Shrouds of Darkness (21 page)

Her question annoys me even more since she has the appointment book right in front of her and knows damn well I don’t.

“No, I need to see him now,” I reply and give her my best intimidating look.

That glare and the power of my predatory presence have sent some of the biggest and meanest men in New York cowering and fighting to control their bladder. It didn’t faze her in the least. It’s like trying to set a rock on fire—or a fossil.

She returns my gaze with equal venom. “Dr. Morison has a patient right now. I can schedule you in on his next available time. If it is an emergency I suggest you go to the emergency room.”

My keen eyesight has no problem picking out the scared little man’s name on her appointment ledger. “Ronald needs to reschedule,” I growl.

“He most certainly does not!” she fires back.

Ronald finds the courage to speak although with great trepidation. “Maybe it is best if I reschedule.”

“Ronald, you do not have to reschedule,” she assures him forcefully.

“Yes you do, Ronald,” I snarl as I direct my scary glare at him and he nearly pisses his pants, which makes me feel a lot better. I was afraid I was slipping.

“I’m sorry,” he sputters and bolts from the room before the old woman can even respond.

“It seems the doc has an opening in his schedule,” I tell her smugly.

She raises herself up from her chair, leans forward on her desk supported by her wrinkly old fists, and opens her mouth to unleash a bitter tirade upon me, but the doctor interrupts her as he steps through the door that separates his office from the reception room.

“It’s all right, Jeanine, I’ll see him.”

I smile at her as she sits back down and I strut past her desk on my way into Stanley’s office.

“Rancid little shit,” she hisses as I pass.

My jaw drops in surprise at her vehemence and still registers on my face as I take a seat in the plush client chair in the doctor’s immaculate office.

“Your secretary just called me a rancid little shit.”

Dr. Morison takes a seat in the chair that sits in front of and slightly to side of the one I’m occupying and pulls out a pad of paper and a pen.

“And you disagree with her assessment of your character?”

I purse my lips as I ponder the old broad’s scornful words. “I don’t disagree so much as find it unprofessional to vocalize it.”

Stanley shrugs with a noncommittal grunt. It’s obvious I’ll get no sympathy from him.

“You failed to make an appointment after your last call so I assume something else has happened that causes you to rudely barge into my office, frighten off my clients, and demand immediate, special treatment.”

“Yeah, sorry about that, doc.”

“I am your psychiatrist and have been for years so don’t bother lying to me,” he replies without looking up from the pad that he is already scribbling notes on. “I don’t think you’ve been sorry about anything since you left Vietnam.”

“I had sex last night,” I tell him, deciding to plunge right in.

He stops writing and looks up at me with arched eyebrows. Now I have his attention. Figures, I think all shrinks are closet perverts that get into the field just to hear about other people’s sexual happenings. Bunch of voyeurs, or whatever the auditory version of voyeurism is called.

“Now that is interesting. How did that go?”

“I almost killed her,” I respond without emotion.

“Please explain.”

“I had a flashback and woke up with my hands around her throat.”

I am unable to make that statement without almost choking on it. Let him tell me I don’t regret that!

“And where were you in your flashback, do you recall?”

“Vietnam, in the hut with the young woman and the screaming kids.”

“We have talked about this flashback before haven’t we? It is the same one you said that broke you out of your feeding frenzy; from being rogue as you call it. Correct?” he asks me.

I nod. “Yeah, that’s the one.”

“How did you feel going into this sexual encounter?”

“I don’t know. Hesitant, resistant, but then I sort of gave in and let it happen. I stopped fighting.”

“What kind of relationship do you have with this woman? I get the feeling it is more than simply a momentary physical desire on your part. You have not expressed any such things in previous sessions.”

I think and shake my head. “I don’t know, doc. She is—different. I didn’t know I could feel this way anymore. It’s been so long I don’t even know what it is I’m feeling or how to deal with it.”

“You care for her and it makes you feel vulnerable,” he tells me matter-of-factly. “The last time you allowed yourself to feel vulnerable was in that hut in Vietnam. That girl or that situation broke through the walls you had erected to shield your own sanity. The fact that this woman was able to get inside your defenses last night made you feel vulnerable even though it is ultimately best for your own mental welfare. That moment of emotional vulnerability ultimately saved you from yourself in Vietnam but it also made you see the horror of your own existence and it frightened you. Now once again you are feeling emotionally vulnerable, that too may very well force life-changing behaviors on you, and it frightens you. You spent so many years building these barriers against everything and everyone around you, not just to keep yourself safe from them but also to keep them safe from you, and here comes a woman that with a single act, tears them all down. For once in a very long time, you are not in complete control of your little sphere of life. That’s scary stuff.”

What he says makes sense but I’m not sure how that is going to help me. “So how do I deal with it so I don’t hurt her again?”

