PSYCHOPHILIA: A Disturbing Psychological Thriller

by Michelle Muckley

  After she closed the door I stood there for a while, silent and without a single thought in my mind. I stood watching the lights flicker underneath the guest bedroom door as if hypnotised. I remained there in a trance until I saw the lights go out, returning to blackness. I quietly closed the door behind me and walked back towards my bed. The lack of thought had cleared a space for a vision to fill my mind. It was Gregory with his slut maid in the guest bedroom on sheets that I had chosen from Collings and Rawlings, mounting her like an animal in ways that he had tried to do with me but that I hadn’t permitted. I took off my night gown and got on the bed, lying flat facing the ceiling, illuminated only by the moonlight through the window. It was cold, and my bare skin was goose pimpled and my nipples hard like stones. I placed one hand on my swollen breast as Gregory had done earlier, and one between my legs. I touched myself, all the while thinking about him trying to push her head into the pillow to muffle her groans so that I wouldn’t hear what they were doing. Afterwards I stood in the shower under a dribble of cold water, wiped what could have been a tear away from my cheeks, and concentrated on once again trying not to feel anything at all.

  Chapter six

  5:15 AM I woke up. Eyes wide. Awake. I was cold, and still naked with the only exception my Triquetra necklace which I never take off. It was Ishiko’s alarm clock that I heard, my ears finely tuned to detect the subtlest of sounds now that I know that the conspirators are creeping around during the night. I was still disappointed at my lack of self control the night before, and my nudity was a repulsive reminder of what I had done to myself. On top of that, I feel demeaned to know that my husband chooses to sleep in another bedroom and fuck the maid whilst I am believed to be asleep. It is degrading and isolating, a mark on my character. Am I so revolting that I cannot be touched? I always knew he had settled when it came to me and by rights should have done much better, but to have it spelt out so clearly with such physical clarity is alarming.

  So with this siren wailing in my head and the throbbing of the reopened wound that I have been picking since last night, I make a plan for the day. It is day one. Day one of no longer having to work. It will take some time I expect to untrain the muscle memory, break the sleep pattern, feel comfortable in my new routine. My body is programmed for certain activities and it has come to expect certain routines. I became mechanical, like an alarm clock, buzzing at specified moments, idle, ticking along at others. My tissues have been trained like a gymnast to perform certain tasks, and I know it will take time to unlearn certain behaviours. Dr. Abrams taught me that. It is a marvellous thing my black box, the control centre which is beyond unlocking or fully understanding. And yet still people try.

  When I first sat down with Dr. Abrams he told me that we use only ten percent of the brain’s capacity. At the time this seemed an arbitrary figure, because how could he possibly know that? There is no way of measuring the use of the brain. It seemed to me just another example of how people crave an understanding of the indecipherable. I asked him if I could shoot myself through the head, taking out at least fifty percent of my brain and still function. He said no, and went on to clarify if I was actually planning to do it, and if I owned or had access to a gun. I admitted that Gregory had one, but I told him that I had since decided a gun would in no way help me fulfil my destiny.

  It takes only a rudimentary example such as this to demonstrate how the brain remains elusive. We comprehend so little of the brains capabilities, and yet we think we can unlock its patterns and understand its purpose. People want to understand themselves, know themselves, a verbalisation of their wish to understand the brain. I HAD to go to therapy. I HAD to try and understand. So we sit there, Dr. Abrams and me, him asking the gate keeper to provide the key and looking surprised when we still haven’t found it. The brain doesn’t want to give away its secrets. So instead we sit in therapy and talk endlessly in circles as he asks, but what do you think, what do you feel, as if it is possible to really know. I have sat on chairs with wires sprouting from my head like the roots of a tree, branching out, searching for a life source, as people recorded the scribbles of my brain, a hieroglyph of a language still virtually unfathomable to man.

