Somnambulism

This was a semester end assignment from a creative writing class at WSU. At this point in my writing I was imitating Rod Serling (it's hard to go wrong with that). It's another piece that represents where I've come from as opposed to where I am, but the few people who've read my writing still list this as one of their favorites, so enjoy.

Somnambulism

By Joe Sudar

            “I’m going to record this conversation. Is that alright with you?”

            “Yes,” said Berger, “actually I’m glad you offered. I need a record of what’s happening to me before it gets serious. When they find me crushed in a cement mixer there will at least be an explanation for the police.”

            Skinner nodded but said nothing. A good psychologist knows not to support or dismiss a client’s delusions. His job is to provide objective analysis of any potential psychological disorders. He clicked play and record on his pocket tape recorder and set it on the table between them. Its reels whirred in anticipation.

            “Every night for the past two weeks I’ve had the same dream,” Berger began, his textured hands woven together on his lap, “and every night it has become more and more vivid. The first thing I feel is panic. Something horrible has happened, or maybe is happening, I don’t really know.”

            Skinner nodded again, scribbling a single word onto his notepad:

            Panicked

            “I never see or hear a single thing. It’s not just darkness, it’s like there’s nothing there at all; it’s just empty around me. I never go anywhere or do anything, I only ever remember that terrible feeling. It’s horrible, like having a knotted rope pulled through you. Every pull makes me panic more and more, and I feel this urge to do something to stop it but I have no idea what.

            Motivation for action

            “That’s not the half of it either: I’m sleepwalking. That’s not much I know, I’m sure you’ve had a hundred clients with little kids walking around at night but you haven’t heard anything like this.

            “The first time it happened was last Sunday night. It was also the first time I had the dream. The terror felt as new and horrible as an open wound. I woke in clothes drenched all the way through with my own sweat. Instead of waking in my bed, however, I was ten feet outside the door to my apartment, which I’d left wide open. It was two or three in the morning and no one saw me, but I’d left my home for God knows where.”

            Physiological reaction

            Somnambulism

            Leaving home in night

            “Monday night it happened again. I came out of the dream just like before but this time I wasn’t in my apartment hall, I was in the foyer, ground floor. Tuesday night came, I dreamt again and I walked to the street corner outside.

            Progressive increase in distance from home

            “After that I called my physician and he recommended you. He said you were an expert on dream cases, that you studied it for your thesis or whatever you guys do for your degree. I figured you could tell me what my dream means and why I was sleepwalking.”

            “Unfortunately the process is not as simple as that,” said Skinner, flipping to a fresh page in his notebook, “with continued interview and analysis we will certainly be able to decipher any meaning in this dream, but as it is…”

            “I wasn’t finished,” interrupted Berger, “there’s more. It’s Friday, I called on Wednesday. I had the dream again on Wednesday and Thursday night. Two nights ago, after I called and made an appointment with your secretary and found out I had two more nights to survive I decided to try a solution of my own: I duct-taped my hand to the bedpost. It didn’t do squat. I woke up with bruises from the constriction and a fragment of it still attached to my skin. I’d made it twice as far, two streets past the corner where I’d woken up the night before.”

            Same route every night?

            “Last night was the worst. I made it five blocks away and woke up three blocks away from the highway.”

            Skinner nodded, penning the detail on his pad. He knew that Berger meant the city’s central thoroughfare, which ran from the northern suburbs down through the commercial area all the way to the industrial properties at the limits. Traffic was clearly audible at all times in the clinic. The builders had done their best to soundproof the building, but the rush of vehicles moving day and night at seventy miles per hour was tough to beat.

            The psychologist looked up to see his client staring at him like a prosecutor extracting a confession. Skinner let his pencil hover above the page, waiting for his client to go on. The reels of the tape recorder gulped hungrily at the silence.

            “Don’t you see?” asked Berger, his jaw quivering. “Don’t you get what’s happening?”

            “What do you think is happening?” Skinner responded in monotone.

            “I’m being put in extreme danger. I don’t know why I’m going to that stupid freeway but I know I don’t want to be there in my sleep. It’s a dangerous road to drive on, If I make it there in my sleep I’ll be splattered like that!” Berger snapped his fingers for emphasis

            “You mentioned that you were still several blocks away, there’s no indication that you’ll make it all the way to the highway…” Skinner began.

            “You haven’t felt how terrifying this dream is. I feel like I’m watching myself be torn apart but I can’t do a damned thing about it. I want to stop it and I try but I’m completely helpless. Can you even imagine feeling like that and then waking up outside your home, exposed in the middle of the night, halfway to rushing traffic? It’s enough for me to do anything to feel safe again, I’ll even be committed.”

            Skinner shook his head. “At this point in time that is out of the question, at least as far as my ability is concerned. The criteria for commitment involves demonstration of a hazard to yourself or others. At this point Often times dreams like this are metaphors for other factors in your life that cause stress. It could even be something that you are equally impotent to change, but before we can pinpoint what it is I need to conduct more interviews with you.

            “I have no stress that even comes close to this: I own my apartment, I have no debt, a solid savings account and retirement plan, a lucrative job, and I’m happily single by choice. Until Sunday night I’d never felt anything like this in my entire life. I don’t know what this is coming from but I need it to stop, or I need some sort of security that I can’t break past to ensure that I’m not going to hurt myself. For crying out loud, I’m crossing the street in my sleep, how is that not a danger to myself?”

            “Somnambulism isn’t totally uncommon, and more often than not it manifests for a short period of time and then ends. If it ended tonight I wouldn’t be surprised. My power is very limited when it comes to committing you, and due to precedents set by malpractice lawsuits I need to be extremely careful when considering it. If you’re so worried however, it hasn’t been unheard of for someone to commit themselves.”

            “I’ve already thought about it, I need it to be on the states dollar. My medical insurance won’t cover it.”

            “Then I’m sorry Mr. Berger but for now there is nothing else I can do for your case. As it is right now I need more evidence and more testimony from you. I’ll pencil you in for my very first appointment, 8am next Monday, and we’ll see if your condition persists through the weekend.”

