Author's Note: chapter two! I managed to write it! The story is coming slow, but I hope you're all enjoying it. Got a comment? A suggestion to make things better? Feel free to tell me. That's what reviews are for. ; )
Author's thanks at the end.
Back in the staff lounge, Carly impatiently dialed a number from memory, and equally impatiently, waited for the phone to be picked up.
"This is Todd."
Todd was the near ancient caretaker for the grounds that Briar Ridge occupied. He didn't do too much of the work himself anymore, but he had a good-sized crew of men – this time of year it was mostly college boys getting a head start on summer jobs – that did most of the mowing, mulching, and other tasks that kept the lawns and gardens looking so nice. And he was the man to go to with a complaint because he would make sure that the right fire was lit under the right butt to get something done.
"Todd, this is Dr. Beckham. I –"
"You need to come down and join me for lunch some afternoon, missy. The rose garden is wilting in your presence."
"It's too early for blossoms, Todd." The irascible old man knew practically every staff person and their botanical preferences. The only people he hadn't bothered to meet were the ones who didn't bother to come see the plants he was so proud of.
"But not even a bud are they throwing out. They need your charming presence to encourage them."
Carly actually laughed at that. Todd must be the only person she knew who would call her charming. Most preferred "headstrong," "brusque," and her personal favorites, "cool and aloof." One of the reasons she got along so well with the head gardener was that she willingly joined him in his diatribes and rants about what was wrong with society in general and some of the more pompous doctors on staff in specific. "They're going to have to wait a little longer, Todd. I just got a new case."
"Well, bring 'em down to see your kids then." She shook her head at her comparison to a rose. They both knew he was talking about thorns, not petals. "There's nothing a little sunlight won't fix."
"That's why I needed to get a hold of you, old-timer. I was up on the third floor today, where they keep our patients that are suspected or convicted of violent crime. And lo-and-behold, all the windows were covered up in ivy. Someone on your staff has been neglecting to trim the verge."
"Dagnabit!" The exclamation from the old man simply made Carly smile – someone was in trouble. "Dang college kids, complaining about how they get the heebie-jeebies. I'll make sure this is corrected in sort order. Bad enough being stark, raving mad without being stark, raving mad in the dark," he said emphatically. The one thing that could be said about Todd was that he took his responsibilities very seriously. "I owe you a vase of the first rose blooms, missy, if you don't come down and get them yourself."
"I will. When I have time."
"Girl, how many times do I have to tell you that you have to make time for things?"
"At least once more, but do it later . . . I'm in a bit of a rush." With a fond smile, Carly hung up the phone, the smile soon fading. Who was she kidding? She rarely had time to do anything more than walk a patient around the gardens during the course of treatment. In the past that had been often enough since she mainly dealt with those who voluntarily checked themselves in and some of the higher functioning committed patients, but with Mr. Rainey on her caseload, she'd be devoting most of her time to him. So the gardens were out of reach for the time being.
"And speaking of time, I'm wasting it," she muttered to herself. Once again dialing a number, she took the time to plan what she was going to say.
"Milbank Computer Repair and Wholesale, this is Brian."
"Hi, Brian. This is Carly. Mom is on the warpath and I thought I'd warn you."
"Oh god. What is it this time?" There was a trace of amusement in her brother's voice.
"Oh, the dirtiest battle of them all. Worse than the battle of the bulge. We're talking really grimy. Spring cleaning." Surface conversation was always the way to go between them. Carly had never really understood her brother, and he seemed to know that and hadn't made an effort to help her.
After several moments of strained silence, she heard a bell ring in the background.
"Is that all you called to warn me about? Because I do have customers . . ."
"Yeah, actually, I've got two other reasons for calling. I need a laptop for one of my patients. Nothing fancy, but it does need to have an operating system and preferably some word processing software." In the ensuing silence that followed her declaration, Carly could clearly hear her brother thinking, "Business first. As always," and it frustrated her. Was it her fault she was a decade older than he was?
