CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

Al sat on the overstuffed leather armchair, unable to relax. He glanced at the sofa, and then turned away with a flush of shame. He remembered that goddamn sofa. He had been deep in the throes of a night terror, unable to shake the horror of one of the most debilitating and degrading of countless atrocious torture sessions. He had a dim and humiliating recollection of struggling to remember what the thing was called—as if he was a newly-repatriated wretch who had forgotten simple things like which way to turn a faucet. He didn't want to relive his last session in this room any more than he wanted to re-experience is years in Vietnam. The way things were already going, he would be doing a lot of both before the day was through.

He had left Chester in the care of Doctor Gushman for the day, and he hoped that nothing would go wrong with Starbright's dozens of computers. The programmer was a good guy, but he was a bit absent-minded and very easily distracted. If worst came to worst, Al would be home by midnight, but he hated the thought of the dog doing without anything for so long.

There was a knock at the door.

"He's not here," Al called. "He's out doing something on the ward."

There was a good-natured chuckle from the other side of the door. "It's Doctor Untreigner, Captain." The door opened and the owner of the office came in. Al got to his feet and accepted the proffered hand. "I'm glad to see you again."

"Uh… ditto…" Al said.

"I'm so sorry to hear about the divorce," Untreigner said, sitting down on the sofa. Al settled uneasily back into the armchair, shrugging indifferently.

"It isn't the first one," he said.

"I know," the psychiatrist intoned softly. "That doesn't mean that such things get easier with practice."

"You'd be surprised," Al muttered.

"What was her name?"

Al answered without thinking. "Beth." He heard what he had said and wished he could cut out his traitorous tongue. "Sharon," he corrected hastily. "Her name's Sharon."

"Captain—this is ridiculous. I'm Jack."

"Al," he offered dispassionately.

"Al. Why did you split, if it's not presumptuous of me to ask."

Al shrugged. "I don't care who knows it. She cheated. Took off with a bricklayer. Women: what can you do?"

Jack laughed a little. "I don't know," he said. "My wife is still a mystery to me, and we've been together forty-nine years."

"Tactful," Al sneered.

The psychiatrist regarded him levelly. "You don't strike me as the kind of man to accept tacit pity," he said. "If I danced around the question you would be angry and resentful, wouldn't you?"

Al stared. The shrink was right. For the first time in his experience, the headshrinker actually had some sense of where he was coming from.

Jack smiled. "I thought so. Now, are you interested in telling me more about Sharon, or would you rather we move on to another subject?"

Al shrugged. "You're the expert on the human mind, not me."

"No one knows your mind better than you do, Al," Untreigner said.

"Why do you want me here anyway?" Al asked.

"Well, to be honest, I was concerned about the nightmare you had during your check-up in the spring," Jack admitted.

Al found himself waxing defensive again. "You said that was normal," he said.

"I don't use that word," Untreigner said. "Normal doesn't exist. I said I didn't think you were crazy."

Al blinked in mild surprise. The man actually remembered what they had talked about? Six months later? What kind of a psychiatrist was he?

"The nightmares are to be expected," Jack continued. "My concern is how often you experience them. You mentioned they came occasionally, but not occasionally enough. I take that to mean they're something of an inconvenience?"

Waking up screaming and perspiring almost every night? No, not inconvenient at all. Al wasn't going to admit it, though. If he did, the man would only use the confession against him. They were always trying to force you into a box, to corner you so that they could force you to see one of them regularly. Psychiatry was the most self-satiating profession of all. Hell, they were even worse than lawyers!

These cynical and vaguely paranoid thoughts were being undermined by the look of kind concern on the man's face. Al wanted reassurance. He wanted support. He wanted a friend. He had to remind himself fiercely that friends were nothing but trouble. You poured out your heart to somebody, and they let it run all over the floor. As soon as Untreigner found out the truth about the depth of his black thoughts and his medically unsound way of coping with them, of forgetting the misery and the ugliness, he would revile him. Betray him. Al had to be smarter than his own longing for an ally.

