Gray Matter

by Gary Braver

  “Well,” she began, thinking how she didn’t want to begin with a lie. She chuckled nervously. “Is it really that important?”

  “Only because we’ll be discussing matters that concern his son, too, no?” His manner was pleasant, although she was beginning to feel uncomfortable.

  “Actually, he doesn’t know. This is a kind of a reconnaissance mission. Maybe if things work out, I’ll bring him next time.”

  He looked puzzled, but said nothing and affixed a pair of half-glasses to his nose and thumbed through a folder of Dylan’s test results.

  Adding to his immaculate appearance was his nearly pure white hair, which was combed back, emphasizing a broad aggressive forehead. In spite of the hair, he had dark, thick eyebrows and a smooth, boyish face that belied his age. He was a big man who might have been an athlete at one time. His eyes were heavy lidded and intensely watchful. But there was something disconcerting about his gaze—something she had vaguely registered the moment they had met. And only now did Rachel realize what it was: His eyes didn’t match. One was reef-water blue, but the other looked black. On closer inspection Rachel noticed that one iris was all pupil, giving him a disorienting appearance—one eye icy cool, the other darkly alluring.

  On the walls hung a few framed plaques—from the American College of Neurological Medicine, the International Society of Skull Base Surgeons, the American Board of Neurosurgery. Also, a Kiwanis Club award for outstanding contribution. Clustered on the opposite walls were photos of him with groups of students from Bloomfield Prep and with people at black-tie functions. The only other form of decoration was a bronze sculpture of the Indian elephant-head god on the windowsill. It had four arms, and each hand held something different. Only one she could make out. It was an axe.

  “His name is Ganesha,” Malenko said, his face still in the folder. “He’s the elephant-faced deity, sacred to Hindus the world over.”

  “It’s rather charming,” she said. The figure had a large potbelly spilling over his lower garment, and his eyes were large and his smile broad under his trunk.

  “Yes. Indians revere him as a god of intellectual strength. Was your son named after Bob Dylan?”

  “No, the poet Dylan Thomas.”

  “Ah, yes, the great Irish bard. ‘Do not go gentle into that good night.’ Wonderful stuff. Are you a literature person?”

  “I like to read.”

  “A former textbook editor, of course.”

  Rachel wondered how he knew that, because she hadn’t put that in the questionnaire. Perhaps it was in Dylan’s medical records.

  “Reading is the highest intellectual activity of the human experience,” Malenko continued. “More sectors of the brain are active than in any other endeavor including mathematics or flying an airplane. It’s the most totally interactive processing of information, even with children reading Mother Goose.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “Well, now you do.” He smiled and displayed a row of small but perfect white teeth in a sugar-pink mouth. “So, what can I do for you?”

  The baldness of the question threw her. Dylan’s records and test results sat under his nose. “Well, you can see from his folder that he has serious learning disabilities.”

  Malenko removed his half-glasses. “Yes, he’s functionally dyslexic, which means that the Wernicke’s area and the angular gyri—those areas of the brain involved in deciphering words—are underactive. As Dr. Samson clearly explained, we have here some of the best LD people in the country who could construct a personalized curriculum for your son.” He tapped his fingers impatiently as he spoke, as if to say, Why are you wasting my time?

  “It’s just that I wanted to explore other approaches.”

  “Other approaches?”

  Clearly Sheila had not told him about her. She probably did not even know the man, just his reputation. “Well, you’re a neurophysician, correct?”

  “I also can be found baking cookies.”

  She smiled in relief that his manner had softened. “I’m just wondering if there was anything you could do medically to help him.”

  “Medically?”

  “You know … some special procedures …”

  “Everything we do is a special procedure. We tailor our programs to each child, according to his and her individual needs. I’m not sure what you’re referring to.”

  “It’s just that I heard you had some kind of enhancement procedures.”

  Malenko’s eyebrows arched up. “Enhancement procedures?” He pronounced the word as if for the first time.

