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February 2014

How do you feel in general?”

“Empty.”

“Empty?”

“Empty, hollow, vacant, blank, bare. Empty, I feel empty. You don’t understand?”

“I understand. I just want more details.”

“I don’t like your tone. It’s incredibly general, professional—dull and boring, if you like, but I’m not here to judge, I guess that’s your job.” A pause, an evaluation, a summary. “Devoid of accent, clean, standard. Did you go to a public school?”

“I don’t think it’s relevant.”

“Not relevant?” Joseph Lee reclined back into the poor comfort of his chair. His back rested against the thin padding, woven into a tartan design and worn well with age. He sighed and stared at the woman in front of him, sitting in a much more comfortable leather seat, her legs crossed and her glasses hanging on the bridge of her nose. Her eyes were fierce yet soft, professional yet powerful; they met Joseph’s stare over the desk. “What if I said it would make me more comfortable to know? Would that make it relevant?”

She unfolded her legs and rolled her chair closer to the desk. She rested a notepad on her lap and waved a pen over it. “Yes, I did go to a public school,” she admitted, her eyes still pouring their ferocity into the face of the man opposite.

Joseph grinned and leaned forward. “So, Doctor Marsh,” he said slowly, sitting back again, somewhat agitated and uncomfortable. “Do you think I’m insane?”

“What happened was …” The doctor paused and sucked the tip of her pen anxiously. Her eyes switched from Joseph to her notepad, which showed very little.

“Awful?” Joseph offered. “Horrific? Terrible? Pick one and say it. I’m not a walking thesaurus, you know.”

“Unquestionable,” she said, regaining her composure.

“They asked me questions about it.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“I know,” he paused, his eyes boring into those of the psychiatrist. “This is not a foregone conclusion you know, far from it in fact. I didn’t do it.”

“I never said anything to the contrary, Mr. Lee.”

“But you thought it.”

Doctor Marsh shifted in her chair, the plush leather squeaked underneath her backside. “Lets, just for a moment, imagine you did do it,” she said. “Do you understand what could—could have—happened to you? Do you understand the seriousness of the situation?”

Joseph propelled himself forward in his chair again. “Life in jail,” he pondered brashly. “Could it get more serious? What about Death Row, would you consider that a harsher sentence?”

“This is England, Mr. Lee,” she pointed out. “There is no Death Row, there is no death sentence.”

“Yet there is a life sentence,” Lee said with a smile. “A life sentence and a death sentence.” He repeated the words numerous times. “You see, a life sentence sounds … minimal. It’s life, after all—we all live and life is just a sentence; it has a beginning, middle, and an end, the full stop being your final breath. A death sentence on the other hand sounds rather bleak. In fact, it sounds fucking ominous, and death has no beginning or middle, just an end.

“It’s like prison, really … only without the beginning and the middle. You die and you die alone. You get wrapped in a body bag and buried six feet under with a two-foot, shitty fucking tombstone provided by the council. People piss on graves, you know—people destroy them and deface them, kids mostly; it’s a game to them. It’s the circle of life. First you’re born, you get a few years of bliss, and then you get pissed and shit on until you die. When you’re stiff and ready, they stick you six feet underground, you get a few years of peace and silence, and then you get pissed on again.”

“Are you going anywhere with this, Mr. Lee?”

“No, but I like to talk, you’re a shrink. You’re paid to listen.”

“Tell me something else then, Mr. Lee,” she said, her eyes fixed on the dark orbs of her patient. “What happened last Christmas?”

December 2013

Joseph Lee watched the digital clock nudge onto 6:32 and sighed. All day he’d lounged inside the confines of his living room. Christmas depressed him. It was for children and religion; adults had no place in the glittering holiday. No longer were gifts given and accepted with warmth and love; the love had died. Christmas was a time for running up credit card bills and bingeing on chocolate and alcohol.

More people committed suicide at Christmastime than at any other time of year. More people decided to climb behind the wheels of their cars drunk than at any other time of year. For the people who have friends and family, Christmas is an expensive, overindulgent holiday; for the people without, it’s a depressing reminder of a life they don’t have.

He opened another can of beer and drank half, burping loudly after the liquid settled on his stomach.

“Aren’t you going to get ready?”

He turned toward the figure in the doorway: a tall, beautiful young woman—her hands on her hips, a stern look on her face.

