The Devil in Silver

by Victor Lavalle

  “Sammy!” Dr. Barger barked.

  Both women laughed together. It didn’t matter to them if anyone else enjoyed the joke.

  But Pepper felt too angry about the four weeks he’d lost to be insulted. Instead he pointed at the doctor. “I was supposed to be here for a seventy-two-hour observation, but now …”

  Dr. Barger wagged one short red finger.

  “I’m at New Hyde as your therapist. Dr. Anand is the staff psychiatrist.”

  “So?”

  Dorry said, “Dr. Barger doesn’t have the power to release you.”

  Dr. Barger’s mouth narrowed into a frown. “I wouldn’t put it that way, Dorry.”

  “Well, what would you say then?” Dorry smiled pleasantly.

  “Dr. Anand’s authority supersedes my own.”

  Loochie crossed her arms and leaned forward in her seat aggressively. “How’s that different from what she said?”

  Dr. Barger looked at the teenager, his red face reddening even more. “I have authority here. It’s just not the kind that can …”

  Then the doctor stopped himself. He shut his eyes and rested a hand on the top of his head. He breathed quietly for a moment, and when he opened his eyes, all the patients were watching him in silence.

  Dr. Barger spoke with overdone civility. “I want to welcome you all to our weekly Book Group. I’m happy to see so many of you back.” He nodded at Pepper. “And to welcome our newest member.”

  Pepper and Dorry sat on one long end of the conference table. Loochie, Coffee, and the two jokers sat opposite them. Dr. Barger sat at the head. As they settled, the nurse from Pepper’s escape attempt entered the room, pushing a three-tiered cart full of books. She wheeled it around the table and stopped behind Dr. Barger. Pepper could see that the nurse was young. Probably not much older than Loochie. She stood next to the book cart and smiled. Her cheeks were as plump and smooth as the Gerber baby’s.

  Dr. Barger sat back in his chair. He rested his hands on his belly proudly.

  “So you see, Sammy? This time we do have books,” he gloated, looking around the table as if awaiting applause.

  But only Coffee reacted, raising one hand like a pupil with a question for the teacher.

  Dr. Barger ignored him. “As you can see, I’ve been able to acquire these.”

  Coffee continued chopping the air with his raised hand. He huffed now, too, and looked even more like that kid in the front row.

  Finally, Dr. Barger acknowledged him. “Okay, Coffee, do you have something to say? About Book Group?”

  Coffee revealed a thin blue binder. He set it on the table and opened it and flourished a pen. Everyone but Pepper and the new nurse sighed loudly.

  “The phone number of New York City Comptroller John Liu,” Coffee said. “Can you please provide it for me?”

  Dr. Barger dropped his voice an octave. “What does that have to do with Book Group?”

  Coffee ignored that. He said, “Attempts to reach the mayor have failed. I was recently visited by a representative of his office who threatened to have me arrested and to sue me if I don’t stop calling. So I accept that. Mr. Liu seems like a serious alternative. I believe he will help.”

  Sammy leaned forward and said, “What does a comptroller do, anyway?” She turned to her best friend, her doubles partner, setting the woman up for a match point. “Sam?”

  Sam said, “I don’t know, but if you hum a few bars I can fake it!”

  This made the two of them crash backward with laughter. Their chairs buckling. They laughed so loudly that Loochie, right beside them, pulled her knit cap down over her ears. That only made the two women laugh more.

  “You’re giving that poor girl brain damage,” said Sammy.

  “Well, we’re in the right place for it!” shouted Sam.

  Coffee tapped his pen against the table. “Dr. Barger,” he said. “The number?”

  Now the doctor knocked on the table with force and the women’s laughter quieted. Even Coffee stopped tapping the pen.

  Then the nurse spoke up. “These books won’t be useful anyway.”

  Dr. Barger looked over his shoulder. “Excuse me, nurse?”

  “Have you looked at the collection lately?”

  Everyone in the room scanned the shelves. This Bookmobile was hardly a fine library. It looked like the dumping grounds for vocational-training manuals. (ISP—Industrial Security Professional Exam Manual; Automotive Technician Certification: Test Preparation Manual; Medium/Heavy Duty Truck Technician Certification: Test Preparation Manual, and so on.) There were a few spy novels, a few mysteries, the Book of Common Prayer (it had curse words written in the margins of many pages). Not great reading material maybe, but also only one or two copies of each. Not enough for everyone. The nurse was right. Not only poor quality, but also poor quantity.

  Dr. Barger couldn’t pretend to miss the problem. But he could refuse to admit the fault was his. He looked up at the nurse and said, “I told you to bring all the books from the trunk of my car.”

  Before the nurse could argue, explain, or apologize, Dorry proposed, “Why don’t we vote on one book we want to read together. Then maybe New Hyde could get us all copies of that.”

  Pepper pointed at the book cart. Why did it bring him a childish pleasure to see the choices were so bad?

