PSYCHOPHILIA: A Disturbing Psychological Thriller

by Michelle Muckley

  I wash. I eat. I smile politely. I wash. I answer. I look positive. I nod my head. I wash. I shower. I wash again. There is nothing left for me to do so I sleep.

  Chapter eighteen

  Thursday began as a relatively uneventful day. The minutes ticked by and I counted, at times, the seconds such was the monotony. But there was a thing of positivity about Thursday and that was the attitude with which I awoke. I admit that based on my complete and intoxicating apathy of Wednesday night, which culminated in me slipping into bed with my hands in latex gloves because I couldn’t convince myself that my hands were appropriately clean, I was rather taken by surprise when I woke up in a better mood. The latex gloves were something that I had stolen without intention from the hospital during an opportune moment of solitude and which I have washed thoroughly inside and out prior to use.

  The first good thing to come out of this attitude was that I made the decision to see Dr. Abrams again. My utter lack of interest in the pregnancy yesterday was most likely the culmination of a whole lot of nothing. The mind can and does become intolerable when left alone and unused, rotting like an abandoned piece of fruit, soft, and good for nothing. It happens when there is no stimulation or hope to cling to that life can and will be better. The resulting detachment and utter indifference to my situation imprisoned me in despondency which appears today, like the mist outside to have lifted. When I first discovered the pregnancy I had decided that there was little point in continuing the trips to Dr. Abrams and avoided his methods of neural interrogation. Why would I waste an hour of each week discussing the past with him when I could be thinking about the future with Gregory? With a baby. Gregory’s actions soon put a stop to that source of positivity, and so I have decided to hang on to the snippet of peace that this last trip to the therapist’s chair offered me. Dr. Abrams wanted so much for me to be happy, and it seems has never once lost hope. Gregory has written me off. Since the day in hospital when his tears ran across my cheeks and he ignored the black lumps of vomit staining my sheets and his sleeves we have completed a one hundred and eighty degree shift in his behaviour.

  The second was a growing satisfaction at the collection of items in my bedside table and for this I owe a great deal of my gratitude to Ishiko. Forty nine undiscovered and unmissed capsules collected and without any hassle stored away neatly. My own effort. The addition of the photograph and CD brought with it a rewarding sense of accomplishment, and late on yesterday afternoon the addition of Marianne’s bracelet was another source of positivity. A reason for hope. It is a fortunate turn of fate that Gregory cannot tolerate my routines or my obsessions. He cannot tolerate that it always takes me time and a prescriptive effort to take a tablet. He cannot stand it whilst I hold water in my mouth for the count of thirty to moisten it. Less than this and it remains dry and the tablet does not slip down. One time I almost choked to death. It was within the first week of being home, and to try to pacify him I swallowed the water too soon and took the tablet before the time was up. That tablet wedged itself into my throat, its plastic coating sticking to me as if I were its life raft, its last hope before an acidic digestion. After that I refused and we agreed (at his suggestion) that the Prozac be taken in privacy. More dignified. For whom I don’t know. Me I suppose. I do not remember the incident well. Prozac has an effect on me you see. It works like a giant square box in which I sit right at the centre. Each tablet slowly pushes each wall further and further away from me. The bad, all the pain and hurt outside of the box got further away, but so did all the good that was mixed in with it. The world got further and further away from me. I didn’t care about anything. Nothing mattered. You could have told me my father had risen from the lake and was sat waiting for me at home and I wouldn’t have cared. My pain left me, but with it took everything else until all I was left with was numbness and space. Numbness squared. I didn’t care about anything. Even when I saw Ishiko dancing in front of Gregory and realised they were fucking, I barely cared. Then one day I threw up. Right after taking the tablet. That day I realised what had been happening to me. They were drugging me to shut me out from reality so they could create their own. I finally saw it. I flushed the tablet away with my vomit. I calculated the dates. I took the test. I placed the next tablet on the shelf behind my drawer. I don’t know why I didn’t flush it away.

