Blue Aspen Read online

  "Why is that?" asked Carl. "Who brought her in anyway?"

  "Phelps."

  "Ah ha." Carl smirked.

  "Wait a minute Carl," Jean interjected. "I know we make fun of Phelps a lot, but he has never given me any reason to doubt his ability as an analyst. In fact, I’ve seen him work first hand and his skills with the patients is impressive. He just has no social skills with people who are sane."

  "It’s just that he’s pinned her as a schizophrenic, and I would have too, except that the file notes she shows no trace of paranoia. And I’ve never had or heard of a case where the patient was in love with an alter ego or the voices in their head. Have you?"

  "No, but the idea doesn’t seem so bizarre to me," Carl said. "I do know of some who have thought of their alter ego as a friend. Why not a lover?"

  Jean had her head cocked to one side, thinking. "That’s why she’s so sad," she said quietly.

  Dr. Verell and Dr. Wilkam looked at her, bewildered. She straightened up.

  "The meds are taking the voices away," Jean explained.

  "Yeah, I bet that’s it," Carl agreed. "That girl is like a black cloud."

  "Maybe you’re right. But even so, it’s not like she could think of it in those terms, that the medication had separated her from her lover, I mean…I’ve never even seen her," Verell said, more to herself than her friends.

  "I had a weird case study when I was in college that sounds like what you’re talking about" Jean said. "The case of Jennifer Cartwright. What I remember is she was in love with her alter ego and her delusions were fantastic, but she was paranoid. She thought that her lover was the only person she could trust, and she was also very jealous. She thought other people were trying to steal her lover."

  "That sounds similar. Last night I read the girl’s notebook and her hallucinations are like none I’ve ever heard of. She wrote out her experience like a novel. And it’s not just a bunch of random, cryptic notes either. She doesn’t even lose track of time throughout the whole thing. I mean, it’s totally impossible, but yet…coherent."

  "You know what I’ve always wondered about?" Carl piped up. "You know how a schizophrenic can hear and taste and see things that are not there, but what about the dysfunctional hand?"

  Both women looked at him curiously.

  "What about it?" Jean asked.

  "Well, the fact that some cases can use their right hand but can’t tell how it’s been touched or if it’s been touched. If your brain can’t register feeling in the right hand, while in a hallucination, could you clasp your hands together and believe that you were holding someone else’s hand? Don’t you think? I’ve always wondered about that."

  Jean looked like she was fighting back a laugh. "I suppose your guess is as good as mine. What are you going to try first with Dulcee? Psycho dynamic psychotherapy or cognitive/behavioral therapy?"

  Dr. Verell sighed. "I’m not sure yet." And then to get a rise out of Carl she added, "I think cognitive/behavioral. Freud’s techniques are so overrated."

  "What?!" Carl demanded loudly. "You can’t possibly think that! Our entire profession is based on Freud’s theories. He’s the father of psychiatry, and I personally think…" Carl shut up and rolled his eyes. Both women were laughing at him uncontrollably.

  "Oh yes, very funny. Laugh it up."

  They did, cackling unashamed. Carl looked down pointedly at his watch and excused himself saying he had something important to do.

  "He rises every time," Dr. Verell chortled. "I know I shouldn’t, but he’s such an easy target. Seriously though, I’m not sure what I will try first with Dulcee. Her academic record indicates she’s very smart, and I don’t want her thinking I’m working her right off the bat. I want to establish some trust first, and maybe because she is unusual, she can be used as a case study also."

  "Well, I’m sure you’ll figure out what’s best for her. I better go too. I’ve got to get ready for my first group session. You want to go out for lunch today?" Jean asked

  "Maybe. Good luck with your group."

  Jean smiled warmly at her friend and left the staff lounge.

  Dr. Verell finished her coffee and went back to her office. She was feeling better now, more centered. She had a half hour to kill before she had any sessions. Dr. Verell turned on her computer and began going through her patient files. As she scanned over the notes she had made yesterday, her mind began to wander. One thought began flowing through her head in overwhelming clarity.

  Vincent…Vincent… Vincent… Vincent….

  Dr. Verell closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead. She shivered, feeling feverish. Her mind was wholly undivided on him. She replayed her short dream over in her head, concentrating on all the details she could remember. Dr. Verell opened a new document file and began to write it down. Her fingers trembled over the keys as she typed. He had only been a shadow. She had no mental image of his face. It didn't matter. She had never encountered anyone so…compelling.

  She pushed away from her desk and went to her bookshelf. She pulled out a heavy, leather volume she hadn't opened in years and sat back down. She flipped through the musty pages until she came to Freud's theories on dream distortion. She really did have respect for Freud, despite her goading Carl.

  She read her free time away. Pondering and irritated at the conclusions she wished she could dismiss. Had her dream really been a subconscious means of wish fulfillment?

  She angrily slammed the heavy book closed, sending dust into the air. The root of this was planted in her state of lovelessness. Her ever-growing desire for love was coming to the surface, and that disturbed her, greatly. The words Dulcee had written about a gently gaping hole made perfect sense to her. She could honestly say that was how she felt, and that made her angry. This problem had to be dealt with before it grew bigger and more insistent.