  “What do you mean?” he joked. “Don’t we all want to read the Medium/Heavy Duty Truck Technician Certification: Test Preparation Manual?”

  Dorry tapped Pepper’s forearm, another subtle but effective correction. “I can speak to Dr. Anand. I’ll get him to buy us the books.”

  Dr. Barger strained forward at the table. “You’ll talk to Dr. Anand?”

  Sammy and Sam clapped. Sammy said, “We like this idea. A title to vote for.”

  Dr. Barger just shook his head. “Fine then. I’ll buy us the books if I have to.”

  Dorry grinned at the other patients, ignoring Dr. Barger’s glare. “Isn’t that generous?”

  “Georgina, will you go get us some tape, and a legal pad?” Dr. Barger asked the nurse.

  She nodded, but just as she left the room she said, “My name is Josephine.”

  “Better bring a black marker, too,” Dr. Barger said.

  Something in Josephine wanted to argue the point—Say my name, say my name!—but realized Dr. Barger was one of a dwindling population: old mutts who were never trained to find others terribly worthwhile. Have an hour’s conversation and these men might be charming, funny, captivating, and kind. But they wouldn’t ask you a single question about yourself. Not one. They simply wouldn’t be interested. They were never trained to be curious about others, and they sure weren’t going to start now. At twenty-four, Josephine already knew she could spend the next minute trying and failing to make Dr. Barger hear her, or she could do something to help these patients. Only one choice was worth it. She left the room to fetch the man his pad and pen and tape.

  Dr. Barger said, “Okay, so let’s have some suggestions for books.”

  One of the two jokers raised her hand.

  “Thank you, Sammy.”

  “I’m Sam,” the woman said. “She’s Sammy.”

  Dr. Barger said, “What’s your choice then, Sam.”

  But it was Sammy who answered. “Ask Click and Clack,” she said.

  Dr. Barger’s nostrils flared. “I have no idea what that is.”

  Pepper leaned across the table, toward Sammy and Sam. “The Tappet brothers, right?” He looked at the doctor. “It’s a radio show called Car Talk. I love that show.”

  Sam pointed at Pepper enthusiastically. “See that, Frankenstein knows what we’re talking about.”

  Despite himself, Pepper laughed.

  Sammy applauded him. “Hey, that’s nice. Frankenstein’s got a sense of humor.”

  Sam and Sammy whistled and cheered.

  Dr. Barger knocked on the table again. “We’re not reading a car book.”

  Then Loochie spoke, no hand raised, no permission req
uested. She said, “Magazines.”

  “What does that mean?” the doctor asked.

  Loochie shrugged. “Magazines. That’s what I like to read in here. Vibe. XXL. Black Hair.”

  Pepper said, “You want us all to read Black Hair in Book Group?”

  Sammy opened her mouth, she had a joke, but thought better of sharing it.

  Dorry spoke calmly. “No offense, Loochie, but I think the rest of us are too old for XXVibe or whatever it’s called.”

  Loochie laughed like a native speaker at a foreigner attempting to master her tongue.

  Josephine returned with the materials.

  “How about Ken Kesey?” Josephine suggested. “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest? That book meant a lot to me in high school. I think you all might really like it.”

  Sammy frowned. “Well, why don’t you read Slaughterhouse Five to a roomful of cattle.”

  Sam shook her head. “You’ll have to excuse my best friend. She only reads the covers of great books.”

  Sammy grinned. “That’s usually the best part!”

  Josephine didn’t give up.

  “I just thought you all might like it because it’s about a mental hospital.”

  Dorry took off her glasses, which instantly made her look less nuts. Her eyes were smaller, and she seemed younger by ten years. She blew on the lenses, and small specks of dust, flakes of skin, and dandruff fell like flurries toward the tabletop. She put the glasses back on and, nutty again, looked at the nurse.

  “Here’s what you have to understand about that book, Josephine. As good as it is, it isn’t about mentally ill people. It takes places in a mental hospital, yes. But that book is about the way a certain young generation felt that society was designed to destroy them. Make them into thoughtless parts of a machine. To lobotomize them. That book is about them, not about people like us.”

  Josephine stammered, trying to respond, but Dorry didn’t stop talking.

  “If you remember the patients who really mattered in that story, most of them were voluntary. Do you remember what the main characters called the other ones? The ones who would never leave because they could never be cured?”

  “No,” Josephine admitted quietly.

  “The Chronics. Most of them were vegetables. Brain-deads. Maybe violent. Chronically sick. Diagnosed as everlastingly damaged. All of us here at Northwest? That’s who we are. Northwest is nothing but Chronics. We’ve all been committed, and most of us are not voluntary. So why would we want to read a book that barely mentions us except to tell us we’re fucked in the anus?”

  Dr. Barger shouted, “Dorry!”

  Josephine could withstand Dr. Barger’s callousness, but to get torn down by Dorry actually hurt.

  “I was only trying to …”

  Her eyes reddened, and she quickly walked out of the conference room without looking back.

