Good Kings Bad Kings

by Susan Nussbaum

  I say, “Cheri told that Michelle girl that she got schizophrenia and then Michelle called Cheri’s parents and talked them into shipping Cheri off to here and now she can’t get out. I told Cheri she’s going to have to stop telling everyone and they mama she gots schizophrenia. People gonna think she’s crazy.”

  Joanne says, “I met her.”

  I say, “Who?”

  Joanne says, “That Michelle girl.”

  Cheri says, “Can you get her to talk to my parents and say they should let me come home?”

  “I’m—well, I’m not sure. I don’t really know her, I just know who she is.”

  I says to Cheri, “If anyone can help you get home, it’s Joanne.”

  “Wait a second. I doubt I can help,” Joanne says. “Even if I talked to her it’s extremely unlikely that she would be willing to turn this around. To help you get home, I mean. Her job is the opposite of that. She gets people into nursing homes and other institutions for a living. She got paid for convincing Cheri’s parents to send her here.”

  Cheri says, “Can you call my parents?”

  “Oh, Cheri, I . . .”

  Joanne starts in shaking her head and looking down at her hands and shaking her head some more.

  Then she says, “I will try to see if there’s anything I can do. But listen, shh, shh, now listen. I probably can’t do a thing, I just want you to understand. But I’ll speak to someone I know about this. And I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

  “One more thing,” Joanne says. “You cannot say a word about this. Not one word. If you talk to each other about it, make absolutely sure no one is listening, okay?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Me and Cheri both said that practically in the same second. Then Joanne asks Cheri to tell her about why she got into a homeless shelter in the first place and Cheri tells her about the naked T-Mobile guy in her bedroom and all that and Joanne asks her when she got diagnosed with schizophrenia. Cheri says, “Um, when I was in grade school my mom heard me conversating with myself in my bed and laughing.”

  I say, “She sees patterns sometimes and sometimes the patterns is covered in blood and she gets so, so, so scared.”

  “Yes, sure, I can see why,” Joanne said. “I promise to do my best. Just don’t get your hopes up.”

  “I won’t.” But Cheri was smiling when she said that, so it was too late not to get her hopes up.

  It looked like they was stopped talking, so I says, “Joanne. Girl. Tell me who is this hunk of man meat you got taped up on your wall?”

  “Him? I don’t know. He’s some random crip at a crip-rights protest. I found the picture in this little magazine I read called the Plumed Serpent. It’s a cool picture, don’t you think?”

  “Oh my God, this boy is beyond hot. Cheri, come look at this succulent male. Why’s he got chains on him?”

  “That’s part of the way they protest when they’re really mad about something. He’s trying to shut down a building where—well, it’s complicated—okay, in this building they have senators and other politicians who support nursing homes. He’s chained up to the doors so no one can go in or out and the police can’t pull him away.”

  “You don’t want to play with them po-lice.”

  “I know. Do you want to look at the article that goes with the picture?” Joanne says.

  “No. But can I have the picture?”

  “Absolutely. Take it. I’ll bring more protest pictures. Mrs. Phoebe will love it.”

  I say, “She will?” and Joanne says, “Sarcasm.”

  When I get the picture of the angry, succulent brother down off the wall I look at him closer and I swear my heart starts beating straight out my chest. He has long locks to his shoulders and I can imagine myself braiding them and looking into those big, fierce-looking eyes. I fell in love then and there.

  When we get by the pop machine later, Cheri says, “Why do Joanne call disable people crips?”

  I say, “Oh, that’s just Joanne.”

  She says, “Do she think we’re crips?”

  “Yeah, probably,” I say. “I hope so.”

  Mia Oviedo

  Beverly push me to the infirmary. When we come there Beverly say, “Okay, let me get back up there. Ask the nurse to call up there for me when you’re done, okay?”

  She put me where you wait for the nurse. I can’t stand no more how bad it hurt. Down there, you know? Is like burning and hurting so bad. I feeling hot.

  Beverly say, “You need anything? Drink of water? Have the nurse call upstairs when you’re done now.”