"Yeah, I suppose I've got something like that lying around. How much did you want to spend?"
"It's for business, but I wouldn't want to go any higher than $400."
"Ok, I've got something on stock that'll fit those specifications. I'm assuming you're not going to fill out the warranty card? It won't do you much good if the computer gets thrown against the wall or something."
First of all, I'm not even sure I'm going to end up using it. This is just a nebulous idea still. Second of all, Rainey isn't displaying violent tendencies. "That'll be fine. Umm . . . I'll call in two days to let you know whether to ship it or not. I want to make sure my cockamamie little plan is going to work before I spend anything."
"Understandable."
Again there was silence on the line.
"You said there was a second reason you called?"
"Yeah. Mom made me promise to call. She said you had some news."
"Well . . . I've been thinking about getting a dog."
Carly actually smiled. "Right. That's what had Mom all excited. Spill, baby bro."
"You know Penny?"
"I'd hope so, I have met the woman."
"Well, I hope you like her, because she's going to be coming to a lot more family gatherings in the near future." His voice held quite a bit of quiet pride.
"You proposed?" Carly asked with a bit of surprise.
"I did. And she accepted. I don't suppose there's any chance I could talk you into actually attending the wedding?"
It's not like I'll have a choice. A few years short of forty, and she still didn't dare disobey certain maternal dictates. "Of course you can. I want to see Mom walk you down the aisle," she teased.
The rest of the conversation went quickly, and the two siblings cordially said good-bye. Carly for one was glad to hang up. Weddings made her uneasy, ever since she'd managed to single-handedly ruin her own marriage in a matter of months. And if one took into consideration the extremely messy divorce and the hostility that had followed . . . Well, happy unions had never looked the same for her. But she did hope that her brother had better luck than she'd had.
The pager on her hip buzzed, pulling her away from such depressing thoughts. Real life took precedence over the past. Always. Or at least that's what she tried to tell herself.
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Time had no meaning. Sound had no meaning except to ensure him that he was still alive . . . which wasn't much of an assurance. In the back room of his brain that he now occupied, touch had no meaning. And sight . . . sight could not be afforded.
He couldn't notice anything. He couldn't. He was a writer through and through, and his imagination sprung from the people and places around him. But what had that gotten him? And what would it get him? There was no life or color or hope in the place his body was. And if he wrote what he saw, and if he got lost in what he wrote . . . he stopped before his mind could drift in that direction. If it did, he'd get lost in that day, and that was something to be avoided at all costs.
His body was being moved, manipulated like a puppet, but he paid no attention to it. Why should he when he was too dangerous to live in the outside world? He was scared of what might happen if his fertile imagination ran away with him again.
Who would he hurt?
How badly would he hurt them?
What would be the price?
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Her face, jeans, and lab coat smudged with dust and grime, Carly tottered out of the elevator hauling an ancient typewriter with her. Before she gave Rainey the laptop, she wanted to confirm something. As an author, the man would be used to expressing himself on paper, silently but eloquently. When she'd gotten the case, his name had struck a chord in her, and she'd gone home to examine her large and eclectic collection of books, most of them in the same pristine condition that they'd come to her home in. She always intended to read, but somehow never managed to get around to it.
It'd taken fifteen minutes of searching, but she'd finally found a copy of The Organ-Grinder's Boy that her mother had given her years before. She'd read the first few chapters, but something had come up – like something always did – and she'd never finished it. But now she was glad to have it, for no other reason that the insights it might offer into the writer.
The man certainly had a way of stringing together words in an unique and attention grabbing fashion. Not that every sentence was written that way. No, they were hidden among the thoughtful prose like little gems for the reader to find if they took their time. It'd reminded her of another writing style at first – someone she'd probably had to read in high school or college – but she couldn't remember.
First and foremost, she'd thought, this man is an author. And if that were true, he'd probably be more likely to first express himself through this medium than any other. As far as she was concerned, verbal communication was some ways down the road for him.
