Chapter 2: The Support Group
Knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock—
Harold opened the door. "Come on in, Adrian."
"Could you please close the door, for just one second? Let me make it an even ten."
"Oh. OK." He closed the door.
Knock.
Harold opened the door. "Come on in, Adrian."
"Thank you."
"No problem." He gestured into the room. "See, what did I tell you? Train wreck, isn't it?"
"What are you talking about? This is terrific! Everything's straight and neat and even."
"I'm telling you, it's a nightmare. I can never find anything when I need it. It may seem perfect now, but it keeps messing it up. Marisa and Jimmy keep moving everything."
"There's nothing on the floor. I don't see any dust anywhere." He breathed in deeply through his nose. "It even smells so clean. I don't even know where to start."
"Well, I tell you what. I'll give you the tour. Maybe that'll inspire you."
Harold led Monk into every room. Monk investigated every detail to find anything out of place that looked even a little bit sloppy. He didn't notice a thing until they passed by a really small room with the door cracked. Monk opened the door to see all kinds of models made of plastic, colored blocks as well as model airplanes and cars. There was a desk next to the window which was covered with blocks in piles according to color. It was sticky with glue.
"Is this Jimmy's room?" Monk asked.
"No, this is my office."
"Your office? What do you do, make toys?"
"Well, 'office' isn't really the right word. I don't work here. I mean, I see it as work, but I don't get paid for what I do in here. But it's not my room because I sleep in another room. I tried calling it a den for a while, but it just didn't work because—"
"OK, OK. It's your office." Monk shook his head. He was starting to sound like Kevin.
"Anyway, you don't have to bother with this room. There are a lot of unfinished projects in here."
"What's this?" Monk pointed to one such unfinished project on the desk, which looked something like a castle with high walls.
"It's my latest one, an original. I've been working on it for a few weeks now. It's a full-scale model of Jericho."
"Jericho? The city in the Bible that fell down?"
Harold nodded.
"How can you build a full-scale model of that? We don't know what it looked like! Because it fell down!"
"Well . . . I have to use my imagination. I like to think it's a reasonable facsimile at least."
"Oh, you really think that Jericho had purple bricks? And blue bricks?"
"You gotta work with what you have, right? At least the colors are symmetrical. All I really know about Jericho is that it had very, very, very high walls." Harold sighed. "I like building walls. They're so easy, just putting one brick on top of the other. You know, Dr. Kroger said doing constructive projects like this would relieve a lot of stress. He was right. He was always right."
"No he wasn't."
"Well, maybe not with you, but he was with me," Harold said in a harsh tone. He turned back to Jericho. "Whenever I'm in here, it's like the whole world disappears. It's just me and the blocks. I love that feeling, that numbness. Have you ever tried it?"
Monk nodded. "I know that feeling."
"Sometimes when I go in here, I don't ever want to come out. I've been spending a lot of time in here these past few weeks, just building walls."
"Are you going to tear them down?"
"I don't know. I probably should. It's always hard, though, destroying something you've worked so hard to build. Hey, I think I know somewhere that you can straighten."
"Where?"
"Come on." He led him upstairs to a room that was floor to ceiling with shelves of books. There was also a table, a love seat, and a stepping stool. "This is the library. You know, people keep taking books out of the shelves, and the spines get all uneven. I'm guilty of it, too, of course. You could probably, I guess, work on that."
"I used to work in a library. I know what to do."
"Really? Somehow, I'm not surprised."
"Some of those look kinda high, though."
"Well, you could start at the bottom and work your way up. You probably won't make it to the top shelves. Oh, just one thing—don't move the books around. I have my own system, and I'm really good at keeping up with it."
"Alright, I'll try to restrain myself." He worked in the library straightening for about an hour. All the while, he was looking, trying to figure out Harold's system. He couldn't get it at all. They weren't alphabetized by title or author's name. They weren't even arranged by subject. "It just doesn't make any sense."
