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Gods & Dragons Book Preview: Part Two!

For the first part of the Gods & Dragons preview, click HERE.

Part Two

They strapped me to a gurney. Danny and Darryl walked alongside me. Some unknown person pushed me from behind. I looked up at Darryl.

“I know this is an illegal mechanical restraint.”

Darryl shook his head, “Don’t come at me again, bro.”

“You wait, Darryl. I’m talking to your supervisor, and then a lawyer. You may have just paid for my college.”

“You don’t know how often I hear that, bro.”

His confidence cowed me, and wisdom demanded my silence. We boarded an elevator, and we were in there for awhile. Then we were in a hallway. Fluorescent lights beamed down from yellow cells spaced evenly along the ceiling tiles. I shut my eyes against the slant of their flickering brightness.

Darryl made a call. He told them everything, the way he needed to tell it. He covered his ass.

They took my wallet. They took my keys. They took my phone. They took my belt. They took my shoes. They shoved papers in front of me. I read them. I read them again. I saw the sheet with its seven layers of multi-colored carbon copy.

“Do you know what an illegal mechanical restraint is?” I asked. Darryl and Danny both placed hands on my shoulders and squeezed. It was as if they knew exactly when the bruising would start, and stopped just short.

“Please sign the form, Byron.”

“Do you know what an illegal mechanical restraint is?” I asked again. I rose from my seat.

It hurt. And at the end, I couldn’t move.

They told me they acted unilaterally. My suicidal and homicidal declarations in combination with my aggression toward clinic staff forced them to keep me for the night. They placed me in the first tier of their psych ward, called the stress center. I shared a room with a classmate from high school. I feigned non-recognition.

I sat alone. Adrenaline coursed through my body, overriding my sleep starvation. I felt a power in my hand. I looked down at my palms. They dripped with sweat. I yearned for a fight, so long as it wasn’t with Darryl or Danny.

I breathed in, and I breathed out. I tried to force the murder from my mind. Then the Little Whisper returned. Now, more than before, I welcomed its counsel. The moment I was out of this place, I’d find a high ledge and jump. It was the best way to show these assholes.

Darryl and Danny entered. They brought a lady with them. She told me it was time for medicine. I refused. Darryl loomed over me and made threats, each one punctuated with a bitter dose of “bro,” but I didn’t listen. After a while, they left.

I clenched my fist and grinned. But then the door swung open. Darryl and Danny stood at the entrance. Darryl held a paper cup in one hand, and a pill in the other.

It hurt. I couldn’t move. They pushed. They made their threats. But they couldn’t make me swallow. I’d grown wise that they couldn’t bruise me. So I endured them squeezing my jaw to open my mouth, because I knew they couldn’t break the bones. And I endured them plugging my nose, because I knew they couldn’t suffocate me. I endured them putting ice on my neck, because that was just pitiful.

I suspected that not even this ward could get away with using a hypodermic needle. After an hour, they gave up. Darryl and Danny stood, covered in sweat. They cursed and left me alone.

But I didn’t sit still this time. I followed them into the hall. I padded just behind their backs until they reached the nurse’s station.

“He threatened to kill us,” Darryl reported.

“I noticed some SIB, so we better keep an eye out for that,” Danny followed.

SIB, I knew what that meant; it was a common issue in my work. It stood for Self Injurious Behavior. Clients with SIB would often smack themselves or bite their own wrists. It was a good excuse for finding bruises.

I cleared my throat. “I’d like to call my father, please.”

Darryl and Danny jumped at the sound of my voice. They both glared. “You earn phone calls through good behavior, bro. You haven’t had good behavior.”

“What do I have to do?”

“You start by taking your medicine.”

“I haven’t seen a doctor. I don’t have any prescription. You don’t know if I’m allergic to that medication.”

“On your forms, it says you don’t have any allergies.”

“I didn’t sign any forms.”

“Yes you did, bro, we got two witnesses.”

Of course. Anyone bold enough to ignore restraint rules wouldn’t have an issue with signatures mucking up their work. “One question, do you have cameras in this ward? If you do, could someone review tape from the past hour in the room you assigned me?”

“Sorry, bro. We don’t film med passes, for our patients’ privacy.”

Of course. “What about that camera?” I pointed at the monitor above the nurses’ station. It looked down the main hallway. “Do you ever turn that one off?”

They didn’t answer. A bead of sweat dribbled down Darryl’s cheek. He crossed his arms. I thought it was the posture of a man who knew he’d gone too far. If I hadn’t felt trampled by this guy, I’d have been having fun. Just to unnerve Darryl, I cracked a smile.