            Berger opened his mouth then clamped it shut, his shoulders slumped in resignation. He nodded, turning towards the door and reaching for his jacket as he left. At the office’s threshold he stopped and turned around to face Skinner.

            “It’s not going to stop.” he said. As the fluorescent lighting from outside spilled in Skinner noticed the dark circles under his client’s eyes. “I’ll see you Monday.”

            Skinner watched him go. For a moment he closed his eyes and pictured a panic so complete and potent that it made him feel helpless as a child. He thought of falling down a well and struggling to keep afloat. He let himself be chased through his house by a slobbering psychopath with an axe. When his hair was standing straight up, mounted on goose bumps he shuddered and grabbed his things to leave with a new and healthy respect for Berger’s fear.

*

            “I’m home!” called Skinner as he pushed through the door of his house.

            Four clawed paws skidded along hardwood as Siggy came to greet his master. The black lab spun in circles before pausing, his head still and expecting a pat while his tail wagged so hard that it shook his rear.

            “I’m in the TV room Bobby!” called Jennifer. Skinner hung up his coat and kicked off his loafers before heading through the hall to the living room. Siggy trotted close behind, his tongue lolling from side to side.

            “How was work?” asked Jen, pulling her legs in to make room on the couch.

            “Only one case that really stood out, I suppose. A client is experiencing recurring nightmares that almost exhibit the extremity of night terrors. He’s sleepwalking as well, on what seems to be a fixed course.”

            “That’s crazy! Any idea what you’re going to do with him?” Jen flipped through the channels as she talked, passing two animated cats throwing hammers at each other and a news bulletin on a missing fifteen year old girl with a dyed red mohawk before settling on a drama where two police officers were hard at work raiding a meth house.

            “I haven’t decided yet. I’m still thinking of how to approach this without getting him too worked up. You should see his face he talks about the dream: like the victim in a horror movie.”

            “Well, what does Freud have to say on the matter?” teased Jennifer, knowing her husband’s opinion on the famous Austrian’s method of dream analysis.

            “Freud would say the man is trapped in a vagina, which is probably his mother’s. And he’s probably heading to his mother’s house when he sleepwalks, either to kill her or rape her. There’s only one Sigmund who’s opinion I need today.” Almost on cue Siggy leapt onto the couch and buried his face into Skinner’s lap. In minutes he was snoring.

            “I’m not totally sure what to make of the case so far. I’ve read the man’s file and he’s never exhibited any past psychological trauma. Any of the conditions he fits the criteria for require at least one other symptom that he’s lacking. I’m beginning to think that this is less of  a disorder and more of a manifestation of his unconscious, but I need to find whatever is causing this stress before I can make a detailed diagnosis.

“All I need to treat this man,” mused Skinner, “is a concrete way of making him face the object of his fear, like the systematic desensitization of phobia patients. Unfortunately that isn’t very easy to do with dreams.”

            “Well you’ll have to find a way to do that. You’re the doctor, he needs your help.” Jennifer closed her eyes and laid her head onto Skinner’s shoulder.

            Skinner watched the cop drama without paying attention to it. His wife was right, he needed to find a way, some creative or innovative way to make his patient look at his dreams without the fear. He had all weekend to figure out how to perform this miracle.

*

            “Siggy, come on boy, time to go outside.”

            The black rocket hurtled down the hall before skidding to a stop at Skinner’s feet and planting himself in a seated position. It was Saturday afternoon, time for Sigmund’s weekly jaunt to the park. His tail swept the ground so furiously in anticipation that Skinner nearly expected lacquer flakes to be picked up from the floor.

            After putting on his blazer, Skinner reached up on the shelf above the coat rack, probing around until he found a retractable leash and choke collar. Siggy’s ears cocked forward and his mouth snapped shut while his tail kicked into fourth gear. With a smile the dog owner trailed the leash back and forth in front of his pet, watching two shining brown marbles follow it like a surveillance camera.

            “Yes Siggy,” Skinner said in a cartoonish Austrian accent, “I believe ve are making much progress, yes? Ven I snap my fingers, you vill speak.” At the popping sound Siggy jumped and barked. “And ven I lay my hand flat, you vill lay flat upon the ground.” Siggy pressed his belly into the ground as firmly at his owner’s behest.

            “You see,” Skinner laughed, “how even ze great Sigmund himself cannot help but to obey whilst under the power of hypnosis…”

            He trailed off as a switch inside his head connected and sparked with life. He slid the shining chain collar over his dog’s head and led him through the door, thumbing through numbers on his cell phone as he walked. By the time he’d stepped out onto the sidewalk in front of his apartment he’d found the temporary number marked “Berger.”

            As the phone rang he thought of ways to phrase his proposal. Berger seemed desperate enough to try anything so it shouldn’t be too hard, but all the same it was an unusual idea. Soon enough he heard the click of a receiver at the other end.

            “What?” Skinner was momentarily taken aback at the roughness of the voice on the other line. It was as unexpected as a dog’s growl when you approach with a friendly hand.

            “Mr. Berger, this is Dr. Skinner. I’ve had an idea on how we might approach the treatment of your case and…”

            “Shut up!” The mysterious voice barked, “I don’t know who you are but there’s no Berger here and I’m not about to listen to any trash from doctor anyone. Wake me up for crap like this again and I’ll come find you.”

            The other end clicked in termination, leaving a very confused doctor wondering at how his luck had tossed him such a violent wrong number. Regardless he still had an appointment with his patient in two days. Deciding that his idea could wait to be discussed in person, he returned his attention to the gung ho Labrador that was pulling his wrist apart.

*

            “If it’s alright with you, Mr. Berger, I’d like to try something a little different during our session today.”

            “Anything, Doctor,” groaned Berger, “I’ll play by your rules if they work.”

            “Perfect. First of all let’s talk about this weekend. Were there any new developments in either the dream or your somnambulism?”