"You must be Adrian," a female voice said.
Monk turned around and saw a small woman with dark hair smiling at him. "Uh, yes ma'am. I am Adrian . . . Monk."
She extended her hand to him. "Marisa Krenshaw. I'm Harold's wife. Oh, don't worry, I just washed it. With antibacterial soap, and I haven't touched anything. I always make it a habit to wash or sanitize my hands first thing when I walk in the door."
Monk came closer and shook her hand. It still felt a little wet. "That's very considerate of you."
"Well, it keeps Harold happy." She held his hand tightly. "I am so sorry about Dr. Kroger. I'm sure it must be really hard on you."
"Yes, it is," Monk said as he got his hand free.
"It's been awful for Harold. He's been miserable for weeks. He's been doing all sorts of things since the funeral that's been connected with this. He sent flowers to Chuck's mother, and he offered to help Madeline and Troy move."
"And now, he's trying to connect with me. Do you know why?"
"No, not entirely. You know, I'm very worried about him. He's holding something back about all this. I know he is; I can see it in his eyes. There's something he's not talking about, something he won't even tell me, something that's tearing him up inside. You know, I'm a little used to him keeping secrets from me. He's been so comfortable with the 'doctor/patient confidentiality agreement.' But this one . . ."
"He . . . didn't talk at the funeral."
"No, he didn't, and I encouraged him to."
"He just hides in that room, his office."
"Well, he's always there. Or the bathroom, you know, cleaning. We have an agreement. I'd be in charge of the kitchen, and he'd have the bathroom. He almost wrote it into our wedding vows."
"But he hasn't told you anything? Do you think he might feel responsible?"
"I don't know. Maybe. You're not saying that he—"
"No, Harold didn't kill him. It's just weird. Oh, forget it. I'm not the guy to get it out of him. I barely know Harold, and he hates me."
"I don't think so. Harold talks about you all the time, and he speaks so highly about you."
"He does?"
"Yes. He admires how intelligent you are and how much you accomplish despite your fears. In fact, I think he's a little envious of you."
"Well, I'd believe that. It's certainly not the side of him I've seen."
"Oh, he can be pretty irritable when he feels contradicted. It's his greatest flaw. Well, I gotta go down and make some chili casserole for the support group tonight. It's Harold's favorite, and it's what he wanted to bring." She smiled at Monk. "It was so good of you to come."
"Is it? I'm about 95 percent sure that it's a mistake. When Harold finds a new therapist—"
"I don't think he wants a new therapist. He hasn't even been looking for one. I don't know why, unless Dr. Kroger meant that much to him. But he has been so excited about this support group. He saw a flyer for it in Chuck's office, as he's always been meaning to go. I guess he figures now is the time. I hope they'll finally help him get through this." She looked off sadly for a moment, then walked out of the room. Monk turned back to the books.
"Harold!" Monk called later. He looked in the "office," but Harold wasn't there. He headed over to the bathroom. The door was open, and Harold was on the floor on his hands and knees. "Harold, Marissa says it's about time to—what are you doing?"
"What does it look like I'm doing?" Harold replied without looking up. "I'm cleaning."
"You don't have any cleaning supplies—"
"I don't need 'em."
"—and the room is already spotless."
"You mean to tell me you don't see it? You who have been trained to find evidence, you don't see it? How can you not see it? It's all over the place! Against this white tile, it's so obvious to me. I can't believe that I'm the only one who SEES IT!"
"What? What am I supposed to see?"
"THIS!" Harold stood and showed him a small, wound-up ball of—
"Hair?"
"Yes, hair. It's everywhere, and it drives me nuts."
"So . . . you're losing your hair."
"It's not my hair. Well, some of it is, but most of it's too long to be mine. Most of it's probably Marissa's. Some of it might be Jimmy's. His hair is getting kinda long."
"And you're just picking it up from the floor, with your fingers?"
"I have to. No one else will."
