by Emma Janson
They were quiet at first, but as they got closer to the dining hall, Ignacio was the first to break the silence as softly as he could. “I must confess, I was in there to do the same thing. Thank you for the gift. Maybe we could help each other in the future.” His attempts to smooth over the literal facts were something to be applauded in case someone overheard.
Maggie didn’t catch the hidden meaning, though. “Listen, I am a married woman who is completely in love…”
He interrupted as soon as he could. “What? No, not sex – I meant I can get you things if you get me money. We could be a team.”
“Stealing is against God. I do this to survive and to eat, and therefore I can be forgiven if I truly mean it in my heart...which I do.” Her worried eyes were sincere as they passed by the many doors and hallways.
“Whatever helps you sleep at night, sister; I just want to save my money for a ring for someone. I believe I am falling in love.”
“You haven’t even been here a week!” Maggie yelled in a whisper through her teeth as she looked around suspiciously. Together, they entered the dining room and then they each picked up a tray while falsely smiling at the servers behind the counter. She felt compelled to ask Ignacio to attend the next Bible study with Mr. Jenkins, but she knew he would decline.
As they selected items to place on their trays, she tried to do something kind to counteract her acts of sin and sinful thoughts in room four. She pulled the ring from her pocket and smashed it into the sweaty palm of his unsuspecting hand. She didn’t want to give it to him, but she could tell that he was serious about the whole ring idea and, really, she just wanted him to leave her alone. The ring was a strange, yet kind gesture just as much as it was a disgusting payoff. She leaned into his space to prevent others from hearing. “It’s big enough to fit a man, so you can get it resized when you get out of here. How are you paying for this place if you can’t afford to buy a ring, though? Scoot down.”
Ignacio took a quick look at the ring before dropping it into the pocket of his fresh jeans and grabbing a side dish of mash potatoes. It was beautiful and simple and perfect. “Well aren’t you nosey? You were going to eat it, weren’t you?” He could not believe how someone could want to eat a non-edible item when he was staring at the fried chicken in front of him, and the cheesecake he would eventually grab at the end of the line and happily consume. Thinking of food had suddenly made him very hungry, so he began putting a little more on his plate than he normally would have. Sadly, the thought of going back to his grandmother’s hoarded house to eat stale items washed over him next. With clarity, conviction, and focus, he said, “I’m declared mentally disabled by the state of New York. I’m sponsored.”
“Well, I’m a pro-bonobo case,” she said smugly, not realizing how incorrectly she was pronouncing the term. Ignacio smirked while she continued. “I don’t have money, either, and now you don’t need money for a ring. No more deals to be made here.”
Maggie began to walk away, feeling very clever, but he grabbed her arm with just enough pressure to stop her in mid-stride. “Don’t make this difficult,” he said. “I’ll never tell anyone about your thievery if you get money for me. You can even watch me send it to my grandmother who’s living in squalor. I swear, it’s for her.” His beautiful brown eyes were earnest, but Maggie saw something beyond his sweet dimples and neatly combed hair that seemed sinister.
“You’ve got the devil in you. Let go of my arm!” she again yelled through her teeth while shaking her arm to free it from his grip. “I don’t know where squalor is, but I’ll do it for the innocent souls you have tortured now and in your future.” Then she waddled away like a pregnant woman, or rather, like a woman with a gun between her legs.
He flipped her off when she wasn’t looking and smiled again when she was.
TRIUMPHANTLY TRAPPED
Clinically, alters and hosts of people who suffer from Disassociative Identity Disorder are normally oblivious of each other. However, Samuel and Mr. Jenkins were something of a classic Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde case – aware. Samuel, the alternate personality of Mr. Jenkins, didn’t see himself as he was: a mid-sixties, bow-legged, church-going piano player. He felt strong and wise and healthy, unlike the image he saw when he looked into any mirror. He repeatedly complained to his girlfriend, Belinda, about ‘that old fucker’ adversely affecting his appearance since they were one and the same. Reflections of the physical form that Mr. Jenkins had dominated for over fifty years were used and tired. The confidence of Samuel felt this reflection should match the lion that roared within. Despite smoking and drinking, Samuel believed he would have been in good shape if he’d been the only personality occupying the one frame. To Belinda, he proclaimed that his host was a pitiful lost cause who wasn’t surprised with the current rental situation. His exact words were much less refined: “This nigga should be thankin’ me for putting some youth back into his soul and gettin’ the spunk out his dick! It’s nigga maintenance.”