"I wouldn't say inconvenient," he told the psychiatrist, keeping his cool. "Just annoying."

"I can see that," Jack said. "Do you know how often you dream?"

"Yes," Al said flatly.

"How often?"

"Most humans spend between two and four hours in deep R.E.M. sleep every night," Al answered.

Jack laughed. "I meant how often do you have nightmares."

"Oh. Well, there's this one where I'm on stage in my underwear…"

"On stage?"

Al shrugged. "I used to be an actor."

Untreigner smiled. "Really? My grandson's trying to make a name for himself on Broadway."

"Good luck to him," Al said. "I'd offer to give him some pointers, but I imagine the theatre scene has changed since my day."

"It's a hard place to make a living," Jack said.

Al laughed. "You're telling me! I'll say this about the Navy: they don't usually let you go hungry."

"Usually?"

Al colored in embarrassment. It was too much of an admission, and not one that he had wanted to make. "Well, some of the slop they serve on those aircraft carriers…" he tried.

He wasn't fooling Untreigner. The shrink nodded almost sadly, then smiled again. "So tell me, how are you finding your new posting?"

"Not all that new anymore," Al said. "Eighteen months."

"I understand it's a position of some responsibility with a government project."

"Top secret, I'm afraid," Al said.

"Of course. I'm more interested in how you are finding the work, not what the work is."

Al laughed. "Now there's an awkward sentence." He sobered again, because Jack was still looking at him with respect and genuine concern. "It's a little stressful sometimes," Al allowed. "And sometimes it's boring as hell. I wouldn't trade it for anything, though. It's… you should see… when things start working…" He gesticulated enormously, but impotently. There was no way that he could communicate the grand scope of it all without betraying more than he should.

"Good! I'm glad," Jack said. "Would you say it's more or less stressful than flying?"

"Spoken like someone who's never flown," Al said. "There's a whole different kind of stress when you're trying to pull together eighteen eggheads so you can send a report off to Congress. It's nothing like the stress of barrelling through the air at mach .75, dodging anti-aircraft missiles and wondering if the next one is going to leave your wife a widow."

"You had been married six years when you were shot down," Jack said, even before Al realized he had alluded to Beth.

"Yeah. First run's the longest," Al muttered.

"Do you want to tell me about her?" queried the psychiatrist. For a moment Al almost forgot that he was a psychiatrist. Then the walls went back up. He couldn't trust. He couldn't let go.

"Sure!" he quipped. "She had dark hair and great legs …" At Jack's expression he stopped. He wasn't fooling him. Al shrugged in defeat. "She liked calla lilies," he said flatly.

Jack hummed a little, nodding. "What about your second wife?"

"The Hungarian?" Al asked, as usual coming up with a blank on the woman's name. "Well… she was Hungarian."

"What kind of flowers did she like?"

Al shrugged again. "I dunno."

"What about music?"

"Huh?"

"What kind of music did she like?"

"Ray Charles. Beth loved Ray Charles…"

"I meant the Hungarian," Jack clarified gently.

"Oh…" Al tried to rout through his brain for that information, but he was coming up blank. "I have no idea," he admitted at last. "What kind of music do Hungarians usually like?"

"I'm not sure," Jack said. "Your third wife. Tell me a little about her."

"Who, Ruthie? She's great," Al told him. "You know, she's the only woman I've ever been with who's a better cook than I am? I mean, she makes a gefilte fish that could kill you! And these little knishes with the apples and the cinnamon… yumola! Of course, her ma and her sisters are pretty good, too, but Ruthie! Wow!" It was making his mouth water just thinking about it. Funny how the thought of real food did that to a guy after a few months of cafeteria slops. Maybe he could bum a meal off of her when he was up in New York next month…

"Sounds like quite a woman. Now, my wife can boil an egg if you write out the instructions, but…"

"Sounds like Sharon!" Al chortled. "The woman—great painter, but absolutely the worst housekeeper I've ever had the misfortune to live with!"