  “To repair the damaged areas. Maybe something experimental—some electrical stimulation thing.”

  He looked at her for a long moment that reprimanded her in its silence. Then he glanced inside the folder again. “I see that you were recommended by Sheila MacPhearson, the real estate lady.”

  “Yes.”

  “And what exactly did she say, Mrs. Whitman?”

  “Well, that you had some special procedures that can enhance children’s cognitive abilities.”

  “Like cripples at Lourdes.”

  “Beg pardon?”

  “We get some child to improve significantly on a math test or the SATs, and the word gets out that we’re miracle workers.” He chuckled to himself. “Mrs. Whitman, let me explain that we do perform miracles here, in a sense. We even improve a child’s ability to take tests so that scores go up a few points. But that’s incidental to our objective, which is to maximize a child’s potential. I’m not sure what you are looking for, but this is not Prodigies R Us.”

  Rachel felt a little foolish. She had been caught in Sheila’s exaggerated promise. Martin was right. “You’ve seen the MRI scans, correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, they’re not normal. There’s some kind of anomaly. I was just wondering if—you know—if anything could be done about that? I mean, with all the breakthroughs in medical science, aren’t there any corrective measures that could be taken—some kind of neurostimulation procedure or something … ?” She trailed off, hearing Dr. Stanley Chu’s response: “It’s like wanting to regenerate an amputated finger. It can’t be done.”

  Malenko stared at her intently as he considered her appeal, then he opened the folder and removed the MRI scans. “It seems to me, Mrs. Whitman, that you are confusing some magical medical fix with behavioral programs. I’ve looked these over, and I see no signs of hemorrhaging or lesions or tumors that might be impinging on your son’s intellectual development or performance. If there were, then something possibly could be corrected by surgery or radiation.”

  “But the left hemisphere is smaller than the right.”

  “Mrs. Whitman, let me ask you why you had the MRI scan done.”

  Suddenly she felt as if she were entering a minefield. “Because I was worried that he had a tumor or some other problem.”

  “But what made you suspect a tumor or some other problem?”

  “It was simply … I don’t know … precautionary. His memory retention isn’t normal.”

  “Had you consulted your pediatrician for possible psychiatric counseling or medications? Sometimes a child’s memory problems are the results of environment issues or chemical imbalances.”

  “Yes, we went through all of that.”

  “And was it your pediatrician who referred you for the MRI?”

  “Yes.”

  “And what was his evaluation?”

  “That the ventricles in the left hemisphere of his brain were larger than normal, indicating some kind of underdevelopment in the thalamus.”

  “And what did the doctor recommend in terms of medical treatment?”

  “He said nothing could be done.”

  “And you didn’t believe him.”

  “I’m seeking a second opinion.”

  “Surely your pediatrician consulted neurologists for an evaluation.”

  “I wasn’t satisfied.”

  Malenko listened intently, his bright eye tr
aining on her as if it were some kind of laser mind-scan. “Does your husband know about this?”

  “No, he doesn’t know, but why is that so important?”

  Malenko leaned forward. “Mrs. Whitman, if we are going to work with Dylan, then we cannot have misunderstandings regarding the medical condition of a prospective student. If we are going to set for ourselves expectations and objectives, candidness is essential.”

  Rachel nodded.

  “Good. Then am I correct in assuming that your husband does not know about the MRI scan or the dysmorphic abnormalities in your son’s brain?”

  She felt as if he had stripped her naked. “Yes.”

  “I see. Then may I ask what you are hiding?”

  “Hiding?”

  “Mrs. Whitman, you have an MRI done on your son’s brain, you discover an anomalous formation, then two weeks later you come in here for consultation—and your husband knows nothing. I find that unusual, unless you are in the throes of separation or divorce. Are you?”

  There was no equivocating with this man, Rachel thought. She struggled with the urge to tell him that it was none of his damn business, but she stopped herself. If she showed offense at his persistence, he might dismiss her. “No, we’re not.”