I spent the rest of the day in the arc of that one camera. They didn’t bother me. I knew they couldn’t keep me in this place forever. Eventually, Darryl and Danny had to go home. Then I would talk to their replacements. They would give me a phone call. I would tell father everything, and he would come and demand justice for me.

An intercom crackled, “Byron, please come to the interview room to meet with Dr. Griffin.”

This would be good. I’d talk with a doctor, tell him what happened. He would do what’s right. And then I’ll get out of here.

I went to the interview room. A bald man with a ski-slope for a nose and black rimmed glasses sat at a plastic folding table. Sitting next to him in the corner was a young woman. She smiled, but I felt a frown crease my face. I thought she was a little young for a nurse.

The doctor stood and extended his hand. “Ah, Byron! Come in and have a seat. I’m Dr. Griffin, and this is Lisa. She’s here for observation.”

“So you’re a student? What year are you?” I asked.

Before the woman could answer, Griffin cut her off.            “That’s not what we’re here for. You are here because you aggressed against staff. In addition, your coworkers reported suicidal and homicidal thoughts and desires.”

“Doctor, before we continue, I want to know what year she is.”

“Again, that’s not what we’re here for, Byron. You need to—”

“—What year are you?” I demanded.

“Don’t answer that question,” Griffin commanded, “Don’t encourage this behavior, Lisa. In these situations it is important to show the patient—”

“—Doctor, what do you know about patients’ rights?”

Griffin’s eyes beamed through his thick glasses. They seemed to magnify his glare like a sunbeam on an ant.

“What year are you?” I asked again. Lisa glanced at the doctor. Griffin raised his palms upward.

“I’m a junior,” she replied.

“A junior—in pre-med?”

“No, at Bloomington North.” She wasn’t out of high school.

“Doctor, I’m sorry. I don’t want to talk while she’s here.”

Griffin pouted his lips and narrowed his eye lids. Then he put his hands together in front of himself, as if praying. He took off his glasses with a fluid swipe of one hand. “No, she’s going to take care of people when she’s older. It wouldn’t be fair to future patients if we denied her this invaluable experience.” He leaned over the table. “You don’t want to hurt sick people like that, do you?”

I left the room.

Had I wandered into a new world, one where Griffin dictated a new set of laws based on his whims? I shook my head and cussed and spit and railed. If I wasn’t crazy when I came to this hospital, dammit I would be by the time I got out. I banged my head against a window. I shook my brow against the reinforced glass and felt it wobble. Then I looked up.

Darryl and Danny were in the room. They brought a wheelchair.

It hurt, and at the end I couldn’t move.

Griffin made a call. He did what he wanted to, like he knew he could.

They wheeled me through a hallway within the psych ward, past a secondary ward reserved for more high-risk clients, and into the tertiary ward called the “crisis center.” It’s where they put people they considered imminent dangers to themselves and others.

They took my shirt. They took my trousers. They took my socks. They took my underwear.

They shoved a set of green scrubs into my arms and commanded me to wear them. They pushed me into a white room. The only furnishing was a window and a bed. A camera roosted ub an upper corner like a barn owl.

A woman screamed.

My body ached from all the fighting and the angry chemicals that burned beneath my skin. Darryl told me to “calm down” before dinner. So I tried. And I waited. I sat on the bed in that white room, and the camera watched me with its unblinking eye.

The screaming woman worked hard to get out of her room; I could tell through the rise and fall of her shrieks. They couldn’t stop her. The doors had no locks or latches. At least they couldn’t get away with violating that law, I thought to myself.

Dinner came wrapped in aluminum foil on a plastic tray. I didn’t eat it. I felt like I would puke. And that woman kept screaming. She said something like, “Jesus! Jesus! Jesus is coming for you!”

The doctor came to mind. I thought about the thousands who had come in and out of this psych ward under his care. Every one of them would have their own story. Some of them would be violent. Others would be helpless. Could he know all of them?

Would I take time to know all those people?

Darryl and Danny probably told him I was violent, that I refused medication, and had to be mechanically restrained. I didn’t have the chance to make a first impression, Darryl did it for me. When I entered the room and aggressively defied the doctor in front of an attractive young woman, it would only confirm what Darryl said.

And how would I react, having my authority challenged by a patient like that?

And then, as if by summons, Griffin entered the white room. He carried a notepad and a pen. He towered over me as I lay sullen in the bed. I waited for him to say something.

He just stared at me over his triangular nose. His glasses glinted.

“Do you want to get out of here?” he asked. He clicked his pen and leaned against the white wall.

“Yes.”