            Berger laid back onto the office couch. Putting a box of tissue between his hands would have been the classic image of therapist and client. His massive shoulders quaked like a kid describing a nightmare to his parents.

            “It hasn’t stopped. Every night I dream just like I did last week and I wake up away from home. I haven’t gotten any farther than I did before though. I wake up  just a few blocks from the freeway like before, right when the sun is coming up. I’m pretty sure that I walk all night to get that far but I’m not sure.”

            “I see. Mr. Berger do you have a history of drug use?”

            Berger sat up, his face as contorted as the mask of drama. “You think I’m on drugs?  What’s wrong with you? I’m trying to open up to you about something that’s real and terrifying for me but you’re treating me like a criminal. I don’t want drug prescriptions from you, I’m not trying to get committed because Jack Nicholson showed me it was a sweet deal, I’m scared for my God damn life!”

            Skinner raised his hand, “You’re misinterpreting my intentions, Mr. Berger. First of all, it is standard procedure within the psychological health community to explore the possibility of drug abuse first before we consider the possibility of a disorder. My question was not a personal attack against you, I ask everyone who exhibits symptoms like yours the same question.”

            “Symptoms of what?”

            “Honestly I can’t tell yet. You’re missing a few key symptoms for some of the more well known psychological disorders, but that probably means that this will be easier to solve than we originally though. I would say that your case isn’t any more peculiar than some others that I have dealt with, but we are still early in our meetings so I can’t say much about your prognosis yet.”

            “Then you aren’t going to commit me?”

            “Please Mr. Berger, let me finish. As I’ve said before, commitment is a very serious procedure and is only done when the patient is believed to be a danger to themselves or others. So far from your description, the sleepwalking has kept you to routes that are free from hazards, and while I am sure it is stressful and may be inhibiting your rest, we don’t commit people for sleeplessness. If we did then the wards would be full of insomniacs.

            “The primary thing that makes your situation unique is the presence of this recurring dream. What you may have is a manifestation of an unconsciously known danger. I intend to discover whether or not this is the case today.

            “The reason why I asked you whether or not you have had a history of drug use, Mr. Berger, is because I would like to hypnotize you, and there could be an adverse reaction if you have a history of hallucinogen usage. Hypnosis was a common practice before Sigmund Freud developed his theories on unconscious motivation and psychoanalytic method. In fact he continued to use hypnosis as a viable treatment option for some time, believing that it was a way to explore the significance of phenomena such as dreams, which he called the “royal road to the unconscious” without inhibition. I don’t often agree with Freudian ideals, but since we’re treading in his territory right now I don’t see why we shouldn’t follow the path he’s already lain.”

            Berger nodded slowly, his hand brushing at week old stubble. “Alright, if you believe that this is the way to go I’ll follow your lead.”

            “I’m glad you’ve agreed, I think we can make some serious progress with this method. To begin with please lay down flat on the couch.”

            Berger complied, smiling wryly. “No pocket watch to wave in my face, doc?”

            “I’m afraid I left it back in the eighteen hundreds. The second thing I would like you to do is relax yourself completely.”

            Berger’s chest rose and fell as each of his limbs grew slowly limp.

            “Beginning at your toes, I would like to imagine that you are being submerged in a bathtub of warm water. It creeps up your skin, the warmth of it flooding into your muscles, releasing every bit of tension from the last week’s exertions. You are standing knee deep now, and it keeps rising. As it passes up your thighs and reaches your hips you begin to feel as though you have no legs at all.”

            Berger’s lips opened a millimeter at a time as his jaw gradually grew slack beneath his tight shut eyes.

            “The warmth continues up you, inch by inch, making you grow more and more comfortable and relaxed with every passing moment. Soon you can no longer feel your arms past the elbow, and everything below your ribcage has disappeared in the same way. Vertebrae by vertebrae, your spine releases the burden of supporting your body, and you are enveloped more and more into the soothing bath. Your arms have left, and your neck is vanishing just the same. As the water rises above your head you find yourself able to breathe freely, conscious only of the thoughts deep in the back of your mind.”

            The figure on the couch lay so still that he might easily have been a cadaver at the morgue.

            “If I were to clap my hands, you would return to full consciousness, and this relaxation would leave you in an instant. Before then though, I would like to hear more about this dream that has been bothering you, is that alright?”

            Berger’s head moved up and down in a single nod.

            “When I could backwards from ten, I would like you to tell me about what is inspiring the panic in your dream.

            “Ten, nine, eight,”

            Berger lay completely still..

            “Seven, six, five,”

            The room was as silent as a soundproofed studio.

            “Four, three, two,”

            Skinner drew a final breath.

            “One.”

            Like a whip in mid crack Berger rose from the couch, sprinting past the shocked psychologist and out the door.

            Skinner dropped his notepad and burst through the door after his patient. Mary, his secretary sat frozen with the phone halfway to her ear. The doctor screamed at her to call the hospital and send a crew as he erupted from the clinic and after Berger.

            Berger was already a few hundred feet away down the professional mall parking lot. Skinner girded himself for a sprint and fired every cylinder at once. Hundreds of miles on the treadmill came up and fueled his legs as they pumped after the sleepwalker. Ahead, Berger rounded a corner past the far building and disappeared. Skinner furiously clapped his hands but his patient was too far away to hear.

            Dr. Skinner rounded the corner in time to see his patient charging headlong towards the freeway like a startled rodent. The psychologist summoned every scrap of strength and speed in his body, letting it all out in a thunderous eruption like the hoof beats of wild horses. The gap between them closed foot by foot as the sounds of long haul trucks and SUVs filled his ears. The tails of Berger’s shirt fluttered just out of his reach.

Skinner jumped, tackling his patient to the ground moments before he stepped in front of a semi-truck with two cars.

            Berger twisted like a Greco-Roman wrestler, pinning his doctor as he tried to get to his feet and back along his course. Skinner threaded their legs together in a pretzel like jumble, freeing his hands long enough to bring them together in an ear-splitting clap.

