The Animal Hour (19 page)

Nancy sat in her blue plastic chair opposite his desk. Squeezed, in that tiny room, between the table to her left and the edge of the open door. Nurses with their folders walked by in the hallway. Sometimes patients shuffled by. She felt they could hear every word she said, see everything she did. She kept her hands folded in her lap. Her chin lowered. She kept her eyes trained on a single cigarette burn in the linoleum floor. She was trying very hard to act harmless.

She stared and stared at that burn while the doctor spoke into the phone. She had not lifted her eyes from it since he came in—only briefly, meekly, respectfully, when she answered his questions, then she looked down again. Maybe she was staring at the burn too much, she thought. Maybe the doctor would write in his folder, “Stares at burns too much. Strange. Very strange.” She risked glancing up at him. He was leaning forward, elbow on his desk. Massaging his brow with his free hand.

“No. No. They're going to have to keep her on the medication at least three more days. Well, explain it to them. I haven't got time now. No. No. Explain it to them, I haven't got time.”

She recognized him as the doctor with the syringe, the one who had pumped her full of stuff when she was screaming. He was a young man, maybe thirty, maybe just. He had shaggy black hair and a black, pointed beard, which didn't stop him from looking bright-eyed and boyish. He wore a tweed jacket with patches at the elbow. A black knit tie on a plaid shirt. Every inch the Young Professor.

“Well, explain it to the family. I'm with a patient right now. Right.” He hung up the phone. “Right-right-right-right.” He tapped his forehead. “Where were we?”

Dr. Schoenfeld. That was his name. Dr. Thomas Schoenfeld. A decent guy. A concerned, good-hearted guy. His buddies probably called him Tom, Nancy thought, or Tommy.
Yo, Tommy, how about a couple of beers when you're sprung from the loony bin tonight?
His mother maybe still called him Thomas. Shaking her finger at him.
Thomas Schoenfeld, how do you expect to meet any nice girls working in a horrible place like that?

And he can sign his name
, Nancy thought.
He can sign his name to a piece of paper and have me locked away in here. Locked away with that nut case Billy Joe.

“We're going to have lots of little chats like this, Nancy. We're going to find the Magic Word together.”

“Okay,” said Dr. Schoenfeld. He swiveled his chair around to face her. Nancy stared hard at that cigarette burn on the floor. “Sorry for the interruption.”

“S'all right,” she murmured. She wasn't exactly going anywhere, was she.

“No one else can handle anything in this place,” he said. He had a gentle smile behind the sharp beard. She dared to smile slightly in return. “So,” he said. “We were getting the rundown. Any drugs?”

“What's that?”

“Have you been using any drugs? Any alcohol?”

“Oh. No.”

“Cause you were pretty agitated out there a while ago. Drugs'll do that to you.”

She shook her head.

“The police say you made quite a fuss downtown too. I mean, you're really lucky they decided to bring you in here. They could've just charged you, then you'd have real problems.”

She nodded contritely.

“So?” said the doctor. “You want to tell me what the trouble is?” He lifted his brows, waiting for her. Leaned forward, his hands clasped between his knees.

And Nancy thought,
All right then. This is it.
She figured she had exactly one chance to explain this thing. To tell her story and sound rational doing it. Otherwise, they would put her away. Dr. Tommy would sign his name and she'd be gone for good and …

The Animal Hour. Eight o'clock. You have to be there.

Oh, not that again. She forced the thought back into the murk. She had to forget about that. Stay calm. Think calm.
Sound
calm.

She fought off the pressure of the little room. The files and desks and chairs and he and she all crammed together. The nurses with their folders who continued to go past in the hall. Listening. She swallowed, braced herself. “Well—” It was her most reasonable voice, her grown-up voice. “Some very … uh … very strange things have happened to me today, Doctor.” She glanced up at him with a quick smile. “To say the least! I mean, I went to work this morning …”

“Goddamn it!” the doctor said. The phone was breeping again. “I'm sorry, Nancy. I'm sorry. Excuse me for one moment here.” He grabbed the handset. “What? No. No! I'm with a patient right now. I'll call you back in a few minutes.” He put the phone down hard. Shook his head at her. “Sorry. Go ahead.”

