Mind Over Mind (11 page)

“OK. Drastic measures time.” After another quick swallow of coffee, she went to the freezer and pulled out a bag of frozen vegetables. She pressed it to her face. Joshua noticed there was white tape across it that said: ICE PACK. DO NOT EAT.

Joshua laughed. “I thought my mother was the only person who did that.”

When she spoke, her voice was muffled. “Oh, it’s an old nurse’s trick. Frozen peas make the best ice packs. So, think you’ll be free this Saturday night?”

_*

Saturday night? He was glad that her eyes were covered by her cold pack so that she didn’t see his jaw drop. He took a second to compose himself, hoping she would think he was mentally running over his schedule. When he spoke, he did his best to sound casual. “Sure. Evenings are free. What did you have in mind?”

“I’m having a dinner party at my place. I’ve invited about nine people; you’ll know most of them from here. Dress is Newport casual: slacks, nice shirt, but not too fancy. It’ll start at 6:30, with dinner at 7. Want to come?” She turned to put away the peas, which gave him a chance again to compose himself before answering.

“I’d love to. Should I bring anything?”

She sat down again and took a long sip of cappuccino. “No food. I love to cook big, fancy meals. I used to help out in my father’s restaurant before I started med school. However, all my guests must provide the evening’s entertainment.”

“O-ho. Sing for my supper?”

“You’ve got it, although we’ve had a lot of different things: board games, comedy. Dr. Malachai will probably do magic tricks. He’s actually pretty good. Do I look better now?”

“Mm-hm.”

“Hope so. I’ve got to get back. I’ll e-mail directions to you tonight. Thanks for the coffee. And…” She set her hand on his. “Thanks.”

_*

“I thought I might find you out here,” Sachiko said as she came up behind Ydrel. Her shift had just ended, and she’d gone to check on the young client before she went home. Finding his empty room, she’d headed for the inner courtyard, where she knew she’d find him reclined on one of the lounges, brooding at the stars. She took a seat next to his. “You OK?”

He shrugged. “Yeah. I guess. My head hurts, still. Sach—is it...OK…to wish that, that—”

“That he’d die? I don’t know. It is, and it isn’t. It’s not fair that he should suffer.”

Ydrel spoke in a whisper. “We hurt so bad. It’s not anything you can drug him against, either. I can’t shield myself. I’m not sure I want to. If I did, he’d be hurting and alone.”

“You’ve been a good friend,” was her only reply. She hadn’t doubted his psychic powers for years, since the night he’d caught her in the supply room stealing medicines with the intention of killing herself.

_*

She’d been on the midnight shift then, and everyone had been asleep. Even her coworker was nodding off at the desk. Ydrel had been awakened by her acute anguish and had run to the usually locked room where they kept the medicines, where he’d found her mixing herself a deadly poison, pulling a little of several narcotics so that the loss hopefully wouldn’t be noticed until it was too late. He’d known exactly what she’d been thinking:
Not that anyone notices what I do, anyway
. For two years, she’d been carrying on an affair with the chief psychiatrist and no one had noticed, much to Malachai’s satisfaction. Last month, when morning sickness sent her running to the head at four o’clock in the morning faithfully for two weeks, no one noticed. No one noticed anything unusual in her sudden absence, nor in her change in demeanor when she returned to work; they were all content to attribute it to the “flu” Dr. Malachai had mentioned she was getting over.

“I noticed,” he’d said, and she whirled, nearly knocking down the cart with its many bottles.

“Ydrel, you shouldn’t be here.” She had tried to sound stern.

“Neither should you,” he’d responded, and bit back a sob. “Sachiko, I’m sorry! I know what a manipulative monster Malachai can be, and I didn’t say anything. I was, I don’t know, scared. I swear, I didn’t think he’d talk you into—” He couldn’t say it. He looked at her stomach instead.

“What are you talking about?” she whispered.

“I’m sure you’ll make the best decision for yourself,” Ydrel said, in a perfect imitation of Randall’s voice. “I do love you, Sachiko dear, although I think it’s in our best interests that this not happen at this point of our relationship.”

Sachiko slid to the floor.

“Sachiko!” He knelt in front of her and took her hands.

