Random Acts Part 11

"Hesitantly, yes."

"Oh thank G.o.d." He looks relieved. "It's the truth, it's the honest to G.o.d truth."

"Okay, I'll accept it."

"Please, tell that to Tom. He almost threw me out a second story window because of this. I mean, he literally hung me out the window by my s.h.i.+rt."

"Jesus." I'm going to have to ask him about this.

Felix stands up, hands in his pockets. "I gotta go," he says.

"You're going to be okay. You're coming through this fine. Your ability to see reason is as good as it ever was, I don't think you're going to have any trouble."

"Just don't give me any more hallucinogenics," I tell him, "whether I ask for them or not."

"Are you kidding? I'm going off them permanently myself. I'll see you when you get home."

"Okay." I watch him walk off toward the main building, which is the only way in or out.

Aaron and Pris are my next two visitors. They show up just after I've finished eating, and I lead them outside, away from the crazy people. The sun is still up, but it's hanging low on the horizon. Just below it is a hazy layer of fog which is rolling in over the bay. "How are you doing?" Aaron asks.

"I'm doing fine. I just have some memory loss, that's all. The memories I do have seem to be all screwed up."

"I can't believe Felix did this," Pris says. Her voice is defensive, in fact it's almost hostile. She's defending Felix against me. "I mean, I just don't see his motive."

"I've talked to him about it," I tell her. "He----"

"He was here?" Aaron asks.

"Yes. He swears that I asked for the LSD, and that I took it of my own accord. It's kind of hard for me to believe, but it's just as hard for me to believe he'd slip it to me without me knowing. I don't know.

Is it something I would have done?"

"You're asking us?" Aaron says.

"Yes. I have no idea. Would I have asked Felix for it, and would I have stupidly taken so much of it all at once?"

Neither of them answer. Apparently they don't know me well enough to make that judgment call. "I have another bone to pick with you," Pris says. "Tom told me you claim you slept with me."

I stare at her a moment, feeling embarra.s.sed. "I'm sorry, I know I promised not to tell him."

"You and I have never slept together." Her voice is very matter of fact, and angry. "That night you came over, you were too drunk to drive home, and I let you spend the night. But I never let you . . . we have a strictly platonic relations.h.i.+p. If I'd known that you had that in mind, or were going to have this . . . delusion, I never would have invited you over in the first place."

My brain does not accept this. It bounces off my forehead like a sharp rock, jarring me, and I'm not accepting it. Why, I wonder, is she lying? She's using my confused mental state to erase the reality of what happened, because . . . why? Because she's mad that I told Tom? Because I broke my promise? The pain floods through me like poison. "I love you," I suddenly say to her. "I love you, and you treat me like this?"

Aaron has taken a sudden step back from us, and turns away. He's staying out of it. Pris is looking at me with a degree of astonishment.

"What?" she says.

"Couldn't you tell?" My voice is pleading. "Didn't that night mean anything to you?"

"I don't know what you've dreamed up, but nothing has ever happened between you and me."

"Pris . . ." I'm choking up. The pain is unbearable. There's so much pain that when the tears start flooding down my face I don't even care. I want her to see them, I want her to see what she's doing to me.

"I don't believe this," she says, backing away from me. "I don't want to hear this, I don't want to be a part of this." She turns toward Aaron, still taking steps away from me. "Aaron, take me home now."

"Wait," he says.

"No, I want to leave now."

"Then go wait by the car," he says harshly.

She's somewhat startled by his voice, and wordlessly she reenters the building and disappears. Aaron turns toward me with dismay. "I don't know what to say," he says. "You've got to try to distinguish between what is real, and what you want to be real."

I can't say anything. I'm crying like a baby.

"I know the way you feel about her, but she's still in love with Tom. It's not over between them yet."

"What do you mean?" I exclaim. "He dropped her."

"Even though he's seeing Heather, there's still a lot going on between him and Pris. You know that."

"Everything I know is wrong!" I shout at him. "I don't know a f.u.c.king thing!"

"I'm going to come back when you're feeling better, okay?" He turns and leaves me, unable to deal with it all.

I stand there watching him go, feeling black waves of pain. Inside he meets with Pris and puts an arm around her, and she throws a glance at me through the window as they walk away. Wild thoughts of murder and suicide fill my mind, painful thoughts swimming in the h.e.l.l that my insides have become. I want to ram my head into a tree. I want someone to cut my throat. I want it to end. Just end.

It doesn't end. It goes on and on.

By the time Tom makes his return visit, accompanied by Heather, the orderlies had gotten to me and now I'm fully sedated. The pain still rages on, but now it's in a box in a corner somewhere, insulated by wads of cotton which fill me. I feel I've lost everything, and the worst was the loss of Pris. But the sense of loss is an illusion, as I'd never had her in the first place, and this is twice as painful.

"How are you feeling?" Tom asks.

"Totally insane."

"Did they drug you?"

"Yes. They had to. I was trying to kill myself."

"Why?"

"Pris doesn't love me. She doesn't even like me. She thinks I'm a worm."

"All men are worms," Heather says.

