Rookwood Asylum

by David Longhorn

  Liz shook her head.

  “No, I’m on my own now. Well, sort of.”

  There was an awkward silence until Paul suggested she sit down. Liz kicked off her shoes and curled up on the sofa. He found it hard to ignore her slender, shapely legs, so made a point of looking past her left ear as he asked her again if she wanted anything.

  “A cup of tea would be nice,” she said softly. “And a chocolate biscuit, if you have any.”

  “Cookies? Guess I have some,” he said. “Somewhere. Maybe.”

  He walked over to the kitchen door, stumbled slightly, cursed under his breath.

  “You’re a little bit drunk, Paul.”

  “More than a little, I’m afraid!”

  He smiled back at Liz, but she was looking at him with a serious expression he could not read. He put a teabag in a mug, poured boiling water over it, and let it brew while he looked for cookies. Eventually, he found a half-empty packet of chocolate digestives, a British ‘biscuit’ that he sometimes dunked in his coffee.

  “Are you lonely?”

  Paul dropped the packet, fragments of brittle, light brown biscuit spraying over the tiled floor. Liz was right behind him. Her face showed concern and some puzzlement. She ignored his efforts to pick up the debris. He noticed she was barefoot, and in his half-drunk state he stared at her small, perfectly-formed feet.

  God, he thought, inviting her in was a bad idea. I’m gonna make a fool of myself.

  “I asked, are you lonely?”

  Paul gave up trying to round up the crumbs on the kitchen floor and stood up again. Looking down at Liz, eyes bleary, he nodded.

  “Yeah,” he blurted out. “I don’t know why exactly, but lately I feel – so alone. I’ve got a lot to be grateful for, and it’s not like it’s the first time I’ve broken up with someone, but –”

  Once he had begun talking, all his self-doubt and misery came tumbling out. He felt a cool hand take hold of his, and Liz led him back into the living room. Again, he stumbled, and knew he had had at least one too many with Mike.

  “I’m quite drunk,” he said, breaking off his account of his struggle with depression. “I’m very drunk, and I’m talking too much. I’m sorry, really, you’d better go.”

  Liz put a small hand on his forehead. Her skin felt cool, very soft, and Paul thought of a summer breeze caressing him. He closed his eyes, shutting out the evening sunlight that was suddenly too bright.

  “Go?” she said. “I want to be here. I want to be with you. We have so much in common.”

  “Bad idea,” he muttered. “Not a good idea to have rebound – to try and – God, I can’t even talk now.”

  “Then don’t.”

  He felt a finger on his lips, then sensed it moving down his chin, his chest. Then she began to unbutton his shirt. Paul mumbled a protest, reached up, and tried to stop the small, agile fingers. But somehow, they seemed far too strong for him.

  Oh God, I am so drunk, he thought.

  And then he passed out.

  ***

  In his dream, Paul was walking along the hallway outside Apartment 212, heading toward the elevators. The lift doors both bore OUT OF ORDER signs. Paul knew he had to get away, go down to the main entrance, leave Rookwood. He looked up at the stained-glass window, and with dream-logic, implored Saint Dymphna to help him.

  The white-robed woman turned her perfect face to his. Her expression held infinite sadness, pity, an understanding of suffering from the inside. The saint, he suddenly realized, was also his mother. He seemed to float, pass through the window, and found himself in a familiar room, a room he hated. It was white-walled, with a pale green carpet, a window looking out onto a snow-bound copse of trees. There was a table, riveted to the floor, and two chairs, also fixed down. Paul sat in one, his mother sat opposite.

  His mother was rocking back and forth, slowly, as she always did. She wore a white robe, but it was stained, frayed, nothing like the raiment of a saint in a stained glass. Her hair was disheveled, brownish strands flecked with gray falling over her face. Her eyes peered anxiously at something Paul could not see. He looked down, saw familiar sneakers, a pair he had worn for a couple of summers back in high school. His mother had been in and out of institutions during that time, her body awash with prescription meds, her mind wandering. He had hated visiting her, hated himself for not wanting to go, felt anger and despair at the whole grown-up world for what had happened to her.