"Harold, here's the thing: people walk on the floor. Sometimes in the bathroom, they don't even wear shoes." He added in an anxious whisper, "They walk barefoot."
"I know, but I don't have a choice!"
"Don't you have a vacuum?"
"You can't vacuum hair! It clogs the vacuum and shortens its life!"
"Well, why don't you sweep it up with a broom?"
"I tried that. It gets stuck in the bristles. I also tried doing this with gloves or tweezers, and it just doesn't work. No, this is the only way. Don't worry, every time I do this, I always wash my hands three times, especially under the fingernails. Then I sanitize them and put on some lotion so they won't get chapped." He threw the ball of hair away and turn to the sink. "I can't believe this doesn't bother you at all."
"Well, I don't have this problem, because if you hadn't noticed, my hair is very short."
"What about Natalie?"
"What about Natalie?"
"Her hair's gotta be all over your place. I mean, every time I see her, her hair looks different. I don't know how you stand that either. I can hardly look Marissa in the eye when she gets a new hairstyle for about a month. By then I forget what she looked like before the haircut."
"I've talked to her about it, but there are just some things she won't stop doing."
"I see," Harold sighed as he washed his hands. He turned the water off and shook the water off. "Guess we better go."
At 7:00, Monk and Harold went to the support group, which was held in the same complex as Dr. Kroger's office. They started with a potluck meal, but Monk did not feel like eating. After that, everyone sat around in a circle. Monk looked around and counted seven other people besides Harold and himself, five men and two women. Monk stared at the floor.
"You look uncomfortable, friend," a man in his thirties with dark hair who earlier introduced himself as Brian said to him.
"Oh, I'm just wishing that there was one other person here. You know, to make it an even ten."
"Are you kidding?" a young man with thick glasses sitting adjacent to Monk cried out. "We finally have nine people! Nine has been my favorite number since third grade! Don't you know all the things that nine can do? The sum of the digits for every number divisible by nine is equal to nine or another number divisible of nine, and if you add those digits, they equal nine! That's always true! Even if you multiply a number in the millions by nine, its digits will add up to nine! And—"
"No way, Mr. Mathematician," an older woman sitting next to Monk said. "We should have stopped at seven people. Everyone knows that seven is the number of perfection. It's all over the Bible."
"Seven's a prime number, not a perfect number. Six is perfect."
"Oh, so Biblical scholars for centuries have been completely wrong about the Beast whose number is 666!"
"Well, mathematically—"
"Michael, Grace, please calm down," Brian said firmly. "We should be happy with any number that our group reaches. It means more people to encourage and to help all of us." He looked at Monk. "And to answer your concern, we actually do have ten people here."
"We do? Is somebody late?"
"No. One of them is here in spirit." (Monk groaned; he never could believe that people were ever present "in spirit.") "Many of us are (well, were) patients of Dr. Charles Kroger. Even before he passed away, we have made it a tradition to have an empty chair in the circle to remind us that even though he is not here, we are guided by his wisdom. Now that we have lost him, I believe we need that more than ever. Well, as many of you have noticed, we have—"
"Excuse me, Brian," Monk said raising his hand, "we all know Dr. Kroger isn't coming. So, could we perhaps fill that empty chair? Perhaps that young lady can put her book bag there. So we could just, you know, fill in the gaps."
"Is it distracting to you?"
"Yes, I think it's distracting everybody."
"Thank you!" a balding man sitting next to the empty chair said. "I've wanted to say that for ages. The empty chair always creeps me out. What's the point of it anyway? We all know he's not coming!"
"Fine," Brian said in annoyance. "Go ahead and put your books there. Matt, I'm sorry I bothered you with that. You should have spoken up."
"Well, I didn't want to be a 'fusspot' here, too."
"No, it's no bother. We're all a family here." The younger female guest put her backpack in the empty chair. "As I was saying, many of you have probably noticed that we have two fresh faces with us tonight. Why don't you both stand up and tell us about yourselves?"