            The two of them collapsed onto the ground, gasping. Berger sat up, looking around in confusion as the sound of ambulance sirens sounded far off in the distance.

            “Well Mr. Berger,” Skinner said between gulps of air, “You’ve convinced me. Let’s go begin the paperwork to have you committed.”

*

            Skinner’s cell phone rang in the night, as cursed a sound as the proverbial alarm clock. Wiping sleep from his eyes he answered quickly, hoping that his wife hadn’t been disturbed. She hated that he slept with the phone on, but he considered caring for his patients to be paramount to a psychologist’s obligations, even if that meant giving up some sleep every now and then.

            “Dr. Skinner,” he groaned into the receiver.

            “I’m sorry to wake you doctor,” it was a man’s voice, “This is the night orderly at Northern Hills Sanitarium, we got a patient missing. Book says he’s one of yours: Berger, Douglas.

            “Berger?” It had been three days since his commitment, and Skinner had checked in on him every day to see if there was a change in his condition. So far none had manifested, he sleepwalked every night, pacing around the perimeter of his quarters and reported the same dream as before. “What did the security cameras see?”

            “Nothing, he had a key in his room somehow, we’re still working on where he got it from. You can bet some heads are gonna roll from that one. For once I’m glad to be on this shift, I never went near the guy so I’m in the clear.”

            “Sir,” said Skinner as he put on his coat and loafers, “we have a missing patient, your job is practically a non issue in comparison. That may sound callous but we are dealing with a man who has exhibited dangerous sleepwalking habits, so you’ll forgive me if I’m a little stressed out. I’m on my way to the hospital.”

            “Yes doctor,” the line closed.

            Siggy materialized in the pitch black hallway, his tail swishing hopefully as he saw his owner preparing for a trip outside. Skinner gave him a quick rub behind the ears before exiting the hallway.

            His phone vibrated as he pulled out of the parking garage. He propped the wheel in place with his knee and answered the un-recognized number.

            “Dr. Skinner.”

            Doctor, it’s Berger.”

            Skinner nearly dropped the phone in surprise. “Berger? Where are you? You realize that you’re committing a crime by exiting a hospital after you were committed?”

            “You’re going to hypnotize me again, after that I’ll return to the hospital with you. The dream has changed and something is very wrong.”

            “And if I tell that to the authorities at the hospital you’re going to remain there for a very long time. Tell me where you are and come with me now before you ruin your life.”

            “Come with me so that we can save someone.”

            Skinner was glad that his patient couldn’t see rolling eyes through the phone. He’d dealt with delusional patients before, he just needed to play along for a while. “Very well Berger, where can I meet you?”

            “I’ll direct you along the route, you’ll find out where I am when you get here.”

            Skinner was also glad that frustrated grimaces couldn’t be seen through a phone line. “Alright, where should I head?”

*

            The psychologist and his patient stood by a phone booth at the edge of the city’s industrial district. Skinner performed the hypnotic sequence just as he had before in his office, though he had to concentrate twice as hard this time. He hadn’t been able to call the police yet. He only needed a minute to make the call, but he needed to complete the process before he could.

            “five, four,”

            Skinner glanced over the steel and concrete jungle before them. The economy had shut down the entire blocks throughout the site. Smokestacks and towers created a jagged horizon like the skyline of Victorian London. Lights and steam rose up here and there, but the majority of the metal city was dead and black. The only light came from streetlamps casting golden circles down the paths.

            “three, two,”

            Berger had taken to the suggestion of hypnosis as readily as the first time. He sat slumped on the hood of Skinner’s car, subtly poised for the final count.

            “one.”

            Berger took off like a greyhound after a rabbit with Skinner keeping pace a few feet behind him. The sleepwalker was moving twice as fast as before and his doctor could barely keep up the speed. He needed to wait for them to stop before he could complete make the phone call.

Beyond barbed wire fences to their left and right rose towering structures. Darkened foundries stood past storage silos with pipes stretching out like networks to still and dead warehouses.

            Berger faded in and out of streetlights, darting straight ahead like a hound clinging to a scent trail. Skinner’s feet seemed to grow heavier with every step. Soon spittle clung to the edges of his lips and needles of exertion pierced his lungs. By the fifteenth lamp post he began wondering how long he could keep the pace. At the twenty fifth he had to imagine lead weights in his hands to keep from raising them and clapping for a breather.

            Berger turned on a dime, cruising into a commercial property without breaking his pace. Skinner paused momentarily to look at the sign. It was a storage yard frequented by several companies in the area, but it had been sold two weeks ago. A glance inside at the titan stacks of metal storage containers showed that the new owners hadn’t made much progress towards emptying the premises.

            Stopping had been a mistake. As Skinner started again he felt the buildup of lactic acid with every step. Berger moved ahead just as furiously as before. His faithful psychologist put on a burst of speed to catch up. Moonlight alone had to do, there were no lights here. Berger raced left and right down the labyrinth of steel containers.

            An open warehouse loomed ahead of them, its doorway a gaping black gullet into which Berger raced. Skinner paused at the entrance, feeling around for a light switch. The power was disconnected, but he found a metal box with a flashlight which flickered to life, casting shadows amongst the equipment ahead of him.

            Tools and machinery filled the warehouse. In his shaky hands the flashlight made them all seem to shudder in the blackness. For a few minutes Skinner was reduced to childhood, telling himself that there was no such thing as monsters. The flashlight caught in the reflective headlights of a group of forklifts, making the glitter like cat eyes in the blackness. Coiled groups of extension cords became pythons, waiting to strike at anyone venturing close enough. In the end he forced himself to stare down at the wet footprints leading him through the gauntlet.

            Berger was standing so silently and so still that Skinner nearly ran into him. The burly industry worker stared like a sentinel at a lone storage container in the warehouse corner. Skinner crept behind him, shining his light up and down the shed. There were no markings and there was no lock on the door. Tucking the flashlight into his armpit, he clapped his hands.