  I saw him. He come after dinnertime. I keeping my head down but I see Fantasia go away from me real fast alla sudden. I pray I am too sick to go back in my room after. Maybe the nurse let me sleep here. Please, please, God, let me sleep here.

  “What’s the matter tonight?” the nurse say.

  “I feeling sick,” I say.

  We go in a room. The room got wallpaper with bunnies on it and little blue and yellow and pink eggs. Easter. I don’t want to tell her how bad my coochie hurting me. She take my blood pressure. She go, “You don’t have a fever, so it’s probably nothing too serious.” I feeling so nervous and I am afraid. She say, “What hurts?” and I say, “Down there,” and she say, “Your vagina?” Oh my goodness! I don’ wan’ her to say that. I am so embarrass. I nod my head yeah. Yes.

  Nurse Donna take me to a different room. It got a kine of a bed with the place for the feets. And she sit next to me an’ she pet my shoulder. I know I not suppose to cry but the feets on the bed making me nervous and worrying and my belly hurting and I crying a little—and she asking me, “What’s wrong?”

  I say, “I don’ feel so good.”

  An’ Nurse Donna say, “Shhh.” And she pet on my back and she say it gonna be okay but I think I gonna throw up, you know? And I can’t breathe. She put her hand on my hand and she say, “Stop crying. Stop crying.”

  And I tell her, “Please, can I sleep here tonight? I am so stress out, you know?”

  Nurse Donna say, “But I don’t know what’s wrong with you. Let’s find out the problem and go from there. Can I examine you now?”

  An’ I say, “Please don’t exam me. Okay? I think only thing I need is medicine, you know? Please, Miss Nurse.”

  She say, “Mia, I have to examine you. There’s nothing to cry about. Don’t act like a baby.”

  The feets remine me of—they scaring me a lot. I say, “I change my mind. I feeling better.”

  Nurse Donna say, “Mia, I’m going to help you.” And she get all kine of stuff out the closet and she moving me to the table with feets and she slide me on it an’ taking my shoes an’ I just wanna stay here and she taking my pants and eberything.

  I say, “Can I stay here after?”

  She say, “Shh.”

  She listen to my heart and make me breathe. I say, “Please, can I stay here after? I be quiet, okay?” Maybe she not gonna look. Maybe she only listen to my heart. I not gonna say nothing.

  “Mia? I’m going to take a look in your pelvic area, okay? When was your last period?”

  “My last period? Not too much time. Not very long, okay?”

  Then alla sudden she taking my foot and put it in the thing and I don’ want her to. I feeling hot. Stop it! “¡Déjame! Please don’ do that!”

  “Mia, just relax and I won’t hurt you.”

  She put my other foot up there. I trow up in my mouth.

  “Just relax.”

  “I tryne.”

  “I know it’s cold but I am not hurting you.”

  “Please, please,” I say.

  “Just relax. Do the houseparents wash your vagina?”

  “No! I don’ know. Yeah, they help me.”

  “Well. You have a discharge.”

  I look at the wallpaper and it got seals on it. At the circus.

  She say, “I’m just taking a little sample here.”

  I wanna say, “Shut up, Nurse Donna.” I say, “I gonna trow up.”

>   “Don’t tense.”

  “I gonna trow up.”

  She looking at a microscope. The seals clapping with their paws.

  “Can I stay here now?” I say.

  “Just be still.”

  “I still,” I say.

  She say, “Mia, are you having sex with somebody?”

  My head hurting. I trow up in my neck. I say, “No.”

  She say, “Don’t lie to me. You’ve got a venereal disease. Do you know what that is?”

  “I—no.”

  “Well, you have a parasite that is usually passed through sexual intercourse. I took a sample to be sure. Let me clean you up.”

  Miss Donna get a—the thing, from the closet, to trow up in it, and a wet towel and wipe my face and neck. I shut my eyes.

  Nurse Donna say, “I’ll have to tell Mrs. Phoebe. Who did you have sex with?”

  “Nobody.”

  She say, “Who? Mia?”

  “I tell you, nobody. Nobody.”

  “Your boyfriend?”

  “I don’ got no boyfrien’.”