He mumbled something even he couldn’t understand.

“Well?” she strode into the room. He watched her and smiled—the swaying of her slim hips, the slight swing of her firm backside clad tightly in dark denim, the subtle movement of her large breasts beneath a thin white blouse.

She took a seat opposite him.

He stared at her for a while. She had amazing blue eyes, thin lips covered with dark red lipstick, and supple skin. Her blouse was cut into a V shape, exposing her cleavage. His eyes followed a silver necklace that hung down her neckline. On the end of the chain, a sapphire set in white gold dangled just above her voluptuous breasts.

“Stop staring at my tits, Joseph,” she said lightly. “Answer me, would you?”

“Why do I have to get dressed?”

“It’s half past six, it’s dark outside, and you still haven’t changed out of your dressing gown.”

“It’s Christmas, Jennifer,” he explained. “I’m allowed to be lazy.”

“We have guests coming in a couple of hours.”

“Do we?”

“Sandra and Alan. Your brother, for God’s sake. You arranged it. They’ll be here at eight, remember?”

Joseph shrugged and took another sip from his can. “Now that you mention it, yes, I remember.”

“Well, are you going to get dressed?”

He paused and studied his wife again. She was as perfect as she had been three years ago when he had taken her hand in marriage.

“Fine,” he relented. “I’ll go and throw some clothes on.” He rose from the chair and drained the rest of his drink, putting the empty can on the floor. “Just let me get a shower and a shave first.”

“Okay,” Jennifer agreed, frowning at the empty can on the floor. “Brush your teeth, as well. Freshen up a bit. You stink of booze.”

____

Joseph tossed his gown carelessly on the floor in the master bedroom. The creased heap of sweat-clogged cotton collapsed in a bundle near the bed. Standing naked in front of a wall-length mirror, he admired his body.

He wasn’t a well-built man, but he wasn’t skinny or fat either. He worked out in his younger days and jogged every other morning.

He sucked in his bloated stomach and sighed the air back out.

After a few months of marriage, his fitness plans had completely spiraled out of control. Instead of a high-protein breakfast, pasta lunches, and snacks from cereal bars, protein shakes, and isotonic drinks, he opted for fast food, chocolate, and beer. He had a beautiful woman who had sworn to love him regardless, but he had abused that privilege.

Despite the years of neglect, his metabolism had managed to keep his body in decent shape. His belly was protruding and the rest of him was built with extra layers of fat, but underneath it all was plenty of muscle waiting to be unleashed. He was sure one day he would get back into the running and the weight training, but he wasn’t quite sure when that day would be.

After checking every angle of his naked flesh in the mirror, he walked to the ensuite. His bare feet rubbed against the soft bedroom carpet and left tracks—footprints in fluffy snow. He opened the shower door, turned on the shower, and watched his face in the bathroom mirror as the water heated up.

He was still good looking, or so he told himself, but the toil of the last few days—the lazy, indulgent nature of the holidays—was showing. Stubble popped through his skin and blackened his face, his lips were dry and flaky, and his eyes were heavy, almost black. Before the hot water steamed up the mirror and covered his features, he splashed two handfuls of cold water over his face. It did little to aid his appearance but it woke him up a little.

As the steam flowed, turning the small ensuite into a sauna, he reached for a portable music player on the counter, swamped by a collection of soaps and shower gels. He flicked through the channels on the MP3 player until he found the one he sought, then, with a jiggle of his naked behind, he mimed the words to Metallica’s “Master of Puppets” as the notes filtered through the dense, steamy air.

He turned the music up all the way, stepped through the wall of steam, and disappeared into his own world.

February 2014

Doctor Claire Marsh leaned back in her chair, waiting for more. Joseph Lee stopped talking.

“And?” she pushed.

“There is no and,” Joseph said placidly. “That’s all I can remember.”

“The last thing you remember is standing in the shower?”

“Yes.”

“What about your wife?”

“I don’t know what she was doing. I was in the shower, remember?”

The doctor tapped the tip of her pen against her front teeth, her eyes focused on the floor. “Did you often argue with your wife?”

“Arguing gets you nowhere,” Joseph said lightly. The doctor lifted her eyes and stared at him. “I preferred to kick the shit out of her.”

