Sleeping Beauty (10 page)

I pull away. “I’m okay. Well, mostly.” I sit down and look back over my shoulder through her still-open door. “Are we waiting for Dr. Charmant?”

Wendy becomes fidgety and strange, her voice overly bright. “He should be here shortly. Brendan is, uh, monitoring your case, of course, but I’ve been your attending physician for quite some time now.”

“Oh, uh, okay.”
Strange thing to say
, I think.

“He’s probably still in surgery. An emergency case came in early this morning, a car accident. It should just be a few minutes.”

“That’s okay,” I say. “We don’t have to wait.”

She sits back down behind her desk, the cushion of her office chair making a sound like a long, weary exhale as her bottom compresses it. I giggle.

Wendy smiles. “New chair. It’s like a mood ring. If any of the residents are wondering what I think of their performance, I just sit down and let the chair do the talking.” She flips open my chart. “Okay, let’s see what we’ve got here…”

“Wendy, how long was I in the sleep lab?”

Once again her discomfort becomes palatable. She hems and haws and makes a show of looking through the paperwork. “Let’s see…if I recall correctly, Brendan says he was unable to capture any cataplexy attacks, that you almost immediately entered a long-term episode. At that point I arrived and asked the sleep technician there to stay and monitor you for another twenty-four hours” She shuts the folder. “Then you went home with your brother.”

“And?” I say. “What’s the verdict?”

“Hi, Claire.”

I spin around in my chair. Brendan Charmant walks in, fully garbed in puce green surgical scrubs, a procedure mask hanging casually from his neck. He’s leaning against the doorway, his expression tired and sad.

“Hi…Brendan.” It’s not easy to choke out his first name, but after the whole nighttime babysitting, script-delivery thing–not to mention the fact that it sounds like he’s seen me naked–the formality of “Dr. Charmant” seems a bit absurd. Plus it looks like he’s just lost a patient or something, so I don’t want to pile on to whatever he’s dealing with right at the moment.

He takes a seat in the chair against the wall, and removes the shoe covers from his sneakers. I feel like a voyeur watching him as he slips a Sponge Bob Square Pants surgical cap off his head, but I can’t really help it; his ensemble nails every doctor/uniform fetish a woman could ever have. It’s hard
not
to look. That’s when I feel a sort of
pop!
behind my eyes, like I’m remembering something, maybe a phone conversation I had:

“
What’re you wearing?”

“
Scrubs, same as every day.”

“
Mmm…nice. You sound tired.”

“
I’m exhausted. I’ll be over soon.”

Then it’s over, and I realize Brendan’s watching me stare at him. I jerk my head forward, back to Wendy, disoriented by the…well, I don’t know
what
it was. Not a memory, because I have no conscious memory of it at all.

“So…” I say, trying to act like everything’s normal, “what’s the verdict?”

“Since your twenty-four hours in the sleep lab”–and here I catch a glance of uneasiness pass between them–“we’ve spent a considerable amount of time studying your history, looking through the literature, and consulting with other physicians.”

I look over at Brendan, expecting him to add something, but he’s just staring at me with the same mournful expression, the ridiculous Sponge Bob Square Pants cap in his hands.

And then I get it–the strange looks between them, Brendan’s Droopy the Dog face. “I’m going to die, aren’t I?” I try to say this calmly, as if I’m simply stating a fact, and requesting additional details about my impending demise, but I choke up right around the word “aren’t.” “I’m just going to fall asleep one day and not wake up, right?”

“No.” Brendan pitches forward and reaches for my hand, but yanks it back like he’s hit a force field. He never touches me but I feel it, a kind of vestigial current running between us. He settles back into his chair, his jaw set. “You’re not dying, Claire, I promise you.”

I crinkle my brow, confused.
What happened to this guy’s medical detachment, anyway
?

Wendy clears her throat, interrupting our strange intimacy. “We believe you have a rare disorder called Sleeping Beauty Syndrome.”

The Disney incarnation springs unbidden into my head with all the trademarked images of evil witches, reversible pink and blue ball gowns, and enchanted spinning wheels it can muster up on short notice and old memories.