“You know, just for the record, I don’t think you belong here. But there are rules, mostly for liability, that must be followed. I can’t let you out of here, like I want to. You’ve got to play the game for a while, follow the rules for a bit. You can’t yell and storm out of an interview without consequences. If you’d sat still, I bet you’d be getting your effects and walking out of this hospital right now. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Good. That’s good. I want to help you, Byron. I do. But you’ve got to help me, too. You’ve got to show me you are ready to follow the rules.” Griffin sauntered from the wall toward the bed. He laid down his pen and notebook near my feet and sat beside my legs. “I know how hard it can be to have no control over your situation. I don’t know how many times I’ve felt I was powerless, like I couldn’t do anything about this or that problem. I want you to know there’s hope. There’s hope for people like us, who don’t know what to do.”

Griffin placed his hand on my knee. He kneaded the flesh beneath my scrubs. A chill rippled down my body. I raised my knees up to my chest. He lifted his hands, as if to show he was unarmed. He smiled. He took off his glasses and set them aside. He leaned so his body touched mine.

“Don’t panic, stay calm. It’s okay. You’re safe here. The camera turns off during doctor-patient interviews. It’s just us here. You don’t have to worry. Darryl and Danny are just outside. They are waiting for my call. I just have to shout, and they’ll be right here. They’ll come in and take care of everything. So you’re safe. Just relax.”

Griffin did what he wanted. He did whatever he wanted. It hurt. At the end, I couldn’t move. I didn’t sleep at all that night.

An hour later, after I moved past the denial, I imagined a dozen ways to murder that man.

I imagined sitting in a tree outside his home, waiting for him to come home one evening. I’d watch his wife and kids prepare for dinner. Then, once he pulled into the driveway, I would knock an arrow into a compound bow, draw it, and aim for his bald head. I’d loose three arrows into his center mass, drop the bow, and walk away.

That was probably my favorite fantasy of the night. The fantasies made me feel powerful, if only for a moment. And I held that power to my breast like a child would hold a teddy bear.

“Jesus! Jesus! Jesus is coming for you!” the woman screamed.

Never before had I wanted to kill someone other than myself. The suicidal urges from the Little Whisper came from a cold and contemplative place. This new homicidal rage swirled and boiled inside my chest like a grease fire. I relived the day over and over as if stuck in a feedback loop.

“There’s a land that is fairer than day!” the woman’s screams turned to song, and her voice moved from the room next door into the hallway. I stared into the white wall separating us. The shift from banshee wailing to soprano caroling drew my attention.

“And by faith we shall see it afar!” She carried on. I didn’t recognize the hymn. I never listened to hymns before, or at least never knew I was listening to them. Maybe two nights without sleep tuned my ears to hear her song, or maybe it was Something Else.

“For our Father waits over the way! To prepare us a dwelling place there!” She walked through the door of the white room. She stood before me, her scrubs phosphorescent in the dark. She raised her arms. I stayed still like a rabbit as I listened to her.

“In the sweet by and by! We shall meet on that beautiful shore! In the sweet by and by! We shall meet on that beautiful shore!”

A night staff entered the white room. A flashlight swung on a loop around his wrist, casting light from one end of the room to the other like a prison searchlight. He chewed at some interrupted midnight meal. He led her out of the white room. “Sorry about this,” he muttered.

A part of me wanted to return to my reverie of violence. Another part of me begged for sleep. A smaller part of me wanted to die.

But some untapped part of my brain forced the woman’s song to return to from near memory. It seemed to soothe aches left behind by the twisting of anger within me, and—and I wanted to hear it again. Murder left my mind. Not only murder, but the little whisper quieted as well. A visceral something grabbed at my innards, longing for something hidden in that song. It came from a primordial place, like the cry for air coursing through a diver holding her breath.

I focused on the words of her song, straining against time to remember. And when I found the tune, I made up lyrics that would work for me. I cried out to the wall of the white room.

“In the land that is fairer today,” I whispered because I needed to believe there was a place that wasn’t like this hospital. “I’ll face what I’ve seen from afar,” I muttered because justice and love seemed a long way over the horizon, and I wanted to see them. “A father watches over my way,” I hummed because I pined for Someone to see my path and keep me from further harm. “To prepare me and dwell with me there,” I whimpered because I ached for that Someone to know me and want me. These words echoed off the walls and returned as if my wailing turned to a harmonizing choir.

“In the sweet by and by, I will meet you there on the other shore, in the sweet by and by, I will meet you there on the other shore.”

And even though my lyrics didn’t make sense, the hymn kept me from my self-damning cycle of internal violence. I’d never given much thought to faith. I’d never believed in a god. But I sang a hymn of my own devising to a god I needed in that moment.

And that’s when I asked for help. I didn’t sleep, but I already said that.