SCARS OF PAIN
“I have to be honest with you, Alister. I don’t believe in curses or intangible evil things that lurk in dark places and prey on unsuspecting people,” Anna said.
Alister sighed. “And I see being a doctor doesn’t make you any less foolish.”
Alister cleared his throat and coughed. He rubbed his neck. The burning itch in his throat made it difficult and painful to speak.
Anna’s focus was on Alister’s palms, and his eyes followed her gaze. They were discolored with red and purple mountains of scarred flesh. He placed them in his lap, palms down.
“What happened to your hands?”
“Something terrible, but there is much to tell you before we get to that.”
“Then let us begin.”
“With my wife, Sharon?” he said, and his voice cracked.
“If you’re uncomfortable, I can get you some water.”
“I deserve no comfort, not after the things I have done.” He ran taut fingers through his long, gray hair and a cluster of knots stopped his hand. “All the suffering I get, I deserve.”
“I don’t believe you deserve to suffer.”
“Maybe you should hold your judgment until you hear my story.”
Anna nodded and her hair swayed with the movement of her head.
“Sharon, my wife, was good for me, but I was no good for her.”
“Because of the curse?”
“Yes.” Alister crossed his arms over his chest. “But you make it sound so simple when you say it like that.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Sharon was the only constant in all the tragedy that surrounded me.”
Anna smiled. “Did you know each other long?”
“Through grade school, junior high, and senior high. We started dating in eleventh grade and had a typical relationship of old. It was at a time when men respected women. I can remember rushing to open doors for her, and we always held hands.” His eyes danced around the room, chasing memories concealed long ago. He smiled. “We would go for ice-cream sodas, enjoy the drive-in theaters and frequent sock hops.”
“The age of innocence.”
Those words broadened Alister’s smile. “Indeed it was. Sharon wore poodle skirts with bobby socks and saddle shoes and a neck scarf with a virgin pin that she displayed proudly.”
“And what about you?”
“Me? My hair was slicked back, and I always had a pack of cigarettes rolled in the sleeve of my tight undershirt.” He pointed to his bare feet and ran a finger up his leg. “Penny loafers with blue jeans.”
“Things sound like they were so much simpler then.”
“In many ways they were, and I often wished it would never end. Sharon and I were consumed with our future. We would talk for hours about getting married, starting a family and living in a house with a white picket fence.”
“That sounds romantic.”
“It was all a lie. I tried to tuck away my secret of being cursed, hoping that if I ignored it, it would just go away. But soon after we married and Sharon got pregnant, complications started.” Alister rubbed his chin. “She had morning sickness that lasted the entire day, and her doctor treated her for toxemia. Back then, they used water pills as a treatment, but nowadays that is known to worsen the condition. She couldn’t function when she was awake and couldn’t find the comfort to sleep.”
“She must have been miserable.”
“That’s an understatement, doctor. As her pregnancy progressed, the symptoms only worsened. I took care of her as best I could, but my efforts were never enough. Everything that went wrong was my fault, and, according to Sharon, nothing was ever right.”
“You fought a lot?”
Alister nodded. “It was like the curse was tormenting her and making me suffer for some reason.”
“What would it have to gain by making you suffer?”
“I don’t know, and that is something I still struggle with.” Alister sagged into the chair. “By breaking me down emotionally, maybe it was making me more dependent on it.”
Anna started to speak, but refrained.
“The day of joy came when Sharon’s water broke and I rushed her to the hospital. I thought the changes in her body would make things right.” A tear fell from his eye, and he wiped it away. “Sharon had a placenta previa birth, and the umbilical cord was wrapped around Rebecca’s throat. The child had been deprived of oxygen and had come into the world with severe retardation.”
“I’m sorry,” Anna said.
“Sharon was ashamed of her.”
Anna looked out the window. The steel bars blocked most of the view.
“Sharon remained silent about Rebecca’s condition. As the days went by, her depression only seemed to deepen, and her patience and compassion for Rebecca had become nonexistent.” Alister’s posture stiffened. “She didn’t care for her the way a mother normally does. Mothers are gentle and nurturing by nature, but she was distant and uncaring.”
Alister repressed the swell of emotion that fought to escape. He swallowed hard and shook his head.
“What happened to Rebecca wasn’t Sharon’s fault; it was nature underperforming.”
But deep down inside, Alister knew better. Although the curse hadn’t yet become blatant in its desire to make him suffer, all the signs had been there.
“I remember this sweltering hot day when we were sitting on the patio. Sharon was in her eighth month of pregnancy, and that day more than any day before held lots of promise. She smiled when we spoke, and there weren’t any rude comments whispered.”
Alister chased an itch that moved up his arm, and Anna watched him.