  Depression.

  The word had been woven into the fabric of his life. When they had studied The Great Depression in history class, he had tried hard not to think of his mother staring at the TV, slumped in her robe, not moving or speaking for hours or days. Paul’s sisters, older and tougher than he, had held things together for as long as they could. But eventually, Mom had had to ‘go away.’ They never named the place, never said ‘committed.’ It was always ‘gone away to be looked after properly.’

  “Mom?” Paul said. “Mom, it’s me.”

  She looked up because it was a dream. In reality, she had never looked at him, not really. Her face had been turned toward him, but she was seeing some terrible inner world, a private hell he had not understood, not at the time. But now her eyes were focused on him, and she smiled. It was a puzzled, hesitant smile, but Paul still felt immense relief. She had recognized him, she knew him. Then her expression changed to concern, anxiety. Her eyes flickered toward the door. Paul noticed that the door was not as he remembered it. It was metal-framed and padded, covered in worn, studded leather.

  “Get out,” she said. “Get out, quick.”

  “Mom?” Paul said.

  He felt hurt, rejected. This was as bad as her indifference. He reached out for her hand, but she snatched it away, held it up to the side of her head. And now he saw something new; a patch of redness on her temple, near her left eye. She almost touched it, then let her hand fall.

  “Get out before he does this to you,” his mother warned. “Get out before the doctor –”

  She stopped, her head jerked around, listening. Paul heard the clang of a door opening. A metallic sound, like in a prison movie. Then came footsteps, echoing in the corridor outside.

  “It’s too late,” his mother said, shaking her head in despair. “Oh, it’s too late. The doctor knows you’re here. He knows you’re like me. Ready for treatment. Ready for the experiment.”

  The door opened outward. A flickering, like distant flashes of lightning, played across the wall of the corridor. Then a squat, white-coated figure appeared. Round spectacles reflected the light and made the man’s eyes invisible. A surgical mask covered the lower half of his face. The mask rippled as the mouth beneath it spoke.

  “It’s time for your treatment, Paul. Just like your mother.”

  The doctor stepped into the room, which was now a padded cell, its floor and walls worn and stained. The chairs and table were gone. So had Paul’s mother. Now, he was chained to the wall, and as the masked doctor came closer, he began to pull frantically at his manacles. The doctor held up a hypodermic syringe, tapped it, then tried the plunger. A thin jet of clear fluid shot from the tip of the needle.

  “You won’t take me back to that place!”

  Paul sat up. It took him a moment to realize that he was in his new bedroom. The curtains were open, and a colorless moonlight shone in. He got up, felt his head throb with an incipient hangover. Groaning, he headed to the window, noting that he was still wearing his socks and undershorts. He could make out the distant lights of the city. By his phone, it was just before three in the morning.

  What the hell happened?

  He flicked on the light and saw his pants and shirt, folded neatly on the chair by the dresser. He recalled Liz, snatches of conversation, the darkness of her eyes, her full-lipped mouth. He remembered her fingers undoing his shirt. He went into the bathroom, winced at the sudden piercing light, and splashed water on his face.

  “Okay, you passed out, and a teenage girl put you to bed,” he croaked
at his reflection. “Possibly a new low.”

  ***

  “Why do we have to go to church?” asked Ella.

  “Because it’s Sunday, and we’re Catholics,” replied Neve. “Not particularly good ones, but that’s all right, because guilt and sin are key parts of the package.”

  Ella looked up at her mother skeptically.

  “But what if I don’t believe in God anymore?” she demanded. “Then church is just a man talking.”

  “Father McGuire will be hurt if you don’t go,” said Neve, deciding on a change of tactics. “Also, you’ll miss all your friends at Sunday School.”

  Ella looked doubtful, but Neve sensed she was making headway. She continued to fuss around Ella, adjusting her daughter’s hair, dress, coat, fretting over the girl’s worn school shoes. Then Neve checked her own appearance, groaned at her hair’s refusal to remain even vaguely tidy. She decided to shove it all under a woolen hat and hope for the best, then put on her coat.

