Mind Over Mind

by Karina L. Fabian

  She bit her lip thoughtfully. “And now that you’ve confronted this memory, are you going to freak out over thornless roses?”

  He shrugged. “I doubt it.”

  “All right, then. You’re forgiven. Next page.”

  They looked at photos of his house, of the view from his bedroom window—a wide expanse of beige and green prairie with deep blue mountains suddenly rising from the horizon against a sky that shaded from clear summer blue to an almost white powdery blue. One mountain towered above the rest, snow covering its peak. Pikes Peak, he told her. There were photos of their land in the mountains near Westcliffe, a more rugged terrain than she was used to with lots of rock outcroppings and cactus mixed in with wildflowers, pine and Aspen trees. He had a photo of his horse, a sturdy Morgan he’d gotten through a 4-H program.

  When they got to photos of the band, she laughed. “Whose…car...is that?” Joshua and four other guys including Rique were posed with their instruments on and around a brilliant yellow El Camino. On the tailgate was a well-known painting of the Virgin Mary in a pink dress and a blue robe, surrounded by gold.

  “Rique’s. I thought my parents were going to kill him—he used the graduation money they gave him to get that paint job. That’s Our Lady of Guadalupe on the back. She’s the patron saint of the Americas, and his chosen patroness, too. This is Carl with the blond hair and guitar; he plays bass and hand drums when we do stuff with more Native American influence. Leon is our percussionist. Austin plays just about any wind instrument you can imagine, but usually saxophone and flute. He’s been teaching me a little of the saxophone. This is actually our professional photo—we’ve used it on flyers, and even had some posters and t-shirts done. Here—” He turned the page, to more photos of them around the car at different angles. She could see in them that in addition to the icon, the car was decorated with a line of chili peppers running along the side.

  “There’s no losing that in the parking lot.”

  “Yeah. It’s a lowrider, too. Got the bouncing shocks. Fun, fun car. Here’s one of our gigs. A Halloween party the city sponsored at the Events Center. They had three bands, so we got to play and have some fun, too.”

  Along with some long shots of them on stage, there were photos of them in costume at the party itself. One was Joshua in a Renaissance peasant’s outfit with his arms around a tall, thin, woman whose costume consisted of angel’s wings and a red bikini and hot pants. She had a halo on her head, but had sculpted her hair with red gel into two horns. She had one hand on his chest and the other low and to the back of his hip. “A fan?”

  Joshua snorted. “LaTisha. My Ex.”

  “What, wife?” She meant it teasingly, but he answered with vehemence.

  “No. Thank God it never got that far!”

  “That bad, huh?” She looked again at the photo. There was something very captivating about her, very sleek and sensuous, but kind of disturbing, too, like a cross between a panther and a snake. There was something possessive about the way she had her arms around him…Think I’ll just hate her now, Sachiko decided. She didn’t realize she’d spoken aloud until Joshua laughed.

  “I’ll give you Rique’s e-mail; you can join his anti-fan club. All my friends hated her. I kind of neglected a lot of people as well as things like my studies. I just really—our relationship was pretty…intense. What was good was incredibly good; what was bad…The costume really says it all: LaTisha was heaven and hell.” He looked at the photo with a half grin, half grimace, a little wistful. Silence came between them.

  Sachiko broke it. “You’re not on the rebound, are you?”

  “No. I admit, I have a few unresolved issues to work out, but I haven’t been pining or looking for love or anything. In fact,” he shut the book and kicked it under the couch, then turned to face her, “my plan had been to spend a quiet summer of hermit-like introspection and work. But then you had to come along with those exotic eyes and beguiling grin.”

  “Aw, did I wreck your widdle pwans?” she teased as he pushed her back against the cushions.

  “You’re forgiven.” A moment later, he purred, “I like your ideas better.”

  *

  Many, many moments later, she pulled away and leaned against his shoulder with a happy sigh. As before, they were playing by what she’d jokingly called “good Catholic boy rules.” He’d even resisted her attempts to ease off his shirt, though she did manage to unbutton it part way. She caressed his smooth chest. He had one hand behind his head and the other was playing with her hair. “Can I ask you something?”

