After the alleged flight to the Met, many of the staff, as well as virtually all of the patients, of course, were now firmly convinced that prot was who he said he was. Not long after that unbelievable journey I got a call from the research ophthalmologist who had wanted to examine prot’s visual capabilities in 1995 (after learning that he was able to see ultraviolet light, much as certain insects and a few other earthly creatures can do).
“You’ll have to talk to Giselle Griffin about that.”
“I already did. She told me to call you.”
“All I can do is ask him.”
Since it would have been difficult to truck all of the necessary equipment up to MPI, I sent prot, who was perfectly willing to cooperate in this venture—perhaps he had finalized his list of fellow travelers—to Dr. Sternik’s office and laboratory at NYU, along with a security officer. They left on Wednesday morning and didn’t return until late afternoon.
Sternik called me at six o’clock, just as I was packing my briefcase to leave. When I had talked to him earlier his voice was steady, confident. Now he spoke uncertainly in quavery tones, obviously shaken. He confirmed that prot could see light down to around 400 Å and added, “I’ve examined every part of his eyes and they are quite normal in all other respects. Unusually healthy eyes, in fact. Except for his retinas. Besides the usual rods and cones, there seem to be little hexagonal crystals scattered around the fovea. Whether they have anything to do with his ultraviolet vision or not, I haven’t a clue. But I’ve never seen anything like it....”
I waited for him to go on. There wasn’t much I could offer, anyway.
“I was wondering,” he said finally, “whether prot would be willing to donate one of his eyes to us.”
“Well, I don’t—”
“In the event of his death, of course. I think we might learn some very interesting things from those retinas.”
I promised him I would speak to prot about it. “But he’s leaving us on the thirty-first.”
“Leaving? Where’s he going?”
“Says he’s going back to the planet he came from.”
Without a moment’s hesitation he cried out, “I’ll give him a hundred thousand dollars for an eye!”
I promised to pass on the offer, but advised him not to hold his breath.
The next day I was swamped with patients, meetings (one in mid-town), and my regular lecture at Columbia, the last of the semester, during which I had to cram in all the material I hadn’t gotten to earlier. On top of everything else I had suffered through another restless night, with thoughts of recent events racing around in my head at tachyon speed. But all of them kept circling round and round the central question: Who was prot? Suppose he was an alien from halfway across the galaxy, or Santa Claus, or the tooth fairy, or God Himself. How would this help my patient, Robert Porter? I pondered the alternative—that he was merely an alter ego, a human being from Guelph, Montana. Whatever he was, Robert remained catatonic. When I finally got up I felt a bit more achy than usual and a little lightheaded, and I wondered whether I was coming down with something. It couldn’t be the flu, I told myself; I had been vaccinated in October along with the rest of the staff.
Somehow I got through the morning (though I fell asleep during a session with one of my patients, the first time I had ever done so). I was tempted to cancel the lecture, but how could I? It was the last one, and I still had enough material for three more classes.
But the students had heard about the lightning-quick trip to the museum, and already knew about the results of prot’s retinal exam. Bleary-eyed, I threw my notebook on the desk, gave them a huge reading assignment, assured them that everything I hadn’t discussed in class would be on the final exam, and told them exactly where the case of Robert Porter stood. What the hell, I rationalized, maybe they could come up with something I hadn’t.
The discussion was led, of course, by “Doctor Sacks,” who declared: “It’s as plain as the nose on your face. The father asked his son to help him commit suicide. It probably took many discussions out on the lawn at night, in the guise of watching the stars, but finally, as his dad got worse and worse, the boy became convinced. Now imagine his dilemma—here he was, six years old, and his beloved father was in enormous pain. Wouldn’t you want to help him end the misery? At the same time he knew it was wrong to kill his father. He was caught between a rock and a hard place. One night his father said he couldn’t stand it any longer. He begged Rob to help him do it. Maybe the boy held him down in the tub, or tied him down so he couldn’t get out, something like that. Of course when it was all over and he realized what he had done, he ran out of the bathroom and kept on running, trying to get away from it all. But no matter how far or how fast he ran, he couldn’t get away from himself. Not in a million years. It would be enough to drive anyone crazy!”