She paused, looked for a twinkle in Lee’s eyes, and then continued. “Can you please be serious about this?”

“But that’s what you want to hear, isn’t it?”

“Not necessarily. I think you’re misreading my intentions.”

“Bullshit,” Joseph snapped. “You’re digging for violence, domestic disturbance. You’d be delighted if I was a drunken, wife-beating lowlife; it would make your job so much easier, wouldn’t it?”

She remained silent, staring at Lee.

“I’m not a violent person,” Lee said, calming down.

She nodded. “I said nothing to the contrary.”

“But you think I did it. I’m a human being in mourning. You want to turn me into a statistic.”

“I just want to know what happened, I want the truth.”

“You don’t give a shit about the truth. You care about your own job, your own life. That’s the way the world works. You just want the easy way out, the easy answers. You want my guilt. My guilt puts your face on the front page.”

Doctor Marsh disregarded the comment. “What was the next thing you remember after climbing into the shower?”

December 2013

He woke with a start; his eyes sprung open. His lungs burst into an instantaneous applause on awakening, coughing fluid.

Jets of hot water purged from the shower head, raining onto the slumped figure curled underneath. While near-scalding water hit his face, Joseph Lee felt the urge to move.

His legs propped open the shower door. While the top half of his body had been relaxing inside the shower, his bottom half had slumped outside.

“What the fuck …” he mumbled, trickles of water spilling from his mouth. He lifted his head but soon wished he hadn’t.

A shooting pain, starting at the base of his skull, raced around his brain, sticking needles in every crevice before leaving a painful throb in its wake.

He moved his hand toward the pain, brushing the back of his head with his palm and inspecting the result. A smear of crimson stuck to his hand before the jets washed it away. He brushed his hand against his head again, as though he needed confirmation. Again his palm was smeared with blood—not a large amount but enough to cause him concern.

He mumbled distasteful and incoherent slurs as he watched blue stars dance in the corner of his eyes. He tried to push his body up but the shower’s wet plastic surface rejected his grip and he fell face-first into a pool of water that had accumulated around the plughole. He felt his front tooth crack. A chunk of enamel broke free and pushed through his upper lip, spraying blood across his face.

He clawed at the walls, managed to propel himself to his knees. He rested back on his heels and tilted his head upward, inviting the hot jets of water to wash away the blood and soothe the pain. Spots of blood had sprayed up his nose. The thick fluid had stuck to nostrils hairs, leaving a sickly coppery stench.

He took in gulps of water, swishing them around in his mouth and spitting out the diluted crimson concoction until the taste and smell of his own blood had been reduced to a minor annoyance.

He looked up and, with a dreary expression, shouted as loud as he could: “Hello!” he sprayed pink globs onto the half-open shower screen. “Jennifer!” Every screamed syllable cut through his nerves like a cold knife.

He reached forward, hoping to grasp the shower door. His hand fell short and he collapsed, tumbling out of the shower and onto the dripping floor. The music was still blaring. Crunching guitars, thudding drums, and heavy bass pounded his weary head. He left the noise behind and slowly dragged himself, on his hands and knees, out of the bathroom and across the bedroom.

On the carpeted hallway, several feet from the staircase, he lifted his head and screamed again, calling for his wife, calling for help. The throbbing pulse in his ear drums canceled out any chance of a coherent reply. Blood dripped down his chin; he could feel the thick fluid fusing with his saliva and forming on his tongue and gums. The taste of copper was prominent enough to make him gag.

He crawled to the banister at the top of the stairs and used the wooden stand to climb to his feet. Immediately he struggled to keep his balance, his legs turned to jelly, the strength sucked out of his body. Adrenaline forced him to continue. He slowly made his way down the stairs, careful with every step he took.

Every footfall sent a bolt of pain through his body. From the tips of his toes to the top of his head, agony poured through him.

He gripped the banister tightly with both hands as he made his way, smearing red carnage on the oak. His blurred eyes wobbled around his skull, causing the room to spin and vibrate. His vision allowed his eyes to scan only a small area, so he focused them on his wobbly feet, careful not to lose his footing.

When he reached the bottom of the staircase, he made a painful misjudgment and missed the bottom step. He toppled over like a rag doll, his knees smacked the edge of the uncarpeted stair, twisting and crunching under the impact. He screamed in anguish, falling chest-first onto the wooden corridor at the bottom of the staircase.

