San Jose, California
When Anjali was a kid her parents made her promise never to tell anyone she was psychic.
Personally, she’d found such a precaution unnecessary but she swore anyway.
Honestly, did her parents think she’d go around making introductions like, “Hi, my name is Anjali Kumar and I can communicate with the dead. What’s your name?”
That’s right.
Anjali could communicate with the dead, but she couldn’t beat the house in Vegas.
Go figure.
She was the black sheep in the family, the skeleton in the closet (although thanks to a certain fondness for vodka and chocolate, she hardly considered herself bone-thin).
But Anjali wasn’t in the psychiatrist’s office that gloomy afternoon to talk about her parents…much.
She was there to talk about the whole psychic thing. Or rather, a way to shut it off.
Namely drugs.
If Prozac could quiet a child’s love of starting fires, then surely it could help her—a woman too psychic to function.
Across the cherrywood desk, Dr. Feldman held court in a plush leather armchair. The smile she leveled carried a distinctly patronizing glint. “You realize, Anjali, that everyone is born with some extrasensory ability. Knowing the phone is going to ring before it does. Disliking someone you just met without knowing why…but reading minds, communing with spirits…well, that just doesn’t exist. All of the world’s so-called psychics have proven to be frauds.”
Great.
How could Dr. Feldman—a psychiatrist who bore an eerie resemblance to Barbra Streisand—possibly help her when she didn’t believe psychic abilities were real? When she didn’t believe Anjali’s problems were real?
Anjali wished she’d never made the appointment. She’d gotten her hopes up after seeing an ad on TV. The actress in the commercial with the soothing voice had promised, “Whatever your problem, a little white pill can help.”
Whatever her problem…
After she hit puberty, Anjali’s abilities had zoomed into warp drive. She had only to touch an object to know who held it last. Any wonder she wasn’t a big fan of vintage clothing?
Anjali had no clue where her so-called gift came from. According to what she’d read, a person was usually born with ESP, inherited through DNA like blue eyes or male pattern baldness. At twenty-eight she had the same golden skin, brown eyes, and wavy black hair as the rest of her family. But to her knowledge, none of the other Kumars ever slapped a bumper sticker on a car that read: Honk if you’re telepathic.
Sometimes Anjali wished she was just plain old crazy.
There was nothing wrong with crazy. They had a cure for crazy. Crazy was good.
Sanity was overrated.
Dr. Feldman steepled her hands and narrowed her eyes, focusing on her patient. “Now Anjali, this problem you have of being overly sensitive to the world around you—”
Translation: Another neurotic basket case.
“—merely nerves. A change of scene might be in order.”
I co-own a sanitarium.
“There are methods of relaxation you can try—”
Electroshock therapy is making a comeback.
Great. Of all the luck, she’d managed to find the one psychiatrist in the nation who didn’t leap at the chance to prescribe medication. And Dr. Feldman was the only shrink in the area she could afford. Her crappy-ass health insurance didn’t cover psychiatric consultations.
She’d tried everything and every form of therapy to gain control of and subdue her ability: yoga, transcendental meditation, regular meditation, therapeutic art classes, rebirthing, past life regression, interpretive dancing, and sensory deprivation. Nothing worked.
“Let’s get back to high school,” the good doctor delved. “You’d begun describing those years to me.”
The words slipped from her lips before she could stop them. “They called me Carrie.”
“Carrie?”
“You know the movie with Sissy Spacek? Pig’s blood on prom night?”
“And how did that make you feel?”
Lame question alert!
“Angry, of course…but eventually the teasing stopped.”
“Oh?”
“Well, I reminded them of what happened at the end of the movie. Carrie mentally locked the doors of the gym and everyone inside was burned alive.”
“Aha.” Dr. Feldman began scribbling something in her notepad.
Anjali took a deep breath. She had to give this one more shot. “Dr. Feldman, I really think what I need is an antidepressant or maybe a tranquilizer? Just something to dull my senses, help me get through the day?”
“Tell me more about wanting to kill your classmates,” the doctor prompted.
Anjali dug her nails into her palms and bit back a scream of frustration. Dr. Feldman was no Barbra Streisand and this wasn’t The Prince of Tides. She’d get no help with her demons.
She took a deep breath and tried to center herself. After all, it could’ve been worse. Dr. Feldman could have prescribed what countless relatives had—a husband. Time and time again she’d heard, “You’re a pretty girl but you’re nearly thirty—Hai Ram!—and your looks won’t last forever.”
Oh, who was she kidding? There was no antidepressant on earth that could shut down her sixth sense.
Unlike most people’s image of a psychic, Anjali Kumar did not have gruesome dreams of serial killers committing their crimes, nor did she make millions dispensing advice via a 1-900 number.
Being psychic was not as cool as it sounded.