  I woke early, 6:41 AM, and I dressed immediately on this should be miserable Thursday. I rinsed my mouth three times and washed my hands three times. I went straight out for my walk and the chill of the morning air against my skin felt clean and invigorating. I felt it. I didn’t feel fuzzy or blurred or sad. I was sharp and awake and alive. I walked with my left hand against my stomach, and I wondered how it was that only yesterday I felt so flat and lifeless. Fifty days have passed since I found out I was pregnant. Fifty whole days. I encircled the small bump under my coat, tracing it with my fingertips and realised that I had not paid it due attention. At the start I did, but along the way I seem to have got lost. It's Gregory's fault. He snuffed out my hope. I have to show him that there is a future. That I count. That I am worth it. Before I forget again.

  I could hear him eating his breakfast and the rustle of the newspaper when I arrived home but I made a point of not joining him. Instead I searched the cupboards in the dining room – still wearing the latex gloves which I acknowledge as an unfortunate act of madness but I am trying to be flexible with myself - and found his mother’s old sewing box. There is a musty smell to it, like an old cupboard opened after years of closure, or the smell of an old unwashed lady. I found the tape measure and took it with me upstairs. I washed it well, made sure it was clean and with no trace of the odour, and then made several measurements of my body. First my stomach, then under my breasts to my pubic bone, around the circumference where my ribs ended, around my belly button, buttocks, and hips. I wrote them all down. I made a chart. I pulled at my skin until it hurt, unable to comprehend how it might be that it would stretch to the required size. I was able to pull at no more than an inch in any location. I drew lines on my skin to document the measurement position, the ones on the back appearing a little less perfect and more like a series of dots. I used a permanent marker that I found in the drawer of the cabinet in the dining room. Holding the tape measure steady was a challenge, but I managed and felt very good about the fact. Underneath my clothes I now look like an architectural plan for motherhood. Grow here. Spread out there. Fill this area. I stood naked for a while admiring my work in the bathroom mirror and because of my good cheer I added a few lines of artistic expectation to give the stomach a rounder appearance. At the moment there is nothing more than a bump. A too-much-food bump. I suspect in a couple of weeks I could look a little fat rather than pregnant. I think we have another six or seven weeks before he is obliged to tell the world, or hide me away like an unmarried mother in 1945.

  I waited for Gregory to leave and then dressed before I made my way downstairs. Ishiko was waiting for me, ready with breakfast. I ate. I didn’t speak to her. She hovered around me today as if she had something to say but I didn’t push to learn what it might be. I am not interested in her thoughts. Not at the moment. I wonder if she has missed the photograph that I took from her wall. I wonder if she knows that I was in her room. I wonder if Gregory told her what happened. Would she sympathise with him? With me? Would she tell him he deserves better and stroke his face to remind him how perfect it would be if it wasn’t for me still hanging around. Perhaps she wants to kill me too.

  I slept for a while. I locked my bedroom door and lay back on the bed with the pearl bracelet and photograph in my hands. I woke when Ishiko began hoovering. I got up and watched her. She knew I was there, but what could she say? Would she ask me to leave? I watched as she leant over the toilet in the spare room and scrubbed Gregory’s filth from the shower. He still hasn’t returned to our room, and I doubt he will for some time. Not whilst she is around for middle of the night rendezvous.

  Because the fog has lifted I took a walk
in the garden, just to see what was happening in the world beyond the house. Whilst I was out there I saw Dana leaving in her Range Rover. She smiled, waved, and looked embarrassed. Although she called by the other day, she has not tried to return so I am not sure if she was really calling to see me. Perhaps Gregory has asked her to leave me alone. Mr. Sedgwick was also in the car, and he said something to her that looked like it was about me because I saw him say it and then they both took a look at me before carrying on with their conversation.

  In the wintertime there are many roses in the garden. Red, pink, and yellow. I called to Ishiko who came out in her red duffle coat and under my watchful eye cut some for me. Her hands were blue by the end of it and covered in tiny scratches like she had been playing with an overexcited kitten. I asked her to cut the furthest flowers, the ones near the back of the bushes and for which she had to stretch to reach. She is short, and at times it was level with her face and so she got scratched on the cheeks too. I enjoyed my time in the garden and the flowers and the cuts are beautiful.