  Jessica Peters was escorted into Dr. Verell’s office a moment later, looking jumpy as always. She was thankful that Jessica never needed any encouragement to talk. She blabbed on and on in a jerky fashion, throughout the entire session.

  Dr. Verell didn’t hear a word. She sat starring at the girl she had seen every day for many months, and was annoyed there was nothing interesting about her. She was anxious to meet Dulcee. Dr. Verell was sure she would be interesting. When Jessica was gone, Dr. Verell buried her face in her hands, ashamed of herself. She had never zoned out on a patient like that before. She prided herself on being a wonderful therapist, but at this moment, she felt unworthy of her title.

  The rest of the morning sped by in blur until finally it was time for Dulcee to come in. Dr. Verell felt nervous, and because of the dream she had last night, her anxiety was akin to how a mistress might feel meeting the wife. She was also afraid Dulcee would disappoint her and be just as unexceptional as Jessica Peters. But everything she was thinking and worrying about went up in smoke when Dulcee came into her office. A beefy orderly in white scrubs, escorted Dulcee in, lowered her into the chair, and shuffled out.

  There was a moment of nothing as Dulcee’s eyes roved around the office looking at everything but Dr. Verell. She gapped at Dulcee, uncertain of her first impression, because she was feeling so many things at once. Now she understood why people said Dulcee had a black cloud over her head. Verell was no stranger to depression but this was something else, something more acute.

  As Dr. Verell looked at Dulcee, she was startled to discover there was a physical resemblance between the two of them, as though Dulcee could have been her little sister. Dulcee’s large, hazel eyes had the glazed telltale signs of the medication she was on. Aside from that, she looked ill. It was like looking at an animated corpse. She imagined the way Dulcee would have looked at a time when she was happy and then compared that image to what sat in front of her. The contrast was heartbreaking, or would have been if Dr. Verell had a heart that wasn’t atrophied.

  It seemed Dulcee was attempting to get through therapy by pretending she wasn’t there at all. But since Dr. Verell had said no
thing and was doing nothing but staring, Dulcee shifted and looked her in the eyes. Dr. Verell flinched but did not look away. Still, nothing was said.

  At first Dulcee’s face was blank as she gazed at her therapist. Then a small light came through her foggy eyes and she blinked, furrowing her eyebrows as though confused by what she was looking at. Still, nothing was said. Dr. Verell, having lost her senses momentarily, sat stone still, continuing to stare.

  Dulcee blinked a few more times and her look of confusion turned into irritation. She slumped back in her chair and gave a loud sigh.

  "Well, this is an interesting approach, Doc," Dulcee said derisively. "But I guess it worked. I mean, you’ve got me talking and I was going to do my best not to."

  The sound of Dulcee’s voice snapped Dr. Verell out of her discombobulation.

  "I’m sorry," she said. "I’m not quite myself today…I'm a little off, if you know what I mean." Verell let out a nervous laugh.

  Dulcee sneered at her.

  Verell cleared her throat, embarrassed. "So anyway, Hi. I’m Dr. Verell."

  Dulcee replaced her previous mask of deadness and looked at the floor. She hated this woman and she didn’t know why. Dr. Verell looked nice enough but there was something wrong with her. Dulcee was uncomfortable with the way she had been stared at. It seemed very unprofessional.

  Dr. Verell frowned, seeing that Dulcee was not going to be forthcoming. She examined her again, just the ruin of a seventeen-year-old girl. Dr. Verell wondered how this shell of a person had disarmed her so completely. She didn’t want to be Dulcee’s psychiatrist, and she recklessly decided right then that she didn’t really want to act like it either. Her years of school and work experience fell aside to make way for obscene curiosity, and she knew what to do to get the answers she wanted.

  Dr. Verell dramatically cleared her throat and opened her desk drawer. Dulcee looked up as Dr. Verell placed her notebook on the desk. A tremor rocked Dulcee under her skin and she gritted her teeth, digging her fingers into the arms of the chair. Now she knew why she hated Dr. Verell. Dulcee cringed, knowing the person in front of her knew intimate things about her, things Dulcee couldn’t even remember. Why had she insisted on bringing the notebook? Why hadn’t she hidden it?

  Dulcee tried hard to think through the fog in her head. She had almost forgotten her notebook even existed, and now having laid eyes on it again, wanted back so badly, it was like acid in her mouth. She had to find a way to get it back. She had to be cunning, diplomatic. Then, Dr. Verell laid her hand on it and lightly ran her fingers along the edge of the cover, caressing it. Dulcee’s fingers dug deeper into the chair. Dr. Verell was purposefully trying to provoke her. She had to keep her head.

  "That’s mine," Dulcee hissed acerbically. "I would like it back, please."

  Dr. Verell’s eyes glinted and she smiled. "I’ll see what I can do about that, but I need to hang onto it for a while, for reference."

  Dulcee tried hard to smile back. "Of course. I understand. Have you read it?"

  "Yes, I have. Moreover, I’m curious to know what it is. Will you tell me?"

  "It’s my autobiography," Dulcee said flatly, as though she were stating the obvious.