  After dressing and washing and mouth rinsing and worrying about the wound on my head that is still throbbing no matter how much I make it bleed, I walk down the stairs and see that it is still perfectly dark outside, with no visible street lamp blurring the moment between night and day. I pull on my trainers, and dress in a waterproof jacket from the cupboard. Realising I have forgotten my watch I walk back upstairs and grab it, attaching it to my wrist. I can hear Ishiko in the kitchen, and the whistle of the kettle as it boils. She is expecting to provide me with tea and for me to sit in silence and drink it without milk or sugar. But I promised her that things would change around here. How dare she presume to know what to expect. I pull on new leather gloves. Besides the door handle, I touch nothing.

  I swing my arms back and forth, and feel the blood racing to my fingertips and it eases the throbbing in my head. The frost is thick and the trees white with winter. I reach the end of the private drive and contemplate left or right. Both directions lead towards the lake in some way or another. It may as well surround me. I choose right towards town, and follow the main road up past the jetty where I had been seen yesterday and keep my head low, as if blinkered, seeing only the pavement beneath my feet. I pass the coffee shop which is dark and shuttered. I can still hear the movement of the water as it touches the banks of the lake, the boats rocking, the trees rustling as if they are calling to me. There are no cars and I haven’t seen another soul. I make good progress along the main road as it passes up through the town but I divert left, and before long I have passed the car parks and petrol stations that mark the borders of humanity and I am treading the steps of an adventurer, away from the crowd and into peace.

  After only a few more steps, I feel the waves of nausea creeping over me, beginning to bubble in my stomach. Without warning I double over and clutch at the nearest wall, dirtying my gloves. I wretch, bringing up bile and fluids. The taste is foul, digested food, saliva pouring into my mouth as I breathe heavily and spit it out. I want to wipe my mouth for I am certain that there must be a splash of the vomit on my cheek, or at the very least, my lip. But I cannot because I have failed to bring my bag with the cleaning wipes, and my gloves have just touched the wall and who knows what is growing on there. I bring my hands back and forth towards my face trying to find the courage to touch my dirty lips but I cannot, so instead I hold back the tears and follow my footsteps back towards the town, not stopping or turning once. I arrive at the private road at 7:05 AM still trying not to cry, my head down and arms outstretched. As I climb our private driveway I see Marianne leaving for the day, her lights blinding me because she has them on full beam.

  “Ah, sorry Charlotte, I nearly didn’t see you there.”

  She has slowed to a stop and she is calling out through an open window. I glance up enough to see her breath fogging in the car but I cannot speak, and instead I manage a wave and a half smile. There is dirt on my gloves and vomit on my face. There is dirt on my gloves and vomit on my face. I pass her and she is gone. I continue until I am near the front door of my home and I see Gregory at the window, his face pressed up against it like an animal in captivity, his breath marking the glass, leaving marks that need cleaning. When he sees me he starts moving away from the window with a degree of urgency, like a lost child has been returned. The front door is open within seconds. It brings a smile to my face that he was worried, but it is a smile without the pleasure or depth of love, which I am no longer sure I am capable of feeling.

  “Where have you been?” His words are edgy, sharp like they have been dropped a few times, the edges splintered away leaving exposed shards which must be handled with caution. He could be angry with me at any minute. He steps out wearing his granddad slippers and thick winter dressing gown, and as the light from the hallway reaches my face he sees my vom
it splattered lips. I wanted to slip back into the house, unnoticed like dust and wash my face and hands and rinse my mouth. I need to rinse my mouth. I need it like I need blood.

  “I just wanted to walk. Don’t worry,” I manage. “I wasn’t near the water,” I say, raising the subject of the lake so we both understand my acknowledgement of the truth. As if I have pressed a button, he looks more relaxed as he hears what sounds like an answer from a brain aware of the world around it. His thoughts are already delving into my head, I can feel them rifling around the fragments for the truth, always uncertain if that is what I have given him. I pull off the gloves and discard them on the steps. Another ruined pair. I step past him and reach for my handbag.

