Cold, Dark

 

A short, homely, overweight man with crooked wire rim glasses and a prematurely balding blonde head, came into the downtown mental health clinic one rainy morning. In the foyer he collapsed a small umbrella. The rain clouds on the street cast a morose tone that carried into the broad, empty lobby that was more shadow than light. He mitigated the revolving door after a few bumbling attempts. His right arm was peculiarly pointed up like a hook so as not to allow his backpack to slide off his narrow shoulders. It was scuffed, dirty and a clanking sound, like a tool box, came from it with each labored step that he took. He was winded and walked with a painful twist that threw his left leg forward, then his right leg followed if only to catch his weight. He had been referred to as retarded by his peers throughout his life. He wiped his nose on his left sleeve, then sniffed hard as if he was trying to pull the snot back into his head. His jacket appeared slightly too big for him and his shoelaces were untied. His pants were dark and as dirty and as scuffed as his back pack was. He walked by the vacant reception desk where two fluorescent strip light bulbs intermittently flickered, providing the only light in the vast lobby.

He arrived early, slogged to the elevator and pressed the button to go up. He adjusted his pack so it wouldn’t fall off his shoulder, there was nobody present to hear the muffled jangle that came from the Turquoise Everest backpack. The elevator arrived with the proverbial ping sound and he stepped inside. He pushed the number 23, the door slid closed and he was on his way. He didn’t usually come this early but on this day was agitated as he had been off of his medication for a week and a half. He looked in the polished steel of the elevator door, analyzing himself, with his coke bottle glasses and hand-me-down clothes. He hated what he saw, he dropped his backpack, pulled open the zipper, reached in and pulled out a screw driver. Clumsily, he stuck it aside his belt and under a roll of fat on his stomach. The voices in his head were antagonizing him, calling him fat and ugly. The elevator signaled his arrival, then the steel doors opened. He stumbled four doors down the hall, to his psychiatrists door. He turned the handle on the door but nobody was there. It was only 7:30 after all.

Harold had Dissociative Identity Disorder, also known as Multi Personality Disorder.  He had dramatic mood swings and a hard time keeping an appointment as his sense of time was often distorted. He was prone to rage which manifested in altercations quite often. 

Feeling anxious, Harold needed a cigarette and went back down the elevator, already muttering to himself his displeasure that nobody was in then office. He pushed through the revolving door with a force he didn’t arrive with. He stood in the rain and sucked down a generic cigarette then went back up to the office. This time, to his surprise, when he turned the handle, it opened. However, only the receptionist was in.

“Oh, Harold! We aren’t open yet.” said Gemma the middle aged receptionist with an English accent, as he plopped down in a chair. The waiting room was softly lit with lamps on three end tables.

“I…I…I’ll wait here, it’s w…wet outside and I can’t smoke in the rain!” Harry said with clear tension. He often stuttered when he felt that way. The receptionist was aware of Harry’s tendencies as he had been coming to the clinic for three years. She looked down upon him but disguised her abhorrent attitude with a wide smile.

“OK, Harry. That will be fine.” said she from behind a small sliding window that was only open mere inches, then buried herself in some banal paperwork.

Harry picked up a magazine and started flipping through the pages. “You’re a liar! Stupid bitch!” and he threw the magazine down to the floor. Gemma noticed his agitation. His voices were laughing at him and telling him that he was worthless.

He started tearing the pages of another magazine that sat next to him on an end table with a lamp on it, into thin strips. “Please don’t make a mess, Harry!” said Gemma already annoyed.

The doctor arrived within the hour. He came in through a back door. Gemma welcomed him with cordial greetings, “Good Morning Dr. Stern. Can I get you some coffee?”

“Maybe later, thanks.” He walked up behind her, “Who do we have today?” Then he whispered “Oh, I see Mr. Harry is here.” Dr. Stern’s face was level with the slid open window.

“Why are you hear so early Harry?” Dr. Stern said.

“I didn’t…I did not…know I was early. Harry said with a clear agitation. He pulled his sleeve out from his jacket and wiped his nose on it.

The doctor chuckled, “Harry, come here and get some tissue.” Harry stood up and slowly and walked across the floor to grab a few from the box of Kleenex. “You’re welcome…”

“I said thank you!” Harry said.

“OK, OK, Harry. Give me ten minutes and I’ll be right with you.” The doctor said.

Harry continued to destroy magazines until he was called in. He left a pile of glossy, colored paper on the carpet of the waiting room. Apparently, oblivious to the request of Gemma to not make a mess. The voices were calling him a coward.

He was called when Gemma opened the door that lead back to the doctors office, “The doctor will see you now, Harry”

Harry dragged his back pack behind him as he followed Gemma into the small office. The screwdriver in his pants was cutting into his chubby stomach and before he sat down, in the office, he dislodged the tool and laid it between his legs as he sat down.

“Well, how are you, Harry?” the doc asked. The boisterous sound made Harry jump as if a bomb went off. Harry sat to the doctor’s right, against his . They sat an arm’s reach apart.

“I’m not so good!” Harry said as the doctor started fiddling with some paperwork. His office was more of a closet, 

“You’re gonna have to give me a second, I just got here.” Dr. Stern said. He was an elderly man but was fit. But his attention was diverted this morning by paperwork.

“Didn’t you hear me!” Harry shouted, “I’M…NOT…DOING…GOOD!”

“OK, Harry. I wasn’t ignoring you, I was just taking care of my list of patients, that you would have been on had you come in on your scheduled time!” then he turned his head back ton his work. Harry began to sweat, his hand was on his lap fumbling with the screw driver between his legs.

“Can I have another tissue?” Harold asked. He spotted the tissues on the opposite end of his desk from where he sat, when he entered the office.

“Sure, Harry” and as Dr. Stern reached for the tissue box on the left side of his desk, Harry gripped the screwdriver in fist, he crossed his chest with his right arm and swung the screwdriver, plunging the tool deep into the doctor’s neck. Voices in his head goaded him, “Again and again you pussy!” The doctor moaned as he pulled the screwdriver out and repeated four more sloppy times, Dr. Stern raised his arm in a feeble attempt to protect himself then grabbed his neck. In the five strikes that Harry hit the doctor with, he burst his jugular and blood was squirting with the doctors final beats of the doctor’s heart. It was everywhere, all over his desk and even drenched the stacks of medication samples behind his desk. Harry’s face was covered in the warm viscous fluid, he dragged fingers down his face and observed blood on his hands. The voices cheered, then told him that the police were coming. Dr. Stern’s head collapsed onto the paperwork in front of him as blood pooled around his forehead.

Fortunately, the office bathroom was next to Dr. Stern’s office. Harry cleaned himself up as he caught a glimpse of himself in then mirror above the sink and saw the monster that he had become, then slipped out to the waiting room and out of the office. Gemma spotted him but only after the door was open.

“Bye Harry!” Gemma said. Hearing her as he left. Harry backed up.

“Oh,umm, Bye…thank you!” Gemma never heard him say thank you, before.