“And how does prot fit into all this?”
“He called out for help. Prot was the only one who heard him.”
“You think he came from K-PAX to help someone he didn’t even know?”
“He’s here, ain’t he?”
I dismissed the class early and went home.
The next day I had a low-grade fever, pain in every joint. I’ve always thought that people who are sick should stay home and not spread their illness to everyone they might come into contact with. But there was no choice—I had to keep my appointment with prot. So, feeling like a Typhoid Mary, I forced myself to get up and go to the hospital.
I shuffled in a few minutes late for our session. He was already in his usual place, gorging on tangerines. “Prot, I’d like to talk to you.”
“Talk away.”
“But first I’d like to speak to Rob.”
He gawked around. “Where is he?”
“Never mind that for now. Please—-just sit back and relax.”
He sighed and rolled his UV-sensitive eyes, but his head finally drooped down.
“Rob?”
No response.
“Rob, I want to apologize to you for what I said a couple of sessions ago. I accused your father of attacking you in the bathroom. Now I think it was something else. It may have been an accident. He may have fallen and hit his head. But I don’t think you’d feel all this guilt if that were the case.”
I waited a minute to let this sink in. If he agreed, he didn’t acknowledge it.
“Rob, did your father ask you to help him kill himself? I think he did, and you finally agreed. But you were overwhelmed with guilt about this, weren’t you, Rob? Isn’t that why you ran out of the bathroom when it was over?”
There was no indication that he had even heard me.
“Okay. Thank you, Rob. You may go. Prot?”
His head came up.
“All right. I’m putting the white dot back on the wall. Go ahead and hypnotize yourself whenever you’re ready.”
When I turned around, he was already “out.”
“Good. Now I’d like to speak to Robert again. Rob? C’mon out, Rob—I know you’re there.” When nothing happened I repeated almost verbatim the speech I had given a few minutes earlier, ending with the suggestion that he had been talked into helping his father commit suicide. “You had no choice, Rob. Under the circumstances, I would probably have done the same thing. Almost anybody would have.”
Again there wasn’t the slightest acknowledgment.
At this point I decided there was nothing to lose by playing the only card left in the deck. “But he didn’t just ask you to help him die, did he, Rob? In fact, he made you do it, didn’t he? He threatened to tell your mother about Uncle Dave, didn’t he? And if he did that, your Uncle Dave would kill you, isn’t that right?”
The only response was a kind of deep sigh, more like a snore.
“That wasn’t a very nice thing your father did to you, was it, Rob? In fact, you realized he was no better than your uncle. You knew he would take advantage of you at every opportunity. You realized then that your father wasn’t a god, as you had thought. In fact, he was just the opposite. Your father was a piece of shit, wasn’t he, Rob?”
He made another noise, but I didn’t wait for more.
“You hated him, didn’t you, Rob? You hated him with all the passion in your young soul, with all the frustration and disgust you felt for Uncle Dave. You took your frustration and hopelessness out on your father, didn’t you? You grabbed a baseball bat or something, and when he was in the bathtub and couldn’t get away from you, you let him have it, isn’t that right? You killed him, didn’t you? You brought that club down on his head and watched him sink into the water, isn’t that what happened? Isn’t it, Rob? ISN’T IT?”
His head came up and his eyes, like those of some animal in the dark, flashed at me. “You fucking asshole!” he snarled. “You dirty, rotten bastard! You motherfucking son-of-a-bitch! You’re the dumbest, lousiest, shittiest turd in the universe! I loved my father. Can’t you understand that? He was the most wonderful man in the world. That’s why I...”
“What, Rob? What did you do to your father?”
But he had broken down sobbing. At last, at last, at long last, I thought: This is what I’ve been waiting for. “All right, Rob, I understand. Take your time. When you’re—”
“That’s why I tried to do to Daddy what Uncle Dave wanted me to do with him!” He broke down completely. “Oh, God, I can’t stand it!”
