Finding Alice

by Melody Carlson

  chapter SIX

  The Golden Scissors

  At some point, I imagined God with a pair of golden scissors, neatly snipping my life into two separate sections. One life I call “BC” (before crazy); the other one is simply “now.” But it’s not until I hear Dr. Thornton say that hideous word that I begin to differentiate between the two separate lifetimes. Even then I am not entirely convinced. The convincing will take time.

  “Do you know what schizophrenia is?” he asks me in a voice that reminds me of a grade-school teacher. We are seated in his woodpaneled office, dimly lit and somber, as if the room itself is warning me that all is not well in here. The sun sinks low into the sky, and I am terribly worried that my mother isn’t coming back to get me. I fidget with the stack of papers that I have promised to read.

  “Schizophrenia.” I pronounce the word as if it’s my turn in a spelling bee, as if I’m about to articulate each letter correctly, although I doubt I can. Still, I don’t want to appear stupid. It seems I’ve spent the entire day trying hard not to appear stupid or crazy. “Doesn’t it mean you have a split mind?” I venture carefully. “Or is that like a multiple personality disorder?”

  “I can see you’re a smart young woman, Alice, and I want to speak candidly with you now.” He leans forward, and the bald spot on the top of his head glimmers from his desk lamp. He is a small man but intense and, I suspect, powerful. At least in this God-forsaken place where everyone seems to jump whenever he walks by.

  I nod in agreement, as if I’m his colleague and not some crazy misfit that he’d just as soon lock up.

  “The word schizophrenia does mean ‘split-mind’ in Greek, but that’s not what this illness is about. This is an illness of the brain. You might call it an impairment or chemical imbalance, but for whatever reason the brain is unable to differentiate between what is real and what is not. It experiences hallucinations that can be very deceptive. These hallucinations can come in audible or visual forms. Some people even experience what seems like an assault on their entire sensory system. They smell aromas that don’t exist. Like smoke for instance. It’s as if the brain’s ability to send messages is completely scrambled. Does this make any sense to you?”

  I press my lips together and nod without speaking. As much as I hate to admit it, some of what he’s saying does make sense. But then how would I know since I’m the one who’s supposedly crazy here? Besides, I am fairly tired and discouraged right now. It’s been a long day filled with all sorts of tests. I’ve been poked and prodded and quizzed and examined. During my “questionings,” I lied again and again. Particularly in response to the inquiries about hearing voices or seeing faces that don’t exist. I mean how would I know if they exist or not? I’m the one who’s supposed to be bonkers. How can I be expected to discern what’s real and what’s not? If I’m nuts, that is. I’m still not convinced that Dr. Thornton hasn’t been sent by Pastor John and my other enemies. How to tell if you’re crazy or not? Aren’t we all a little crazy?

  I guess I must’ve let my guard down there for a moment and possibly even said some of those thoughts out loud, because I am now being lectured on how they don’t use the words crazy, nuts, or bonkers here.

  “Okay.” I shrug now, getting weary of the game that never ends.

  “It’s an illness,” he tells me again, as if being told that you are sick is encouraging.

  “So, how’d I catch it?” I ask in a flippant voice.

  “It’s not contagious, Alice. But it is hereditary.”

  “Grandma.” It’s not a question as much as an answer.

  He nods. “You know that she was diagnosed as schizophrenic-paranoid?”

  “Paranoid? As in thinking that people were trying to get her?”

  He nods again. “Do you experience that too, Alice?”

  “No,” I answer quickly, probably too quickly. I look down at the papers in my lap and pretend to be quite interested. Then in a quiet voice I ask the dreaded question. “When can my mom take me home?”

  “As soon as we finish.”

  I’m not sure whether I can trust him, but I wait while he writes something on one of those little white pads that doctors like to use. “I am prescribing an antipsychotic. It should help you to think more clearly.”