  “I love to be kissed right here,” he answered, pointing to the hollow of his shoulder.

  “I’ll remember that,” she said caressing the spot. “But my question is more serious. Ydrel said you told Isaac that it was OK to die, and you, you made him agree?”

  He stopped stroking her hair. “Is he upset about it?”

  “No, not really. But I am. How could you do that?”

  For a moment he didn’t answer. She waited, afraid to look into his face, wondering if she should have waited until another day to say anything, or even at all.

  You know how upset he was about Isaac. Why’d you break the moment just to upset him again?

  When he did speak, he didn’t sound upset, just a little apprehensive. “Let me up, would ya?” She slid away, and he sat up and reached under the couch, pulling out—again—his scrapbook. He flipped to the back. “This is my grandpa Jebediah, my mom’s dad.”

  She leaned over to look at the photos, taken when Joshua was different ages: a portly, smiling man with just a hint of gray holding an infant with Joshua’s mom leaned over him; a much grayer and heavier man passing out Christmas presents; finally, a drastically older and thinner man in a chair with a young boy Joshua standing beside him. The man had a blanket over his knees, although Joshua was in shorts and a tank top, and although they tried to hide it for the photo, Sachiko’s nurse’s training made her spot the IV.

  “He died just after my tenth birthday. We never really knew quite what he had, just that his body would go nuts: one day, he couldn’t eat enough; the next week, a cracker would make him vomit all day long. He had these awful, awful hemorrhages. He was in and out of the hospital for a few months; the doctors finally said there was nothing they could do and he had maybe a few months to live. They recommended a nursing home. But we couldn’t. So we brought him home, and some hospice workers came and helped us. Anyway, he just got worse, and it got more and more painful for him. And my mom. I mean, even as an adult, she was always his little girl; if something needed to be done, she’d call him as easily as my dad. He almost died a couple of times, but just kept hanging on.

  “Anyway, after one especially bad hemorrhage, my mom went downstairs to put the towels in the washer and call the hospital to see if there was anything we could do, anything, and I was with him. He was shivering so hard, and he was too weak to speak, but he just looked at me, he was so—”

  He stopped, squeezed his eyes shut and mashed his lips together. She wanted to throw her arms around him and comfort him, but she still didn’t understand how this applied to Isaac, so she waited, silent but sympathetic. Finally, he spoke, in a quiet almost childlike voice.

  “I told him it was OK, that Dad and I would take care of Mom, and he could die. He didn’t have to hurt anymore. I told my grandpa to die.

  “And he smiled at me, and tears fell from his eyes, but he just smiled. Then he died.”

  Suddenly, he stood up, spilling the book onto the floor. He strode to the kitchen and pulled a can of soda out of the refrigerator. Only after he’d popped the can and downed half its contents in a long series of swallows did he return, picking up a box of tissue on his way. Smiling ruefully, he handed one to Sachiko and took one for himself. Only then did she notice she was crying, too. They blew their noses and giggled.

  “So,” he said, his voice stronger. “Isaac. Obviously, he wasn’t in the same way as grandpa, but it was obvious he was hangi
ng on. I’d talked to him before, when he was lucid; he knew what Ydrel was doing, how he got caught up in his awful memories he was reliving. How he tried to save him from those memories. I think he was scared Ydrel might try to, I don’t know, follow him into death. I know: that’s ridiculous—”

  “No. No, I understand what you mean. He got really caught up in those fantasies, like he was living what was in Isaac’s mind.”

  Joshua smiled with relief. “Exactly. I didn’t want to mention that to anyone; they might think I’m buying into Ydrel being psychic or something. But also, I recognized the look Ydrel had. I’d seen it in my mom. I’d worn it. So I said what seemed needed to be said. But Isaac needed to hear Ydrel’s release, too. I tried to explain some of this to Ydrel, but I really didn’t want to get into everything with my grandpa there. I mean, I was a mess for months afterward, didn’t want to be near anyone older than my parents. My mom did Meals on Wheels—I’d scream whenever I had to go with her. I still can’t talk about it easily. Obviously.”