“I brought her out a glass of ice cold lemonade and settled into a chair beside her.” He smiled. “Things were perfect.” He watched dandruff dance in the sunlight beaming in through the window.
“The bliss I was feeling was intoxicating.” His smile broadened, and he raised a brow. “So powerful that I’d forgotten about all the bad we’d been through.”
Alister paused, looked to his feet and slowly raised his focus to Anna.
“Believe me when I tell you, doctor, we’d been through a lot of bad, and for me to forget for even a moment, there must have been magic.”
Anna looked to her notepad, chewed her pen, and jotted down some thoughts. Alister reached for her paper and tried to spy what it said.
“What are you writing?”
She moved away. “Just some thoughts.”
“Yours or mine?”
“Both.”
Alister wrinkled the skin on his forehead.
“Care to share?”
Anna shook her head. “I want to know about this day you started to tell me about.”
“Good distraction, doctor.” He smiled. “I wish I could have held on to that moment forever. We were friends for the first time in months, and I actually felt loved.”
“That’s a wonderful feeling,” Anna said. “Knowing someone cares for you.”
“For me in that moment, it was nothing more than a distraction, a way to help me forget about all the death that surrounded me.”
Anna logged additional thoughts in her notebook.
“Our conversation quickly fell off, and Sharon broke the silence by asking what I had done.”
“Did you know what she was referring to?”
“Yes, but I didn’t say so.” He scratched his forearm. “I didn’t dare.”
“What did she say?”
“That there was something unnatural surrounding me. And that it had gone after everyone I loved, and Sharon and the baby were all that I had left.”
Anna placed her pen down. “Those were powerful words and a heavy accusation.”
“It hit home, and it still does. My heart sank. That was the only time she ever hinted at knowing about the strange events happening around me.”
Anna paused in thought, and Alister used the time to massage the front of his neck.
“And yet she didn’t do anything to escape it?” Anna said.
Alister shrugged. “Maybe she knew she couldn’t. She rubbed her belly and told me she could feel things weren’t right, and that whatever I was hiding was making my unborn child suffer for it. She flashed me a disappointed smile and walked into the house without another word.”
Anna refused to scratch an itch on her arm. “With all due respect, I’m going to be skeptical until I see proof that makes me think otherwise. I don’t believe you are crazy or cursed.”
“I am one or the other, doctor. There is no doubt about that.”
“I believe you’ve been plagued by a series of tragedies that have forced you into a safe place.”
“I’m not the one who is safe in here.”
“It is easier to hide from a problem—”
“The people outside this room are the ones who are safe.”
“—rather than face it.”
“Is that what you think this is? A problem?” Alister’s eyes were wide, and Anna looked away. “I think your need to find traditional answers to extraordinary circumstances has clouded your ability to see the truth no matter how close to it you actually are.”
Anna turned a page in her notepad. “That very well could be. After all, I am only human.”
“Well, from where I sit, it is.”
She clasped her hands together and placed them on her lap.
“I see you don’t like it when you are challenged.”
“This isn’t about me.”
“I know, and I also know that you like to stay in control. That’s what shrinks do.” Alister threw his hands in the air. “Very well, I haven’t had control in years, so it is yours to keep.”
Anna took her pen and jotted something down.
“Something you may find interesting is that I like to compare the curse to a black widow spider,” Alister said.
“A black widow spider?”
Alister tilted his head. “Why do you do that?”
“I’m sorry, but do what?”
He studied her. “You really don’t hear yourself?”
Anna paused. “Do I have to ask what it is that I’m supposed to be hearing?”
“Your evasiveness. It’s like you try and buy time by repeating my statements in question format.”
“I don’t mean to do that.”
“I find it annoying.”
“We were going to talk about why you compare the curse to the black widow spider.”
Alister scratched his chin and cheek. “Well, it’s death’s job to take a life at specified times, and it is the black widow’s job to kill the male after they mate.”
“I suppose you’re talking about the female eating the male after they mate?”
“That’s right.”
Anna rolled her eyes. “That’s as far-fetched as saying human mothers kill all their young. Yeah, you will get a few females that kill their young, but that is not perceived as normal behavior. The idea people have about the black widow killing their mate is a complete misconception.”
Alister’s heart sank. “Human mothers do kill their young. I saw that with my own eyes.” He swallowed hard. The lump in his throat was huge. “Besides, I’m merely trying to make a point.”
Anna nodded in acceptance, and Alister could see her resistance. She obviously liked to base discussions on pure fact and anything else was senseless.
“Let us just say that killing their mate is common practice for the black widow spider, and for the sake of easy understanding, we’ll say that behavior is preprogrammed by nature and must be obeyed absolutely. Suppose that spider finds one male that it likes so much it doesn’t want to kill it. It goes against the rules of its programming, against the impossible, and allows the male to live so she can have him for herself.” Alister fell silent and then said, “I believe that is the plan death has for me.”