Harold and Monk both glanced around. "Which one of us should go first?" Harold asked.
"Oh, it doesn't matter, whichever of you wants to go first."
Harold and Monk both stared at each other, both silently pleading for the other to stand. When either of them refused to move, Monk made a gesture and mouthed, "After you."
"I'm not ready. You go ahead," Harold whispered back.
"I can't! I can't do this!"
"Oh, we're going to be here all night," Matt whined. "I keep telling you, Brian, that those open-ended options never work. Why don't you guys go alphabetically?'
"Thank you!" Harold said. "I completely agree. Thank you." He turned back to Monk. "Well, go on."
"He said alphabetically!" Monk whispered back.
"That's right. A comes way before H in the alphabet."
"Well, K comes before M!"
"We don't reveal last names here!"
"Well, last initials!"
"Tell you what," Michael said, "I'm thinking of a number between 1 and 10."
"1!" Harold quickly said.
"0!" Monk yelled just as quickly.
"That's not between 1 and 10!"
"Um, one-tenth!"
"Oooh, oooh, I know what to do!" a young man with spikey hair spoke up. He started pointing at them. "Eenie, meenie, miney, moe—"
"Excuse me, could you do the 'wire, briar' one instead? I like it better. It makes more sense."
"The one with the dishrag?" Harold said softly. "Adrian, we just ate!"
"Alright," Brian said. "I understand, you're both nervous. We all share a lot of the same fears, and we're all uncomfortable talking in front of people. But you got to learn to open yourselves up so that we can help you and you can help us. Don't worry. Neither one of you are being judged here."
Harold sighed and buried his head in his hands. "This was a bad idea," he said under his breath.
"You're telling me," Monk whispered.
"You in the tan jacket, why don't you go first?"
Harold took a deep breath. "Alright." He very slowly stood up. He took a moment to look at all of them. "My name is Harold, uh, K."
"Hello, Harold," the group said in unison.
Harold smiled and started scratching the back of his neck. "Yeah, uh, you know, I should've expected something like this, but it didn't occur to me that I'd have to do this, so I didn't really think this through. I don't really have much to say. I'm a forty-something. I am happily married, and I have a son, whom I very proud of. I was on the school board a few years ago, but I don't really have an interesting job—"
"Oh, I recognize you!" the spikey-haired kid cried out. "You were the Frisco Fly, weren't you?"
"No, he wasn't!" Monk said.
"Uh, that's, that's really a long story, and I don't want to get into it right now."
"You don't have to if you don't want to. And Jake, remember what I told you last time about interrupting?" Brian said.
"Sorry, Brian," the kid said.
"Why don't you tell us a little bit about your problems, Harold?"
"My, my problems?" Harold said.
"Yes. Why are you here?"
"Well, I have OCD as well as a number of phobias and social difficulties. I've been Dr. Kroger's patient for about five, six years, I think. I guess I'm here because I've always felt so alone, like nobody really understands what I'm going through. Nobody really 'gets' me, not even the people I was closest to. My wife advised me to seek professional help, and it got me somewhere. Dr. Kroger understood. He was like my compass. He'd lead somewhere closer to sanity. And he . . ." Harold paused and looked away. Then, he sat down. "That's really all I want to say."
"Very good," Brian said. "Well, welcome, Harold. And you definitely came to the right place. 'Getting' each other is what we're all about. And now, you sir?"
Monk also took a deep breath and timidly stood. "My name is Adrian Mon—uh, M."
"Hello, Adrian," the group said once again in unison.
"Hello," Adrian replied. He tried to grin. Then, he sat down.
"No, no, go ahead," Brian said encouragingly. "Tell us some more."
Adrian stood up quickly. "Uh, here's the thing. I'm not really sure why I'm here. I came because Harold told me to come."
"Oh, good. You two know each other."
"Yeah, uh, you could say that."
"So, are you saying that you have no problems?"
