Figment - Jace Cameron - Страница 46
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Chapter 5 8
Psychiatry, Radcliffe Lunatic Asylum, Oxford
I am lying on my back again. This time I am on a comfortable leather couch. The room's temperature is just about right. The smell of flowers fills the room, which is dimmed except for a faint yellow lamp next to me. I feel tired, but I feel cozy. I think I just woke up from sleeping.
Where am I? Why am I not waking in Einstein's room in Oxford University?
"You realize nothing of what you said makes any sense," a man tells me. I can't see his face, dimmed by a curtain of darkness. I can smell the tobacco from the pipe he is smoking. It has a certain flavor I can't put my hands on. "The Pillar, the Cheshire, The White Queen; you realize they are only characters in a book," he says as the chair he sits on creaks against the parquet floor.
I am too tired to look deeper or stand up. It feels better lying on this couch. Does this place feel familiar? Have I been here before? Why don't I feel the need to resist the man's voice? His voice is soothing, and I like it.
Where am I? Who am I?
"I see you'd prefer silence," the man says. A tinge of pity is lurking in this voice. "Would you like to end this session now?"
My hands are too lazy to move. Was I sedated? Am I being hypnotized? Why is this man saying the Pillar's existence doesn't make sense? Have I not returned to the right time?
"We've reached a great point in your story," the man says. "Usually patients need to let their imagination go wild." He drags from his pipe. What's that flavor he is smoking? "We encourage patients to let their imagination go wild because, however creative, it always goes too wild and hits against the walls of absurdity." He pauses, and I don't feel the need to speak. How can you speak when you're not sure whom you're speaking to? When you don't know who you are. "Absurdity is good for patients. It makes them start to realize they are hallucinating. Because, frankly, some stories can't be believed, even by the most delusional patients. Like the story you just told me about entering Wonderland through Einstein's room in Oxford University, then trying to save this Gorgon from the Queen of Hearts. A man who has his eyes pop out when he sneezes? You don't really believe this. Do you?"
I feel like I have no mouth, and I want to scream. My arms are still numb. I have no idea where I am or who this man is.
"I'd say we stop the session today," the man says, and scribbles something on a paper. The scratching of his pencil is annoying to my ears. "I'll prescribe you a new drug called Lullaby. It will help you let your imagination go even wilder. I need you to stretch your mind as far as you can so you can see and realize how none of this is true. How none of it is but a production of your overactive imagination influenced by a book you read as a child." He pulls the paper out. "I will also tell Waltraud to stop any shock therapy for a while. See you next week?" He sounds like a gentle doctor smiling at me, but I still can't see his face in the dark. "Great." He stands up. I hear footsteps walk out of a nearby door.
I crane my neck to take a look at my numb arms. They aren't numb. Nor is there anything seriously wrong with my arms, except that I am wearing a straitjacket that this time I can't free myself from.
Chapter 59
Alice's cell, Radcliffe Lunatic Asylum, Oxford
Waltraud and Ogier enter the room and help me to a chair. At first I tell them I don't need a wheelchair because I can walk. But then I discover my legs are even number than my arms. I let them wheel me through the corridor underground. Patients are holding their cell bars without saying a word.
Not even Waltraud or Ogier talk to me. They roll me into my cell, which terrifies me when I enter it. Nothing is really different but a mirror stacked on the wall right in front of me.
I shield my eyes and shout, "What is this mirror doing here?"
"Relax," Waltraud says in her German accent. "The mirror won't bite you."
You don't understand," I press my eyelids tighter. "Get it away from here."
"You have to face your fears," Waltraud says. "Doctor's orders."
"I can't," I plead. "Please take it away."
"I can't too," she says. "Your doctor said you have to look in the mirror. Nothing bad will come out it, but he truth. And it's time to face the truth, Alice. You can't keep denying what happened to you. Face your fears and you might be out of here sooner than you think."
"Deny what happened to me?" I have no idea what she is talking about. Then a thought occurs to me and rather changes my mind.
I am mad. Totally bonkers, hallucinating a whole world in my mind. Then I wake up on a couch and a doctor tells me I need to push my imagination to the limit in order to heal. I WANT TO HEAL. Maybe I should push it further and look in the mirror. What do I have to lose? Vomiting or fainting again when seeing the scary rabbit?
I take a deep breath and open my eyes.
Nothing happens—just like in Wonderland. Maybe I am finally cured from my phobia.
The mirror in front me has no rabbit in it. There are only a few dirt stains on its surface and a cobweb on the frame's upper left. But no white rabbit sneering at me.
It doesn't mean I shouldn't panic. In fact, I might cry for hours. Days. Years.
The girl in the mirror in front of me is tied in a straitjacket and sitting on a wheelchair, not because her legs are numb, but because she is paralyzed.
"It happened after your accident," Waltraud says. She looks happy I am finally realizing my dilemma and facing my fears. "You're the only one who survived, but like this." She points her prod at my feet. "See, that's what the doctor meant. Facing your fears. You made up this silly story about a rabbit appearing in the mirror so you wouldn't confront the reality of your paralysis."
My eyes scan the room for my Tiger Lily but it's gone. I feel lonelier, pushed into a dark corner too tight for my size.
"I'd like to be alone," I say, still holding the tears, but not sure for how long.
"I can't object to that. You're a lucky girl. The doctor denied me the satisfaction of your shock therapy for the whole week." She turns to walk away, but then stops and looks at me in the mirror. "But I am sure you will do something stupid and be my slave in the Mush Room again." She laughs and closes the door.
Alone again. I can't stand any of this. Whether it's true or not, I close my eyes and pray to God to get me out of this, even it means to send me back to the insane world I have supposedly imagined. I don't mind to be mad. I don't mind the madness in the world, if only I get up walking again. If this is really my real and sane world, then I am in love with my insane one. Whether I am imagining it or not, I want to be the girl who saves lives. Please, I want to wake up from this.
Chapter 6 0
Pillar's limousine, somewhere on the road back to London
"You're all right, sweetie?" Fabiola's generous smiles lands upon my face and blesses it with safety I have always needed: a rare moment to feel that someone truly cares for you.
I don't reply to her, though. I realize I am in the back of the Pillar's limousine, stretched with my head resting on Fabiola's lap. The first thing I do is stare at my legs. They look all right. But it's not enough. I wiggle my toe. It's all right. But not enough. I bend my knee, and it works. I am not crippled. Then what was all of this? A bad dream? Or am I living in my imagined world right now?
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