’re gonna start back there, I’ll be an old woman before I get outta here.”
“I’ll send for your records from California,” he said.
“I won’t be here that long. I’m writing to my friend tonight.”
“But you must stay at least thirty days.”
“Thirty days!”
He explained the paper she had signed. She shook her head. “What a racket. They think of everything. When you’re coming here, who figures you need the William Morris office to check the fine print!”
He stood up. “I’ll see you tomorrow, same time.”
She shrugged. “Okay, so I got a thirty-day hitch. I might as well enjoy it.” Then she said suddenly, “I can leave in thirty days, can’t I?”
“We’ll see,” he said vaguely.
“What do you mean, we’ll see?”
“At the end of the period we’ll evaluate our findings. If we think you’re fit—”
”We? What is this we crap? I’m the one who’s here, and I’m the one to say I want to go. How can anyone stop me?”
“Miss O’Hara, if you insisted on leaving and we didn’t think you were fit, we would talk to the people who are responsible for you—in this case, Miss Welles. We’d ask her to commit you for three months—that is, if you didn’t agree to sign yourself in.”
“Suppose Anne refused?”
“Then we could take means to have you committed—present your case to an impartial board . . .”
She was rigid with fright. “A nice little racket you got here.”
“It’s no racket, Miss O’Hara. We want to cure people. If we released someone before she was cured and she took her life a few months later, or harmed someone else . . . well, it wouldn’t give us a good name. If you had an operation in a medical hospital and you wanted to leave before the incision had healed, the doctor would have a right to restrain you. At Haven Manor, when we release a person, they are ready to take their place in society.”
“Sure—in the old-age home.”
He smiled. “I think you have a long, productive life ahead. A year or two here will not be wasted.”
“A year or two!” She began to tremble. “No! Listen . . . thirty days, okay—if I’m stuck. But that’s all!”
He smiled again. “You take your Rorschach test now. That will tell us more.”
Neely grabbed his arm. “Look, Doc, I don’t know about tests—maybe my inkblots will show I’m some kind of a nut—but I’m not like other people. That’s why I’m a star. You can’t get to where I’ve gotten unless you are different. Why, if you threw a butterfly net over Sardi’s and Chasens and gave them Rorschach tests, you wouldn’t release any of them for years. Don’t you see, it’s just our little kinks that make us what we are.”
“I agree. And they’re fine if they work for you. But when they turn and work toward self-destruction, then we have to step in and change the course.”
“I’m not self-destructive. Everything just went wrong. Look, when you have a studio treating you like you were Jesus Christ for so many years, taking care of everything, I guess it becomes a big mother image. They do everything—get you plane tickets, write your speeches, take care of the press . . . they even fix traffic tickets. And you gradually fall into a way of depending on them. You feel like you belong, li
ke the studio is protecting you. Then, when you’re thrown on your own, it’s like a big rejection. It’s scary. I felt like I was just Neely again.”
“Who is ’just Neely’?”
“Ethel Agnes O’Neill, who had to do her own dirty work, wash her own underwear and make her own breaks. Neely O’Hara had things done for her. She commanded respect. It should work like that, if you’re a real talent, so that all you have to do is concentrate on your work. That’s why I lost my voice—I couldn’t do both.”
“But Ethel Agnes O’Neill obviously did both at one time,” he said.
“Sure. At seventeen you can do anything. You have nothing to lose. You start with nothing, so you can attempt anything. I’m thirty-two now. I haven’t worked recently, but I’m sort of a living legend. I can’t afford to risk my reputation. That’s why I really froze on that picture in Hollywood. It was a one-picture deal—no studio was behind me, building me for the future and guarding me. They were using me, hoping to make a quick buck on my name. I knew it was a lousy picture and they knew it, too, but they figured it would make money. So I lost my voice—I really lost it. Dr. Massinger explained that to me. But the studio marks me as uncooperative and unreliable so they can get off the hook.”
“But I thought you said the studio was the mother image.”
She sighed. “That’s gone. Television changed everything. Even The Head. He’s a frightened old man who has to report every move to his stockholders. They’re trying to dump him, I hear. Everything is changed.”
“Then you have to change with it, grow up.”
“Maybe,” she agreed. “But it doesn’t mean I have to run scared. I’m a star. I have to act like one, no matter what happens.”
Valley of the Dolls Page 41