"What do you miss about her? Sharon, I mean," Jack asked.

Al considered the question. "Well… she's got these hips…" He mimed them in the air in front of him. "When she's wearing one of her pink baby dolls…"

Untreigner frowned. "How old is she?"

Al chuckled. "She'd kill me for telling," he said. "Forty-four."

"Ah." Untreigner seemed to smile. "Have you got a new lady friend?"

"Oh, seven or eight!" Al said happily. Jack chuckled. "I'm not joking," Al told him. "Lots of lonesome young chemistry whizzes around Starbright."

"Well, that should make for interesting times. Al, I'm curious. How many years did you spend as a prisoner of war?"

"Six," Al said, his good mood deflating like a balloon. "Six godforsaken years."

"Where were you held?"

Al was going to snap back that it was none of his damned business, but Jack was watching him with something like genuine concern in his eyes. His heart ached for a chance to let go, just a little bit. Surely it couldn't hurt to give in to the desire to have someone care, just once…

"I spent nine months at the Hilton," he said. "But I was trouble. Too much trouble for a crowded, central prison. They banished me out to Briarpatch. You heard of it?"

Jack nodded.

"Stinking cesspool," Al said. "I was there… must've been close to a year. Then…"

He shuddered convulsively, studying his shoes. He expected the shrink to prompt him, prod him for more information, but he didn't. Amazingly, Al found himself speaking.

"I was chosen… by one of the V.C. war heroes. I dunno. Maybe they just wanted me out of the way, you know? They took me… to a jungle outpost outside Cham Hoi. I got moved around a lot after that. Even spent some time on the Mekong Delta. We couldn'ta been twenty miles from American troops. Quon used us… as a trap. A company of SEALs…" He shook his head. The memories were trickling back. "One of Charlie's little bitches killed their commander. She… they…"

"I didn't realize that women served with the Viet Cong," Jack said softly, offering him an out.

Al took it. "Oh, sure! You think we've got women's lib? They've had women as soldiers for centuries. They make good soldiers. They make excellent interrogators." His right hand moved unconsciously to his ribs, moving along an old scar, a memento of the march back north.

Jack nodded soberly. "I never would have thought."

"No, 'cause China's so repressive, and Japan is huge on femininity, so you think all Asian countries are like that: men have a place, women have a place. It's not like that in Vietnam. Women are s'posed to be strong. The "long-haired warriors", they call 'em." Al was wrapped up in the culture lesson, actually finding himself swept away by the uniqueness of it. "But some of them are great mothers. There was this one…" His voice trailed off and he grinned sheepishly. "But you don't want to talk about that," he demurred.

"I want to talk about whatever you want to," Jack said.

"Oh, really?"

"Well… it would be nice if we could keep the conversation close to your personal experience, and not discuss basketball," Untreigner allowed.

Al laughed a little. "All right," he said. "What else do you want to know?"

"You were tortured," Jack said.

Al's brows knit together. "So I was tortured," he said harshly. "So what?"

"I wanted to see if you could say it. Some can't," Jack said. "There are some who were incarcerated over there who want to pretend that the whole thing never happened. I'm glad to see you're not one of those."

Shows what he knew. "Doesn't help to lie to yourself," Al said. "Whole world tries to lie to you, and you're going to help it?"

"The world lies to you?"

Al tried to laugh his way out of it. "Sure!" he said. "Do you know, I saw a dog food commercial all about how your pet would love this particular brand. So I picked some up for Chester, and he wouldn't even touch it? Wouldn't eat anything else out of the dish it'd been in, either! I had to buy him a whole new bowl!" It was a lie—no, not a lie, a wisecrack. A story.

Untreigner laughed. "I didn't know you had a dog."

"Yeah, well, I almost didn't," Al growled. "She tried to get custody! Can you believe it? She tried to take my dog!"