To Mr. Jenkins’ credit, he relentlessly tried everything from drugs to exorcisms to free himself from waking up in undignified situations. Though unsuccessful, it never thwarted his desire for freedom. A failure merely meant longer periods of duality while he planned his next attempt. There was no chance of harmony in one body with two distinct personalities. Moreover, beneath their solitary skin, Samuel and Mr. Jenkins were twice as bitter as time moved on.
Their opinions on picking grapes as “alternative therapy” fell right in line with their constant opposition.
According to Mr. Jenkins, harvesting grapes at Northern Lights was one of the most pleasant alternative therapies. He enjoyed being outdoors as everyone busied their hands with the task and looked forward to the guided therapeutic conversations. It opened the doors to releasing the tension in his head.
Samuel felt this “alternative therapy” was really slave labor that doubled as one serious libido killer.
Unfortunately for them both, the season to pick grapes for ice wine fell within the rental space of Samuel.
Just over a month after the Mexican’s arrival, Samuel begrudgingly suited up for the cold weather – all the while cursing the safety vests they were required to wear. He knew it was simply to track everyone. He then followed orderlies, therapists, and Mr. Reed to the appropriate vines. During the block of instruction, Samuel popped a few cold grapes into his mouth to tantalize up some desire for the juicy bursts of chilled perfection. He mumbled under his breath, “Fuck ya’ll. Niggas eat grapes, too.” While darting his eyes over the group, he noticed Maggie Koontz rolling a grape in her own mouth. As she shifted it from one cheek to the other, her cross pendant shimmered, and then she smiled at him. Her smile indicated that she thought his body was occupied by her Bible partner. Just as he was about to destroy her with words, though, he noticed a shiny metal object poking haphazardly from the pocket of her red coat. This alone stopped him. The safety vest had tightened the coat appropriately so that it pushed the foreign object to the top of her pocket for easy viewing. Samuel sidestepped in order identify the object. It pained him to smile back as if her face was a friendly and familiar to one.
Maggie stepped to him and whispered under the cover of Mr. Reed’s briefing. “This is my first time being in a vineyard. I’m excited to be a part of this process, although the end result is wine, but I guess it’s okay because they drank it in the Bible.” She winked. Samuel didn’t give a fuck, but he forced his head to nod in agreement.
He sniffed as his nose began to run, then sniffed again to stifle a barrage of degrading comments that were boiling in his throat. He faked being agreeable while she continued to whisper. Thankfully, she turned for another grape just enough for him to clearly see a gun. He was genuinely shocked, and popped another grape in his mouth like frozen candy. It appeared to be a small vintage metal pistol that was carved and etched at the grip with ornate designs. He tried to bite down on the thawed portion of the grape, but then cursed Mr. Jenkins for the toot
h he needed to fix. He winced and balled his fists up.
How and where had she acquired this item, and why would she have it on her now? Although these questions burned at his brain, he knew that Magpie, dumb as she was, wouldn’t share information with him, Samuel...but if he played nice, softened up his posture, and tried his best to sound easygoing and polite without cursing, she would squeal like a pig. “You know you can’t have that in your muth...pocket,” he whispered in his best reenactment of Mr. Jenkins. Then he added, “The Lord is watching you. Why don’t you give it to me, so you won’t get into trouble?” He swallowed the grape in his mouth and tried to look trustworthy as he sniffed several times. A massive shiver shook him as he inhaled more chilled air. He tried to overcome the cold by standing a little taller, as if this would help.
