The Madman's Tale Page 7

  The first thing one recognized at the Western State Hospital was the biggest lie of them all—that no one was truly trying to help you get better, no one was actually trying to help you go home. A lot was said, and a lot was done, ostensibly to help you readjust to society, but these were mostly shows and fictions, like the release hearings that were held from time to time. The hospital was like tar on the road. It stuck you in place. A famous poet once quite elegantly and naively wrote that home was the place where they always took you in. Maybe for poets, but not for madmen. The hospital was about keeping you out of the sane world’s eyes. We were all bound by medications that dulled the senses, stymied the voices, but never did completely away with anything hallucinatory, so that vibrant delusions still echoed and resounded throughout the corridors. But what was truly evil about our lives was how quickly we all came to accept those delusions. After a few days in the hospital, it didn’t bother me when little Napoleon would stand next to my bed and start talking energetically of troop movements at Waterloo, and how if only the British squares had cracked under the assault of his cavalry, or Blücher had been delayed upon the road, or had The Old Guard not withered under the hail of grapeshot and musketry, how all of Europe would have been changed forever. I was never exactly sure that Napoleon actually thought he was the emperor of France, though at moments he behaved that way, or whether he simply obsessed with all these things because he was a small man, shunted away in a loony bin with the rest of us, and he more than anything wanted to signify something in life.

  All of us mad folks did; it was our greatest hope and dream, we wanted to be something. What afflicted us was the elusiveness in achieving that goal, and so, instead we substituted delusion. On my floor alone, there were a half-dozen Jesuses, or at least folks who insisted they could communicate with Him directly, one Mohammad who fell to his knees three times a day, praying to Mecca, although he was often pointed in the wrong direction, a couple of George Washingtons or assorted other presidents, from Lincoln and Jefferson right up to LBJ and Tricky Dick, and more than a few folks, like the truly harmless but occasionally terrifying Lanky, who were on the lookout for signs of Satan or any of his minions. There were folks obsessed with germs, people terrified of unseen bacteria floating in the air, others who believed that every bolt of lightning during a thunderstorm was aimed directly at them, and so they cowered in the corners. There were patients who said nothing, spending days on end in total silence, and others who blasted obscenities right and left. Some washed their hands twenty or thirty times per day, others never bathed. We were an army of compulsions and obsessions, delusions and despairs. One of the men that I came to like was called Newsman. He wandered the hallways like some present day town crier, spouting headlines, an encyclopedia of current events. At least, in his own mad way, he kept us connected to the outside world, and reminded us that events were taking place beyond the walls of the hospital. And there was even one famously overweight woman, who occupied hours playing a mean game of Ping-Pong in the dayroom, but who spent most of her time considering the issues connected with being the direct reincarnation of Cleopatra. Sometimes, however, Cleo only thought she was Elizabeth Taylor in the movie. One way or the other, she could quote virtually every line from the film, even Richard Burton’s, or the entirety of Shakespeare’s play, as she slammed another winner past whoever dared play the game against her.

  When I think back, it all seems so ridiculous, I think I should laugh out loud.

  But it wasn’t. It was a place of unspeakable pain.

  That is what the people who have never been mad cannot understand. How much every delusion hurts. How reality just seems beyond one’s grasp. A world of desperation and frustration. Sisyphus and his boulder would have fit in well at the Western State Hospital.

  I went to my daily group sessions with Mister Evans, whom we called Mister Evil. A wiry psychiatric social worker with a sunken chest and an imperious attitude that seemed to suggest that he was somehow superior because he went home at the end of the day, and we did not, which we resented, but which was unfortunately the truest kind of superiority. In these sessions, we were encouraged to speak openly about why we were in the hospital, and what we would do when we were released.

  Everyone lied. Wonderful, unbridled, optimistic, runaway, enthusiastic lies.

  Except Peter the Fireman, who rarely contributed. He sat beside me politely listening to whatever fantastic fiction either I or one of the others came up with, about getting a regular job, or returning to school, or maybe joining an uplifting program that might serve to help others afflicted as we were. All these conversations were lies with one singular and hopeless desire at their core: to appear to be normal. Or, at least normal enough to be allowed to go home.