  I don’t tell him that I have been thinking quite clearly. Too clearly, I’m afraid. Or that I am able to interpret the ancient Scriptures, discern God’s deepest mysteries, and even write prophetic inspirations. Somehow I don’t think he’d appreciate this sort of clarity.

  He tears off the sheet. “This is for clozapine. My nurse will give you some samples to tide you over until your mother can get to the drugstore. It’s fairly mild with some side effects like dry mouth, sleepiness, and rapid heartbeat. Just read the paper in the sample box; it’s all there. You need to avoid caffeine and nicotine, as well as alcohol and any other drugs, of course. However, I am pleased to see that your blood test shows you are clean of drugs, Alice. Good for you.”

  Clean of drugs until now, I’m thinking. Until I start taking his little prescription. But what makes his particular brand of drugs so good? Still, I keep these questions to myself. Or at least I think I do. I can never be sure what’s going through my mind and coming out of my mouth these days. I take his little white notepaper and nod as if everything is perfectly fine. I just want out of here. But I’m thinking, You can’t make me take your stupid pills. It could be more of the poison they’ve been slipping into my food.

  “It’s natural for you to want to resist the meds.” He peers over his half-glasses at me, and now I am worried he can actually read my mind because I am certain I didn’t just say that.

  I hold up the paper and force a smile to my lips. “Don’t worry. I’ll take these. I want to get well.”

  “You need to understand that the only reason I’m not keeping you here at Forest Hills today is because your mother has promised to oversee your recovery at home. She has assured me that you will take your meds. But it’s your choice, Alice. If you refuse, you will find yourself right back here with us. Not that that’s a bad option. This is, after all, a place of healing.” He smiles now, and I suddenly remember, word for word, a poem from the Alice book.

  How doth the little crocodile

  Improve his shining tail,

  And pour the waters of the Nile

  On every golden scale!

  How cheerfully he seems to grin,

  How neatly spread his claws,

  And welcome little fishes in

  With gently smiling jaws!

  I hold tightly to Dr. Thornton’s little white slip of paper and assure him once more that I do want to get better as I carefully back up toward the door.

  “That’s the key,” he tells me as he pats my back.

  No, I’m thinking, that is not the key. Not the golden key. Still, I am cornered. What are my choices anyway? As I walk back toward the reception area, I wonder again if Dr. Thornton is in cahoots with Pastor John and Mrs. Knoll. Perhaps even my mother is involved. Who can you trust? Who can you trust?

  Trust Jesus.

  I turn around to see who said that. I know it’s not Amelia, although the voice is somewhat comforting. And it’s nothing like Pastor John’s voice or any of the church people. There’s obviously no one in the hallway, but then it’s nothing new to hear voices that have no bodies attached. But it’s not like those other voices, the vicious ones that threaten to destroy me. I’m sure that I just imagined it.

  Nurse Kelly already has the clozapine samples ready for me when I reach the reception area. She is smiling, just as she did earlier when she talked me into eating a green salad and a small bowl of peaches in the cafeteria. She told me she’s a vegetarian and can understand my aversion to meats. She’s a pretty woman, early thirties I’d guess, but not the showy type. She has nice white teeth and dark hair that’s smoothed back into a neat ponytail. For some reason I don’t think she’s part of this particular conspiracy. But then how can I be sure? />
  “Make sure you take these with food.” She gently squeezes my arm. “You could use a little more weight on you, Alice.”

  Despite her kindness, I’m still not convinced they’re going to let me leave. I walk quickly to the waiting area. I expect to find it empty and deserted, the front door locked. But there’s my mother, reading what looks like a well-worn magazine. She stands quickly and walks my way.

  “Everything okay, dear?”

  “Just peachy.”

  She smiles a stiff smile and picks up her handbag and coat. I cling to my backpack as I tentatively head toward the front exit, still expecting someone to run up and stop me. I remember seeing a fairly burly looking orderly earlier today as I was waiting in the hallway for a blood test. He had to hold down an agitated man while a nurse injected the poor guy with what I’m sure was some sort of sedative. I felt sorry for the man but must also admit to feeling slightly relieved when his screaming finally came to a halt. I didn’t allow myself to look at him again after that. Not only because it seemed disrespectful, but also because I felt truly scared deep inside my soul. It seems so wrong to treat another human being this way.