  Malenko looked at her with a bemused expression. Then he picked up the film scans and clipped them to the display board on the wall. “This disparity between the hemispheres of Dylan’s brain could be the result of many different causes, including infant trauma.” He glanced down at her.

  Christ! Now he’s wondering if I had battered my own baby.

  “It could also be chemical, genetic, oxygen starvation in utero … a number of possibilities. Sometimes these structural deformities can occur as the result of chromosomal damage, usually from the mother’s side.”

  For a prickly moment his eyes gauged Rachel’s face.

  chromosomal damage

  from the mother’s side

  He suspects, she told herself. He is a neurologist so he surely knows about the Chu study and recognizes the TNT signature damage.

  “Did you smoke or take any unusual medications while carrying your son?’

  “No.”

  “Any medical emergencies during pregnancy—emergency room visits? Hospitalization? Any intravenal medications?”

  All this was on the questionnaire. He was testing her. “No.”

  “Another possibility is alcohol. Did you drink while carrying your son?”

  “No.”

  Malenko handed her a box of Kleenex without comment.

  Rachel wiped her eyes, feeling that any moment she would break down.

  “MRI scans can only give us gross anatomical pictures, not minor neurocomponents. But the left temporal horn is dilated. Given your son’s test results, my guess is that the cortical regions have been short-circuited to the hippocampus, which is involved with recurrent memories and might explain his linguistic deficiencies.”

  There was no reason to dissemble with this man. “I took some bad drugs in college. Something called TNT. The chemical name is trimethoxy-4-methyl-triphetamine.”

  Malenko’s eyes flared. “‘TNT for dynamite sex. Get off with a bang.’”

  The old catch phrases for the stuff.

  “And I suppose your husband doesn’t know that either—which is why you’re here.”

  Rachel knew that under ordinary circumstances she would have dismissed Malenko’s unctuously manipulative manner and got up and left. But she suddenly felt a preternatural numbness from all the grief and guilt that had wracked her soul for the last weeks and just didn’t care about his obtuseness. Perhaps it was just the relief of getting it all out—like lancing a boil. “I’ve mentally crippled my son,” she said softly. “I just don’t want him to suffer. I don’t want him to go through life feeling inadequate and inferior.”

  “And that is why you’ve not told him.”

  She nodded.

  “Probably a good reason.” Malenko moved back to his desk chair and sat down. “I’d like to meet your husband.”

  “I don’t want him to know.”

  “Telling him is your business, not mine, Mrs. Whitman. But I think we all should meet again to weigh the options.”

  Weigh the options?

  She looked up. “Are you saying there’s something that can be done?”

  “I’m saying simply that we should meet again.” He glanced at his watch then closed Dylan’s folder and dropped it on a pile of others with a conclusive snap. “What kind of work is your husband in?” The discussion was over.

  If he had some experimental procedure in mind, he wasn’t talking. Yet Rachel felt a flicker of promise. “Recruitment. Martin’s in the recruitment business.”

  “Ah, you mean a head hunter.”

  “Yes, for the high-tech industry.”

  Malenko nodded in approval. “So he matches up eggheads with egghead companies.”

  “Something like that.”

  “Very good. Is it his own business?”

  “Yes.”

  “And business is good, no doubt?”

  She nodded. She felt emotionally drained. “Mmmm.”

  Malenko smiled, probably because it suggested that they could afford their pricey services. Then he picked up Dylan’s folder. “I will look these over more closely,” he said. “Let me suggest we meet next week, and with your husband. About the MRI, I will explain that you came in here on referral from a local friend, and we had a scan done as a matter of protocol.”

  He was saying that she could lie, and he’d swear to it. “Thank you.”

  “You can make an appointment with Marie. Good day.”

  Rachel left the building, torn between renewed hope and the overpowering desire to drive home and fall into a long dreamless sleep.

