The Ward (3 page)

He had something serious to discuss
with Rene. But all that could wait until after dinner. The trouble
was they had never tried to talk of anything really serious before.
He had no idea of how it would go.

For the moment, he was content just to
be with her. The traffic noises were light and far away up on this
floor. Her curtains were open, although it was dark outside, and
the lights of the town spread away below them.

Somewhere out there, down below, was a
fourteen year-old boy with a telescope, he thought morosely.
Staring at that window, all through the night, waiting, hoping,
praying that she would walk by that window.

Ben wasn’t judging anyone. Snorting
gently, he examined her but she was caught up in the show, which
had reached a climactic moment.

Rene liked her jell-o, and he smiled
at her pleasure. He could take it or leave it himself, but it was
probably better to eat everything they put on your plate. It’s not
like you could just go to the kitchen and make yourself a sandwich
anytime you wanted. His heart ached. What a completely different,
completely dependent world they now lived in. It wasn’t right for
him, he knew that much. He thought of Rene and her life so far. How
could she remain untouched by it? It simply wasn’t
possible.

God knew his own perceptions were hard
to manage sometimes. Maybe she just blocked them out, and lived in
a cottony-soft dream world. In the process Rene had become a little
bit simple herself. She was insulated from reality in a way Ben had
never seen before, and so he couldn’t even really conceive of it.
She had her meds, names and formulations he had looked up on the
one and only accessible computer in the place. People used it to
play solitaire and he’d snuck in after official hours or he never
would have gotten a crack at it.

“
So what did you want to
tell me?” She looked happy in that moment.

His heart ached at the
sight.

The time had come. He had to be strong
for both of them. She wouldn’t understand and wasn’t all that
capable anyway. He must keep it light and cheerful.

“
I have a board exam on
Monday. This time I think they’re going to let me out.”

“
Oh, Ben.” The
heart-stricken look she gave, and the sudden gasp as she scurried
across the bed, and the way she clung to him, pretty much said it
all. It was almost more than he could handle.

What a wonderful feeling. What a
terrible feeling at one and the same time.

Ben held her closely and tried to
think about basketball.

Scene Two

The phone rang.

Rene looked at it. It wasn’t Sunday
night.

She hadn’t been eating very much
lately. They would be worried about her. But since they never
called, how would they ever know?

The phone rang.

Her sister Mary had called yesterday.
No, two days ago. Maybe three. Sue had called a week ago. She
couldn’t think of anyone else who might call.

The phone rang.

Her pulse picked up a little. Usually,
if one of her sisters called unexpectedly, it was some kind of
emergency. Like when her Aunt Isobel died.

The phone rang.

Crazy old Mrs. Beck in the next room
would be having a fit right about now. No one ever called her. She
had to sit there and listen to it ringing. She hated that. But she
should be at dinner now.

The phone rang.

Rene took a deep breath. She stared at
it, and looked at the clock. Her hand moved, almost as in a
dream.

The phone rang.

“
He-hello?”

“
Hi, Baby, how ya
doin’?”

“
Ben!”

“
Yeah, Baby, who did you
think it was? What, you got another boyfriend already?”

“
Hi, Ben! Oh,
Ben.”

“
So how are you doing,
Rene?”

She stared wildly at the back of the
door.

She stared at the window. She stared
at the TV set. There were no answers anywhere.

“
I—I—I’m all right.” She
hadn’t seen Ben in three whole days, not since they booted him out
which was what some people said around there.

She wondered where he was. She was so
sad to see him go. She missed Ben terribly.

“
Good.”

She clung to the phone, holding it
tight to her head so as not to miss a thing. Loud voices moved past
her door and down to the open wards at the end of the
hall.

“
Ben? Ben! Are you
there?”

“
Yeah. Sorry about that.”
She heard murmuring and muttering sounds over the phone.

He came right back.

“
Mister Sullivan is
letting me in.”

“
Who—Mister Sullivan?” The
security guard?

Her mouth dropped open. Ben was here
to visit her?

She was lucky to get a visitor once a
month, plus Christmas, birthday and holidays.

“
Okay, hang up, Baby. I’ll
be there in a minute. I’ve got a little treat for you.”

“
What? A
treat?”

He could imagine her look.

“
Do you like
Micky-D’s?”

She didn’t even have to think about
that one. Her eyes lit up and she began to speak.

But Ben was already at the
door.

***

“
Oh…my, God. Oh, that’s
good.” Sitting cross-legged on the bed, face to face with Ben on
the foot of it, she slumped through the middle.

She chewed in sheer bliss. Not even
really hungry one minute, and now this, fully sated.

“
I forgot how good it
was.” Her sister had taken her out for Micky-D’s a few months ago,
which was a fairly long time when every day was the
same.

“
Everything is so bland in
here. You tend to forget what real food tastes like.”

“
Whew. I’ll say.” Rene
looked in the bottom of the French fry box and pulled out the last
two crunchy brown ones, laden with sparkling grains of salt. “Oh,
my, Ben. Whatever possessed you?”

“
You possessed me.” It
just slipped out, a line he could be proud of perhaps.

She gagged a bit on something going
down and then waved her hand in front of her mouth as if to get
more oxygen.

“
Ben.”

“
Rene.”

She smiled impishly, and they
exchanged a long look. Ben let it go on as Rene’s smile faded and
the girl searched his face, looking for new meanings.

Her mouth closed.

“
It’s okay, Rene. I
understand.” Ben took a sip of his chocolate milkshake. “You
figured I wasn’t coming back. But I, I, uh…I’m serious about you,
Rene.”