"She loves you," I tell Tom. "Everyone loves you. I even love you.

Why can't I be you?"

"You're a lot more interesting than I am," Tom says.

"Especially now," Heather says. She's grinning at me like she's trying to cheer me up with the sheer force of her smile. She looks arrogant enough to think that she can actually do it. "What's it like to be insane?"

"Heather!" Tom says angrily.

"Shut up, let me talk to him." Turning back to me, she says, "I've always wanted to go completely nuts."

"Everything I know is wrong," I tell her.

"How exciting!"

"It's a pain in the a.s.s."

"Yeah, but it's not your ordinary pain in the a.s.s, is it? I mean anyone can moan and complain that they've wrecked their car, or that everything in their house was stolen, or that some girl dumped them. But you --- you've got them beat hands down. Everything you know is wrong!"

"Heather . . ." Tom says.

She hits him to shut him up, and continues. "So what that some dumb little girl doesn't love you, what do you need her for? You're a handsome guy. Don't tell me you never noticed me undressing you with my eyes every time I come over to visit."

"I never noticed."

"I do," she says, her voice lowering. "And sometimes I imagine what it would be like to make love to you."

"Heather!" Tom says.

She hits him again. "I can be lying though my teeth and it still sounds good, doesn't it?" Her voice gets really low, and her face is right in mine. "I give the best b.l.o.w. .j.o.bs."

Despite everything, I crack a smile. She smiles back, and gives me a quick kiss. "See," she says to Tom. "I cheered him up."

I actually laugh. "She did," I tell him. I feel a tiny note of cheer above the constant wail of pain. It's the best I could hope for, and she managed it. I at least feel affable, the visit is a pleasant one. When they leave I manage a somewhat peaceful sleep.

The next morning I wake up, and everything's the same. Even the pain of Priscilla's rejection is pushed down under the weight of my relief that I have, at last, regained a rock-hard sense of reality. I am in a hospital recovering from a drug overdose. This is reality. I can accept it.

Dr. Wakefield shows up and sits beside my bed. He wants to discuss my "mood swing" last night, but I want to forget about it. Nevertheless, he prods and probes and brings all the emotions back up so he can see them, gets me crying and miserable, then notes it all down on his clipboard. Then it's more happy pills for me and he leaves.

Between breakfast and lunch the cops show up. The good doctor has told them I know who slipped me the LSD, and they want to know who it was. One officer is a handsome black man, very clean shaven with a spotless uniform, and his partner is a white guy with a mustache, five o'clock shadow, and coffee stains on his s.h.i.+rt. "You know," I tell them, "yesterday I thought I knew who it was, but now I'm thinking it must have been someone else."

"Who?"

"I don't know his name. It was a student who was at the party just a little while."

"What was the name of the guy you thought had done it?"

"I don't remember his name. You see, my memory is all scrambled. I can't remember anything straight to save my life."

This pretty much stops the questioning. What is the point in trying to prosecute someone when the star witness would tell the jury that his memory is scrambled? Disgruntled and looking a bit impotent, the two officers leave.

Tom shows up after lunch, alone, and I'm a bit disappointed he didn't bring Heather again. "I want out of here," I tell him.

"You look a lot better."

"I feel a lot better. But the doctor is giving me happy pills, and I don't want any drugs in my body right now."

"Pris wants me to tell you she's sorry."

"Oh." I feel hollow, isolated, and numb. The happy pills don't really make you happy, they make you feel like a robot, void of emotion.

"She did?"

"Yes. She realizes that you have feelings for her, and she wants you to know she's really sorry for being so unsympathetic."

"Tell her that I appreciate her sympathy."

He nods. "How's your memory?"

"My memory is as scrambled as ever, but I'm dealing with it. The doctor says I'm going to have to relearn my relations.h.i.+ps with everybody, and for a while I'm not going to be able to a.s.sume anything."

"You remember that you and I are best friends."

"That's one thing I never forgot."

"We're not h.o.m.os.e.xual lovers or anything, though." He says this with a smile, hoping I would think its funny. It is, after a fas.h.i.+on, but I don't smile back.

"The doctor says I'm doing very well in dealing with reality. I should be out of here soon."

"That's great."

"We are roommates, aren't we?"

He laughs. "Yes, that's a correct memory."

"So I'm not going to come home and find you've sublet out my room or anything, right?"

"Your room is your room. And I've been trying to feed your specimens every day."

"Thank G.o.d. I just want to get out of here and get on with my life."

"You'll be out," he tells me. "There's nothing wrong with you." He pats me on the shoulder, then looks at his watch. "I've got to get back to work."

"See ya."

After Tom leaves I take a short, dreamless nap, and am awakened by another visitor. When I look up and see who it is, the shock of recognition hits me like a jolt from a car battery. It's Alvin Laurel.

He's dressed in jeans and a tee-s.h.i.+rt, both of which are very clean, and he sits down on the side of my bed and crosses his legs. "Everyone down at the University is wondering how you are," he says. "The rumor is you were drugged by a student."

"Yes." I'm certainly not going to tell him I took the LSD of my own accord, which --- if Felix is telling the truth --- is what I did.