  Through the window, Lucius Malenko watched Mrs. Rachel Whitman cross the parking lot to her car, a gold Nissan Maxima. Not a Jaguar or BMW, but also not a Ford Escort. He watched her pull out to the road that would lead back to her perfect little seaview home on the perfect little hill surrounded by perfectly nurtured horticulture.

  He had seen her likes by the dozens over the years: yuppies, suburbies, and middle-aged country-club parents of different ethnicities and races—all driven by guilt and vanity and all devotees of the new American religion of self-improvement. From birth and even before, they were obsessed with rearing the supertot. They put toy computers in their children’s cribs. They sent them to bed with Mozart and bilingual CDs. They muscled their way into the best preschools. Infertile couples advertised for egg donors in the Yale Daily News. Others doled out thousand of dollars for the sperm of Nobel laureates. Some had even consulted geneticists, hoping that they could locate a “smart” gene to be stimulated. There is none, of course, nor any known cluster or combination, but that didn’t prevent people from spending small fortunes. It was all so amazing and amusing.

  “Nobody wants to be normal anymore,” he said aloud.

  As Mrs. Rachel Whitman drove away, a new silver BMW 530 two-door pulled into the slot just vacated by her. It was Mrs. Vanessa Watts, coming in to consult about her Julian’s behavior problems. Years ago, she had come in just like this Rachel Whitman, gnarled with despair that her youngster was distracted all the time, unfocused, a slow learner, and that he had scored in the fortieth percentile on his math aptitude and fifty-five on the verbal. She was likewise desperate to know what could be done to boost his ranks, otherwise he would never get into Cornell where his father had gone or even into Littleton State where, after some unpleasantness regarding a paper on Jonathan Swift, she eventually earned a doctorate in English literature. And that just could not be—not her Julian. No way. It was unacceptable, and they would do anything, pay anything to make him a brighter bulb.

  He watched Vanessa Watts cross the lot to the front entrance as she had on several occasions to come up and complain that they had succeeded too well—that her Julian was too absorbed in his studies, in his projects, that he had bec
ome antisocial: that his filament was all too brilliant.

  Never satisfied, these bastards. Especially this one—Professor Loose Cannon. And now she was here with her ultimatum. Fortunately, he had one of his own.

  He picked up the phone and dialed Sheila MacPhearson.

  28

  Brendan found Nicole in her ballet class in a building off Bloomfield Prep’s central quad. She was with seven other girls and an instructor in a dance room with mirrors and bars.

  Through the glass door, Nicole was dressed in white tights. Her shoulders were bare, giving her long-neck Modigliani proportions. She looked like a swan. They were going through motions called out by a woman instructor dressed in a jogging outfit.

  Because it was the last day of classes, the place was empty, so Brendan watched without being discovered. Nicole was perched with one leg up on the bar in line with the other girls. In the reflecting mirror, they looked like twin rows of exotic roosting birds, their faces in a numbed tensity. Suddenly the instructor said something, and they went into leg-flashing exercises. Nicole was second in line at the mirror, her long legs kicking out with elegant precision as if spring-loaded. From a CD player flowed the sweet violin strains of Swan Lake. The instructor shouted something, and on cue Nicole broke into her solo, going through complex leaps and pirouettes across the room. Brendan was amazed to see how totally involved she was in the movement, and so precise and athletic. Her teeth were clenched, muscles bunched up for each vault, her shoulders and face aspic’d with sweat, those muscular semaphore legs moving with effortless grace as she flashed around the room. She was a diva in the making.

  When the instructor turned off the music and announced class was over, Brendan left the building and waited for her behind some trees in the quadrangle.

  Several minutes later, he saw her with two boys coming down the walk toward him. She had changed and was heading for the cafeteria.

  “What are you doing here?” Nicole said when he stepped out from behind a tree.

  “I have to t-talk to you.”

  “How did you find me?”