  Now Sachiko set the book neatly on the floor and wrapped her arms around him. “Thank you for trusting me enough to tell me,” she whispered.

  He sniffled and shivered. “Sachiko, I—”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “All right, then.” She pulled him back until they were again in their original position, reclined on the couch, her head nestled into his shoulder, his hand stroking her hair. “Finish your story.”

  “Finish?”

  “Yes. You were a mess, wouldn’t even feed old people!” she teased him lightly, then asked, “So what happened?”

  “Confession, actually.”

  “You told your dad what happened?”

  “No, my First Confession. I told a priest. Man, I was scared. The only thing that made me go through with it was that I wouldn’t be able to explain to Mommarosa why I couldn’t get my First Communion. But the priest told me he couldn’t absolve me because I hadn’t done anything wrong. I didn’t kill my grandfather. I didn’t even make him die. I just gave a scared old man strength to complete the last journey God had for him. So I cried a little, and we prayed for Grandpa, and I confessed all my other bad behaviors, and in addition to the usual prayers of penance, he asked me to volunteer in a nursing home. It turned out to be very healing for me.”

  “Did the priest ever tell your parents?”

  He pulled back to give her a funny look. “This was Confession. Total confidentiality, remember? I’m not sure I’d have ever confessed again if he’d told my parents. And believe me, I’ve needed confession.”

  “What? A good Catholic boy like you?”

  “I wasn’t so good last year. I had a lot to confess before I left home this summer.”

  “Because of LaTisha?”

  For a moment, he didn’t answer, but he continued to caress her hair, so she knew he was thinking rather than being upset. Again, she waited silently, letting her fingers trace little circles and designs on his chest, listening only to his heartbeat. It was very comfortable, and she was even getting a little drowsy. She’d almost thought he wasn’t going to answer, when: “LaTisha was the catalyst, but not the cause. That’s what I’m trying to work out, I guess. But that’s another deep, emotional story and I’m tired of deep emotional stories! Next week is your turn!”

  “No promises. Do you want me to go so you can get some sleep?”

  He laid an arm around her waist before she could rise. “Who said anything about being sleepy?” he asked in a low voice that sent delicious shivers along her spine. She smiled up at him.

  They kissed.

  CHAPTER 26

  When Roger barged into Ydrel’s room early Saturday morning, Ydrel was showered and dressed and sitting on his made bed, reading. “I assume His Majesty wishes to see me?” he asked in a dignified voice.

  “Get moving,” Roger growled.

  Ydrel rose without argument to precede him out the door. Again, his stomach was bothering him—something that was happening with increasing frequency—but he was not about to show any weakness in front of the orderly. As he passed through, he glanced at Roger. “There’s something different about you today. Are you sober?”

  “Shut up!” But even though the orderly muttered obscenities under his breath, he did not, as he might have before, try to “accidentally” bump Ydrel into a door.

  That would make Sachiko—and others on the staff—both happy and sad: happy, that Roger was no longer abusing patients; sad, that he didn’t get pushed over the edge and do something that would get him fired. Ydrel wondered if there was some way he could manage both until he got to Malachai’s office.

  “Reporting as ordered, sir,” Ydrel smiled sarcastically as he sat, laced his hands behind his head and leaned back in the chair, studying the psychiatrist closely. He was in the usual pose: leaned back slightly yet with perfect posture in his oh-so-grand leather office chair, his elbows resting lightly on the arms and his hands steepled. He was pushed away from his desk and turned at an angle, so he didn’t fully face the desk, or the client across from it, yet his face was turned and tilted slightly. The perfect picture of caring professionalism. Still, Ydrel had seen and heard about little slips in his façade. Perhaps Roger wasn’t the only one being thrown off center by their “upstart young intern.”