“I suggest you accept what she is willing to offer you. Accept that change can be a good thing and that you can share yourself with another and still be safe. The feeling of safety and control you think you have through avoidance is an illusion. How did she react after your episode?”

I smile ruefully. “She told me stop being a big baby and that I could not chase her away so easily.”

“She sounds like a remarkable woman. I hope you will consider building on this relationship. Maybe you won’t be such a rancid little prick to everyone.”

“Don’t hold your breath, doc. If a little sex cured crazy, you would be running a whorehouse on the second floor. Costs about the same,” I tell him as I stand up to leave.

“Are you leaving already? I’m sure we have plenty more talk about. You’re paying for the full hour you know.”

I turn about abruptly. “What? I’ve been here like fifteen minutes!”

“I bill for the hour and you ran off my other appointment,” he replies unabashedly.

“I guess you don’t need a whorehouse upstairs, you do fine screwing people right in your office,” I mumble as I step out of his office.

I’m not really mad. I know the score but we both like to play our little word games. I give Jeanine a fake smile as I step out then a feigned a look of shock when she raises her bony old digit and flips me the bird.

As I step onto the sidewalk, a nervous voice speaks to me from behind. “You’re not like other people. You’re different.”

My reaction is instantaneous. I spin around and catch the speaker by his throat, easily lifting him from the ground. I quickly see that it is the scared little man, Ronald, from the office.

“What do you mean, I’m different? How am I different?” I demand, thinking that he somehow knows I’m a vampire, which may well mean the end of Ronald and all his troubles.

 “You’re different, you’re not scared of anything, I can tell,” he gasps out as he clutches my wrist with both his hands.

I release my grip and he falls on his ass. “Most people aren’t afraid of everything.”

“But you’re not afraid of anything,” he reiterates as he scrambles back to his feet. “Me, I’m afraid of everything. I can barely leave my apartment to come to this appointment and it’s only a block away! How do I be like you?”

I’m impressed that the little worm has the spine to even approach me, given what he just said of his problems. He must be really desperate, or just really crazy.

“Dying helps. What is it that made you so afraid to begin with? I can’t imagine you were always a complete chicken shit.”

Ronald gulps audibly then relates his story. “A few years ago I was mugged by a man with a knife. He took my money and my driver’s license and said he now knew where I lived and if the cops ever come after him, he would come kill me. Ever since then I haven’t left my apartment except to see Dr. Morison. I lost my job, my wife, everything. Please tell me how to be like you.”

I pause to think for a moment then motion to the narrow alley next to the doc’s office with my head. “Let’s get off the street and I’ll see if I can explain.”

Ronald hesitantly steps between the narrow gap between the buildings as I follow close behind.

“I just can’t go on like this anymore. I’m losing what little grip I have on my remaining sanity,” he babbles.

He holds his hand with clenched fists against his chest, his fingers twitching about as if he is using a subtle form of sign language. When he turns to face me, the end of his nose disappears inside Shalonda’s massive bore. Every muscle in his body goes so stiff he cannot even fall down or release the piss that is desperately trying to escape his body.

“This gun has a stock trigger pull of just under four pounds. I’ve modified it to nearly half that. From your vantage point, you could set it off just by breathing too hard.”

There is no real threat of that since he hadn’t taken a breath and probably wouldn’t until he passed out.

“Look at me, Ronald. Look in my eyes.”

Ronald’s eyes uncross as he stops focusing on Shalonda’s heavy black barrel and looks at me.

“Tell me, what would happen if I decide to pull the trigger right now?”

The terrified man’s lips begin to quiver but no sound escapes them.

“Come on, Ronald, stay with me. I need you to use your words. What will happen if I pull the trigger?”

“I-it w-would go off.”

“And?”

“A-and I would die,” he wailed in a whisper.

“And?” I continue to press.

The man is confused as much as terrified as he answers. “I-I don’t know. Nothing, I would be dead and then there would be nothing!”

“That’s right, there would be nothing,” I affirm as I ride the hammer back down and slip the big gun back into my deep coat pocket. “There would be no more fear, no more shrinks, and no more bad memories. There would be nothing. Now what is so terrifying about nothing?”

“I don’t know. Nothing I suppose. What are you saying; that I should kill myself?”

“I’m saying that death is going to come to you. It eventually comes for every one of us whether it’s today if a man stabs you and takes your money, tomorrow if a bus hits you as you step off the curb, or fifty years from now in your sleep. Death is the peaceful oblivion we are all rewarded with for suffering through all the bullshit we put up with in life. When you accept it as an inevitability, just like the sun rising and setting every day, when you can say ‘fuck you, death’, only then can you actually live and enjoy your life.”

I watch Ronald’s entire countenance change right before my eyes. He relaxes his arms and stands up straighter.