  Then she get mad. She say, “Mia, I’m not stupid!”

  “He will be mad.”

  She say, “Who?”

  “I feeling sick. I—please, please—”

  “Well, I’ll just have to test everyone here. Because I will find out.”

  Snitches get stitches.

  “Answer me, Mia.”

  I say real, real soft, “Jerry.”

  She say, “Are you sure?” She say, “If you’re not telling the truth, that’s a very bad thing.”

  I don’t say nothing.

  Nurse Donna say, “I’ll try to find someone to dress you now. I’ll be right back.”

  She leave. She didn’t cover me down there. The wallpaper got little seals. Seals from a circus. And the seals doing all different things like one seal got a big ball on his nose, another seal clapping his paws. I want my feets down. I hate Nurse Donna. I wanna be cover.

  “Nurse Donna!”

  The ceiling got yellow squares. They look old. Like they be here a long time. Like I be here a long time.

  Joanne Madsen

  I took a sick day today. My new driver is taking me to see Elaine Brown at the Center for Disability Justice, or CDJ. I finally posted an ad on Craigslist for a driver and he had the best response. Any response with any variation on the theme “I really love helping people who are less fortunate” gets an immediate delete. Do they not understand that this is a job? That I am paying them money? And do I really need to know if the person driving my car is a Christian? In fact, thanks for pointing that out so I can delete you. Bye, have fun at the Rapture.

  The guy I hired wrote just the facts. Very Dragnet. He lives near my neighborhood and is flexible because he has a small side business that allows him to work out of his apartment. He’s been on the company payroll—me—for about a week and we get along fine. So far. It’s a work in progress.

  One time I hired a guy who honked at other cars constantly. If we were at a stoplight, he’d start honking a moment before the light on the cross street turned yellow. He’d honk if we were stopped at the light but he perceived the car ahead of him could be a few inches closer to the intersection. He’d honk at people if they were going merely the speed limit. And he dressed like a pirate. Not once in a while, but every day. He had his pants tucked into his boots with a puffy effect at the knees and he had long, greasy hair and wore a bandanna around his head. I fired him. You might ask why I would hire someone who arrived at the interview in a pirate outfit. All I can say is, guilty as charged.

  My new driver’s name is Leo.

  I don’t want to rely on Ricky for rides. Now that our relationship is on somewhat solid ground, I’m staking out my independence. His too, in a way. I’m a believer in keeping your relationship person clearly separated from your employee person. I don’t want to be Ricky’s job.

  Leo drops me off a few minutes early at CDJ. The office is nice. Small lobby. A few People magazines, back issues of the Nation. Brochures. And a Plumed Serpent—very auspicious. The receptionist is behind a sliding glass window, so I can see behind her into the office. The walls are painted with a big mural of people shouting and protesting about something. Some of the people in the mural have disabilities. But they’re your basic generic-looking crips—one white guy in a manual wheelchair, a black guy with a white cane and black sunglasses, and a white woman signing to her friend. The Big Three. Someone said to the muralist, “Okay, we want disabled people to be represented,” and the muralist went home and got his inspiration from a McDonald’s commercial. He should’ve shown Mia in her crappy, broken-down manual chair and Cheri trying to shut out the mean voices.

  Only a few of the staff at ILLC are supposed to know about what happened to Mia, but everyone seems to know something already. The kids were there when the police arrived at ILLC and arrested Jerry on his way in to work. A few of the kids watched the police cuff him and actually cheered. Fantasia has been questioned by the police and apparently she was awake and terrified during all of the assaults. No one noticed that she’s been suffering herself all this time.

  If most of the kids don’t already have a clear idea of what happened to Mia, they do have a vague notion that Jerry did something to her and whatever he did shouldn’t be named.

  Yessie’s been trying to spend more time with Mia. She and Mia came to my office together once but Mia didn’t bring the matter up. She didn’t say much at all. Then yesterday Yessie wheeled Mia over, disconnected the bungee cord, said, “Mia wants to talk to you,” and left. The moment the door closed behind her, Mia burst into tears.