  “Did you get the samples?” she asks as I open the door and bolt out into the cool evening air.

  I turn and hand the packets to her. “Here, you might as well keep them since you’re supposed to be managing my meds.” I am sorry to hear my sarcastic tone. I tell myself that it’s not my mother’s fault, that she’s not the enemy. But how can I be sure?

  As she drives home in the semidarkness, I contrive an elaborate scheme that I will use to make her believe I am taking my pills. I imagine how I will “take them with food” as Nurse Kelly recommended, but somehow I will adhere them to the roof of my mouth, and then when my mother’s not looking, I will slip them into my napkin or a pocket or something. I’m not sure if it’s my idea or Amelia’s, but it makes perfect sense to me.

  My mother is talking about my brother, Aaron, now, telling me how well he’s doing in football, how fortunate he was to get that full scholarship to the junior college. I nod and act as if I’m listening, as if everything is still perfectly normal, as if I still care about anyone or anything other than my messed-up little life.

  But I’m still pondering Dr. Thornton’s words about schizophrenia and how it’s an illness that can be managed, if not cured. And I’ll admit that a small part of me actually wants to believe him, but that seems to be the BC part of me, the part that has been neatly sliced off and tossed away. Mostly I remember Grandma … how she sat in a chair with a blank stare and didn’t even recognize her own daughter. Do I want to end up like her? Locked up and doped up and totally useless? I don’t think so. No, I’m certain there must be another way out of this mess. Somehow my “messed-up” brain will figure it out. I’ll show them!

  chapter SEVEN

  The Tiny Door

  It seems there is a tiny door that I must walk through. It is called “normal.” But I am not. As a result I cannot fit through this door. And yet they keep telling me I must go through it. They being my mom, the doctor, and the medical profession in general—at least according to the literature that Dr. Thornton gave me to read. Now at times some of this actually makes sense, and then at other times it all sounds absolutely ridiculous. I wonder where they get this stuff. I wonder who invented “normal” in the first place. And I question whether or not it really exists. Or if it exists, perhaps it’s not for me. Because I am certain this is a door I will never be able to squeeze through.

  Now the other they have been curiously silent these past couple of days. I’m not sure if it’s because I’m in my family home, in familiar territory, and they don’t feel quite comfortable here. Or perhaps, other than Amelia, they simply haven’t located me yet. I never did send my change-of-address card. Just the same, one can never be too sure. They may be waiting on my porch right now.

  But back to the tiny door, the one I’m expected to force myself through. As I recall, the only way the other Alice could fit through her tiny door was to take the pills that made her get very, very small. I guess that is what Dr. Thornton’s pills are supposed to do for me. Make me very, very small. Or, in a word, normal. But what if I don’t care to be normal or even very small for that matter? Shouldn’t I have a choice in these things? It is, after all, my life. Or rather it used to be. Sometimes I wonder who’s really running things here. And did I only imagine that God was speaking to me, that he gave me the golden key and all the answers? It seemed so real at the time, and at times still does, despite what everyone else keeps telling me. And I worry that these “normal” pills will undo something important and powerful. Yet at the same time I’m not so sure.

  Anyway, I just don’t know who I can believe anymore. So naturally I balk at taking these suspicious pills. Not only that, but according to the manufacturer, these pills can have some pretty frightening side effects, like temporary paralysis or liver damage or even death. Of course, the fine black print assures me: “These reactions are statistically rare.” But can they promise me that it won’t happen? Of course not. And that makes me wonder why has this happened to me in the first place. Why was I chosen to get this insidious disease—if I really do have it—and did God have anything to do with that? Did I have to get this disease so that I could hear him and accept the golden key? Or have I only imagined all this?