Serious about something for the first
time in my life. But he couldn’t really say that, could
he?

That was no way to win a
girl.

Her eyes went down low. They went
left, right, left…right. She looked up at him.

“
I came back for you,
Rene.”

“
Thank you, Ben.” He
watched her work it out in her head. “I really missed
you.”

He let out a breath and smiled again,
and tried desperately not to let her see the tears welling up from
somewhere deep inside.

***

He sat in the one and only chair
allotted to this particular room, a low grey leather thing with
slab sides and high armrests. She lay across him and the chair,
half in and half out of his lap. Her arm was around his
neck.

“
So what I really want to
know, Rene, is ah…whether I can say that you are my girlfriend, or
not. I mean, you know…in case anyone asks. And, oh! If anyone asks
you, why, ah…you could tell them you have a boyfriend. That would
be me. Right?”

“
Okay, Ben.”

“
But only if you want to,
right?” What a guilt trip he was laying on himself. “Honestly? If I
was you, I wouldn’t trust a guy like me one bit. And rightly
so—guys like me ain’t going too far.”

“
Aw.” She put her head on
his shoulder. “Sure you are. You got out, didn’t you?”

That much was true. Ben was out now.
Ben stood a chance. It was all he had ever asked, and even that
wasn’t often granted.

Turning to the left, she was right
there. He pulled her in and gently kissed her, lips only, as the
clock on the wall ticked inexorably ever onward.

They broke off after a
while

“
Honey. I got to
go.”

“
Can I tell the
nurses?”

“
What? Oh, yeah. Tell
anyone, and everyone, Baby.” Ben grinned from ear to ear. “Now
you’re getting it.”

The next ten minutes were engaged in
more light petting and a lot of mutual eye-gazing and soft
whispering and except for the parties most directly concerned,
really wasn’t all that interesting.

Nine o’clock came and visiting hours
were over.

Ben’s first day on the job was
tomorrow. He would be mopping floors and doing handyman work in a
small drinking establishment in the seedier end of the downtown
core business area.

***

It was a month later and Ben was
having a follow-up visit with Doctor Aloysius Gordon.

For whatever reason people
called him Gordie or even just Gord. That might have been a bit of
a play on
gourd.

“
So. Tell me what you’ve
been up to. Enjoying your freedom?” Gordon was a breezy man in his
fifties, perpetually sunny in disposition and easy enough to talk
to.

Ben had never been all that shy about
his problems and saw no reason to hold anything back.

The doc might even be
helpful.

“
Uh, yeah.” That seemed a
little guarded even to Ben.

“
So, what does that mean?”
The doctor’s quizzical blue eyes were not without warmth and
humour.

“
Well, I mean. I’ve been
busy as hell. Sitting around in here isn’t good for you.” This was
a good tack, with Doctor Gordon. “I was really hurting the first
few days at work.”

The doctor had agitated pretty hard
for a small exercise area, some free weights, and then the
treadmill and some other equipment. Quite a few of the patients
availed themselves of the opportunity and he had no qualms about
Ben’s point. It was accurate enough. The institute was supposed to
rehabilitate, and provide both employment and life skills for the
small number of those lucky enough to get in somehow. In that sense
it wasn’t your usual mental health facility.

“
I heard you got yourself
a job.”

“
Yeah, doc. Two jobs. I
work at the bar from eight until twelve, and then I go to the
car-wash for one o’clock. They’re always short-handed so I can stay
as late as I want. I try to get in as many hours as I
can.”

“
What’s the name of the
place?”

“
Edward’s.”

“
Edward’s?” Doctor Gordon
had never heard of it. “Just…Edward’s?”

Ben shrugged.

“
Yep.”

The more cars you cleaned, the more
tips you earned.

“
Wow. I am happy to hear
that. So how do you think you’re doing so far?”

“
Living at the homeless
shelter, yeah, that really sucked, doc. But I got a room now,
although I still owe them some money at the end of the
week.”

Doctor Gordon nodded. It was early
days yet but Ben seemed pretty engaged.

“
And are you taking the
meds?”

Ben nodded.

“
Yup.”

“
Okay, good man.” The
doctor got up and went to his closet. “I’ll see if I have any free
samples in here. That’ll save you a few bucks. So, any big plans
for the future? Any ideas?”

Ben took a deep breath and spat it
out.

“
I’ll be inviting Rene
over to my place for the weekend.”

He’d lost Doctor Gordon somewhere with
that one. His head popped back out the closet and he
stared.

“
Rene? Who’s
Rene?”

Ben took another deep
breath.

“
Rene Silvers. Our
Rene.”

Scene Three

“
I see.” Doctor Gordon was
back in his chair, a handful of foil and cello-wrapped packages
strewn on his desk.

Ben wondered about that, but the man
had his job to do.

“
Yeah. Well. I mean…I
mean, ah, hopefully, ah, she will say yes.”

“
Hmn. I hear that you’ve
been visiting her a lot. It seems to be doing her a lot of good. So
have you asked Rene about all this yet?” The doctor was careful to
avoid picking up his pen or sounding in any way
negative.

Doctor Gordon really hadn’t foreseen
this. It required some examination. Ben was a free man now.
Reviewing what he knew of Rene’s case, he recalled that she had
signed herself in originally. There was nothing stopping her from
signing herself out if she wanted to. If so, then more power to
her; at least that was his cautious first appraisal. But this was
an interesting development, in both patients’ cases. It could have
a lot of ramifications. There were some obvious perils.