PSYCHOPHILIA: A Disturbing Psychological Thriller (8 page)

5:15
AM I woke up.  Eyes wide.  Awake.  I was cold, and still naked with the only
exception my Triquetra necklace which I never take off.  It was Ishiko’s alarm clock
that I heard, my ears finely tuned to detect the subtlest of sounds now that I
know that the conspirators are creeping around during the night.  I was still disappointed
at my lack of self control the night before, and my nudity was a repulsive
reminder of what I had done to myself.  On top of that, I feel demeaned to know
that my husband chooses to sleep in another bedroom and fuck the maid whilst I
am believed to be asleep.  It is degrading and isolating, a mark on my
character.  Am I so revolting that I cannot be touched?  I always knew he had settled
when it came to me and by rights should have done much better, but to have it
spelt out so clearly with such physical clarity is alarming. 

So
with this siren wailing in my head and the throbbing of the reopened wound that
I have been picking since last night, I make a plan for the day.  It is day
one.  Day one of no longer having to work.  It will take some time I expect to
untrain the muscle memory, break the sleep pattern, feel comfortable in my new
routine.  My body is programmed for certain activities and it has come to
expect certain routines.  I became mechanical, like an alarm clock, buzzing at
specified moments, idle, ticking along at others.  My tissues have been trained
like a gymnast to perform certain tasks, and I know it will take time to
unlearn certain behaviours.  Dr. Abrams taught me that.  It is a marvellous
thing my black box, the control centre which is beyond unlocking or fully
understanding.  And yet still people try. 

When
I first sat down with Dr. Abrams he told me that we use only ten percent of the
brain’s capacity.  At the time this seemed an arbitrary figure, because how
could he possibly know that?  There is no way of measuring the use of the
brain.  It seemed to me just another example of how people crave an
understanding of the indecipherable.  I asked him if I could shoot myself
through the head, taking out at least fifty percent of my brain and still
function.  He said no, and went on to clarify if I was actually planning to do
it, and if I owned or had access to a gun.  I admitted that Gregory had one,
but I told him that I had since decided a gun would in no way help me fulfil my
destiny. 

It
takes only a rudimentary example such as this to demonstrate how the brain
remains elusive.  We comprehend so little of the brains capabilities, and yet
we think we can unlock its patterns and understand its purpose.  People want to
understand themselves, know themselves, a verbalisation of their wish to
understand the brain.  I HAD to go to therapy.  I HAD to try and understand.  So
we sit there, Dr. Abrams and me, him asking the gate keeper to provide the key
and looking surprised when we still haven’t found it.  The brain doesn’t want
to give away its secrets.  So instead we sit in therapy and talk endlessly in
circles as he asks,
but what do you think, what do you feel,
as if it is
possible to really know.  I have sat on chairs with wires sprouting from my
head like the roots of a tree, branching out, searching for a life source, as
people recorded the scribbles of my brain, a hieroglyph of a language still
virtually unfathomable to man. 

After
dressing and washing and mouth rinsing and worrying about the wound on my head
that is still throbbing no matter how much I make it bleed, I walk down the
stairs and see that it is still perfectly dark outside, with no visible street
lamp blurring the moment between night and day.   I pull on my trainers, and dress
in a waterproof jacket from the cupboard.  Realising I have forgotten my watch
I walk back upstairs and grab it, attaching it to my wrist.  I can hear Ishiko
in the kitchen, and the whistle of the kettle as it boils.  She is expecting to
provide me with tea and for me to sit in silence and drink it without milk or
sugar.  But I promised her that things would change around here.  How dare she
presume to know what to expect.  I pull on new leather gloves.  Besides the
door handle, I touch nothing.

I
swing my arms back and forth, and feel the blood racing to my fingertips and it
eases the throbbing in my head.  The frost is thick and the trees white with
winter.  I reach the end of the private drive and contemplate left or right.  
Both directions lead towards the lake in some way or another.  It may as well
surround me.  I choose right towards town, and follow the main road up past the
jetty where I had been seen yesterday and keep my head low, as if blinkered, seeing
only the pavement beneath my feet.  I pass the coffee shop which is dark and
shuttered.  I can still hear the movement of the water as it touches the banks
of the lake, the boats rocking, the trees rustling as if they are calling to me. 
There are no cars and I haven’t seen another soul.  I make good progress along
the main road as it passes up through the town but I divert left, and before
long I have passed the car parks and petrol stations that mark the borders of
humanity and I am treading the steps of an adventurer, away from the crowd and
into peace. 