  So far I’ve only taken two pills, one last night and one this morning, and only because my mother was so insistent. I’m sure I’ve never seen her so strong willed, so unmovable—like a boulder. She won’t budge until she’s satisfied that I’ve swallowed the pill. She even makes me open my mouth wide and stick out my tongue. It’s a whole new side of her and not necessarily a bad thing, at least under different circumstances. She certainly wasn’t this assertive when my father was alive.

  Still I can’t see that the pills have made much difference, other than muffling everything. I suddenly feel like I’ve got a head cold, both inside my head and out, like I’m wrapped in this fluffy gray cocoon. But I haven’t begun to shrink yet. And at this rate, I doubt that I’ll ever be able to make it through that tiny door. Maybe I am hopeless. But normal seems farther away than ever.

  Now I’ve begun to suspect that the reason I must pass through the tiny door is to reach the other side. Sort of like that old chicken-crossing-the-road joke. But even this has me worried. For I have no idea what awaits me on the other side. Things could get even worse for me over there in “Normalville.” Or what if, like the other Alice, these magic pills make me shrink so small that I cannot be heard or seen—or, worse yet, I cease to exist at all? Or what if I am so minuscule that someone, say Pastor John, comes along and steps on me and crushes me like a bug beneath his boot? What then?

  So whether or not to take these pills is not a simple black-and-white question. Like everything else, it’s just varying shades of gray. Everything’s confusing and frightening, and it seems I have absolutely no control over my life. So I stay in my room, imagining that I might possibly have some control up here.

  Being in my little blue bedroom with its fussy eyelet curtains and dust ruffle brought some comfort—at first anyway. I just walked around and around and stared at everything as if seeing it all for the first time, and yet I knew each item, every picture on the wall, my violin case still leaning inside the closet, my stuffed rabbit with the ear that flops down over his eye. It was like a déjà vu. Realistic and familiar but not really real.

  Yet it wasn’t long before the dimensions of my old room became confining and slightly terrifying. And even now as I sit on my crisp white bed, hands folded neatly in my lap and telling myself just to chill, I still feel that I might totally lose it and that I will scream so loudly the whole neighborhood will step out to the street to see what on earth is going on in the Laxton house. Perhaps the whole town of Warren will be on alert—the KBDX noontime news will warn its citizens to be on the lookout for that crazy girl who went flipping mad on Persimmon Lane.


  When I’m not sleeping, I count things—the panes in the windows, the pencils in the cup, the jigsaw puzzles in my closet, even the white flowers on the pale blue wallpaper. Soon my room feels like an itchy wool sweater that shrank three sizes too small. Everything in here is much too tight. The walls press in on me, closer and closer. And those little flowers on the wallpaper are growing to tropical dimensions and suffocating me with their sticky fragrance—just like an old woman’s overbearing perfume in a hot, stuffy elevator.

  I must have become the other Alice, when she grew bigger and bigger and finally became trapped in the White Rabbit’s little house. My arms will soon stick out through the windows, my feet will protrude out the door, and my head will pop right out of the roof or maybe the chimney. I am totally confined and claustrophobic. I cannot breathe. I want to knock down these walls and break free and actually scream. Yes, it seems very clear; I must be going mad.

  Like the other Alice, I decide I must take these stupid pills that will shrink me back down to size if I want to survive. Size: normal, medium, regular, average, one-size-fits-all. Oh, I don’t really want to become small and shrunken and meaningless again. I would much rather be large and important and special. It frightens me to give in like this. And yet it frightens me not to.

  What are my alternatives though? I vaguely wonder if it’s possible to break free from here—to escape my boulder mother and this stuffy little room? I imagine lacing up my old track shoes and sprinting right out the front door. I could run and run and run until there’s only fluid motion, like a horse across an open pasture. But where would I go? Where would I ever fit in? What if all the doors are just this small? What if I am too big to pass through any? What then? Must I always remain on the other side?

  I am so lonely. Exceedingly lonely.

  chapter EIGHT

  Advice from a Caterpillar