  At the start I sometimes wondered if there hadn’t been some private but very tenuous agreement between the two men, because Mister Evil never called on Peter the Fireman to add something to the discussion, even when it turned away from ourselves and our troubles into something interesting, like current events such as the hostage crisis, unrest in the inner cities, or the Red Sox aspirations for the upcoming year—all subjects that the Fireman knew a great deal about. There was some malevolence the two men shared, but one was patient, the other administrator, and at the beginning it was hidden away.

  In an odd way, I very shortly came to think as if I was on some desperate expedition to the farthest, most desolate regions of the earth, cut off from civilization, traveling deeper and farther away from all that was familiar into uncharted lands. Harsh lands.

  And soon to be harsher, still.

  The wall beckoned me, even as the phone in the corner of the kitchen started to ring. I knew it would be one of my sisters, calling to find out how I was, which was, of course, the way I always am, and, I presume, the way I always will be. So, I ignored it.

  Within a few weeks, what remained of the winter seemed to have retreated in sullen defeat, and Francis moved down a corridor at the hospital, searching for something to do. A woman to his right was mumbling something plaintive about lost babies, and rocking herself back and forth, holding her arms in front of her as if they contained something precious, when they did not. Ahead of him, an old man in pajamas, with wrinkled skin and a shock of unruly silver hair, stared forlornly at a stark white wall, until Little Black came along and gently turned him by the shoulders, so that he was now staring out a barred window. The repositioning with its new vista brought a smile to the old man’s face and Little Black patted the man on the arm, reassuring him, then ambled over toward Francis.

  “C-Bird, how you doing today?”

  “I’m okay, Mister Moses. Just slightly bored.”

  “They are watching soap operas in the dayroom.”

  “Those shows don’t do much for me.”

  “You don’t get behind that C-Bird? Start in to wondering just what’s gonna happen to all those folks with all those strange lives. Lots of twists and turns and mystery that keeps folks tuning in. That don’t interest you?”

  “I suppose it should, Mister Moses, but I don’t know. It just doesn’t seem real to me.”

  “Well, there’s also some people playing some cards. Some board games, too.”

  Francis shook his head.

  “Play a game of Ping-Pong with Cleo, maybe?”

  Francis smiled and continued to shake his head. “What, Mister Moses, you think I’m so crazy I’d take her on?”

  This comment made Little Black laugh out loud. “No, C-Bird. Not even you that crazy,” he replied.

  “Can I get an outdoor slip?” Francis asked abruptly.

  Little Black looked at his wristwatch. “I got some folks going outside this afternoon. Maybe plant some flowers on this fine day. Take a little walk. Get some of that fresh air. You go see Mister Evans, he fix you up, maybe. It’s okay with me.”

  Francis found Mister Evil outside his office, standing in the corridor deep in conversation with Doctor Gulp-a-pill. The two men seemed animated, g
esturing back and forth, arguing vehemently, but it was a curious sort of argument, for the more intense it seemed to get, the lower and softer their voices became, so that eventually, as Francis hovered nearby, the two men were hissing back and forth like a pair of snakes confronting each other. The two men seemed oblivious to everyone in the hallway, for more than a few other inmates joined Francis, shuffling about, moving right and left, waiting for an opening. Francis finally heard Gulp-a-pill say angrily, “Well, we simply cannot have this sort of lapse, not for a moment. I hope for your sakes they show up soon,” only to have Mister Evil respond, “Well, they’ve obviously been misplaced, or maybe stolen, and I’m not to blame for that. We will keep searching, that’s the best I can do.” Gulp-a-pill nodded, but his face was set in a curious anger. “You do that,” he said. “And I hope they’re discovered sooner rather than later. Make sure you inform Security, and have them provide you with a new set. But this is a serious breach of the rules.” And then the small Indian abruptly turned and walked away without acknowledging the presence of any of the others, except for one man, who sidled up to the doctor, but was dismissed with a wave before he could speak. Mister Evans turned toward the others, and was equally irritated: “What? What do you want?”

  His very tone caused one woman to instantly snatch a sob from her chest, and another old man to shake his head negatively, and stumble off down the corridor, speaking to himself, more comfortable with whatever conversation he could have with no one, than the one he could have with the angry social worker.