  “But why did you go out so early?” he asks. Did he hear me leave? Was he listening? Did Ishiko, my slut-maid wake him? A morning kiss thick with mouth slime, or a quick roll around in the sweaty sheets with him behind her or over her or under her or however it was that he craved and instructed her.

  “I wanted to start the day with a fresh, clear mind,” I say with a smile that he should realise is fake as I clean my mouth with a wet wipe from my handbag. My smile is met by his own nervous offering, big and toothy, an aristocratic smile. I am aware of my dimples, my pregnancy swollen cheeks, and my pink and winter-sweaty face. “I thought it would help me settle in my new routine.” He looks confused for a moment, and then disappointed, and I know he is thinking about the baby. “It’s my first day of not working,” I remind him and he immediately perks up. He is visibly relieved.

  “Well let’s get you inside and warmed up,” he says, closing the door. I go straight upstairs and rinse my mouth, wash my hands under very hot water which makes my skin tingle and they turn as red as emergency flares. I note that there is a particularly dry area on the once soft triangle of skin between my thumb and forefinger that looks like it could split open at any moment.

  As we sit eating breakfast together I am uncertain if I am pleased by his response this morning, or if I find it distasteful. After spending the night alone, I did consider that I might be justified to expect an explanation. Man and Wife are expected to sleep in the same bed, and any deviation to this fact is, I feel, a basis for discussion. Perhaps Ishiko has told him that I saw her last night and he feels a degree of embarrassment or confusion regarding the subject and doesn’t know how to raise it. Perhaps he feels this arrangement is appropriate and doesn’t require discussion. But if we are to move forward, if we are to survive, something must be said. I cannot spend every night alone. I am pregnant. Perhaps I will need something in the night when I am fat and swollen and unable to move. There may be urgent calls for which a man, a man responsible for the situation, is required to attend. So I raise it myself.

  “I was a little surprised that you did not return to the bedroom last night.” He stops eating, his spoon held mid air and dribbling milk splatters into his bowl, spraying him. He notices they have landed on his dressing gown and he wipes them off, grimacing. “I waited for you. I was expecting you.” I could almost feel sorry for him as I watch him quickly hashing an explanation together, his eyes darting left and right as his brain sparks like firecrackers at Christmas. But I am no longer able to feel sympathy for this man. He should have thought of an explanation in advance. To wait until this moment is disrespectful.

  “I thought you would be tired at the end of a long day yesterday. The meal, the chores, the house showing.” He smiles, but the hope he had placed in his feeble attempt to explain himself is already fading.

  “The pregnancy. The argument.”

  “Yes,” he witters, his head dropping. “And the pregnancy.” His smile has disappeared. “Obviously I was wrong. I will sleep alongside you tonight.” It couldn’t sound any more like an arrangement, a task or something to endure. Not with me, not next to me, not on top of me, or inside me. Alongside me. There but separate. Near me but without contact. Ishiko comes in and so I smile as wide as a summer sky as if he has pleased me. He looks concerned as I let out a breathy little giggle. I consider what satisfaction I would take from taking my juice glass and smashing off the edge of it before ploughing what’s left through the skin of her neck from one side to the next.

  “I will look forward to it,” I say, still staring at her neck. “You can cuddle me to sleep like you always have done.” I cannot remember ever being cuddled to sleep, and neither would I want to be; for it would risk waking up in the jet stream of his morning breath. I can see him fiddling around in my head again wondering what on earth I am talking about. “Ishiko, leave us please,” I say. She places the coffee pot down and scuttles away, neck intact. He looked at her as she left, just a fleeting glance behind me, but it made me wonder, because without turning I couldn’t possibly know, if it was because she looked back at him for an explanation.

  “Is everything alright?” he whispers as he places his spoon back into the bowl, his hands resting onto the table.

  “I am fine, Gregory. I was just teasing, so that you know I missed you. Yesterday, when you touched me, I thought we might,” I feel embarrassed to say it, “be together.”