  “I mean, what if after you die there’s no heaven or hell?” Ella asked. “What if instead you’re just stuck in this world? Doing whatever you were doing before you died?”

  Neve paused, frowning at Ella. She had never heard her daughter talk about life and death in this way, let alone the afterlife. She wondered if Ella was coming under the influence of pretentious or morbid friends at school.

  “Good people go to heaven,” Neve insisted. “We believe that, and it makes sense. Kind of. Now, no more theology because we’ve got to go!”

  They left their flat and headed for the stairs. The American from the second floor was coming down at the same time, dressed in jogging gear. Neve thought he looked terrible, wrung-out, and assumed that he and his English pal had been boozing the night before.

  Just what we need, she thought. Another drunken bloke nearby. And I can’t recall his name.

  “Good morning,” she said, politely but without warmth.

  “Oh, hi!” the American replied, stopping to let Neve and Ella go first. “You heading out for a walk? It’s a fine day.”

  “We’re going to church,” Neve replied shortly.

  “Do you go to church?” Ella asked, looking up at the man.

  “Not for a long time,” he admitted. “You’re Ella, right?”

  The girl nodded. Neve resisted the temptation to pull on her daughter’s hand, hurry her down the last flight of steps.

  “I’m Paul,” the American went on. “Guess we’re neighbors.”

  Ella did not reply to that, and Neve felt no desire to talk to Paul. She was sure she could smell beer on his breath, along with sweat. They reached the foyer in awkward silence, and Neve felt relief that the caretaker was there. He seemed to be adjusting an Out of Order sign on one of the elevators.

  “Bloody thing’s just conked out again,” Declan explained, then looked down at Ella. “I reckon somebody messes with them. It wouldn’t be you, now, would it miss?”

  Ella giggled, and Neve shot her a look.

  “Any idea when it’ll be fixed?” the American asked.

  Declan looked slightly irritated.

  “No idea, pal,” he said. “But Kate’s on the case, I’m sure. And we’ve still got one working.”

  Another awkward pause ended when Paul mumbled that he’d better get going. As the American left the building, Declan began chatting with Ella. Neve did not mind. Declan struck her as honest and rather vulnerable in a way. He did not give off a worrying vibe.

  Unlike that American, she thought. There’s something about him, something not right.

  “Do you think we go to heaven when we die?” Ella was asking.

  Declan looked slightly taken aback, but then grinned.

  “Well, of course, we do,” he declared. “Except for bad people, like Hitler and Stalin. The Devil, he puts all them fellas on a toasting fork for all eternity.”

  Ella laughed, and Neve smiled at Declan in gratitude. He always deflected Ella’s more serious questions, a skill Neve envied. She gave a gentle tug on Ella’s hand, now sure that they were going to be late for morning mass.

  “But what about ghosts?” Ella demanded. “How can there be ghosts if people go to heaven?”

  Declan’s smile seemed to freeze for a moment, then he laughed. It sounded a little forced to Neve.

  “Is it ghosts you’re frightened of now?” he asked. “I thought a big girl like you would be too sensible for that sort of thing.”

  “She is,” Neve said, forcing a smile of her own. “And we really must run, the service will be starting.”

  Declan stood and watched as they walked out into the sunlight. Neve suddenly remembered that she had intended to ask him if he would come with them one Sunday. He had described himself as a lapsed Catholic, but Neve felt sure that Declan would benefit from some spiritual help.

  He seems so lost and lonely, she thought. That’s sad.

  ***

  After his encounter with the single mum and her daughter, Paul resolved to lay off the booze for a while. His initial resolve to jog down to the gates of Rookwood and then around the neighborhood soon evaporated, as he felt himself growing short of breath. His fitness regime had gone to hell months ago, when problems with Mari turned to an obvious split in their relationship.

  Starting with a five-kilometer run, he thought. Probably not a brilliant idea. Let’s make it about five hundred yards.