            Berger blinked and looked around in confusion before locking his eyes onto the storage shed. “Where are we?” he asked.

            “You’ve led us to this container, does it mean anything to you?”

            Berger looked up and down the container, settling on the unlocked handles. “Let’s find out,” he said, approaching it with his arms outstretched. Before Skinner could protest the doors were open, revealing the contents.

            Steel walls came together in a long hallway, stained and puddle but completely empty until the back wall, where the emaciated corpse of a young girl sat hunched and cold.

            Skinner stared. In a moment’s time he remembered back to when he was sitting on the couch with his wife, flipping through channels past a news broadcast about a girl just that age gone missing recently. She had disappeared just over a week ago. Berger’s symptoms had also started just over a week ago.

            The psychologist turned to his client, but he may as well have been looking at a different man. The slouch was replaced with rigid posture, the flabby muscles with tension and tone. The bones in his face sharpened and the skin grew taught. His brow furrowed over rapidly darkening eyes like onyx faceted in a skull. Cracked and chapped lips curled back like a predator revealing its fangs.

            “Well doctor anyone, looks like I don’t have to find you.” The voice was like a dog’s growl when you approach with a friendly hand.

            The final symptom was a catalyst, piecing together all the clues of Berger’s condition like a building implosion played in reverse. Skinner silently gave his diagnosis: schizophrenia with multiple personalities, coupled with antisocial tendencies.

            Berger’s other persona reached out before Skinner could move, pinning his arms and lifting him easily off the ground. With a twist he threw the psychologist, leaving him in a crumpled heap on the metal floor.

            Skinner struggled to his feat as the doors groaned shut. His mind worked like lightning to piece together the situation he was in: Berger’s other personality had abducted the girl, leaving the unconscious trauma that resulted in frightening dreams. For some reason the guilt manifested through the desire to return to the scene of the crime. Once they arrived, the darker side took over again, with a new victim ready to be abused.

            The impenetrable metal doors slammed shut. Outside, the latches screeched into place.

            Skinner flipped open his cell phone and dialed 911 before realizing that the metal tomb was blocking any reception.

            The first thing he felt was panic.

           

Delusion, chapter 1

This is the first chapter of my only completed novel to date. If all goes well, the second (Restless, working title) should be ready to have a chapter shared by the end of 2013. Disclaimer: there's strong language. Please enjoy.

Delusion

By Joe Sudar

Chapter 1

The siren filled Pullman like wax in a mold. It surged down the city streets, echoing left and right down alleys. Cars skidded to shoulders. Walkers hopped onto curbs and watched red and blue lights blur past.

The inside of the ambulance clattered with activity. There were four paramedics, hired for the circumference of their chests and their experience as offensive linemen. One filled a needle with clear barbiturates. Another prepped a gurney that jingled with straps and buckles. One untangled a straightjacket. The last one tucked a Taser into his belt, just in case.

            In the front seat, Doctor Edwin Harrison flipped through a medical file, looking for some reason to not need the muscleheads in the back of the ambulance. The papers in his lap dripped with understatement. He had enough experience in psychiatry to see past the sugar coating and into the file’s subtext. Buddy Stewart, forty-five years old, Caucasian, male. Patient suffers from extreme grandiose delusions (he thinks he’s God. Scratch that, he knows he’s God). Low remorse shown for antisocial behavior when decompensated (he hurt someone once, and didn’t mind). Poor prognosis from dialectical behavioral therapy, despite high effort rating. Only pharmaceutical treatments appear effective (he’s fought with his illness every day of his life. He wants to be normal, but his brain isn’t wired that way. There’s a good voice and a bad voice in his head. One of them is louder than the other, and cramming chemicals down his throat is the only way to change the volume. Without pills, the good voice barely makes a peep).

*

Palouse River Counseling provided therapy for Pullman and the dozen boroughs surrounding the city. Its team offered counseling, clinical work, and assessment to people suffering from mental illness. Nestled in the big tan building’s shadow was a one-floor house. A sign over the doorjamb read, ‘Harvest House.’ It was a clubhouse, where PRC clients trained vocational skills by operating a community center with lunches, business services, and a news publication.

             Services had halted. Computers blinked, waiting for input. Lunch cooled, half-made. The club members evacuated next door to smiling faces and waiting coffee. They smiled and said thank you as counselors greeted them, but they’d all noticed the club’s door as they left. It lay flat on the lawn, hinges bent. The screws that fixed it in the jamb held chunks of wood in their grooves like a crash victim clinging white-knuckled to a steering wheel.

            In Harvest House’s basement, Doctor David Port pressed his head against a locked door. A good voice and a bad voice debated on the other side in a pitch-black bathroom.

John Cooper, Dave’s grad student intern, paced behind him, shoes squeaking every time he turned. Sweat stains ruined the neck and pits of his tailored shirt. His sharp chin quivered as things to say appeared and died in his mouth.

            “This is bullshit,” Cooper said, “the state pays for his meds and he doesn’t take them. Waste of time, waste of money, dangerous and stupid…”

            “John,” Dave whispered, turning away from the door, “this house was built in an era when cost-cutting was more important than quality. Keep that, and the thinness of this door in mind before you decide to rant.”

            Cooper huffed and continued pacing.  Dave turned back to the door. “Buddy,” he called, “can you hear me, young man?”

            Silence, then a whispered, “yes.”

            “You need to open this door, Buddy. Your medication is overdue. That should be all that I need to say. Remember what happened last time?”

            In the darkness, Buddy Stewart turned to the crack of light beneath the bathroom door. He leaned, brushing the painted wood until his fingers touched a cold brass door handle. Ding ding ding, I remember what happened last time, the bad voice shouted an inch from his ear, they robbed you blind, you stupid sack of shit. Everything your grandpa left you, everything your father scrimped and saved, all of it gone. Boom. Gone. You blinked, they snatched it up. Know how much of it vanished when your head was in the sand?