“Death wants you all for itself, and no one else can live?” Anna sat quiet for a moment. “So you’re saying death is a person or entity rather than an event or progression of life?”
Alister swayed as he wrestled with her terminology.
“I’ve always viewed death as being—a living, breathing, thinking entity that kills,” Alister said.
“That is an interesting way of looking at it.”
“Whether interesting or not, doctor, I have since learned it is a fact.”
“If this curse is living, as you suggest, does that mean it too can die?”
Alister shrugged. “I don’t know the order of nature, but I believe it has feelings like you and I do. Flawed according to what our perception of what feelings are, but it has feelings nevertheless.”
“What made you come to such conclusions?”
“I don’t know,” Alister said, and he pondered the innermost thoughts he hadn’t had the opportunity to put into words. “Experience, I suppose. There are times when I can actually feel the connection we have.”
“And what does that connection feel like?”
Alister crossed his legs and considered the question. His gaze moved outside the room and into the garden. The wilted roses that were trampled and starved of all love, light and care painted the perfect picture of how he felt. He felt disliked, uncared for, unwanted and alienated. The horrible feeling that consumed him seemed inescapable.
“I’m not really sure,” he finally said. He found the emotional anguish he would have to endure to explain the details meaningless. The person he was sharing his demons with would be dead soon enough, so, really, how sensible would that be?
Besides, he battled those demons every day.
By himself.
“It’s lonely,” he said, and he closed his eyes. “So awfully cold and lonely. And the worst part is I see no end in sight.”
Anna put a hand on top of Alister’s. “I can help you through this.”
Alister’s eyes moved to Anna’s hand and he pulled away. He didn’t do that because her touch offended him or because it had been so long since he had had any contact with anyone; he welcomed the effort. It was just that he didn’t remember someone’s touch being so cold. Her hands were like ice.
“I’m sorry,” Anna said. “I hope I didn’t offend you.”
Alister shook his head. “No, you didn’t. It’s not that.”
“What is it?”
“Surprise, I suppose.” The truth was better left unsaid sometimes.
A long moment of awkward silence thickened the air.
“I’m sorry to say there is nothing you can do for me,” Alister said. “Just like there is nothing I can do for you.”
“I think you underestimate my abilities, Mr. Kunkle.”
Alister peered out the window. The death that surrounded his area of the building seemed to have spread. It had made its way beyond the reach of his eyes.
“And I think you underestimated the stories you heard before you came to talk with me. You should’ve listened to them.”
Anna laughed. “I have. But I’ve paid more attention to the belief that I can help you through this.”
“And your arrogance has cost you more than you know! Every smile, laugh and outright denial of its existence mocks it. And I can assure you that’s a big mistake. I’ve seen what it can do.”
“I’m not afraid.”
“I’ve heard that before, and it is usually followed by begging and screams for mercy.”
Anna uncrossed her legs and stood. “I’m sorry you’re scared, but I need you to trust me.”
Alister shook his head in irrefutable certainty. “Trust is something I can no longer give.”
“I think that will come in time.”
“Time is something you’re running short on.”
“And if I promise to return tomorrow and actually come back?” Anna raised a brow. “What then?”
Alister looked to Anna with hope on the surface, but the doubt ran deep. “Then you’d be the first to do so in nearly forty years if you want to include the twenty-five years of silence I’ve had to endure inside these walls.”
“Twenty-five years?” Anna said.
“Twenty-five years, doctor, and stop doing that.”
“Tell me, what do you think of when I say the word flower?”
Alister’s expression tightened. “What?”
“A flower. Tell me what you think it resembles.”
Alister mulled over her question, and no matter what angle he looked at it from, he got the same answer. “Death.”
“I say it represents life, love and hope.”
“That’s because you’re naive.”
Anna grabbed her briefcase and readied herself to leave. “You never answered the question I asked before, Alister. What if I were to return?”
Alister hoped she would return in the morning, but he knew better. The overdue reminder that he was cursed would come, and the invisible demon would deliver it without flowers. He wiped his sweaty palms on his pajama leg.
“I can’t answer that because I don’t believe you’re going to return. It’s not possible.” He licked his lips. “Is that answer acceptable?”
“It is honest, and I appreciate that,” Anna said, and she moved toward the door. She looked over her shoulder before she exited. “It was nice meeting you, Alister. I hope I’ve given you some things to think about until I return in the morning. And just so you know, I will be returning.”
“Doctor?” Alister asked, his focus back outside the window. “I would like to tell you it was nice talking to you, but the smile you’d give me in return will only come back to haunt me when I hear of your death.”