  Paul set off to jog slowly around Rookwood, reasoning that he had not looked closely at the place and had only seen it from the front. He went clockwise, circling the West Wing, glancing up occasionally to see if any residents were at their windows. He caught sight of Sadie Prescott watering a window box, called up a cheerful ‘Good Morning.’ She nodded rather coldly.

  I’m earning a ton of disapproval this morning, he thought. Maybe Mike and me were a little too loud last night?

  The side and back of the West Wing proved uninteresting. However, a small area of woodland came into view, and as Paul gazed at it, a flock of black birds rose with a tremendous cawing and fluttering. Paul assumed they were rooks, and that the wood had given the building its name. He made a note to ask Declan or Kate.

  Now he was behind the main block. He looked up to see if he could identify his own apartment. The window looked out over Tynecastle. He slowed to a walk, tried to remember the precise angle.

  Corner apartment, second floor, he mused. So that must be it.

  Someone was looking down at him. Looking at him from his own apartment. He stopped dead, gasped, raised a hand against the bright June sky. The window of the corner flat seemed empty. He dismissed the supposed face as the reflection of a cloud, or something similar.

  Jogging on, he made his way past the rear of the main block. Ahead of him he saw movement, what might have been a white-clad figure retreating around the corner. He slowed a little, then sped up again. It might be a child playing a game, or he could simply be mistaken. Sure enough, as he turned the corner, he saw a loose tarpaulin, light gray, moving slightly in the summer breeze.

  He slowed to a walk again, examining the East Wing. It showed signs of aborted work. There were windows and doors blocked by plastic sheeting. Piles of bricks and heaps of timber had been abandoned. Paul stopped by a door where the sheeting had been torn back and looked inside.

  Shouldn’t be doing this, he thought. May be an unsafe structure.

  Paul took a couple of steps inside the room and shuddered. Despite the balmy summer day, the interior seemed chilly, as if a fridge door had been opened nearby. And yet, the breeze remained gentle, barely moving the stained and smudged plastic sheeting. Paul wondered if anything remained of the old asylum. He felt a sudden, morbid curiosity to see if this old, British institution had resembled the one where his mother had spent so many years.

  The plastic covering the doorway opposite bulged out, the sheet flapping. Dust and fragments of plaster were lifted. They floated toward Paul, but he felt no breeze. The sheet rose further, as if someone were pushing it aside.
He took a step back, tripped on the uneven floor, reeled into the wall. There was someone else in the room, a figure walking toward him. It was short, thick-set, its face half-hidden by an old-style surgical mask. Round glasses gleamed in the half-light. The figure raised a hand, pointed.

  The doctor from my nightmare.

  “You’re not real!” he shouted, closing his eyes.

  When Paul looked again, he was alone in the room. He struggled to get upright, brushed plaster dust off his clothes. His hands were shaking, and he laughed nervously at how easily he had been spooked.

  Just shadows, he thought. An optical illusion.

  But something bothered him. If the phantom ‘doctor’ had been conjured up by his tired, troubled imagination, what had it been pointing at? The figure’s plump finger had not been aimed at Paul, but up and to his right. He looked up and saw what seemed to be graffiti, erratic dark brown lettering disfiguring the white wall. Paul craned his neck to make out the words.

  “Who the hell is Annie?” he murmured.

  Chapter 5

  Paul sat back and read the paragraphs that had taken nearly an hour for him to write. They were, by any reasonable standard, pretty bad.

  The British Industrial Revolution created, for many, a new form of serfdom. Where once great feudal lords had brutally dominated the lower classes, now factory owners imposed cruel, inhuman regulations and working conditions on employees. What made the industrial age worse than the predominantly agrarian culture that had preceded it, was the mechanization of many aspects of life. While even the poorest farm laborer could still live according to the natural rhythms of night and day, and the longer cycle of the seasons, factory hands were expected to function as mere extensions of the machines they served. In a supposedly free society, millions of men and women were enslaved by the time clock.

  “Okay, weak and cliched,” Paul muttered, “but at least it’s coherent.”

  The next paragraph was altogether stranger. He peered at it, wondering why he could not free himself from grim imaginings.