"No, no, no, that's not what I'm saying at all. It's just that . . . this is kinda a crowd. I kinda have a problem with crowds . . . and talking in front of them."
The younger woman, who had the book bag, raised her hand. "Aren't you that detective?"
"Uh . . . well, yeah, I am a detective."
"I knew it! I see you on the news all the time. I had no idea your name was Adrian!"
"Well, you see, the thing about that is—"
"That's my name too! It's probably spelled differently, though, A-D-R-I-E-N-N-E."
"Adrienne, uh, that is Adrienne N., I don't think you're helping his nervousness," Brian said.
But the girl ignored him. "My roommate says you can know everything about a person just by looking at them!"
"Well, that's a bit of an exaggeration," Monk answered with an embarrassed chuckle.
"Do it to me! Tell me what you know about me!" The girl excitedly clapped her hands and bounced up and down.
"Adrienne N., our guest just told us that you've been misinformed," Brian said firmly. "If you've been listening, you would have known that."
"Oh, come on, Brian! I've always wanted to meet this guy!"
"He's not a side show!"
"Well, if he does his thing, I can show him my mental trick."
Monk was getting tired of this, and he knew he had to say something to appease her. "Uh, you're a law student. You go to Pepperdine University."
The girl squealed. "Isn't he amazing?" she said to Michael.
"Your shirt says Pepperdine University, Adrienne. Everybody knows that's a law school," he said in a bored tone.
"Yeah, but that doesn't necessarily mean I go there. What else can you tell me?"
"Well, uh, you usually keep to yourself. You like to do mental exercises," Monk said tentatively.
"That right! I do! How'd you know that?"
"Your book bag, it's full of puzzle books. I saw you working on a sudoku when I came in."
The girl giggled again. "That's just incredible!"
Monk shrugged. "It's a gift and a curse."
At that moment, most of the members in the group muttered approval. "I like that," he heard Grace say.
"That is tremendous, what you just said there, Adrian," Brian said. "Do you realize how much courage it takes to say something like that?"
Monk shook his head. "I haven't really thought of it."
"Well, so many people in the world think we should only consider the curse. They think we're freaks, and we'll never be able to function right in the world. But you consider the positive as well as the negative aspects, and you found a way to make them both work for you in a positive way. As long as you have that mentality, you're moving forward."
Monk sighed. "You don't know me that well. I always . . . well, I've always been different, but it got worse about ten years ago, when I lost my wife, Trudy."
Matt scoffed. "You divorced, too?"
"She was killed. Car bomb in a parking garage. She was 34 years old. We never found the killer. I mean, I found the guys who made and planted the bomb, but I haven't found the man who hired them. I was catatonic for three years, and I lost my badge. I've had a couple of assistants, and Dr. Kroger helped me out to get me somewhere close to functional. But moving forward? I feel like I'm barely moving at all."
Monk sat down, and Grace patted his shoulder. "I know just what you're going through. I lost my husband, too. She's in a better place now, you know."
Monk nodded. "Thank you." He's heard that several times, but it never really made him feel any better.
"Hey, did–oh." Jake raised his hand.
"Go ahead, Jake," Brian nodded.
"Did you ever find it?"
Monk looked into the boy's young, pimply face with confusion. "Found what?"
"Your badge. You said you lost it."
"Uh, he means he was discharged," Brian explained.
"Well, why didn't he say that?"
"It's just another way of saying it." Brian turned to Monk. "Sorry, he takes things literally sometimes. OK, we're very glad to meet our new guests. So, uh, what's new with everybody."
Everybody went around the circle and talked about their problems. It felt like stuff Monk didn't really want to hear about, though Brian did give some helpful advice. Neither Monk nor Harold spoke much for the rest of the session. The only other person who didn't participate was a young man named Timmy, who spent the whole session looking at the floor. Brian prompted him to speak up once, and Timmy simply said he didn't want to talk. In the end, it just felt like one huge argument. Harold and Monk were both anxious to leave.