I look from Wendy to Brendan and back again, then burst out laughing. “Sleeping Beauty…that’s fantastic!” I point at Wendy. “Did you make that up just now? That’s really funny!” I still have a few more hearty guffaws in me before I realize that no one else is laughing. The last of my chuckles trails off like Wendy’s doleful seat cushion: “Hhhhhhhh…”

My face falls. “Wait, what?”

“The medical name is Kleine-Levin Syndrome,” says Wendy. “’KLS’ for short. It usually starts during adolescence, so it’s rare to see it begin in someone your age. Although...” She lifts her chin towards Brendan. “Brendan says the oldest age of onset he found was sixty-five.”

“But why–”

“There’s no known cause,” she says, anticipating my question. “No known triggers, no genetic predispositions have been discovered, your MRIs don’t show any evidence of a brain injury or lesion of any kind, and there is only one case in the literature of it running in families. There’s a possibility it’s an auto-immune disorder.”

“I don’t understand…what is it?”

“Honestly? It’s what’s left after doctors have ruled out brain injury, narcolepsy, depression, hyperthyroidism, diabetes, bipolar disorder, and Klüver–Bucy syndrome.”

I’m so shell-shocked I can’t even feel the chair under my body; it’s like I’m suspended just above the ground in a seated position. “So–I mean–what’s going to happen to me?”

“The good news is that the disorder burns itself out eventually. A person is considered ‘cured’ if they go more than six years without an episode.”

“How long will it take to burn itself out?”

“The median duration is four years.”

“Four
years
?”

Wendy threads her fingers together over my file and nods. “For patients where the onset was after the age of twenty, and who suffer from, ah, certain,
specific
symptoms during their episodes, the duration can be longer.”

I feel my face get hot. “Certain, specific symptoms” can only refer to the embarrassing hypersexuality displays I get to hear about second-hand but never remember. Useless, fat tears fill my eyes and quickly overwhelm my lower lids. “I–can’t–
do
this–for–four years!” I sob, covering my eyes with my hands. “Or even one more day! I’m missing pieces–big pieces–of my life!”

I hear the
swish
of a tissue being pulled from a box, and the sound of a chair being dragged. Brendan pulls one of my hands away from my face and pushes a tissue into it. Before I can protest, his arm is around me, the weight of it bringing a kind of familiar comfort. Without thinking, I let my head fall onto his shoulder and turn on the water-works full-blast.

“I understand, Claire,” says Wendy. “I’m sorry to be bringing this news to you. But there is a possible silver lining.”

I try to dial back my weeping a little so I can hear her.

“Most patients have episodes that last, on average, about twelve days. The good news is that patients with episodes that last longer than average–like yours–seem to experience longer remission periods where they’re symptom-free.”

I think about the nearly fifty days I was, for all intents and purposes, asleep. “What’s the longest an episode could last?”

“The longest episode in the literature was–” she stops and looks at Brendan. “Was it eighty days?” He nods once. “But we believe that we can give you an idea of when the onset of your next episode will be based on the duration and remission times of the others.

“Great,” I say, dabbing my eyes. “When will the next one be? I’ll clear my calendar now.”

Brendan begins rubbing small circles on my back, and that’s when it happens again, some sort of vision, like I’m remembering a scene from a movie:

“
Is that too bright? You want me to turn it off?” A TV turns off with a high-pitched pop. Hands on my back, rubbing my shoulders. “Better?” Fingers sweep my hair aside. Lips on the back of my neck.

Then it’s gone.

“You don’t seem very happy,” says Wendy.

“Oh, sorry,” I say. “I just remembered…it was the weirdest thing.” I swipe my nose with the tissue and shake my head. “Never mind. What were you saying?”

“We think you’ll probably have at least five or six months before the next episode.”

“Well that’s…” My voice trails off because I don’t know what to add. “I guess that really sort of sucks.”

I hear Brendan exhale sharply from his nose, probably the closest he’s ever come to laughing. And then the third one hits me, not a flashback really, but more like the memory of a dream:

“
Don’t you ever smile? I’m not even sure you have teeth.”