  Francis, however, hesitated. The voices of caution inside his head shouted: Leave! Leave now! but Francis paused, and after a moment, mustered up enough courage to say, “I would like an outdoor pass. Mister Moses is taking some people out to the grounds this afternoon, and I’d like to go with them. He said it would be okay.”

  “You want to go out?”

  “Yes. Please.”

  “Why do you want to go out, Petrel? What is it about the great out-of-doors that seems to be attractive to you?” Francis could not tell whether he was mocking him directly, or merely making fun of the idea of stepping beyond the front door of the Amherst Building.

  “It’s a nice day. Like the first nice day in a long time. The sun is shining and it’s warm. Fresh air.”

  “And you think that is better than what is offered here, inside?”

  “I didn’t say that, Mister Evans. It’s just springtime, and I wanted to go out.”

  Mister Evil shook his head. “I think you mean to try to run away, Francis. Escape. I think you believe that you can duck away from Little Black when his back is turned, climb the ivy and vault the wall, then run down the hill past the college before someone spots your flight and catch a bus that will take you away from here. Any bus, you don’t care, because any place is better than here; that’s what I think you mean to do,” he said. His tone had an edgy, aggressive note.

  Francis instantly replied, “No, no, no, I just want to go to the garden.”

  “You say that,” Mister Evil continued, “but how do I know that you are telling me the truth? How can I trust you, C-Bird? What will you do that makes me believe that you are telling me the truth?”

  Francis had no idea how to reply. He did not know how anyone could prove that a promise made was truthful, other than by behaving that way. “I just want to go outside,” Francis said. “I haven’t been outside since I got here.”

  “Do you think you deserve the privilege of going outside? What have you done to earn that, Francis?”

  “I don’t know,” Francis said. “I didn’t know I had to earn it. I just want to go outside.”

  “What do your voices tell you, C-Bird?”

  Francis took a small step back, for his voices were all shouting, distant, yet clear, instructions to get away from the psychologist as fast as he could, but Francis persisted, in rare defiance of the internal racket. “I don’t hear any voices, Mister Evans. I just wanted to go outside. That’s all. I don’t want to escape. I don’t want to take a bus somewhere. I just want some fresh air.”

  Evans nodded, but locked his lips into a sneer at the same time. “I don’t believe you,” he said, but he pulled a small pad from his shirt pocket and wrote a few words on it. “Give this to Mister Moses,” he said. “Permission to go outside granted. But don’t be late for our afternoon group session.”

  Francis found Little Black smoking a cigarette by the nursing station, where he was flirting with the pair on duty. Nurse Wrong was there, and a younger woman, a new nurse-trainee—called Short Blond because she wore her hair cropped close to her head in a pixielike style that contradicted the bouffant do’s of the other staff nurses, who were all a little older, and a little more committed to the sags and wrinkles of middle age. Short Blond was young and thin and wiry, with a boylike physique hidden behind the white nursing outfit. Her skin was pale, almost translucent, and seemed to glow softly beneath the overhead lights of the hospital. She had a slight, hard-to-hear voice that seemed to slide into whispers when she was nervous, which, as best as the patients could tell, was often. Large noisy groups made her anxious, and she struggled when the nursing station was swarmed at the hours medications were dispensed. These were always tense times, with folks jostling back and forth, trying to get up to the wire-enclosed window, where the pills were arranged in small paper cups with patients’ names written on them. She had trouble getting the patients into lines, getting them to be quiet, and she especially had trouble when some pushing and shoving took place, which was often enough. Short Blond did much better when she was alone with a patient, and her reedy, small voice didn’t have to battle with many. Francis liked her, because, at least in part, she wasn’t that much older than he was, but mainly because he thought her voice was soothing, and reminded him of his own mother’s years earlier, when she would read to him at night. For a moment, he tried to remember when she had stopped doing that, because the memory seemed suddenly far distant, almost as if it were history, rather than recollection.

  “You get the permission slip, C-Bird?” Little Black asked.

  “Right here.” He handed it over and looked up and saw Peter the Fireman walking down the corridor. “Peter!” Francis called, “I got permission to go outside. Why don’t you go see Mister Evil, and see if you can come, too.”

