But Inside I'm Screaming

Fifty-Eight

“Isabel?”

“Yeah?”

“It’s Kristen. Sorry to wake you up in the middle of the night. It’s just that there’s only one pay phone here and there’s always a line for it.”

“What’s up?” At the sound of Kristen’s voice Isabel goes from groggy to wide awake. “Are you still at Bellevue?”

“Yeah. Isabel, you’ve got to get me out of here. Please? Please help me get out of here….”

“Kristen, I have no idea how to get you out of there. In case you forgot, I’m in a mental hospital, too. Did you call your doctor yesterday?”

“Yeah, and he wouldn’t do anything. He said he’d handle it and I haven’t heard word one from him. Listen, I can’t talk long,” Kristen whispers urgently into the phone. Isabel pictures her cupping her hand over the mouthpiece. “They’re making me participate in a medication experiment. I don’t have time to explain but I want you to know if anything happens to me, that I’m doing this against my will. Got it?”

“Kristen, what are you talking about?”

“I’ve got to go in a second. Someone’s standing right behind me trying to hear what I’m saying. You’re a reporter, you can do something about this. They use us for medical experiments against our will. I’m telling you, Isabel, this is a huge operation. My doctor said he was going to try to get me out of here but he hasn’t called me back and frankly I think he’s in on it, to be honest with you. Please help me. Please get me out of here.”

Why me?

“Kristen, isn’t there anyone else you could call? What about your parents? Can’t you call them?”

“No! They don’t know where I am and I want to keep it that way!”

“Why?”

“I’ve always been an albatross around their necks,” Kristen says in a disgusted tone. “They wouldn’t hesitate to write me off for medical experimentation if they thought it would get rid of me once and for all.”

Isabel is tired and knows there is no reasoning with paranoia. “I’ve got to go.”

“Okay, I read you. I’m with you. They’re tapping the phones, right? You don’t want them to be able to record this…thanks, Isabel. You’re always one step ahead of me. God! I knew you were the one person who would understand. I’ll call you back later. In the meantime, you’ll do what I told you?”

“What?”

“Work on getting me out of here, remember?”

“Goodbye, Kristen.”

“Bye!”

Isabel hangs up the phone and looks at her watch. Two in the morning. She thinks about staying up and watching television but instead makes her way back to her room and crawls back into her crinkly bed. Her sleep is fitful and unsatisfying.

At daybreak Isabel changes into her running clothes and tiptoes down the hall to the sign-out board. She heads out the door into the warm fall morning. She puts her head down and watches the pavement as she picks up speed.

“Wa-hey there, my friend.” Sure enough, the gardener. “Lovely day we got here!”

Is he ever in a bad mood? Jesus.

“Yeah,” she answers without meeting his eye.

Fifty-Nine

“I need to talk to you about a day pass.” Isabel shifts uncomfortably in her seat. Tell her. Tell her about Kristen.

“Sure,” Dr. Seidler says. “What’s up?”

“I’m getting fired,” Isabel says matter-of-factly. “I set up a meeting so they can go ahead and get it over with.”

“You mentioned they were calling you.” The therapist pauses. “How do you feel about the prospect of meeting with them? Who, exactly, would you be meeting with?”

“Ted Sargent—the head of the news division. He’s the one who’s been gunning for me ever since the Diana thing. I expect someone from Human Resources will be there as well. They don’t know what I’ve been doing on this medical leave so I’m sure they feel like they’ve got to be careful, in case I’m in rehab for a drug problem. Wouldn’t it be against the law for them to fire me if I was in rehab?”

“Yes, if you had a drug or alcohol problem they would have to hold your job for you if you were making a good-faith effort to be clean and sober. But that’s not what we’ve got here, unfortunately, since you’re on contract, and, as you’ve pointed out, your contract just happens to be expiring.”

“So they get rid of me by not renewing. I know, I know. In a way it’ll be a relief. I feel like this pressure’s been building…I’m so ready to prick the balloon.”

“Are you?”

“Yeah. I’ve thought about it and I’ve realized that that job, that life, is not for me. Plus, I don’t want to go back into a work environment that’s not friendly. Everybody’d be gossiping about me… speculating about what happened to me, blah, blah, blah. I’d rather have them do it and get it over with. The rest I can deal with.”

Across the office optimistically filled with colorful southwestern decor, Dr. Seidler smiles at Isabel. She’s been smiling at me a lot lately…she gay or something?

“What?” Isabel shifts again in her seat. “What’re you smiling at?”

“You,” she replies. “I’m smiling because you sound like you’re feeling a bit stronger and, if my instincts are correct, more sure of yourself and what you want—or don’t want—as the case may be. Is that a safe assumption?”

“Yeah, I guess so,” Isabel says. “I do feel stronger. I don’t know what’s changed, but I do feel a little more sure of myself. Maybe being here in the Nut Hut has actually helped me. Go figure.”

Dr. Seidler laughs. “Go figure. A lot of patients can’t ever see their way to feeling better. In fact, I’d say that’s true more times than not. Many people don’t take advantage of the help they have access to here so they remain caught in the grip of their illnesses. Of course, many can’t help it—they’ve been ill for so long or have gone without help for so long that a stay here is too little too late. It’s refreshing to see someone like you come along. Someone who is self-reflective and open, for the most part, to receiving help….”

“There’s something I need to tell you. Not about me. About another patient here. I feel bad for not having come forward sooner. Because she’s in trouble.”

“Who?”

“Kristen. Let me start from the beginning…” Isabel tells her doctor everything: about Kristen’s not taking her medication, about Nick the orderly, the bizarre car ride that ended at JFK, about Kristen’s paranoid phone calls from Bellevue…everything.

“I’m glad you told me.” Dr. Seidler is looking up from the yellow legal pad she’d been scribbling notes on. “I’ll take it from here, don’t worry. You did the right thing coming to me about it.

“Switching gears, because our time’s about up. About your day pass. When do you need to go?”

“October second. I’d need to leave in the morning—our meeting’s first thing—and then I’m going to meet with Alex to cap off a warm-and-fuzzy love-fest day. I’ll probably be getting back kind of late.”