It's all about baby-steps, she thought ironically, making her slow way to the check-in point on the third floor. The piece of machinery in her arms was heavy, bulky, and dirty. A relic from the 60's, it'd been consigned to a storage closet, probably by some secretary who'd been too fond of it to throw it out when word processors and computers had moved into the workplace. But it had ribbon, and all the keys were still intact, and that was all that mattered.
"Let me help you with that, Dr. Beckham." Carly found her arms empty as Ralph took the typewriter from her. She noted that he didn't seem to have any difficulty with how much it weighed.
"Thank you," she muttered, nodding to the man's partner as he opened the gate for them.
"So, what's this antique for?" Ralph enquired as they made their way to Rainey's room.
"An experiment in giving a man back his voice," she replied, her attention switching to more practical matters when she saw Betty, the nurse, waiting for her. "Is something wrong?" she asked, coming to stand by the door again. She peeked in, but didn't see Rainey anywhere. "Is he back?" she asked with a slight frown.
"Yes, doctor. Scrubbed and groomed. He's in the corner to the left of the door." She handed over Rainey's chart once again. "And I'm simply here as a matter of procedure. A security guard and a nurse have to be present when a doctor is visiting a patient. And since Rainey never gives anyone trouble anymore, and my shift ends in an hour . . ." the other woman shrugged.
Carly grinned wryly, but was unhappy with the continued insistence that she couldn't enter the room by herself. Rainey was totally unresponsive to anything. He hadn't even reacted when he'd been stripped, doused with water, and had gotten a hair cut and a shave. She doubted her presence would do much to make him do much more than sit and blink, but she thought that more than one presence would overwhelm him and ensure that he didn't come out of his shell.
Time to pull rank, she mentally sighed. "I want the two of you to stay outside. Leave the door open if you have to, but I want to talk to him alone." Her companions both opened their mouths to object. "That's an order," she said sternly. "If Dr. Marchman had as problem with protocol being ignored, he can address his complaints to my boss. Until then, I will treat this man as I see fit." Carly took the typewriter back. "Now, if you'll open the door for me?"
She had to stand and wait for several seconds while Ralph and Betty seemed to have a silent debate whether to bow to her orders or not, but they finally did, and Carly stepped into the room, much relieved at the fake piney scent of cleaning fluid and disinfectants. Not to mention the fact that behind the thick bars on the window, the ivy that dominated the back of the facility had been cleared away so that sun came into the room.
"Hello, Mort," she said in a soft voice, setting the typewriter down on the table. "My name is Carly Beckham, and I'm going to be visiting you every now and then." There was no answer, but she didn't expect one. Instead, she sat down in a nearby chair and put a piece of paper into the typewriter. She slowly typed what she'd just said, then advanced the paper so it was visible. Then she got up and went to sit on the wall opposite Rainey, watching him carefully. He ignored her.
She made a few notes.
He ignored her.
Carly wrote a list of some background information she needed to gather on him.
He ignored her.
She hummed softly to herself as she took in his clean appearance.
He ignored her . . . and eventually fell asleep.
Standing with a sigh and a groan, Carly went over to the table and removed the paper she'd written on. The last thing they needed was for him to think that the words had appeared out of thin air. That would to lead to who had written them, and beyond that she didn't want to think. "I'll come back and visit you tomorrow, Mr. Rainey," Carly said as she left. The typewriter and paper were where she left them. So was Rainey.
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With a tired sigh, Carly let herself into her small house, that evening. Kicking off her shoes and settling down her briefcase, she groaned. It'd taken her an hour to leave the office because the nurse who'd been responsible for letting Rainey get into the stated he'd been in earlier, and gone straight to the big-wigs when she'd been informed that she was being placed on leave pending a referral hearing. And she'd been called down to explain her actions. Most of the staff on the third floor ward were now not happy with her, but Carly couldn't bring herself to care.