            Buddy’s hand jerked from the door handle to the nape of his neck, squeezing away the stress. “I don’t care,” he said, “I don’t care, I don’t care, shut up, shut up, shut up.”

            Dave understood where the outburst was aimed. Coop didn’t.

            “Okay smartass,” Coop pushed up to the door, “third strike. There’s a team coming from Eastern right now. Open this door and take your pills before they get here or you’re out.”

            Eastern State Hospital’s sterile white corridors blinded Buddy. Doctors and nurses loomed over him, eyes sick with pity. He recoiled from the memory, clamping his hands over his ears, shutting out every outside voice, leaving him alone with the bad one.

            Dave dragged Cooper away from the door by his collar. “Go find Rebecca,” he said, “tell her to get down here, pronto.”

            Coop nursed a scowl all the way across the street. In the PRC reception area, Rebecca Collins hunched over the desk, chin mashed into her open palm. One foot reached up and itched at a pencil-thin leg. Blue eyes, so bright they were almost luminescent, glittered as she debated with Cindy, the receptionist.

            “There’s still time,” Rebecca said, “Buddy can get a grip, but not if the hospital is looming over him. It’ll scare him to death.”

            “Rebecca,” Cindy said, speaking through the hand that her head rested in, “I’m sorry but we can’t call Eastern back and say, ‘sorry, just kidding!’ Doctor Lawrence watched him rip off the door and throw it into the lawn, then told me himself to make the call. Buddy needs the hospital and they’re on their way.”

            “Dave wants you,” Coop interrupted.

            Rebecca jerked up, facing him. Her hands crept to her pants pockets, thumbs tucking in to mirror Coop. He noticed and snapped his hands to his side.

“Alright,” Rebecca said, “I was helping Cindy with an incident report. You can take it from here.” With a pinch of tact, she waited until he was out of sight to smile at his expression. The sight of Harvest House and its gaping door banished the smile.

            She arrived at the entrance as Dr. Harrison and his four hunky EMTs pulled up to the curb. ‘EASTERN’, written on the side of their vehicle, set her stomach wringing.

            “Hello,” Harrison said, extending his hand, “we’re responding to a 911 from Palouse River.”

            “Okay, we’re in the basement,” she answered, shoulders pulling back to match Harrison’s posture. “Real quick, what’s it going to take to keep Buddy from riding with you today?”

            Harrison fanned the pages of Buddy’s file with his thumb. “Something exceptional. Lead the way, miss.”

            They threaded through the living area and the kitchen, down the stairs to the basement. Dave unstuck his head from the door at the sound of footsteps.

            “Dr. Harrison.”

            “David. Any changes?”

            Dave held out his hand to the door. Swears flew through the flimsy wood. “Don’t you fuckin’… It doesn’t matter… No, God damn it… Piece of shit, don’t tell me…”

            The muscled attendants glanced at one another, scrubs tightening as they flexed their credentials. The one with the barbiturates uncapped the needle, showing a waiting bead of drug.

            “I’m hearing significant decompensation in there,” Harrison said, “almost identical to the language we heard before he snapped in ’98. If that happens again and someone gets hurt, he’ll be in the hospital for life. If we can get the door open and take him back with us now, he’ll just be looking at months, until we can get him normalized and on a schedule.”

            Months, Dave thought, the Fourth of July, his birthday, the start-of-school parade, the clubhouse camping trip, Thanksgiving, Christmas. Just months. Logic and emotion wobbled on a scale until it tipped to his clinical side. He nodded in consent.

            “He missed his medication because of a dentist appointment,” Rebecca said, “they told him it’d react with the anesthetic. It took about a day to wear off and that was enough for him to lose his footing. This isn’t negligence, it’s just bad timing.”

            “Son of a bitch, mother fucker,” Buddy snarled through the door.

            Harrison gestured towards the bathroom. “Why doesn’t matter, we’re here addressing that language and what it means. It isn’t what we want to hear from a client with a violent history.”

            “But he’s not saying it at us. That’s him arguing with his other voice. He’s still trying to resist.”

“I’m sorry. It’s unfortunate, but the fact is he doesn’t have medication in his system right now and he needs it.”

            “What if he takes it? He carries it on his person in a little red day-by-day carton. If we get him to take it and he unlocks the door on his own is that enough for him to stay?”

            “That, miss, would be the exceptional something I mentioned.”

            Rebecca turned to Dave. He peered over his bifocals. “Can you do it, young lady?”

            There was no option, so there was no question. “Yes.” She switched places with Dave, leaning hard into the door and listening to the debate on the other side. Edwin and his muscle men raised objections, but Dave’s face said, ‘watch this.’

            Rebecca wiped away everything behind her, leaving only the sounds of Buddy in the black room. She turned her head, pressing her ear against the door. Sounds leaked through, sketching in her mind to show what Buddy looked like past the door: squeaking footsteps (pacing), snickers between every other word (a toothy smile), breathless speech, endless and rapid (hunched body, hands wringing, eyes darting in the shadows to things only he could see).

            Rebecca wilted in front of the clinicians. She hunched over, head hanging low. Her hands ran over one another like a fly landed on its meal. Over her shoulder, they saw the corner of her mouth creep up into a smile. Harrison’s experience rang a bell, telling him that he should pay attention to what he was seeing.

            Buckles jingled behind Rebecca. She turned and saw one of the attendants prepping a straight jacket, coiling the fabric around his hands. The fibers strained as he pulled tight. Little squeaking sounds, like a rope taking load, twanged through the air towards her.

                  Rebecca…

            The sleeves ended in leather straps. At the back they locked in place, a design perfected over a hundred years of restraining people.

            Rebecca…

            She imagined it around her. Warm, sweaty, filling with the smell of a stressed body. Pulling, straining, nothing in response but squeaking sounds and jingling buckles. Smothering, like a pillow pressed over her face as she begged for enough air to scream…

            “Rebecca,” Dave’s voice cut through to her like a searchlight, “Buddy’s running out of time. Concentrate, you can do it.”