  “I’m sorry about that yesterday,” he says, wiping his mouth in a way that makes me think that breakfast is over, and therefore the end of conversation has arrived. “It was highly unexpected of me.” He speaks as if some random intruder got hold of his body, took over his thoughts like a possession by a poltergeist.

  “But I don’t want you to be sorry,” I say as I reach out and take hold of his forearm. “I want you to want me.” Pitiful. I have become pitiful.

  “I do want you, Charlotte. I do.” He removes my hand from his arm, peeling back my fingers to reveal nothing between us. “But,” he pauses, “we are both aware that things have been difficult. I don’t know what you are thinking half the time, and the other half of the time I do know what you are thinking and I don’t know what to do about it.” He spluttered his words out quickly, fast like a speed train, lest they should disappear from his tongue along with his courage.

  “I am sorry about yesterday, and the lake. Dana shouldn’t have said anything. See,” I suggest, motioning to my clothes and my general demeanour, “this morning is different.”

  He screws his lips together and pushes his head forward. “She should have. I must know these things.” I shake my head dismissively and smile and close my eyes, as if what he is saying is complete nonsense with no relation to the truth.

  “Did you call Dr. Abrams?” I ask.

  “No, not yet.”

  “Then don’t. I promise I’ll behave. It won’t get like before.” I cannot make such promises. He knows this very well.

  “But if it does?”

  “It won’t. We are having a baby. I have to be well.”

  “Yes,” he says, placing his napkin back on the table. He stands to leave the room never once making eye contact.

  “So will you come to me tonight?” I say as he steps towards the drawing room. He turns to me, his head cast over his shoulder, speaking without the slightest hint of a smile. “I will try,” he says, before walking away and leaving me alone. If he had just said no, it might have been easier.

  Chapter seven

  I imagine he kisses Ishiko with passion and fire, or not at all. Ishiko isn’t around because he is stuck with her. She is a choice, the fulfilment of desire. He doesn’t have to force anything with her, or try when he doesn’t want to; like he does with me. She is something he needs, not that needs him. I think when he kisses Ishiko it might be with such desperation that her lips start to bleed. I think he might grip her hair with such force that he ends up with clumps of it in his hands, strands of it sacrificed to their lust. I imagine bruises on her body from where he has gripped her in his oversized hands because in the clutch of ecstasy he has forgotten his strength. His kiss for me is swift and sharp, like the blade of a knife slicing through meat. He doesn’t ask how I will spend my day when he pulls his flaccid lips away from my cheek before he leaves for work, but I know
to him it doesn’t matter. I have no plan yet. I am waiting. Thinking and waiting.

  I have pleased him by no longer working. Now I serve nobody but him. The importance of my not working is that finally he is able to fulfil his role as provider. I need him in the way that he intended to be needed, and for this he is grateful. It is not by chance that he has been kinder in the last twenty four hours.

  I shower. I dress. I rinse my mouth. I wash my hands. I check that my stored receipts are in date order. I undress. I sit. I wash my hands. I shower. I dress. After 9:15 AM I cannot find a car parking space outside the office. I stand. I open the cupboard under the sink. There are only three bottles of mouthwash. I sit on the bed. The tide of the lake will have changed by now. The water will be closer to the road. The fog has lifted. I remove my jumper. I wash my hands and forearms. I put the jumper back on. I sit. I sit. The clock in the kitchen runs two minutes fast and will read 10:02 AM. I hear a car outside. I straighten the towels. I wash my hands with a nailbrush. My trousers are a pair of beige chinos, a style that I think is too old for me. Gregory told me that I liked them and so I wear them. My hand is bleeding. My head hurts. I can’t manage the zip because my hands are shaking. I will walk to the lake. I cannot pull up the zip. I wash my hands. My skin splits and I stand by the sink and let some blood flow out. I tell myself to breathe. I wait. There is a bird singing outside. I close the door. I don’t think Ishiko noticed when I told her to go fuck herself. When I held the butter knife in a way that made it look like a weapon for slicing skin, she didn’t even react but afterwards she.....