  I put my arm around her and passed her a tissue from time to time. After she calmed down a little I asked her if she wanted to talk and she shook her head no. So I asked her if she would stay and keep me company and she nodded her head yes. When lunchtime came, I went to the cafeteria and brought her back whatever I could carry and we ate lunch together.

  There’s a therapist that comes to ILLC once a week to meet with various kids and she saw Mia once before leaving for a vacation. The therapist told Mia she’d be back in two weeks and in the meantime to “think happy thoughts.” I’m not making this up.

  What Mia needs is some hard-core psychotherapy by someone who knows what’s she’s doing. I’m going to emphatically bring it up to Mrs. Phoebe. I mean, I’ve seen Mia’s file, I know she was sexually abused and tortured by her father, and here comes that slime Jerry resurrecting the whole experience and Mrs. Phoebe knows it too. Of course, why would Mrs. Phoebe bother to listen? I’m the data-entry clerk.

  Ricky has figured out a way to blame himself for what happened. He feels he could have prevented all of it. So does Jimmie. They think they should have seen signs. Maybe we were all criminally oblivious. But in a way, I think it was bound to happen.

  The elevator door opens and Teddy and his dad come into the lobby. I tell Mr. Dobbs how nice it is to see him again and he shakes my gimpy hand without getting flustered. He’s been around gimpy hands before. He’s wearing a brown, kind of crumpled suit—though not as crumpled as Teddy’s suit.

  Elaine Brown comes out to greet us. She’s tall and really beautiful. A little older than me, I think. We follow her back past the murals and into a conference room. When everyone finds a spot to sit, Elaine says, “I’m a lawyer. My job is all about protecting the rights of people with disabilities in Illinois. Any disabled person. Now Joanne here told me a little bit about your situation. Let me see if I have this right. Teddy, you’re about to turn twenty-two?”

  Teddy says, “On June twenty-eighth.”

  “Okay. And ILLC wants to transfer you to a nursing home in Maywood, is that right?”

  “I ain’t going there,” Teddy says.

  “Tell me where you see yourself living instead.”

  Elaine led Teddy and Mr. Dobbs into a conversation about their options and Teddy’s rights and the law, taking her time, answering questions, making sure
everyone was keeping up. It was an education for me too. I had no idea people actually had any choices.

  Here’s Teddy’s vision of his future: He wants to live in an apartment, get a job, decide where he wants to go and when he’s going to bed. Hooking Teddy up with Elaine Brown was the only worthwhile thing I’d done since I started at ILLC, and if anyone found out I did it, they’d probably fire me.

  Elaine says, “It means you have a right to live in the community, with caregivers you hire and fire yourself. Or there are living situations that are not nursing homes or institutions but have more round-the-clock help if you decide you need that. Meanwhile, we can get an injunction to stop ILLC from transferring you.”

  Teddy says, “Why didn’t Mrs. Phoebe let me do that?”

  Elaine says, “Well, maybe you can ask her.”

  Teddy says, “I want to live in a apartment.”

  Elaine says, “Okay. But first there’s a lot of work to do, for me and for you. I want you to start spending time at Access Now and sign up with the Mi Casa Project. Learn some good skills, talk to other people there who moved out of institutions back into the world. It’ll take some time and you have to be really committed to working on it. Just so you know.”

  We stayed awhile longer. When Teddy and his dad went to the bathroom, Elaine says, “You know, we don’t see too many nursing-home employees bringing kids around here.”

  “Yeah, I bet not. I’m actually home sick today.”

  “Of course,” Elaine says. “Look, here’s my card. Feel free, okay?”

  “Thanks. I saw an article about a case you worked on where an entire institution for disabled kids was shut down.”

  “Oh, a lot of people worked on that. We’re still working on it. Making sure the kids who were in that hellhole get resettled somewhere better, which isn’t easy.”

  “Also,” I say, “I should tell you, in case it makes any difference, that Whitney-Palm owns the nursing home in Maywood where they want to send Teddy. Same company that manages ILLC.”

  I waited on the sidewalk with Teddy while his dad got the car. I risked asking Teddy if he’d talked to Mia lately.

  “I ain’t even thinking about her no more. That’s all over.”