The Math After
“Dr. Goodman, with all due respects, sir…WTF?”
“It’s funny, Abigail…I was thinking along the same lines. I think you have a promising career ahead of you. Get used to the fact that what you learn in college is a foundation that gets you just enough qualifications to learn upon graduation that you are horribly unprepared to practice your craft.”
“Doctor, that was the cutest couple that might ever show up on sitcoms. They were loving, cooperative, normal in every way I could see. They’re educated, competent in their occupations, financially responsible. Their worst expletive was ‘darn’. If there’s a red flag, I’m not seeing it.”
Dr. Goodman tapped in a few more after-session notes and observations, including items mentioned by his intern. You never knew where insight might arise. Interns were often geysers of disjointed wisdom. “The fact there was no clear indication of mental dysfunction or eruption of the animosity and acting out noted by Ms. Singh is, to me, the only red flag we have. That points to a compartmentalization of the dysfunction sufficient to completely hide it until it emerges with guns a’blazing. I find that significant.
“Those two people hit it off almost like they were programmed to do so. Their whole meeting, dating, engagement and marriage were fairy tale quality at all stages. That happens sometimes normally, but not usually. Still, it’s just a piece of the jigsaw puzzle.
“Wednesday, I’ll talk to each of them for a half-session alone. We’ll see what removing the ‘couple dynamic’ does to their interpretations and reactions. Meanwhile, they fill out their daily thought journals as I instructed, focusing on unbidden thoughts, dreams, daydreams, unexpected emotions, etc. Tell me, Abigail, do you have any sensing about that couple? Just any impressions, don’t edit.”
Dr. Goodman had asked her comments in the past, but this one seemed different, like he was searching for something rather than teaching. She wondered if the great Dr. G could be caught clueless like anyone else. “They say they love each other, and that feels honest. Their cooperation and effort they both displayed leads me to think that they are sincere in their desire to get to the truth. What bothers me is how two people can blank out on what it was that incited wrath to the point of fight for her, flight for him. That is, if the one police report we have can suggest a trend and not be just an odd variant. They mentioned feeling antsy in the hallway and suggested claustrophobia as a component. That was a reasonable observation and comment on their part and, if that’s a shared trait, then it might contribute to the pattern of simultaneous emotional eruption. It’s like they’re a Siamese peach that seems whole on the outside, but there’s some kind of shared rotten pit well below the surface. Way down, like soul deep. But, if they share the same malady, if their shared yin is playing ninja havoc on their shared yang, then hypnosis may be the only way to get to the core of the matter. How’d I do, Doctor?”
“Well enough that I have no fears about your future prospects, Abigail. I’d change your yin/yang reference, though. In Chinese philosophy, those were not opposing forces, but complimentary and cooperative forces that needed each other to continue to exist. Daoist contrasting elements of dark and light need each other, for example. They’re opposite, but symbiotic. The Baxters’ affliction is something I’ve not seen before. In previous centuries, and even now in some circles, they’d be suspected of demonic possession. Their ties to religion are not strong, though, either of them, which lessens the likelihood of subconscious ideation of the demonic. The negative ideations and violent enacting overpower their normal cognition and behavior codes to the point of being almost a shared alternate personality. That I have never seen or read of, short of those youngsters engaged in larping.”
“Doctor…are you going to exorcise their demons and, if so, are they real or imagined?”
Dr. Grossman chuckled. Did real versus imagined even make a difference? Demons were demons, whether manufactured, fueled and controlled externally or in-house. “No, leave the candles and incense in the closet for now. We’ll go with Wednesday’s chat and see if it lights a candle in one of their dark valleys. Now, if you’ll excuse me, Greta has dinner about ready, and I’d rather not have the police respond to another domestic disturbance. Greta’s scary.”
Abigail smiled and went to close down the front desk-ette. Dr. Grossman was one peculiar bird, but didn’t many great figures in history have odd personality quirks?
Prime Minister Thatcher, Napoleon, Florence Nightingale and Thomas Edison were famous for getting by on a few scant hours of sleep a night. Ripley of ‘Believe it or Not’ fame had one of the world’s largest collection of automobiles, but never learned to drive. Mr. Fender, of equal fame to electric guitar players, never learned to play guitar.
Abigail giggled. Maybe Dr. Grossman had a secret collection of shrunken heads. Now wouldn’t that be ironic? If so, he’d of bought them on sale and in bulk. That would be Dr. Grossman.
Marcia Green that night was in the hallway, eavesdropping. She knew it was iffy on the moral rightness, but that was her sister in there and she was suffering. Family helped family, whether they wanted the help or not. Using a low-tech privacy invasion device, she placed her ear to the glass, which was gently resting on the spare bedroom door.
“Charlie? I’m so afraid. God, I came close to killing you last time. What’s wrong with me?
“Are you sure it’s ‘us’ and not ‘me’? You’re not just trying to make me feel better?
“OK, I believe you. My love, I’m willing to do anything to get this under control, even shock therapy, or brain surgery, whatever it takes.”
“Well, if that happens, maybe we can at least weave baskets together. Charlie, I’d rather be that than realize some day I k…ki…oh, God, I can’t say it.
“Right, all right. I’m sorry if I upset you. I miss you, Charlie, I really do.
“I love you, too. Good night, husband. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
There were no more sounds for Marcia to hear, other than a very soft weeping that tore her heart out until Joyce finally cried herself to sleep.
Marcia went back to her room, wondering, trying to recall times past. Joyce was her younger sibling by six years. She remembered her little sister to be a testy child with a short fuse early on. That eruptive behavior seemed to just evaporate about the time Joyce started pre-school. Her parents had thought it was the socialization of children her own age that helped pull Joyce out of her angry angst. Now, she wasn’t so sure.