He rolled over several times, tossing and turning. He stopped when his body came into contact with something solid. Something moist and warm. Breathing heavily, blood freely pouring from his head and mouth, tears streaming from his eyes, he cursed several times, spitting every bloody syllable as if the words were poison.

He reached around in the darkness of his hazy eyes, hoping to find something that would supply enough leverage to pull him to his feet. His hand rested on the object that had stopped his incessant and excruciating rolling.

He paused, examining the object with a careful and wary touch. He rolled his hand over warm fabric, traced his fingers across soaked cotton. The tip of his forefinger found its way into a soft, oozing opening.

His heart skipped several beats as a disturbing realization dawned on him. Rolling away, he pushed himself up with the aid of his elbows and stared at the mangled body of his wife.

Jennifer Lee looked back at him through empty and cloudy eyes, her clothes soaked in her own blood. Across her abdomen, where Joseph’s fingers had traced, her top had been ripped to expose her soft skin and several deep cuts. She lay in a pool of her own blood, the red fluid still dripping from numerous wounds and dribbling out of her open mouth.

February 2014

Joseph Lee stared deeply into the eyes of the female psychiatrist. A look of sympathy hid behind her professional gaze, but her curiosity and professional manner froze it out.

“I see her face every time I sleep,” he said softly, his head held low.

The doctor nodded slowly, her eyes fixed on his averted gaze. “When was the last time you slept?”

“Properly? A week, maybe two.”

“I understand.”

Lee raised his head. “Do you? How could you? I lost my wife, I saw her mutilated body, I touched her wounds.” He cringed at the memory. “I loved her. No one should have to go through what I went through. And, to top it off, the police made me the prime fucking suspect. Everyone thinks I killed her; even my own family have turned their backs on me.”

“The police were just doing their job.”

“And what a great job they did. Two months on and they still don’t know who killed her or why. They’re far too preoccupied with trying to drag a confession out of me. That’s why you’re here, after all—you’re the last resort. The law couldn’t do jack-shit, the lie detector proved inconclusive, the evidence was minimal to say the least. If they wasted less time on me and spent more time doing actual police work, then the bastard who killed Jennifer could be locked up by now!”

“I am here for your health, Mr. Lee,” she assured. “This is an assessment of your mental status. You do have a history of mental illness—”

He was quick to interject. “That doesn’t mean I’m capable of murder.”

The psychiatrist leaned forward in her chair. “Look,” she began, her voice full of reason. “In all fairness to the police, you had a motive. The house was in your wife’s name, you have no personal fortune, and you haven’t worked in years—”

Lee opened his mouth to object, but Doctor Marsh quickly continued before he could interrupt. “I know that’s no basis for murder and I’m not implying anything of the sort, but you did stand to gain a lot of money, as well as a house, cars, bank accounts, and a significantly large life insurance policy. The police found no evidence at the scene, no witnesses, no sign of a break-in, and your fingerprints were the only ones found on the body—”

“So you’re suggesting I killed my wife and then beat the shit out of myself?”

“I’m not suggesting anything. I’m not here to take sides.”

Lee nodded. “Fair enough. So, after two months of harassment, you have the final say. The police have finished with me. I don’t think they believe I didn’t kill my wife, but they have no choice: they can’t arrest me, they can’t touch me. They didn’t get a confession and you certainly won’t.” He leaned back in his chair, offering the doctor an unblinking stare. “Which means you’re here to assess me, so assess me. Do I need help? Counseling? Maybe some brain-numbing medications? Or do you simply want to throw me in the nut house?”

Doctor Marsh smiled and shook her head. “You have issues, Mr. Lee,” she surmised. “Which isn’t surprising after what happened, but you need to understand that the world isn’t out to get you. If you want help, I can give you help. I strongly recommend that you take my offer of counseling, some regular sessions perhaps. Having a professional to talk to can help you get through this.” She paused, almost expecting Lee to interrupt. He remained silent. “We could also look at sleeping tablets and possibly some anti-depressants or something to calm your mood. It’s up to you. No one is forcing you into anything.”

Lee smiled and stood. “In that case, I’ll be saying good-bye. I don’t want any pills and I certainly don’t want anyone to talk to. I prefer to block out the memories; talking about them just keeps them alive.”