Maggie thought about his words and bounced her eyes back and forth over his face. Somewhat frightened, she looked up to his average stature. “The cold drains the snot right out don’t it? My ears hurt too do yours? Sure, Mr. Jenkins, I have tissues.” She said just to get closer. Her head dropped low as she whispered, “It’s been a burden. Would you throw it away for me?”
Samuel whispered ‘yes’ as quietly as he could.
Maggie discretely tucked the pistol deeper into her pocket with one finger. Then, unexpectedly, she plunged her hand past the vest and coat into the top of her shirt. The material moved and stretched beyond its intended capacity. Samuel was baffled, but refrained from talking by chewing and rolling more cold grapes around in his mouth. Finally, she pulled three bullets from her bra and held them in the palm of her hand for him to see. Her breath, visible to the eye, blew on them like dragon smoke. They rolled around with her movements before she curled her fingers and shoved her tiny fist into his coat pocket to deposit them without asking permission. She told him that one must have fallen out and asked him to get rid of the bullets that she had been hiding for weeks. Transferring responsibility of the rounds lifted the weight of the world from Maggie’s shoulders. If he had them, she couldn’t eat them.
Samuel fumbled with the bullets for a second and then zipped the pocket for better security. He never looked around to draw suspicion to his actions; instead, he calmly continued pulling grapes from the vines like a professional. Frankly, he was stunned that it had been that easy and didn’t really know what to do with his excitement as he faked being unaffected. His mind, however, became fixated on the pistol still hidden in Maggie’s deep pocket. Plans began to formulate as to how he would obtain it, either through a polite request or violent apprehension. There was something funny about the latter of the two options. His devious thoughts weren’t cut short quickly, as he kept on plucking many cold bundles and moving down the row of grapes like a robot.
Meanwhile, Maggie’s eyes darted over and through each row to scan every person as they talked amongst themselves and put their carefully selected bundles of grapes into their baskets. No one was looking, no one cared, and everyone was popping an occasional grape into their mouths. When Mr. Reed walked past them to move into an untouched section, she made sure he was beyond earshot before asking if Samuel had seen Lydia. If this was her attempt to avoid suspicion, it was a terrible one. What could have been disguised as general concern for another person sounded as if she knew for a fact that something was terribly wrong. Her instincts were usually correct when she became worried, too, and it definitely showed in her face and her hushed tone. Samuel thought for a moment, and then realized that he, too, had not seen the receptionist for a few days. Then Maggie swarmed in with the rumors as if this was the reason she’d brought it up to begin with, and he immediately judged her in a way he was unfamiliar with. Although she claimed to be a fundamental Christian, she sure did a lot of things that were hypocritical and against the Bible – information he’d surely obtained via his host’s brain and not his own.
Maggie grabbed at her cross. “The twins told me Lydia left today because she’s pregnant. Nobody knows if it’s the truth.” she blurted quickly. Her eyes widened and became smug, but she shook her head disapprovingly and pretended to be troubled by this while asking him to pray about it later.
Samuel, forgetting to maintain his cover, giggled when he joked that he wasn’t the daddy. Then he literally bit his tongue to prevent any more identity clues from spilling out. Being yin and yang with his alter had its perks sometimes, and he wanted to preserve it. Maggie giggled, too, as her dainty hand covered her guilty smile. She then placed it on his shoulder before telling him what a good and honest man he was, despite his disorder – which was exactly how she felt about herself. Samuel had a vision of slapping Snow White’s face so hard that it spun her tiny frame to the ground for that comment, but she was a strange asset in so many ways, just as long as he was polite. So, instead, he popped another grape into his mouth and let the icy juice squirt all over the back of his teeth as he bit down through the pain. He sucked in cold snot before asking her how the twins had come upon this information.