With all the strength I could muster I grabbed his shoulders and shook them. “Rob, stay with me for just a minute longer! Are you saying you tried to—”
Still sobbing, he stuttered, “That’s when he took a swing at me. And then he tried to get up. But he slipped and fell and banged his head on the back of the tub. He was dead, I knew it. So I ran away. Oh, Daddy, I’m so sorry. Please, please forgive me! I was only trying to make you feel better....” That was the last word he said before his voice trailed off into a long, diminishing wail.
I waited a few minutes, vainly hoping he would get hold of himself, but there wasn’t a movement or a sound. I sank down in my chair. “Thank you, Rob,” I whispered. “Thank you for trusting me, my friend. The worst of it is over. Now you can rest. You can finally rest.... Prot?”
“Hiya, doc. What next?”
“Please unhypnotize— Thank you.”
“What for?”
“For all your help.”
“You’re welcome, doc.” He seemed puzzled. “You said you wanted to talk to me after you spoke with Robert. Was that what you wanted to tell me?”
“Not exactly. I was going to ask you what you know about retrieving someone from the catatonic state. But now I don’t think that will be necessary. I think he’s going to be okay.”
“He told you that?”
“Not in so many words.”
“Well, I’ll hold his seat open a little while longer, just in case he’s changed his mind. You know how these human beings are.” He turned briskly and hurried out the door.
I sat for a long time after he had gone, just staring after him. How lucky I had been to get into medicine, and then psychiatry. How I wish I could thank my father for pushing me into it!
That state of euphoria lasted about ten seconds. Then I remembered we still had a very long way to go to lead Robert out of the maze. And, despite everything we had accomplished, it might never happen. Totally exhausted, I fell asleep in my chair. It was another hour before Betty found me. I had missed an assignment committee meeting in which two more of our patients were judged to be ready for Ward One.
I slept almost the whole weekend, and still felt weak on Monday. Nonetheless I made it to the hospital in time for the regular staff meeting.
The hot topic for discussion this time was Frankie. It appeared that over the last few days she had suddenly rallied, lost all her bitterness toward the human race and become almost cheerful. Everyone looked at me; she was, after all, my patient, and had been for more than two years. I shrugged feebly, murmured something about a virus.
“Sounds like prot’s work,” Thorstein observed. “I wonder how he did it.”
Everyone looked at me again. “I’ll ask him,” was all I could come up with. The refrain was becoming all too familiar.
But I ran into Frankie first. She was in the exercise room doing calisthenics, something I had never seen her engage in, nor any other kind of game or exercise. “How are you feeling?” I asked her inanely.
“Wonderful. Fine fucking day, isn’t it?” She continued the rhythmic, mesmerizing jumping jacks, the blobs of fat slightly out of sync with the rest of her body. One of the cats, who normally would have nothing to do with her, watched her bounce up and down like a ping-pong ball.
“Yes, it is. So—have you been talking to prot?”
“Once or twice.”
“Did he tell you anything that might have cheered you up at all?”
Perspiring and breathing heavily, she switched to a series of squat thrusts. “Now that you mention it, he did.” She farted loudly.
The “two Al’s” happened to come by. “I’d recognize one of your glaciermelters anywhere,” Albert snorted. (This wasn’t such a silly statement, actually. Recent studies have shown that the feces of the mentally ill contain chemicals related to the nature of their illnesses. Shit happens, and it is telling.)
“Could you tell me what it was he said to you, Frankie? Did he give you a ‘task’ or something?”
“That’s affirmative,” she puffed.
“What was it? To start exercising?”
“Egg-zack-a-tickly. He told me to get in shape for a very goddamned long journey.”
I thought: Oh, shit! “Did he say what journey you needed to prepare for?”
She merely looked up toward the sky with a very prot-like grin.
“You want to consider a transfer to Ward One?”
“No, thanks,” she grunted. “Not worth the trouble.”