After
only a few more steps, I feel the waves of nausea creeping over me, beginning to
bubble in my stomach.  Without warning I double over and clutch at the nearest wall,
dirtying my gloves.  I wretch, bringing up bile and fluids.  The taste is foul,
digested food, saliva pouring into my mouth as I breathe heavily and spit it
out.  I want to wipe my mouth for I am certain that there must be a splash of
the vomit on my cheek, or at the very least, my lip.  But I cannot because I
have failed to bring my bag with the cleaning wipes, and my gloves have just
touched the wall and who knows what is growing on there.  I bring my hands back
and forth towards my face trying to find the courage to touch my dirty lips but
I cannot, so instead I hold back the tears and follow my footsteps back towards
the town, not stopping or turning once.  I arrive at the private road at 7:05
AM still trying not to cry, my head down and arms outstretched.  As I climb our
private driveway I see Marianne leaving for the day, her lights blinding me
because she has them on full beam.

“Ah,
sorry Charlotte, I nearly didn’t see you there.”

She
has slowed to a stop and she is calling out through an open window.  I glance
up enough to see her breath fogging in the car but I cannot speak, and instead
I manage a wave and a half smile.  There is dirt on my gloves and vomit on my
face.  There is dirt on my gloves and vomit on my face.  I pass her  and she is
gone.  I continue until I am near the front door of my home and I see Gregory
at the window, his face pressed up against it like an animal in captivity, his
breath marking the glass, leaving marks that need cleaning.  When he sees me he
starts moving away from the window with a degree of urgency, like a lost child
has been returned.  The front door is open within seconds.  It brings a smile
to my face that he was worried, but it is a smile without the pleasure or depth
of love, which I am no longer sure I am capable of feeling.

“Where
have you been?” His words are edgy, sharp like they have been dropped a few
times, the edges splintered away leaving exposed shards which must be handled
with caution.  He could be angry with me at any minute.  He steps out wearing
his granddad slippers and thick winter dressing gown, and as the light from the
hallway reaches my face he sees my vomit splattered lips.  I wanted to slip
back into the house, unnoticed like dust and wash my face and hands and rinse
my mouth.  I need to rinse my mouth.  I need it like I need blood.

“I
just wanted to walk.  Don’t worry,” I manage.  “I wasn’t near the water,” I
say, raising the subject of the lake so we both understand my acknowledgement of
the truth.  As if I have pressed a button, he looks more relaxed as he hears
what sounds like an answer from a brain aware of the world around it.  His thoughts
are already delving into my head, I can feel them rifling around the fragments
for the truth, always uncertain if that is what I have given him.  I pull off
the gloves and discard them on the steps.  Another ruined pair.  I step past
him and reach for my handbag.

“But
why did you go out so early?” he asks.  Did he hear me leave?  Was he
listening?  Did Ishiko, my slut-maid wake him?  A morning kiss thick with mouth
slime, or a quick roll around in the sweaty sheets with him behind her or over
her or under her or however it was that he craved and instructed her.

“I
wanted to start the day with a fresh, clear mind,” I say with a smile that he
should realise is fake as I clean my mouth with a wet wipe from my handbag.  My
smile is met by his own nervous offering, big and toothy, an aristocratic
smile.  I am aware of my dimples, my pregnancy swollen cheeks, and my pink and
winter-sweaty face.  “I thought it would help me settle in my new routine.”  He
looks confused for a moment, and then disappointed, and I know he is thinking
about the baby.  “It’s my first day of not working,” I remind him and he immediately
perks up.  He is visibly relieved.