  Peter the Fireman walked up quickly. He smiled but shook his head. “No can do, C-Bird,” he said. “Against the rules.” He glanced over at Little Black, who was nodding in agreement.

  “Sorry,” the attendant said. “The Fireman’s right. Not him.”

  “Why not?” Francis asked.

  “Because,” the Fireman said quietly, slowly, “that’s my arrangement here. Not beyond any of the locked doors.”

  “I don’t understand,” Francis said.

  “It’s part of the court order putting me here,” the Fireman continued. His voice seemed tinged with regret. “Ninety days of observation. Assessment. Psychological determination. Tests where they hold up an inkblot and I’m supposed to say it looks like two people having sex. Gulp-a-pill and Mister Evil ask, and I answer, and they write it down and one of these days it goes back to the court. But I’m not allowed past any locked doors. Everybody’s in prison, sort of, C-Bird. Mine is just a little more restricted than yours.”

  Little Black added, “It ain’t a big thing, C-Bird. There’s plenty of folks here who never get to go out. Depends on what you did that got you here. Of course, there’s plenty, too, who don’t want to go out, either, but could, if they only asked. They just never do ask.”

  Francis understood, but didn’t understand, both at the same time. He looked over at the Fireman. “It doesn’t seem fair,” he said.

  “I don’t think the concept of fair was truly one that anyone really had in mind, C-Bird. But I agreed, and so, that’s the way it is. I stay put. Meet with Doctor Gulp-a-pill twice a week. Attend sessions with Mister Evil. Let them watch me. See, even now, while we’re talking, Little Black here a
nd Short Blond and Miss Wrong are all watching me and listening to what I say, and just about anything they observe might end up in the report that Gulp-a-pill is going to write up for the court. So, I pretty much need to mind my p’s and q’s and watch what I say, because no telling what might become the key consideration. Isn’t that right, Mister Moses?”

  Little Black nodded. Francis found it all to be oddly detached, as if they were speaking about someone else, not the person standing in front of him. “When you speak like that,” he said, “it doesn’t sound like you’re crazy.”

  This comment made Peter the Fireman smile wryly, one side of his mouth lifting up, giving him a slightly lopsided, but genuinely bemused look. “Oh my gosh,” he said. “That’s terrible. Terrible.” He made a slight choking sound deep in his throat. “I should be even more careful then,” he said. “Because crazy is what I need to be.”

  This made no sense to Francis. For a man who was being watched, Peter seemed relatively unconcerned, which was in opposition to many of the paranoids in the hospital, who believed they were constantly being observed, when they weren’t, but took evasive steps nevertheless. Of course, they believed it was the FBI or the CIA or perhaps the KGB or extraterrestrials who were doing the watching, which made their circumstances significantly different. Francis watched the Fireman turn and head off through the dayroom doors, and thought that even when he whistled, or perhaps added some obvious jauntiness to his step, it only served to make whatever saddened him all that much more obvious.

  The warm sun hit Francis’s face. Big Black had joined his brother to lead the expedition, one at the front and one at the rear, keeping the dozen patients making the journey through the hospital grounds in single file. Lanky had come along, muttering about being on the lookout, as vigilant as always, and Cleo, who spent some time staring at the ground, and peering at the dirt beneath every bush and shrub, hoping, as she said to anyone who noticed her behavior, to spot an adder. Francis guessed that an ordinary garter snake would nicely serve the serpent part of the bill, but not the suicide part. There were several older women who walked very slowly and a couple of older men, and three middle-aged male patients, all of whom fit into the bedraggled, nondescript category that marked folks who had been assimilated into the hospital routine for years. They wore flip-flop sandals or work boots—and pajama tops beneath frayed and threadbare woolen sweaters or sweatshirts, none of which seemed to quite fit or match, which was the norm for the hospital. A couple of the men had sullen, angry expressions on their faces, as if the sunlight that seemed to caress their faces with warmth infuriated them in some internal way that defied understanding. It was, Francis thought, what made the hospital such an unsettling place. A day that should have brought relaxed laughter instead inspired quiet rage.