  Less satisfying was the attention that Gregory paid her that evening. He obviously thought it safe to attend to an injury without fear of my judgment. Nobody would question a good Samaritan, right? He was right to assume so, because I didn’t question him as I watched him bathe the wounds in a mixture of water and Dettol as his mother had obviously done to him as a child. His delicate fingers worked all over her, first her hands, then the face, to which I noticed he paid particular attention. He even called our doctor to ask if she might need a tetanus vaccination. To her credit, she barely fluttered an eyelash. I sat at their side as this caring process occurred, handing him fresh cotton wool balls as he asked for them and holding the pot that contained the antiseptic solution. Throughout the proceedings I was wearing my latex gloves, a fact for which he seemed mildly impressed and asked me if I had anymore that he could use. He obviously quite fancied the idea of a new character. Dr. Gregory, perhaps. I told him that I didn't. I admit that there was part of me which quite enjoyed watching. I remember so few details about his actions when I was ill. I pretended that I was sat in Ishiko’s place, and that this was how he tended to me. I imagined those delicate fingers would feel quite nice when you are ill, stroking at you like a child’s fingers, or a breath of gentle breeze on a summer’s day. Comforting. He asked me later on that evening when we were sat together in the drawing room why I had asked her to cut the roses. His question was curt and so I replied by asking if he would rather I had done it myself and sustained the wounds on my own arms and face. He didn’t say much, but I heard him utter the words, of course not, before slouching back into his chair with his brandy and last week’s newspaper. I considered that perhaps sustaining a few such wounds was a good idea, and that perhaps they would attract his attention in much the same way. I wondered where he kept the key to the locked away knives, but without much serious intention. This was the only mark on an otherwise good day.

  I lay alone again that night, nothing but my thoughts and baby for comfort. For a while I stared at myself in the mirror, no real effort on my part to do anything other than to stare. I pulled my pyjama top up level with my chest and stared at myself, tracing the lines with my latex gloved fingers. There is a layer of moisture in the glove now, and my skin is feeling itchy more or less all the time, but I have nevertheless decided to keep them on. After a while I returned to the bathroom and searched a drawer underneath the sink which I have not opened all week because it contains make up and I have had no use for it. In there I find a small hand mirror, and after applying a slick of Chanel Inimitable lipstick which is bright red and in this instance makes me feel good, I take it to the bed. I lock the door before taking off my pyjamas. I hold my legs apart as if I was at the gynaecologist's office and with my left hand I hold the mirror in place. With my right hand I prod at myself, pulling in one direction and then the other, sometimes using two fingers to stretch myself apart until the point that it hurt. Afterwards I decided to throw the gloves away. It was probably for the best because my hands were pruned and very red, so I washed them well and used the nail brush again which was a painful process through which I persevered. My right hand looks like it might split open.

  My self-inspection was supposed to allay my fears and instil a certain sense of biological confidence, but I remain unconvinced at the ability of my body to carry an actual child, or push it out when the time comes. So I went downstairs to the study and started up Gregory’s computer. It revved and whirled and beeped a few times before eventually coming to life, a steady blue light casting out across the dark wooden walls. I searched on the Internet for pictures of women carrying babies. I found one that showed the same woman, an image taken every three weeks with her standing in the same position each time. Somebody cared about her growth and the thing inside her that was becoming a person as each day passed. Somebody wanted to document it, to remember it so that the first moments of life would never be forgotten. She stood very proudly, her arm covering her breasts which also seemed to grow in size and hung lower as the photographs progressed. She was smiling in each photograph, even when her stomach became red and sore looking with big blue scratches stretched across the surface. It was the first time I have cried in weeks.