Looking down, she noticed that her cat was twining itself around her legs. Carly laughed, knowing it had less to do with her being glad her mistress was home, and more to do with the proximity of dinner. "Yes, I hear you, Bast. Just give me a moment, would you?" The cat meowed at her. "Yes, I hear you," Carly assured her. "Well, come on then." She headed back towards the kitchen and filled the cat's bowl. Bast immediately settled down to eat, purring contentedly. "I wish some people were as easy to please," Carly murmured, watching her pet.
Shaking her head, she turned and went to her bedroom, changing into a long-sleeved thermal shirt and a pair of pajama pants. Spring might be the reining champion for the latest daytime weather, but the nights still felt distinctly chilly.
After finding her slippers, Carly went back into the kitchen and threw a microwaveable meal into the small appliance, setting the time. Once her dinner was cooking, she went back to the front door and dug through her briefcase for her files. Despite having spent half her day with Rainey, or arranging things for him, she'd seen three other patients, two of them new to Briar Ridge. Both were self-admitted, one for depression and an attempted suicide, and the other for extreme obsessive-compulsive disorder. She thought Nate – the man with ob-com – might be able to go home in a few weeks, but Shirley was going to take a bit more time.
Bringing these files to the table, Carly fetched her laptop from the desk in her small den, then got her dinner. Taking a seat, she typed up transcripts of her talks with the two new patients, and listened to her recording of a session with a patient who'd been admitted, but was now just receiving therapy once every five days.
By the time she'd finished her meal, had dessert, and drunk her first cup of coffee, she was ready to move on to Rainey. It was a habit of hers to get the smaller tasks out of the way so she could focus on the tough patients. And she had the feeling that Rainey was going to be a puzzle.
Stretching, she got up from the table and went to pour herself another cup of coffee. Her limit for the night was three cups, and she intended on drinking all of them. Since she'd stopped drinking, she'd become a bit of a caffeine hound, but she decided that was better than becoming a chain smoker.
Settling back down, Carly started by taking a closer look at Rainey's records. Graduated from Bates college, majored in creative writing. Married for ten years, holding down a steady job for part of that time, then writing full-time the rest. Works included The Organ-Grinder's Boy, The Delacourt Family, and another half a dozen-short and long form stories. The most notable of the short stories – there was even a Xerox of the it in the file – was one called 'Sowing Season.' The story that had managed to send Rainey to Briar Ridge.
Mrs. Amy Rainey, the ex-wife of the interred, states that Mr. Mort Rainey suffered a minor nervous breakdown sometime in 1996. Though eventually proved false, there were some allegations of plagiarism surrounding the circumstances of his breakdown. . . . The rest of the report was cut and dried, and bored Carly to death. Her colleagues said she de-humanized people in order to treat them. Her opinion was, how could she not when she had to read these three page condensed manifests of what had once been someone's life.
Turning the page, Carly looked over the visitor record that she'd had the third-floor office print off for her. It listed everyone who entered the ward to visit the patients, and she had pages covering the eight-month span that Rainey had been at Briar Ridge. Picking up a highlighter, Carly went through and highlighted every visitation he'd received, coming up with some interesting results. For the first five months, there were records of regular visits by Rainey's ex. They drastically dropped off a little over two months ago. She penned herself a note: Why the change? Was it because Rainey's mental state had deteriorated, or something else? Or had Mrs. Rainey simply wanted to move on with her life? Ask Leo to find address, she wrote to herself. If time permitted and circumstances called for it, she'd try to visit with Mrs. Rainey. Any insights could be helpful.
What I need to find out is – She jumped as Bast jumped up onto the table with a quiet meow. "What? Am I ignoring the cat?" Carly reached over and started to scratch her pet's ears. "You're getting spoiled, you know that? You're not supposed to be on the table, sweetie." With one hand, she moved the cat back to the floor.
Her train of thought now lost, Carly turned to the next page in Rainey's file. This was the part that she really hadn't wanted to get to. Steve's diagnoses, she thought with a sigh, staring blankly at the page. But first . . . one more cup of coffee. But even that couldn't keep her from this forever. Doctors in her field rare liked to contradict a colleague's findings, especially when working in the same office as that person – but something didn't feel right about this one. Steve had made the most logical connections from the symptoms that had displayed, and in most cases he might be right . . . but she didn't think he was this time. And the State of Maine would be failing Rainey severely if they let the "right answers" blind them.