            She swallowed hard and turned back to the door. She bent and shriveled and wringed again. The workers from Eastern looked to Dave for an explanation. He ignored them.

            Snorts, snickers, excited groans from inside the bathroom. Buddy’s eyes glimmered at what the bad voice described to him (Rebecca’s eyes twinkled in time). The debate inside his head had shifted. The bad voice was winning.

            “Alright… Yeah I understand…” Rebecca’s ears perked like a watchdog’s to his rambling. Details swirled inside her head. All she needed was one familiar phrase, something for them to crystallize on. “Okay… I know, I’m sorry… I’m sorry, no don’t give it away… I’ll listen… Yes… Yes I want it… I want my house of gold…”

            House of gold. The crystals spread and the lies froze into a solid block. She watched him paced through gleaming pillars. His two hundred dollar shoes echoing down the polished floors. Diamonds glittered in piles to his left and right, spotted with wrinkled cash, stocks and bearer bonds, the legacy of the Stewart family. Enough money to change the world. Enough to rule it.

            “Two million gems ripped from the bones of Africa…” she shouted through the door.

            Rights to all the oil in Arabia, insisted the voice.

            “Rights to all the oil in Arabia. Silks of the Orient…”

            Silks of the Orient, ivory from titan’s mouth…

            “Ivory from titan’s mouth, buffalo land in heathen’s hands, beaches made of polished sand…”

            Beaches made of polished sand… Buddy stopped pacing. He’d heard the beaches mentioned twice. They were secret. No one but his mentor knew about them. Who was talking?

            “History and literature, all of it yours, if you just take it.” The new voice said from somewhere dark behind him.

            History and literature, all of it yours, his mentor insisted… if you just take it… Buddy knew the new voice. “Rebecca?” he called down the corridor of his golden house. “Is that you?”

            “It’s me, Buddy.”

            “Rebecca, how do you know about my assets?”

            “Because you’ve told me them all before, Buddy. Do you remember?”

            Six months ago he’d asked her to step outside. He’d wanted to talk about his mentor. He’d heard he had money, assets, everything he needed to be a made man. Bad people were keeping it all from him. They took from him and gave him pills to make him stupid so they could rob him blind. His mentor could help. He could get him everything he deserved, and he’d never wants again.

She’d listened to his story and asked if he really believed it. He’d tried, but none of it had been true. His mentor had lied.

            “Buddy,” Rebecca said, “do you have your medication with you?”

            He felt in his pocket. Seven containers, one for each day, rattling with little capsules. “Yes,” he answered.

            “This is very important, Buddy, how many days of medication do you have?”

            He took it out of his pocket, but despite all the light in the golden house, he couldn’t see the pills. When he looked at his hands he saw darkness. His other hand groped the bathroom wall until it found the light switch. The golden house burned away in a flood of electric light. He counted the pills in his one-a-day container. Sunday was gone, Monday had half a dose left. Everything from Tuesday onwards was full.

            “Rebecca, what day is it?”

            “It’s Thursday, Buddy.”

            Panic stabbed at his chest. He rushed to the sink, filled his mouth with water and swallowed Thursday’s dose. The bad voice screamed in protest. It swore that he’d lose it all again, that his money would disappear. It promised that the woman outside was next in line to inherit. She’d take it if he didn’t. It screamed that he was falling for a trap. It screamed until it went hoarse, and then it faded down to silence.

            Buddy Stewart opened the bathroom door an hour later. His shoulders filled the doorway so fully that he had to come through at an angle. He saw Dave, who smiled that the debate had closed. The four brawny paramedics had excused themselves earlier. Regardless of their skill set as hired muscle, they understood that their job was to help comfort the chronically uncomfortable, and hovering around would only stress Buddy out.

            Edwin Harrison assessed Buddy’s symptoms as he exited the bathroom. Buddy met his gaze with watery green eyes. When he held the eye contact, Harrison knew that the medication was running its course.

            Buddy looked around the basement. “Where’s Rebecca?”

            “She had something to take care of,” Dave answered.

            Through the PRC reception window, Cooper watched Rebecca emerge from Harvest House. She walked stiff and jerky, a tin soldier wound up and marching. She charged past the ambulance and grabbed her bike from a rack. She rode down the hill towards the city limits. He recognized the look on her face, the way she was walking, and what it implied. He noted the date and time in a Moleskine notebook, and smiled that he’d gotten as least one thing out of the mess.

*

Lighthouse University, Pullman’s bread and butter, sat one mile uphill from Harvest House. Two miles into campus was the Student Recreation Center, the largest in the school’s conference. Inside, clanking weights mixed with the drumbeat of punching bags, topped by the drone of treadmills. The air was perfumed by sweat and rubber. In the farthest corner of the gym sat a pair of rowing ergometers.

            The ergs were designed to mimic the movement and resistance of rowing on the water. Athletes sat on a seat that slid back and forth on a metal rail, their feet strapped in at one end. They held a handle, connected by a chain to an air flywheel that roared with every stroke, feeding data into a digital screen that told how fast they were going. Pulling harder meant the wheel spun faster and resisted more. It was the only workout machine that rewarded hard work by making it harder.

            Two best friends sat next to each other on the ergs. Muscles capable of lifting four hundred pounds straight off the ground flexed against the footpads of the machines. The flywheels roared in approval with every stroke.

            As their warm up ended, the friends caught their breath. Sweat dripped in rivulets off their faces. Here and there, their eyes met, sharing looks reserved for archenemies. The stakes were known, the competition was fierce, the rowers were ready.

            One was a heavyweight, built like a Greek statue with horse legs. The other was a lightweight, thin but trimmed down to a fatless body rippling with muscle. They wore matching navy blue tank tops, blazoned with a golden C for Cal Berkley.

 On the water, physics would even out the race, but the erg only paid attention only to power, determined by the wheel and its little computer. The lightweight took fewer meters on his machine to compensate, but the race was the same: two thousand meters, dead sprint to the finish.