“He dumped me,” she whispered. “He took me to the clinic.” She laughed a bitter, angry laugh. “He took me to the clinic, and then his mother called and he left. He spent the whole weekend with her in Boston. Called me once. Told me I had acted responsibly, and if I could take my shift Monday night, he’d arrange for someone else to finish the week. Like it was a big favor.”

He felt the bile rising in her throat as if it were his own. Her self-hate bombarded his senses until he was dizzy. Her words swam in his mind:
stupid, worthless—

“No, you’re not!” Ydrel cried. “You’re wonderful and compassionate and the best thing that’s happened to this place in a long time! I trusted him, too, Sachiko. I’m psychic, and I believed his lies! And he’s just doing the same thing again, manipulating you, trying to make you leave. You’re not useful to him, so he wants to get rid of you—just like he’ll try to get rid of me if I ever stop being useful to him. Please, please don’t let him win. You’re too good a person, and you’ve done so much for us here. You have no idea what that orderly Roger used to do to us before you took over the shift. And you always take time for us, and you always know what to do. And—and you’re my friend. The only one I’ve got in this whole damn place.” He bowed his head and sobbed openly. “I’m so sorry I didn’t warn you. I was stupid, scared of Malachai. Please don’t kill yourself. If you do, I will, too, I swear. I can’t live knowing you’d— it’d be like I killed you.”

“Stop it. This isn’t your fault.”

“Maybe not.” He looked up again. She stared past his head, and he sat up so that she had to look him in the eye. “Maybe not all of it. But it’s not all your fault either. Don’t let him make you believe that.”

“But I—” she started, and hadn’t been able to make herself finish. Then the tears had come, and they’d leaned into each other and cried together.

Between sobs, he promised to use his abilities to protect her. And he had. And he would.

_*

“You know,” Ydrel ventured suddenly, “you should tell Joshua.”

“You’ve lost me. Tell Joshua what?” The “I-don’t-believe-this” tone of her voice said she knew quite well what he was saying. Still, he answered.

“Everything. What you’re feeling. What happened before. Everything.”

“And just what am I feeling?”

She knew as well as he did, and knew he knew. He sidestepped the issue. “I trust him, Sachiko.” And he laughed. “I haven’t trusted anybody except you since, I don’t know, since before my mom died, I guess. Except Malachai, of course, but that was blind trust, and I learned my lesson. It took a year to truly trust even you. And here’s this teenage intern who only half-believes I’m not some deeply disturbed person, and I trust him right off the bat.”

“He has that effect on people, doesn’t he?”

He could feel as well as hear her mind’s suspicions vying with her heart’s desires. He decided to tip the balance. “Sach, he’s not like Malachai. I could never read Malachai. I don’t think anyone can. So I took him at face value, like an idiot.”

“You weren’t an idiot. You were desperate for help, and he was offering.”

He waved the reassurance away. “It doesn’t matter. The point is, I can read Josh.
Have
read Josh. He’s genuine. He says what he means and believes what he says.”

When she didn’t reply immediately, he knew he’d won his point. Finally, she stood up. When she spoke, it was with annoyance, but he could see her smile in the dim light from the windows. “How’d we get on this tangent, anyway? I’m 29 and he’s just a kid, and even if I was thinking about it, I’m trying to get my medical degree in my off time. I don’t have time for this. Put your match-making away and let’s get you tucked in,
capice
?”

Italian. She hardly ever spoke Italian anymore. He bit back his smile. “Yes, ma’am.”

CHAPTER 15

“Well,” Joshua said as he handed Ydrel back his graded practice test, “I don’t think you’ll be having any trouble with the GED.”

It was Friday, and that morning, Ydrel had announced that he’d read the GED book and, if that was all there was to it, he was ready for the test today. So Joshua arranged for someone to monitor him—Floyd volunteered—while he took a timed practice test. A little more than half the allotted time later, Floyd had quietly called Joshua out of another group session (much to Joshua’s relief) to show him the test. “I don’t think he got one wrong,” the orderly commented, and he’d been right.

Ydrel snorted and leaned back in his chair, a smug smile across his lips. They were in his room; Joshua was seated at the clean desk, and Ydrel was in the comfortable sitting chair, his back to the door. “How hard can it be with a photographic memory?”