Reading over the findings and justifications and wherefores and whatnots, Carly became more and more unsure about this diagnoses. Psychotic depression bordering on schizophrenia with a dash of post-traumatic stress disorder thrown in for seasoning. It sounded good. It sounded logical. To most it would sound unsurprising and right . . . but people with psychotic depression didn't go around killing people. Nor did people with schizophrenia. Violence against others is not a symptom of schizophrenia, she thought. If they're violent, it's usually directed towards themselves.
But what could she do? Without talking directly to Rainey, without hearing his account of what had happened that week in Northern Maine, then she had no grounds to refute any of what was written here. None.
So what do I do now? she asked herself as she stared blankly at her computer screen.
It stared blankly back.
Simple. I convince him to talk.
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Disclaimer: Everything created by Stephen King belongs to him. Which includes at this point: Mort, Amy, Briar Ridge, The Organ-Grinder's Boy, The Delacourt Family, and 'Sowing Season.' They're not mine, but I enjoy playing with them.
Author's Thanks: thanks go to . . . . Dawnie-7 (well, that's not how he got treated every day. It was a 'this only happened once, but that's too many' sort of thing. I'm glad you like Carly, she's a bit of a handful that one. : P); Waking Dream (Well, I'm glad you don't see too much of Tess in Carly. They'll eventually end up different people, but the starting point here is much the same as the one in 'More Than Eyes'. And yes, Don Juan does seem to be coloring this story a bit. Carly is a bit like a female Jack. ^_^); SS (I hope you like this chapter, blossom. ^_^); Lip Balm (Well, I don't think I need a can of water quite yet. : P I hope you approve of Mort in this chapter. At the moment he's a hard guy to get a handle on because he's not talking yet. *laughs*); CaptainJackSparrowsGirl (I'm glad you're finding this interesting. Here's Mort, I just hope it was up to your expectations.); iLuV*rAiNeY*daYz (I'm glad that this plot isn't too clichéd yet. I thought it might be, but I like turning clichés on their ears. That's what I did with my first OUATIM story, and I thought I might be able to do the same here. Although, I admit that I haven't read a whole lot of stories in this section yet.); Merrie (Yeah, you keep telling yourself that about Jeffrey. ; ) Don't worry about the other stories. 'More Than Eyes' was coming rather slowly anyway, and there's no way you'd let me avoid writing MTD. Or that I'd want to.); Depp n Em Fanatic (Hey, HF. Why am I not surprised by your name here? *grins* No, not wrong to be thinking of Don Juan during the meeting, because that's what I was thinking of. For a moment, I kept seeing a female version of Jack. *it really wasn't pretty* : P ); Dangerbabe (mentor mine! As for Nurse Ratchet, I knew she's from something, but I've no idea what. Must be before my time. *yes, I'm evil*); smoochies221 (I'm glad that this one is different than other stories. I always strive for a bit of creativity, and I sometimes succeed. ^_^ And yes, poor Mort. I'll have to work on him.); Cayenne Pepper Powder (It'd take a bit to miss an update because there's a looooooong time between them. But I am glad you got the chance to read and review.); Ibi (I'm trying to hurry, I really am. But you know what you get when you hurry the writing process? BAD WRITING. ^_^ I'm glad you liked my OUATIM fics. They're fun, but different than this, so this is a bit of a change of pace for me.); DeppsCoStar (AH! Side-kick mine! I hope you enjoyed this installment, chica.); normal human being (what are you talking about? This was coherent. I'm glad that you've gotten to see SW. Thanks for the warning that Carly is sounding a bit like Tess. I do want to avoid that, because as dear as Tess is, she's got a fic and needs to stay out of this one. Feel free to let me know if you see Carly becoming too much of a clone.)