  I hadn’t heard Gregory coming down the stairs. He was stood in the doorway, fiddling with his robe, his fingers probing at his sleep swollen eyes. His hair was tousled and free, and there were little white marks on his lips from where his spit had dried. To some he would revolt them in this state. But nobody looks their best in the middle of the night. We all smell, exude, and sweat as the body succumbs to its needs.

  “What are you doing?” His words are soft and there is a half smile on his lips. In the middle of the night whilst he is sleepy, he is unable to hate me as he does during the day. In the dark of his office there is nothing but us, save the occasional whistle as the wind rattles past the corner of the house. I can hear the tress rustling too. To me, this is how I love Gregory. This is who he really is. Here he is not adorned by anything fancy. There is no expensive watch, no glass of brandy, no newspaper to block me out from the character that he plays. This is how he looked when I first spent the night with him. Of course, I didn’t love the smell or the taste or the dried spit at the time, but they were part of him and I grew to love those too. When you love somebody’s flaws you know that they are the most important thing in your life. We discard others when the flaws become evident. We toss things aside that are no good for us. But for the one you love you can tolerate anything. This is the distinction, the difference. Without his flaws, I could not love him as I do.

  I remember once he had an irregular toenail. It became brown, thick, and crusty. I was acutely aware of it, always thinking about how I was the only one that knew it was there. It made me feel privileged. Like we had a secret. Eventually he visited a doctor and treated it. It was fungus. It went after six months, and afterwards I missed its presence. We had lost something between us. He had lost a flaw for me to love him in spite of. That is why I believe he no longer loves me, because it is my flaws that he cannot stand.

  “I was using the Internet.” He walks behind me and he can see the pictures on the screen. I thought about covering them up, but he was too quick. I feel his hand on my shoulder and for a second I think that he may be rubbing his thumb against me. I turn around, and see that he is. It is moving back, and then forth, each stroke returning comfort and affection as he sees the tears still glistening on my cheeks as the light bounces off them and lights my red lips like a warning flare. I look up at him. He is looking at me and I suddenly realise it is so long since we even made eye contact.

  “You have been crying.” He pulls a handkerchief from his pocket, which for some reason I find absurd that he has in a dressing gown, and he wipes my eyes. He stops and looks at me, my face blue in the light of the screen, just like the day I returned cold from the fog. He brushes his fingers against mine, before his hand reaches up to my face. He nods his hea
d backwards, encouraging me to stand. I do, and he turns to me. He pushes me with his body against the desk so that I sit down on the edge. He puts both hands on my face and his lips part before he reaches down and kisses me. It is not a passionate kiss. It is soft, like a butterfly landing. It lingers and I feel his breath against me before he pulls away. But he doesn’t move far. He turns my face and kisses my cheek, again soft and warm and breathy, his hands moving down and rubbing my arms up and down and then back up to my neck and face. With each stroke his grip tightens and his kiss becomes harder. He strokes his hands across me, tracing my form through my pyjamas, my shoulders, my breasts, and then the tiny swelling which houses my tiny centimetre long fish. He lingers here, as if he is trying to feel it. As if he wants to find it. He unbuttons my top without taking his eyes away from my face and I feel scared like this is my first time with him. My pulse is racing which can’t be good for the baby and I almost tell him to stop, but like he is a drug to which I am addicted I don't say anything. I feel hot and swollen like I did in the drawing room, and I wonder if he will use me like he did before and leave me here alone feeling degraded. But during my mental absence he has undone himself, and he too is exposed. Only the necessary bits of us poke out from our nightwear as he pushes me back. He pushes his hand inside my pyjama top, his fingers unknowingly tracing the black marks that I have made across my body as he moves back and forth, grunting quietly and breathing heavily in my ear as his lips move along the side of my neck. It is fumbled and quick, not like a husband should make love to his wife, and not like he did to Ishiko, but we have done it. It is over and he is shaking as he leans into me. He is gripping me, cradling me, his weight pushing me back until I am lying over the desk with his arms wound tightly around me and his head resting between my breasts. He is mumbling and I cannot hear what he is saying. I am uncomfortable and squashed, but I don’t want to disturb him, or the moment, or our connection.