  Let’s see if we can keep him off-center. “You know, it’s not healthy for you to be spending so much time here. You ought to find yourself a woman or something.”

  “Thank you for your advice, but my concern is for you.”

  “Thanks, but I’m not interested in women right now. Maybe when I’m out of here and in the real world.”

  Now Malachai regarded him with a pitying smile. “I think we still have a great deal of work before you’re ready to be released.”

  “So, that’s why you’re here? Got a deadline, Dolfus?” He emphasized Malachai’s much-hated given name, and the pseudonym under which he wrote about Ydrel for the psychic phenomena magazines. “I don’t have any new tricks for you. In case you hadn’t noticed, I’ve had a rough week.”

  “I would think after your ‘session’ with Joshua, you would have a great deal to share. I’ve reviewed his summary tape; the use of ley lines in particular is quite interesting. Tell me: are you able to tap into their power as you’ve implied?”

  “You don’t find it ironic that on the one hand, you’re pressuring me to perform tricks like some psychic monkey, and on the other, you’re trying to disabuse me of the notion I’m psychic?”

  Malachai got up from his chair and went to sit down on the coffee table in front of Ydrel. He leaned forward intently. “Can it be you’ve misunderstood me all these years? I have always believed you have paranormal abilities. Have we not tried to study them in order that you can better control them? I’m actually pleased young Joshua has been able to help you, although it’s a blow to my pride that I did not come up with such simple, obvious ideas as his. But you still hold delusions and attitudes that keep you within these grounds.”

  It had been years since Malachai had crossed the barrier between him and Ydrel that the desk represented. Suddenly, the young client found himself off balance. He sat up cross-legged in the chair and wrapped his arms around himself protectively. “Like what?” he asked guardedly.

  “These visitors that call you from consciousness, for one.”

  Visitors? “It was Joshua that taught me how to deal with Tasmae when you couldn’t.”

  Again, that compassionate, pitying smile. “Ydrel, Joshua has a one-size-fits-all philosophy of psychiatry that, while naïve, is effective in certain cases. He doesn’t truly believe you are psychic, but he lets you pretend it’s the source of all your troubles; that’s why his methods work as well on Tasmae as on real people.

  “Now, I know you have paranormal abilities. I have pushed you to explore those abilities; sometimes, as this week, I’ve pushed too far. I underestimated Mr. McDougal’s psychosis and overestimated your ability to defe
nd yourself. I am sorry. Yet, perhaps this turned out to be a good thing? After all, it gave Joshua a chance to teach you some new and better techniques—from fantasy novels, I presume?”

  Despite himself, Ydrel nodded.

  “But that’s the key, isn’t it, Ydrel? Fantasy. Joshua believes in your psychic abilities no more than he believes in Doleson’s aliens.”

  “Does it matter? If it’s working, who cares whether he believes or not?” Yet the ache in his heart told Ydrel the truth—he cared.

  Malachai looked down and sighed. “Ydrel. Ydrel, it does matter. Joshua’s ‘objectivity’ isn’t objective at all, because it’s ignoring the root causes of your troubles, even how your past is influencing you. It doesn’t matter to him, because he sees what he’s doing as working. It’s very mechanical; in essence he’s an engineer, tinkering to make his project function as best it can.

  “But I know you. And I know the fact of some of your abilities, like your ability to receive and internalize other’s thoughts and emotions. But I also know your emotions. You’ve been very lonely here, very isolated. It’s no secret; that’s one of the reasons we brought Joshua here. But before that, hasn’t your Tasmae filled that need?”

  “What? All she did was call me away and demand information! There was no friendship. Besides, I didn’t ask for her. She called me. You think I’ve enjoyed playing oracle?” Ydrel almost stood up, he was so suddenly angry, yet Dr. Malachai stayed as he was, sitting quietly on the table edge.

  “But you were doing a valuable service. You were needed. And let’s think about this rationally: She is an otherworld creature with incredible powers to contact minds across time and space. Why would she call upon a teenage boy for military information?”