But now, her heart was racing. The interruption had thrown her off balance. What if she messed it all up? What if she lost control again? Oh Christ, what if they strapped her back down to the gurney? They would never let her out of here, never, and …

He's going to die. At eight o'clock. You have to, have to
…

It was a struggle to control her breath, to keep her voice from shaking. But she raised her eyes to him and went on as steadily as she could. “Well, I got to work this morning … Doctor. And, uh … Well … no one knew who I was.” She spread her hands. She gave a small nervous laugh. A nervous glance at the door as a nurse walked by. She lowered her voice. “I mean, I know it sounds … crazy. I know that. But no one
recognized
me, Dr. Schoenfeld. And then … then, I started hearing these strange things like … Oh God, I know this makes me sound so crazy, but I swear this has never happened to me before.” She laughed again. “I mean, most days I manage to be pretty much myself. You know?”

Dr. Schoenfeld smiled gently. “It's all right, Nancy. I understand. Go on.”

She hesitated.
You understand?
she thought. That simple remark—the kindness of his tone—actually brought tears to her eyes. She regarded him carefully.
You understand?

And, well, yes: he did seem to. This young Dr. Thomas Schoenfeld. Judging by his face: the soft brown eyes, the boy's mouth hidden in the doctorly black beard. Judging by the concerned way he leaned toward her. The way he nodded encouragingly. He seemed ready to listen anyway, ready to give it his best shot. She wanted to throw her arms around him and tell all. Weep into his tweed shoulder. Move to a cottage where he would be her father and Mrs. Anderson, the fat black nurse outside, would be her mom. God, she thought, to have someone actually understand!

“Well, like I said,” she went on—more quickly now, pushing down the tears. “Like I said, I heard a voice, okay? From nowhere. And it was telling me to shoot someone. I mean, I know it sounds so awful but … and then later, in the park later, I heard all the beggars there saying things and …” She shook her head, trying to find the words.

“Go on,” he said—and yes, his voice was gentle, kindly.
Understanding.
Yes. “What were they saying? Go on.”

“Jesus. Jesus,” Nancy whispered. “They were all saying that someone was going to die. I mean, that's what I heard them say. All right? They said that someone was going to be killed at eight o'clock tonight and that I had to be there. And the thing was … the thing was …”

It was true! It was all true.' They
are
going to kill him. At eight o'clock. At the Animal Hour. I
do
have to be there! It's all true, Doctor!

But no. No, she didn't say that. She couldn't say that. She mustn't. Even if he was the Gandhi, the Schweitzer of psychiatry, it didn't matter. Even he could understand only so much. And yet …

And yet, as she sat there, jammed into her little chair, her little space between desk and doorway, between the doctor and the wall, she suddenly felt certain of it. It
was
true. What the beggars had told her. It was all exactly right. Someone
was
going to die. At eight o'clock. At the Animal Hour. And for some reason, for some reason just beyond her reach, she
did
have to be there. It was urgent. It was everything.

“Anything else?” said Dr. Schoenfeld. And he said it so sweetly, so patiently, that she really did hunger to tell him. To tell him everything, unburden everything. She ached up into the pillowy depths of those brown peepers of his, half a doctor's, half a boy's. Maybe he
would
understand, she thought.

But she shook her head quickly. “No. No, that's everything. I just got so scared, I took out the gun. I don't even know where the gun came from. I don't even know what happened to it.”

That was a lie, of course, and she felt bad about it. She knew perfectly well where the gun was and that she should tell him, but… Well … That ol' debil gun. That bad, bad gun. She would need it, wouldn't she? Yes. At eight o'clock.

“Can you remember anything preceding all this?” the doctor asked her now. “I mean, before the subway. Anything that might have set it off? Can you remember what you were doing yesterday, for example?”

“Well, yeah,” she started. “I mean, sure, I was … I was …
” Oh no!
Her jaw hung slack. Her silence poured out of her mouth like dust. What
was
she doing yesterday? She couldn't remember. There was just nothing there. Yesterday, the day before—it was all darkness. “I … I …”

The doctor waited another moment for her to continue. Then he nodded. He leaned back in his seat. He steepled his fingers, doctorly. He said: “Nancy. I want you to know, first of all, that I understand how frightened you must be.”