They froze at attention, bodies upright and set, arms stretched out and ready to pull, legs coiled, primed to cannon at the drop of an imaginary flag.

            Attention.

Row.

Adrenaline coursed and told them both a familiar lie: ‘you feel no pain, you have no limits. Harder, faster, stronger. You can beat him easily.’ For a hundred meters, each rower generated enough wattage to power half a bank of stadium lights. Then tingles on the tops of their legs reminded them of an unwelcome truth: ‘you have nineteen hundred meters to go. It’s going to hurt, badly. You are mortal.’

            Five hundred meters in, they settled into race strategies. The heavyweight coiled up the slide after every stroke. At the catch, he floated weightless for a moment then fired in the opposite direction. His boat took another leap forward. The lightweight moved less weight, he pulled less power, but he did it faster. With almost two strokes for every one of the heavyweight’s, he was losing ground but demanded a price for it.

            Heart rates climbed past two hundred beats per minute. Muscles drank nutrition from their own cells as demand climbed higher and higher. Each rower’s brain screamed their body’s demands as they rounded the thousand-meter mark. They begged to know why they were self-destructing. Each athlete belayed explanation, using every trick they knew for mental distraction.

            The heavyweight turned the race into math. Nine hundred meters left. Ten meters per stroke. Ninety strokes left, just ninety. Eighty-nine. Eighty-eight.

            The lightweight felt the chemicals that made him hurt. Lactic acid, burning to signal that his body was working. Endorphins shouting back at the smoke signals that they don’t give a fuck, they’re too damn high. Light headedness, probably from good old-fashioned lack of blood. All the moving parts explained why he felt like he was dying.

            Five hundred meters to go. Numbers ticked down, motivation shot up. In the imaginary water, the bows of their boats pulsed next to each other, vying for the final inch of the race. The heavyweight pulled, ripping the machinery with every stroke. The lightweight upped the rate, climbing into a sprint. He kept the microns he needed and passed the finish line victorious.

            They paddled until the pain subsided long enough for their bodies and minds to angrily demand to know why they enjoyed rowing. The lightweight’s pain ignited, sparked by victory. He rested in the warm knowledge of his spoils.

            The night’s drinks were on the heavyweight.

*

The Terrell Coal Plant marked the city limits of Pullman. Lighthouse owned the property, which had once powered the entire school. Green energy had shut the operation down. Now it was a teaching tool, used once a semester by engineering students. Bleached candy wrappers and shattered beer bottles promised Rebecca some privacy. She curled against the base of the towering smokestack, her bike collapsed nearby and the road out of town beckoning.

Rebecca struggled to keep her cool like a carsick child. She gulped down air to drown the nausea that bubbled in her stomach. Voices battled inside her head. They cycled through one another like frequencies of a HAM radio. Snarls turned to moans, then to smacking lips, then lengthening out into a breathless scream. Words echoed out of the maelstrom every few seconds.

            You cunt.

            Her ringing cell phone pierced the din. She inched it from her pocket as more words thundered through the storm in her head. You think you’re fucking better than me? Dave was calling her.

            “Hi,” she croaked.

            “Where are you, young lady?”

            “I’m sorry, it’s bad.”

            “You don’t need to apologize. Are you okay?”

            “No, it’s really, really bad.”

            “Okay, please listen, Rebecca: you just need to hold on. You can make it through this and you know it. How many attacks this month?”

            “None.”

            “Exactly. You’re doing much, much better. There were some close calls but you beat them. You’re going to be okay, do you hear me?”

            Where the fuck would you be without me?

            “Dave, it’s worse than that. It hurts, I’m scared.”

            “Rebecca Collins, you are stronger than this.”

            “No, I need to go.” She hung up before he could lob another earful of support through the phone. An image flashed in her mind: orange and black light, like a smoky fire, framing a giant silhouette.

            Worthless little bitch.

            She wasn’t safe. The feeling came from somewhere she couldn’t explain, couldn’t rationalize, but it was there. She was in danger. Rebecca leapt onto her bike and pedaled towards safety.

            Palouse County rose and fell in dollops of farmland. It spread for miles in every direction, an agriculture country quilt stitched together by winding highways. She pedaled until her lungs felt like crumpled paper bags.

            You’re going to kill him.

            The land cracked ahead of her into a stony fissure where the road plummeted down a suicide grade. She tucked her body and leaned into the curving path, racing up to forty miles per hour.

And suck dicks for money.

Her left hand stretched out. A bubble of air filled her palm.

And when you die you’ll go to Hell.

She ripped the voices by their roots out and forced them down her neck. As they passed her ear a final thorn pricked at her.

            I love my little girl.

            The voices drained down her shoulder, running the length of her arm like dirty water in a gutter. At her hand they leaked out, mixing into the air bubble. She opened her palm and threw them onto the ground. They smeared on the asphalt with an oily splat.

            The grade leveled and turned into Snake River Road. It meandered, running parallel to the Snake River’s broad surface. Calm water stretched a thousand feet across to a canyon wall that shot straight up, back to farm country. Lines in the rock traced the paths of the superfloods that had shaped the region at the end of the last ice age. The scenery begged to be on a post card or a tourist brochure, but she ignored the sights. Less than a mile to safety.

            Granite Point knuckled up out of the water as her energy waned. The sunset painted it three different colors of red. She tossed her bike at its base, racing up the beaten-bare trail to its top.

            She was basted in sweat by the time she crested. The rock’s tabletop peak waited for her. Summer sun had heated it all day. Wispy tendrils of warmth seeped up through her clothes, wrapping and threading together into a blanket around her.

            No jaws could reach her up there. No voices could find her.

            The sun vanished slowly over the far hill of the canyon. Pinks and blues on the skyline faded to gray, then to black. Stars appeared over the horizon, reflected by the flat, still water below. They mirrored one another. She stared until she couldn’t tell where land ended and sky began. Granite Point floated through space, isolated from the world, surrounded by stars.