"Sharon?"

"That's right! The nerve of the woman! Oh, well. I got him back. He's mine."

"I'm glad to hear that. A dog is the best companion a man can have," Jack said.

"You don't know the half of it," Al whispered. His hands were starting to tremble again. He tucked them into his armpits to hide the shaking. He needed a little nip of whiskey. His flask was resting against his left buttock, but he couldn't very well take it out here. "Look, can I use the head?" he asked abruptly.

"Certainly," Jack said. "Turn left, and it's the third door on your right."

Al nodded gratefully and slipped out of the room. He hastened to the bathroom and took a mouthful of the soothing liquor. Then he washed his face, trying not to look at his reflection. For some reason, old whip-wheals webbing his back now felt raw and fresh. He could almost feel the cloth of his shirt sticking to them, entrapped in the freely flowing blood.

MWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWM

Jack Untreigner waited. He had wondered how long it would take Calavicci to reach the point where he would need to leave the room. The sheer amount of information that he had been able to gather so far was startling. The captain had made a career of burying his agonies and his miseries. He had them immured behind a concrete dam, but every now and then one would trickle over the top. Jack wondered, not for the first time, whether the wall would hold when the floodwaters rose.

Of course, if Calavicci was lucky, the floodwaters would never rise. Yet Jack didn't kid himself. He wasn't a superstitious man, but he had seen too much of the world to kid himself. Some people had luck, and some didn't. Judging from Calavicci's file he fit into the later category.

The problem, then, was how to help him. It boiled down to one fundamental problem. The man obviously didn't want help. Yes, it was possible to force him into psychotherapy, but that was a very, very bad idea. For one thing, it would destroy his career, the one constant throughout a very turbulent life. More importantly, a man so used to resisting the will of others—a man who had withstood six years of torture and brutal interrogations—would never capitulate or cooperate under such circumstances.

And the one-hour appointment was almost over. Jack had less than six minutes to try to do something to help this wounded soul.

MWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWM

Al returned to find the psychiatrist behind his desk, digging in the drawers.

"Done with me, Doc?" he asked.

Jack looked up. "No," he said. "Not quite."

"Oh. Okay." Al resumed his seat.

Untreigner came around the desk, a little coil notebook in his hand. "Al," he said; "I know you've heard before that you don't need to cope with the memories of Vietnam by yourself."

Al had to fight the urge to roll his eyes. Damned right he'd heard it before, and it was bullshit.

"I'm here to tell you that that's bullshit," Jack said. Al gawked. "Of course you need to cope with them yourself. No one can deal with them for you. I can't. Your wives and girlfriends can't. The only person who can is Albert Calavicci."

"What if I don't want to?" Al challenged.

"Then that's your choice. But if you do want to, I know you can face them. I know you can deal with them. You're intelligent enough, stubborn enough, and God knows you're brave enough."

Al almost laughed. The hell he was. He wasn't brave. He had lost his courage the second he'd ejected from that damned plane. Valliant Lieutenant Calavicci had died that day over the Highlands. Brave and bold young Bingo was long gone. All that was left was Al, the coward.

"There's no reason for you to talk about them, if talking is too difficult. What I want you to try instead is writing about them. Every night, before you go to bed, take a minute to fill a page in this notebook with a difficult recollection." Jack saw Al's look of sceptical disgust. "Please try it. Every night for a month. Then if you don't see any value in the exercise, go ahead and quit. But try it, Al. Please try it."

Al looked at the kind face of the older man. He couldn't throw the suggestion back at him. The guy was such a misguided optimist, but he was likeable. Al liked him. He didn't want to hurt him.

He took the book and grinned. "Sure, Doc. I'll try it."

Untreigner smiled. "Thank you."

Al shrugged a little and collected his helmet and jacket. They shook hands and he left.

He had planned to throw the notebook away, but somehow he never got around to it. Back at the Project, he stashed it in one of the barren kitchen cupboards, and promptly forgot about it.