“Well, you know how the twins are; they are everywhere. They listen to stuff through their laughter. People assume they are in their own world, but it’s like being a fly on the wall. Ute told me that. She thinks I am dumb, so she thought I wouldn’t know what that meant.” She bent down to put a few bundles of grapes into her basket before jutting upward again to whisper loudly into Samuel’s face. “By the way, I looked up ‘kaput’ on the library computer. It’s German for broke and useless. They think I am kaput Koontz!” She slinked back to the lowest part of the row to pick grapes as if she’d said nothing at all then, making the transition extremely awkward.
Looking down upon her crouched position, he said, “You. I mean, we, can pray about that later, too.” He swallowed his pride and tried to maintain an act of innocence which was literally making him sick to his stomach.
“Oh, you are so thoughtful. Yes, we should, and I should pray about this need to gossip, too, but I’ll tell you one last thing then before God heals me of it...the twins heard it from Lydia, who was not so quietly telling Ignacio that he was the father. They must have, you know, done it right after he got here, because he’s only been here a month! And they call us crazy. Okay, I’m done. Lord give me strength.” She lifted her hands to the sky and then circled them downward into a position of prayer as she shook her head into her delicately connected fingertips. There was an awkward pause, and then she placed some more bundles of grapes into her basket without skipping a beat.
Unable to bend anymore due to a new knee pain, Samuel stood straighter as his eyebrows hit the top of his hairline and he plucked bunches of cold grapes from the upper portion of the row as if he was an android on autopilot. What was unsettling was the thought that Ignacio had sex with her. The thought of them together baffled his brain. Lydia always seemed overly professional to him. In the next random moment, though, he happened to look right down into Maggie Koontz’s beautifully hallowed white face as she placed her boney index finger over her mouth, shushing confirmation of their unified thoughts.
For the first time, Samuel liked this idea of being a “super nigga spy”; it was empowering. He was stuck in this body, but honestly, he was triumphantly trapped.
MAN OF CHANGE
In the first month of being at Northern Lights, Ignacio had done his best to be exceptionally friendly with the staff at the Northern Lights behavioral health-mental facility...or, the wacky shack, as some called it. Ignacio knew it was of utmost importance to maintain good standing with the owners and clients who had permanent homes within its walls. This ensured that he could admit himself again in a few years’ time – according to his plan. He felt the facility was like a borderline resort atmosphere, minus the crazies and the people who were faking it.
Sure, he had made a mistake with the blonde bombshell, but he was a young man – locked, cocked, and ready to rock. He was hardly to blame. He would have dealt with the error in his own way, too, but she’d become metal to a magnet that couldn’t be repelled no matter ho
w hard he tried. Their one-time bedroom rendezvous had put her in a permanent state of horny that she could only satisfy with secret fantasies. Samuel, her boyfriend, had confessed man to man that he almost couldn’t keep up with her recent demands for anal. Ignacio had listened to his tales of sexual woes on the rare occasions when the alternate personality had sought him out. He was just glad that Samuel didn’t know her sexual appetite had originated with him, and that, regrettably, sometimes the smell of strawberries made him hard.
When the bombshell had approached Ignacio thereafter, it had always been for one more secret session. Temptation had been strong in those first few days, too, but there was something about Lydia’s caramel complexion and unique style that he desired over any physical orgasm that Belinda could have given him. It was unfortunate for her, but Ignacio had stood his ground against yet another sexual adventure – reminding her that her offering herself to him was simply an unwanted distraction. He reminded himself that the goal here was to get a break from pretending to be insane and to secure his monthly disability paychecks; getting lost in her advances would surely ruin everything he’d set up.
He’d held out for the right person, finally giving in to physical desires with Lydia, the sexiest receptionist he had ever known and the apple of his eye since the second he’d seen her. There was an unexplainable familiarity with Lydia from the beginning – an instant connection. Their experience in a dark corner of the smoking room had clarified that he should never give in to the smell of strawberries ever again. Though he understood her reason for backing away was because she didn’t want to lose her job, he was certain their connection was strong.