“
I’m a ‘smile on the inside’ kinda guy.”

“
You need to work on your outside smile. You’re probably scaring the kids at the hospital.”

“
Fine, I’ll work on my inside voice and my outside smile.”

I sit up, blinking and squinting like I’ve suddenly looked into the sun.

“Everything okay?” Brendan says, his voice worried. “You look pale.”

“I think I’m going to be sick.” I’m not lying, I mean it. I bolt out of the room and down the hallway to the staff bathroom. Luckily, there’s a tall trashcan by the door because I don’t even make it to a stall. I vomit until there’s nothing left, and then dry-heave for a few minutes because, well, why not? Might as well make this the worst day of my life.

When I’m done Wendy’s standing there with a wet paper towel and a plastic cup of water. “What did you eat today?”she says, leading me to the sink.

I rinse my mouth out and spit into the basin. My reflection in the mirror is ghastly. “I wasn’t feeling well this morning. I thought I was just nervous about coming here.”

“I don’t blame you. It’s a lot to take in all at once.” She refills the cup and holds it out to me. I shake my head. She chucks it into the trash can and starts washing her hands.

I glance towards the closed door. “Wendy?”

She looks up from the running water, straight into my mirror reflection.

“What was that all about?” I say.

The automatic faucet times out and she restarts it by pushing the top of it with her forearm. “What was
what
all about?”

“Dr. Charmant–” I stop. “
Brendan
.”

“What about him?”

“Look, I know that for everyone else it’s been seven weeks, but for me I feel like I was just in your office talking to you guys for the first time two days ago.”

“I know. It must be incredibly disorienting.”

“In
my
three days ago, he was still my doctor and you had only stepped in because I thought he was a jerk, and you were scared I was going to run him down with my car.”

She breaks eye contact and pulls a paper towel from the dispenser.

“So…” I don’t know how to put it so I just yammer it out as fast as I can. “So now it’s two days later for
me
and all of a sudden he’s
not
my doctor, and we’re on a first name basis. My brother says he was at my house practically every day beginning two weeks after I left the sleep lab. I get the feeling we’re supposed to be all chummy but I don’t know why.”

“Claire, I don’t like to get involved in the personal lives of my patients or my staff.” I start to protest, but she talks over me. “Brendan asked to be removed as an attending physician on your case the first day you were in the sleep lab. He is
not
your doctor anymore.”

“Why?”

She throws the used paper towel into the trash can. “You’d have to ask him. When he asked to be removed he was speaking to me as his supervisor. I can’t share that information with you.”

“But if he isn’t my doctor anymore, what was he doing in your office just now?”

“It’s important to have emotional support available when you’re receiving a diagnosis like this. Brendan indicated to me that your brother was traveling, and that you were purposely keeping your brother’s partner in the dark about your appointment. He was willing to serve as your emotional support.” She has a hand on the door, ready to pull.

I snort in mock laughter. “Wendy, this is ridiculous! Doesn’t this whole thing seem a little strange to you? Because at minimum it feels like some sort of conflict of interest to me.”

Wendy holds up a hand. “Here’s what I can tell you: I know you guys ran into each other about two weeks after the sleep lab. I know that you started spending a lot of time together, and that he came to your house–with your brother’s permission–to help you during the rest of the seven weeks. I know that you had long–incredibly long–periods of lucidity during that time that everyone agreed you’d never experienced before. Now, forgive me if I’m wrong, but I got the impression that there was something more than a friendship developing.”

My face flushes with outrage. “
What
? He told you that?”

“No,
you
did.”

With that she opens the door and sweeps out.

Chapter Nine

After furnishing me with a toothbrush and toothpaste, my favorite health care provider, Proto Nurse, waits outside the bathroom for me to brush my teeth before herding me out of the clinic. Brendan is standing in the waiting room when I emerge. I don’t know what to say to him so I just start walking towards the elevators. He falls in silently beside me. We’re both pushed to the back of the glass elevator car as it stops at each floor and more people get on.