"The length of time I'm here isn't what's important. It's what happens during the time I'm here," he said, as if I were one of his interns, too.
"I can't remember everything, but I remember a lot. Can't you help me remember it all, finally?"
"I think it's best we take it one step at a time, Laura. Tomorrow is another day," he declared with a regal air. His two interns made quick notes on their clipboards as he turned to them.
"I
want to go home," I moaned. "I remember my mother, my father, my little sister, and my brother. Why don't they come to see me now?"
"Perhaps they will very soon," he said. "Classic case," he said, nodding at me. The two interns widened their eyes and pressed their lips
simultaneously. "As you know," he lectured to them, "dissociative amnesia most commonly presents a retrospectively reported gap or series of gaps in recall for aspects of the individual's life history. As illustrated here, these gaps are usually related to traumatic or extremely stressful events."
"It's a common battle-fatigue syndrome," Doctor Fernhoff said.
"Precisely. However, today, we're seeing it more and more with early childhood abuse. I'd like you both to keep a close observation on this case. She's on the verge of crashing through her trauma and the immediate aftermath is most instructive."
They nodded and stared at me. I felt like an amoeba under a microscope. The way their eyes fixed on my face made me cringe.
"I want to go home," I moaned.
"We have to deal with the patient's perception of the event," Doctor Scanlon continued. "It's critical we deal with her sense of guilt as soon as she recalls nearly one hundred percent, for it is precisely that sense of guilt that put her into dissociative amnesia. Again, classic symptoms for classic cases, i.e., mothers who survive accidents when their children don't, husbands or wives who survive, et cetera.
"I'm giving her a series of EEGs. As you know," he continued in his teacher's voice, "regions of the brain that are involved in memory function also affect the stress response. Traumatic stress results in changes in these brain regions; alterations in these brain regions in turn may mediate symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder.
"Unfortunately," he continued, looking at me, "Doctor Southerby neglected to give her an EEG on admittance, so we lost a potential comparison there, but . . ." He smiled at them. "We'll make the best of it."
He gestured at the door and they turned.
"Please let me go home," I cried. Why wouldn't they answer me?
"Our next patient is a more classic case of child abuse," he rattled on as they walked away. "We have a twelve-year-old Caucasian male . . ."
I watched them leave the room and then I dropped my head to the pillow because it suddenly felt like it had turned to stone.
As Doctor Scanlon had explained, later that day I was taken for tests. Electrodes were placed on my head and machines read my brain waves. Doctor Scanlon's interns supervised and studied the results, although no one told me what they were. I was simply brought back to my room and put to bed. When I complained, Mrs. Roundchild permitted me to sit in a chair for a while, as long as I didn't walk around or try to leave the room.
I sat there all day, thinking about my memories, feeling the details fill in, the colors and shapes growing richer and richer with each passing minute. It was as if my recollections, which began as simple line drawings, were now being painted by a wonderful artist. Not only did pictures and words return, but aromas, scents, and tastes did as well. More than ever, I wanted my mother. I cried for her all day, but no one listened. Every time Mrs. Roundchild or one of the interns appeared, they offered me promises, punctuating every hope with "Soon."
Soon was not soon enough, I thought. Only right now was soon enough. Because I became more vocal in my demands, Mrs. Roundchild had me returned to bed and strapped in again. She called Doctor Scanlon and then came back to my room to inform me that he wanted me to take my medication earlier than usual tonight. She said he claimed I was about to make a dramatic breakthrough. Once again, they held up the promise that this would all be over. . . soon.
I took the pills after dinner and immediately fell asleep. In moments I was drifting on the sea. I was in the sailboat and Robert was smiling with pride at his ability to guide us over the waves. We were heading for a cove. It was coming back to me with the promise of love and all that lay just around the bend.
.
In my dreams I saw Robert and this girl who appeared to be me pull the sailboat onto the shore quickly and, laughing and teasing each other, go up the beach. I saw her fall to the sand and then I saw him fall first to his knees, and then to all fours above her. He gazed down at her, his eyes full of love, and he reached out to touch her hair, her cheek, to let her hold his fingers to her lips so she could kiss the tips of them. The girl moaned and the boy leaned over to kiss her softly on the lips, moving his mouth up her face, over her cheeks to her closed eyes.
For a while, he touched her only with his lips. He held himself above her, moving to her forehead, her hair, and then back to her lips before moving to her neck and then, ever so gently, lifting up her shirt.
In the distance the clouds began to gather. Neither the boy nor the girl noticed the change in the wind, the hectic and nervous cries of the birds, or the lift of the water as the tide rushed in faster, higher. They were completely entranced with each other, mesmerized, lost in the whisper of their own voices pledging endless love, promising.
I saw them undress, peel their clothes away quickly, but not roughly. Naked beneath the sky, they held each other first gently, and then desperately, wanting their lovemaking to be bigger, greater, more intense than it had ever been before. And it was.
Exhausted, they collapsed against each other, held each other tight. With this exquisite exhaustion came contentment. They closed their eyes and remained entwined, soon falling asleep. I tried to cry out a warning, but they couldn't hear me.
The sky darkened. The wind grew stronger. The water rose and fell with a slam against the rocks, and the small sailboat was washed away from shore. By the time they finally woke, the boat was out to sea.
Suddenly, I was no longer a third party, an observer. I was on the beach, shouting. Robert was swimming desperately for the boat. I saw it all and rushed forward to help him. That was when the darkness fell again, slamming my memory closed, ripping the sounds away, leaving me in a terrifying silence.