“Well
let’s get you inside and warmed up,” he says, closing the door.  I go straight
upstairs and rinse my mouth, wash my hands under very hot water which makes my
skin tingle and they turn as red as emergency flares.  I note that there is a
particularly dry area on the once soft triangle of skin between my thumb and
forefinger that looks like it could split open at any moment.

As
we sit eating breakfast together I am uncertain if I am pleased by his response
this morning, or if I find it distasteful.  After spending the night alone, I
did consider that I might be justified to expect an explanation.  Man and Wife
are expected to sleep in the same bed, and any deviation to this fact is, I
feel, a basis for discussion.  Perhaps Ishiko has told him that I saw her last
night and he feels a degree of embarrassment or confusion regarding the subject
and doesn’t know how to raise it. Perhaps he feels this arrangement is
appropriate and doesn’t require discussion.  But if we are to move forward, if
we are to survive, something must be said.  I cannot spend every night alone. 
I am pregnant.  Perhaps I will need something in the night when I am fat and
swollen and unable to move.  There may be urgent calls for which a man, a man
responsible for the situation, is required to attend.  So I raise it myself.

“I
was a little surprised that you did not return to the bedroom last night.”  He
stops eating, his spoon held mid air and dribbling milk splatters into his
bowl, spraying him.  He notices they have landed on his dressing gown and he
wipes them off, grimacing.  “I waited for you.  I was expecting you.”  I could almost
feel sorry for him as I watch him quickly hashing an explanation together, his
eyes darting left and right  as his brain sparks like firecrackers at
Christmas.  But I am no longer able to feel sympathy for this man.  He should
have thought of an explanation in advance.  To wait until this moment is
disrespectful.

“I
thought you would be tired at the end of a long day yesterday.  The meal, the
chores, the house showing.”  He smiles, but the hope he had placed in his
feeble attempt to explain himself is already fading.

“The
pregnancy.  The argument.”

“Yes,”
he witters, his head dropping.  “And the pregnancy.”  His smile has
disappeared.  “Obviously I was wrong.  I will sleep alongside you tonight.”  It
couldn’t sound any more like an arrangement, a task or something to endure. 
Not with me, not next to me, not on top of me, or inside me.  Alongside me. 
There but separate.  Near me but without contact.  Ishiko comes in and so I
smile as wide as a summer sky as if he has pleased me.  He looks concerned as I
let out a breathy little giggle.  I consider what satisfaction I would take
from taking my juice glass and smashing off the edge of it before ploughing what’s
left through the skin of her neck from one side to the next. 

“I
will look forward to it,” I say, still staring at her neck.  “You can cuddle me
to sleep like you always have done.”  I cannot remember ever being cuddled to
sleep, and neither would I want to be; for it would risk waking up in the jet
stream of his morning breath.  I can see him fiddling around in my head again
wondering what on earth I am talking about.  “Ishiko, leave us please,” I
say.    She places the coffee pot down and scuttles away, neck intact.  He
looked at her as she left, just a fleeting glance behind me, but it made me
wonder, because without turning I couldn’t possibly know, if it was because she
looked back at him for an explanation.

“Is
everything alright?” he whispers as he places his spoon back into the bowl, his
hands resting onto the table.

“I
am fine, Gregory.  I was just teasing, so that you know I missed you. 
Yesterday, when you touched me, I thought we might,” I feel embarrassed to say
it, “be together.”

“I’m
sorry about that yesterday,” he says, wiping his mouth in a way that makes me
think that breakfast is over, and therefore the end of conversation has arrived. 
“It was highly unexpected of me.”  He speaks as if some random intruder got
hold of his body, took over his thoughts like a possession by a poltergeist. 

“But
I don’t want you to be sorry,” I say as I reach out and take hold of his forearm. 
“I want you to want me.”  Pitiful.  I have become pitiful. 

“I
do want you, Charlotte.  I do.”  He removes my hand from his arm, peeling back my
fingers to reveal nothing between us.  “But,” he pauses, “we are both aware
that things have been difficult.  I don’t know what you are thinking half the
time, and the other half of the time I do know what you are thinking and I
don’t know what to do about it.”  He spluttered his words out quickly, fast
like a speed train, lest they should disappear from his tongue along with his
courage.