Dzh. Hatchins - Personal Effects: Dark Art

If by some miracle I survive my twenties, I am certain Ill look back on today and think, This was the day I began to lose my mind.

Today was the day I coasted into work, still high from last weeks breakthrough, my grin beating back the gloom of these crumbling halls and was unceremoniously shoved into a living horror show, a knife-sharp shadowdance called The Life of Martin Grace. That moment, thereme striding through Brinkvale, punching in on the Depression-era time clock, greeting my coworkerswas when my perception of terra firma reality shifted. Just a nudge. But enough.

I am stone-cold certain that Lina Velasquez was a meth-addicted hummingbird in a past life. The woman is pulled tauter than piano wire. Shes all cats-eye glasses and waving arms, a nitro-fueled perpetual motion machine. Her voice is a nasal blur in the background on any typical day. I dont know why sleepy Brinkvale needs an administrative assistant whos so damned kinetic, but I suppose everyone has a place and Lina was currently putting me in mine.

Taylor!

She was at her desk, behind the scratched, shatterproof window of the Administrators Office, perched on the edge of her antique swivel chair, phone receiver pinched between shoulder and cheek. She was typing on her computer keyboard with one hand. I blinked and stopped, peering in at her.

Already exasperated, she rapped on the window with her free palm. The rings on her fingers clack-clack-clacked, insistent.

I cringed. Total principals office flashback.

In here, now, Lina said. Dr. Peterson. Urgent.

I have never been an urgent kind of guy, but Im getting better at handling moments like this. Late last week proved that. Still, before landing this gig, the word wasnt in the Zach Taylor vocabulary.

Uh, whats up? I asked. I glanced past Lina to the doorway of Petersons dimly lit office. The old psychiatrist was at his desk, hunched over the scattered contents of an open manila folder. They glowed under an ancient gooseneck lamp. The septuagenarians desk was cluttered with towers of precariously stacked papers. My mind captured the moment in charcoal-sketch caricature: Doc Peterson, staring up at his own paperwork Tower of Pisa, cartoon hearts swirling around his bald head. I filed away the image, and tried not to grin.

What? I realized Lina had been talking. She pooched her lips and twitched them to the right. This was Linas nonverbal Venezuelan shorthand: Make your eyes follow my lips, make your feet follow your eyes.

I walked past her into the dark room, uneasy of its dimness. It smelled of old books and stale coffee. The fat metal blinds were drawn shut. Peterson glanced up from the contents of the folder. He gestured to a chair in front of his desk and offered me a smile framing yellowed dentures. I didnt know if the man took pleasure in the act of smiling, but it didnt appear that way. The desk lamps light glimmered in his saucer-sized spectacles.

My path rarely crossed with Petersons. Three months ago, hed interviewed me for an hour, then abruptly offered me the job of staff art therapist.

Brinkvale provides a more, ah positive environment than you might imagine from the stories, hed said as I left his office that day. Since our little chat, I hadnt spent more than five minutes with the guy. Weve done the smile-and-nod bit in the halls ever since.

To hear the saltier veterans of the hospital talk, thats a good thing. They often suggest that the years here have put fractures of the larger-than-hairline variety in Petersons sanity. Hes known colloquially as the Madman in the Atticthe attic being the first floor of this building.

They dont call us Brinkvale employees Morlocks for nothing.

The old mans owl eyes blinked at me, that wide grin still stretching his jowls. I smiled back and sat on the edge of the black vinyl chair, a blocky thing that was at least a decade my senior. Hi, Dr. Peterson.

I shifted position in an attempt to see Petersons face over the preposterous stacks of papers. I tried not to picture cartoon hearts over his head.

Its a pleasure to have you in again, Zachary, he said. Petersons voice had the distinctive lilt of the overeducated; each word clearly enunciated, starched and pressed. He nodded at a comparatively small pile of papers beside the folder.

I read your report, he said. Im proud of you.

From Friday? I asked. Spindle?

Peterson gave a dry chuckle, and shook his head.

Spindler. Gertrude Spindler. That is the patients name, Zachary.

Maybe that was her name now. And maybe it had been her name for the first fifteen years of her life. But Gertie Spindler was Spindle for the dark era in between. She was calling herself Spindle when I met her a month ago and, in my mind, thats who shell always be. Her lifelong obsession with strings, thread, fabric and patterns would have been merely eccentric had it not been for the secrets shed been hiding with them. Hiding in them.

When you can see where the literal bodies are buried by matching swatches that were sewn into two quilts at either end of a decade, youve found a person so far gone, she can call herself anything she likes.

But not completely gone. Not last week, at least.

Spindler, I agreed, nodding nervously. Thanks. Shed been telling her story for years. I guess she just needed the right person to listen.

Petersons smile spread. That yellow half moon was so unnatural on his doughy face, it seemed predatory. This is what a grocery store lobster must see, I thought, right before its yanked from the tank. I shifted in my chair. The vinyl creaked.

You have a lot of empathy for your patients, he said, tapping the file. You tend to become unusually invested in their lives, and their therapy.

I flushed. Oh, hell. I knew this moment. I hated this moment. Ive lived this moment a dozen dozen times in the past decade, in jobs, relationships, art projects, pet projects. This is how Im wired. I fall in love with things, projects, people, even if just a little bit. I have to, in order to help them. To do anything less would be well I wouldnt know how.

You know, about that, Dr. Peterson

The old man cut me off with a wave of his hand. His lips slid into a more natural, dour expression.

Zachary, we have all been where you are. I could say that passion ebbs with age and experience, but I doubt you would listen, so I wont waste your time.

I frowned, off-balance. Was I being criticized or not? Peterson glanced down at the folder before him. From my vantage, I spotted a Brinkvale admittance form, with more attachments than most. A CD-ROM was in there, too. Peterson closed the folder. He pressed two fingers against its surface and pushed it a few inches forward.

You are here because you are precisely what I need: bright and gifted at what you do, he said. Your methods of connecting with patients are quite unconventional, but your success rate has been notable.

I work from my gut, I said. I dont know whats so unconventional about that.

Peterson tapped the stack of papers again. Your first month here, you used a cassette mixtape provided by Leon Macks daughter to usher him out of a nigh-catatonic mute state. Last month, it was a rabbits foot keychain that facilitated closure for Evan Unwin in the death of his infant son. Yesterday, it was needle and thread.