  "It’s really short for an autobiography, even for someone as young as you. An autobiography is supposed to be about your whole life, not just part of it." Verell said kindly.

  Dulcee shifted in her chair, giving her therapist an annoyed look. It was so aggravating, having no secrets from a stranger, a grasping one at that. But what was the point in holding back? She already knew everything anyway. Maybe she could get her notebook back if she made Dr. Verell feel like she thought of her as an ally. Could she play such a game convincingly?

  "It’s my point of view," she sighed. "I had no life before Vincent."

  "I see. Why do you feel that way?"

  "You said you read it," Dulcee accused.

  "I did read it."

  "Then how can you ask me that? As a woman, how can you not understand? Nothing in my life was any good until Vincent. Nothing was worth writing about. All the rest is something I want to forget."

  "Why do you want to forget it?" Dr. Verell leaned forward.

  Dulcee scowled at her and said nothing for a moment. She didn’t want to talk about her past but she did want to talk about Vincent. Maybe talking about him with another person, someone who knew a little about him would jog some of her memories. Even if that person was crouching over the information in a purely ghoulish fashion.

  "Why is it that all you people want to know about is my childhood? All you want is for me to tell you about my mother and father. I don’t get it. I know you think I’m schizophrenic, and Vincent is a figment of my insanity. So why don’t you want me to talk about Vincent? How can you read my notebook and not want to know more? Don’t you want to know how deep the madness goes?"

  Momentarily dumbstruck, Dr. Verell said nothing for a minute. "On the contrary, I do want you to talk about Vincent. I want to know all about him. I want to know about the things that happened that are not written in your little book. It’s my way of finding out how deep the madness goes, as you put it. However, I’m looking for the root, deep under the surface. Vincent is a symptom, not the sickness. Numbing the symptom will not cure what is causing it. Your past holds the key."

  "Vincent is the cure to my sickness, tangible or not," Dulcee said quietly.

  The two women regarded each other for a moment. She did understand. Deep inside her, in the place where secrets live, Dr. Verell felt that last night, she had shared in the same madness.

  Abruptly she wanted to be as far from Dulcee as she could be.

  "Dulcee, I want you to know you can trust me. I know you see me as the enemy right now, but I hope you will come to regard me as your friend. And I want you to know I do understand what you have said. I hope you have understood what I have said."

  Dulcee nodded mutely.

  "Good," Verell continued, "I want you to do something for me before we talk again."

  "What?"

  "I’m going to give you a new notebook, and I want you to begin writing in it. I’m not going to tell you what to write. I just want you to try to write about anything other than Vincent. Will you try that for me?"

  Dulcee shrugged. The suggestion was merely an artifice. Dr. Verell gave her a fresh notebook and sent her on her way. Dulcee walked slowly back to her room with the orderly hanging on her arm. Her first session of therapy had not been what she thought it would be, and neither had her therapist. Dulcee thought back to the look Dr. Verell had in her eyes and she knew she needed to be on her guard.

  Dulcee’s file, which said she had no trace of paranoia, could no longer be called accurate. The heavy door of Dulcee’s room shut behind her. She lay down on her bed and stroked the scars on her chest, thinking. There she formed her opinion of Dr. Verell.

  "She’s a thief," Dulcee whispered to herself. "She’s read my notebook and she wants Vincent for herself. She doesn’t care about me. She wants me out of the way. She’ll do her best to make Vincent her own. I never should have brought my notebook! It’s fallen into the worst hands it could have…Vincent, I think I may be in trouble."

  At noon, Dr. Verell left before Jean could find her. It was her lunch break, and she usually left the hospital for the hour, but today she was going home and not coming back. She had even turned off her cell phone. As Dr. Verell sat in lunch-hour traffic, bemused tears were streaming down her face. Her life had turned from neat and orderly, into a natural disaster in less than twenty-four hours.

  Dr. Verell was smitten with jealousy. What on earth was she jealous of? Mental illness? It’s stupid! She told herself.

  But she knew it wasn’t. Their lives were more parallel than either of them would ever realize. Their internal makeup almost exactly the same, but there was such a marked difference between them that had nothing to do with the fact one was a doctor and the other a patient. Age was not the divider, nor was it madness and sanity.<
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  Dr. Verell clenched the steering wheel. It wasn’t fair Dulcee had found love. She had unlocked a precarious secret Dr. Verell would never have stumbled upon on her own. A child abused and born of nothing learned everything she ever wanted was at her fingertips all she had to do was become mad.

  Dulcee gave Dr. Verell a chill. She had to learn how to fix this or else she might come to cringe at her own reflection.

  4. A house made of straw

  "I’ll huff, and I’ll puff, and I’ll blow your house in." -The Big Bad Wolf

  Dr. Verell was sitting on the floor, surrounded by open photo albums. Her eyes were empty, like the rest of her. When she had arrived home from work, she went through a tirade of emotions. Frustration, anger, loneliness, and despair. She pulled every photo album in the house from their shelves. Time slipped by as she searched the pictures for something that brought an emotional response in her. There was nothing. Her memories were hollow.