“Photographic memory, eh? You didn’t happen to look at the answer keys, just by accident?” Ydrel didn’t answer and Joshua purposely didn’t look at the young man’s face. “Anyway, I’ll bring a couple more tests on Monday for you to try. The practice never hurts. In the meantime, rack your brains and write down everything you’ve ever learned, or projects you’ve ever done, like your art. Books you’ve read, stuff like that. We’ll put it into a transcript/résumé you can use for college applications or job hunting. How are you at writing? Real writing, reports and such, I mean.”

Ydrel thought for a moment, then smiled in bemusement. “I don’t know. I haven’t really written anything since I was…14, maybe? Wow. I used to write long letters to my Aunt Kate, but I stopped
that
pretty fast.”

“Really? How come?”

“Oh, I found out the psychs were reading them and putting copies in my file for further analysis. So much for privacy, eh?” Although, he spoke lightly, the young client’s eyes were dark with anger.

Joshua couldn’t help agreeing. “Man, that stinks. Let’s start with something easy, then.” He scanned the books Ydrel had lined up on the shelf and pulled down a thick hardback with a yellow cover and a Greek-sounding name:
The Landmark Thucydides
. He was taking History of Ancient Greece in the fall; might as well let Ydrel help him get a head start. He scanned the back cover and asked, “Finished this one yet?”

“I had some extra time this week.”

“Smart aleck.”
The Peloponnesian War. That was mentioned in the class summary. Score one for Joshaham!
“OK, then, give me an 8-page summary by Tuesday.”

“What?! Are you cr—kidding?”

“Crazy. The word you are reaching for is ‘crazy.’ And, no, I’m serious. College profs just love eight-page papers. Don’t ask me why. It’s probably closer to sixteen longhand, unless you want to use a typewriter, double-spaced. Obviously, you summarize the main points, leave out a lot of detail—”

“The text’s 554 pages long!”

“Well, see there, Mr. Photographic-Memory? There’s one detail you can leave out. Unless, of course, you think it’s germane, like ‘This was 554 pages of the most painfully narrated—’”

“Forget it. You can’t expect me to condense the whole book into a few pages.”

“Why not? The editors did it in one.” Joshua held up the book jacket.

“Who cares?” Ydrel flared. “Playing school and writing stupid book reports isn’t going to get me out of here, so why bother?”

Joshua sighed and laid the book down with great care. Then he turned to face the angry boy. Keeping half an eye toward the door, he looked at Ydrel and spoke in low, serious tones. “Now, you listen to me. I came here to learn and practice psychology, not to play best-friend-nursemaid-teacher to some spoiled patient who just happens to be close to my age. I’m putting in a lot of extra hours at night so I can devote a good percentage of my day to you, and in my off-time, I’m finding you books and materials I think you need to make it on the outside. I’m offering to build you a transcript and portfolio you can use for college or career—and believe me, that’s no easy task.”

Ydrel gaped at him. Good. He had his attention. He pressed on, one hand on his hip, using the fact that he was standing to look down at Ydrel without looming. Dominant, but not aggressive.

“Edith didn’t ask me to do this, you know. I’m not sure what she had in mind, but I’d guess it was more like being a sympathetic ear or playing catch or something, and I’d say you’ve had plenty of that.”

“Hey!” Ydrel protested, but Joshua wasn’t about to give him a chance to say more. He held up his hand in the classic “stop” signal, and Ydrel pressed his lips together.

“You want to get out of here? Fine. It’s time to stop whining and start working. Dr. Malachai is not the only person in charge of your fate. There are at least four psychiatrists involved in your case to some degree. There’s the support staff. What about your aunt and uncle? They pay the bills; they can arrange for your release or transfer anytime. Are you telling me that Dr. Malachai can overrule all of them, all the time and in concert? Then maybe you ought to think again about your paranoia. I meant it when I said that no one needs to convince people you’re nuts; you do a fine job of that on your own.”

Joshua watched as Ydrel slouched and pulled his knees up—chagrined, sure, but Josh figured he’d felt like this before. Hadn’t changed his behavior, though.

 Joshua crossed his arms and put his weight on one leg. He gestured with an open palm, however. Skeptical, but willing to give Ydrel another chance. “If you want people to believe you can cope out in the real world, then you need to act responsibly in here. I can help you with that. But if you want to treat this like some game, that’s fine, too. Gnaw my ear off with your gripes while we play Disc Golf three times a week. That’ll make you happy, that’ll meet Edith’s criteria, and that’ll free up a lot of time I can devote to my studies and to patients who are serious about healing themselves.”