“Wuh … I … Jesus,” she said. “I mean, you're telling me.”

He gave a snort at that. He nodded. “But these things are not … entirely inexplicable.”

Her next exclamation died aborning. She could only look at him. “They're not?”

“No, absolutely. I mean, what we're dealing with … goddamn it!” The phone again. He yanked it to his ear. “Yes? I don't know, I'm with a patient, I can't talk now. Yes.” He hung up. “God!” Shook his head. “You want my job?”

“Uh … No. No, thanks.”

“Good. At least you're not
really
crazy.”

Nancy surprised herself with a laugh. She looked at this young doctor of hers with something like wonder. Could he really have some answers for her?

Dr. Schoenfeld rolled his chair to the side a little now. He reached out past her cheek to the edge of the door and swung it shut. Oh, that was good. She liked that. The click of the door. The privacy. She was a human being, after all. She faced him gratefully as he rolled back into place before her. He leaned forward again, elbows on his thighs. He peered deeply—warmly—at her. She peered back, her lips parted. Waiting for him to tell her.

“Nancy,” he said slowly. “I want to be totally honest with you. All right? I mean, you are not the usual customer we have coming in here. You understand? You strike me as a very intelligent, very responsible person. I see no reason to jolly you along or sugarcoat things for you or anything like that.”

She nodded. Waited.

Dr. Schoenfeld clapped his hands together three times softly: pop, pop, pop. He marshaled his thoughts. Gave her the moment to prepare. And then he let her have it. “I can't make a complete diagnosis after just one interview, obviously. There are tests we have to do and … other questions to ask and so on. But right now, I would say it's a pretty damn good bet that what you're experiencing is an episode of schizophrenia.”

He waited for her reaction. She had none. She felt nothing. Only her confusion. She was still waiting for the news. “Schizophrenia?” she said—but only because he seemed to expect her to say something. “You mean like … a split personality?”

He smiled quickly. “No, no, no. That's … you know, that's just a popular misuse of the term. That's something very different. Schizophrenia is a very general term—it's so general, in fact, we don't really like to use it anymore but … it's a general term for a series of mental disorders characterized by … oh … auditory-command hallucinations—which means voices telling you what to do. Fixed delusions, like ‘Someone's going to die at eight o'clock.' Memory lapses. Just various other manifestations like the ones you've been experiencing. Do you understand?”

Well … no. No, she didn't. A series of mental disorders. It didn't register. She just sat there, feeling nothing. Gazing at him. Waiting for him to tell her what had happened to her, where her life had gotten to.

And then it dawned on her.

Schizophrenia. Sure, she
had
heard of that. Schizophrenia was what street people had, homeless people. People who muttered to themselves on the street. That was, like, mental illness. She started to smile. “Yes, but …” Not
me
, she was going to tell him. You don't mean that
I
have this. “But … But that's, that would …” That would mean
I'm
mentally ill, she wanted to say. As in sick, as in crazy. You don't mean
I'm
schizophrenic? I have a life. I'm a real person. I have friends. I have parents, things …

But he did. He did mean her. She could see it in his eyes, in the sympathy in his eyes. He was
pitying
her. He was gazing at her warmly and thinking,
Tough break. Poor kid. Thank God it's not me.
Jesus. Jesus! She couldn't speak finally. Not at all. She could only shake her head at him.

“I know,” he cooed. “I know. It's very scary. But things are a lot different now than they used to be. All right? We have new drugs and … new methods of dealing with the disease.”

The disease! Jesus Christ! Nancy kept shaking her head. New methods of dealing with
the disease?
Listen to him. He was trying to sound optimistic. He was trying to give her hope. But she could see it, right there in his eyes: He had no hope. This was not a hopeful situation.

“Can this … I mean, can this just happen?” she said. “I mean, you're walking along and then, poof, you're a schizophrenic. I mean, that doesn't sound … I mean …”