  How could Dorry know all this? Josephine thought. How does some daffy old lady mental patient in a New Hyde psych unit understand that book better than me? Josephine didn’t mean to be so dismissive, but it came surprisingly easily. Then, almost as quickly, she questioned many of the judgments she’d made in her life. Mental patients can’t be intelligent. Junkies can’t be articulate. And so on. But really, honestly, how many did she actually know? Josephine left the room feeling embarrassed and shallow, but also determined to do better, to know these people, with time.

  Back in the conference room, Pepper realized there was only one thing he wanted to discuss.

  “I want to read about a monster,” he said.

  This quieted everyone.

  Dr. Barger finally said, “Why?”

  Pepper said, “Because I’ve seen one.”

  Why did everyone in the room suddenly sit up straight? All except Dr. Barger. The doctor lifted a black marker and pulled off the cap. He watched Pepper coolly. “That’s a belief we’ll have to discuss more in Group next week. But, okay. We can read a horror story. Nothing too gory, though. I can’t stand things like that.”

  “Let’s read Jaws,” Pepper said. It was like he could only look at the monster obliquely, to avoid being stricken blind by the horror of direct sight.

  Loochie raised her eyebrows at him. “About the shark?”

  “Yes.”

  Loochie, to her own great surprise, felt interested. She raised her hand to vote yes. So did Sam and Sammy and Coffee and Dorry.

  Dr. Barger, underwhelmed, said, “Jaws. All right then. I’ll order it.”

  Every hand went down except one.

  Dr. Barger sighed. “What is it, Coffee?”

  “The comptroller’s number, please. You can find it for me on your phone.”

  9

  BOOK GROUP ENDED with a silent march. The patients left the conference room quietly. Sam and Sammy went together. The others, one by one. Only Pepper remained at the table. Dr. Barger and Josephine waited for him to leave so they could lock the door behind him.

  What had Pepper been expecting? To declare he’d been trapped here through deceit and have the others, who’d been trapped even longer, gnash their teeth and weep for him? To confess he’d seen a monster and have everyone melt and hold him close? Maybe so. But that’s not what he’d gotten. He’d admitted to being frightened. The reaction of his peers? They wanted lunch.

  Pepper finally left the room.

  Josephine moved behind him, keeping the Bookmobile between them.

  Dr. Barger locked the door.

  Lunchtime.

  When Pepper reached the nurses’ station, he found half the patients in an orderly line. Scotch Tape stood inside the station, holding a clipboard. He caught Pepper’s eye.

  “No more room service for you, my man. Before every meal, you come here first to get your meds, like everyone else.”

  Pepper didn’t see any point in refusing. He went to the back of the line. Where Loochie and Coffee and Dorry and Sammy and Sam were. They didn’t speak to him. They didn’t even look at him. Had he said something wrong in there?

  Miss Chris was beside Scotch Tape, holding a tray of small white cups. As each patient stepped up to the desktop, Scotch Tape read off a series of medicines: Risperdal. Topomax. Depakote. Celexa. Luvox. Nardil. Dalmane. Haldol. Lithium. (Just to name about a third of Scotch Tape’s list.) Miss Chris checked the cup to be sure the right pills were in each. Then she handed the cup to the patient and both staff members carefully watched each one swallow.

  That was the system. Meds at breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

  Pepper swallowed his Haldol and lithium. He was strangely grateful for the pills. They shaved down the sharp edges of his emotions. Until he felt smooth and round. Easier to roll along, no matter the bumps and curves. He walked down Northwest 5, toward the television lounge, alone. No doubt he’d lost his job with Farooz Brothers by now. Those guys would fire someone if he missed more than two days. Forget about four weeks. But Pepper just kept rolling.

  His rent was paid automatically from his checking account. A system that his landlord (an agency rather than a person) had demanded of all tenants back in 2009 when layoffs first began in big numbers. Electricity, gas, even the cable was probably still working. His life had been disrupted, but not his billing cycles. His cell phone was paid automatically, too. Which meant he might still have service. Where had they put his phone? In a baggie with his boot laces and belt. (That baggie then went into a cubby, like in kindergarten, kept with all the others in a locked room on Northwest 1.) How long could he keep current on his bills? How long would his life outside wait for him? He had about four thousand dollars in his checking account. Which would last longer—his savings or his captivity? Keep rolling.

  He reached the television lounge and the orderly handed him a lunch tray. The gray tray, with its little segmented sections, reminded Pepper of the ones they used to hand out in grade school.

  Pepper moved to an empty table, as far away from the television as possible. The flat screen showed the local news. There was a remote control for
the TV, an old man held it like a scepter. He lifted it high and increased the volume so he could hear over the chatter of the growing lunch crowd.

  The orderly said, “Not too loud, Mr. Mack.”

  The old man turned and glowered at the orderly, a kid. “It’s my half hour to control the remote,” he said. “That includes the volume.”

  Mr. Mack looked to his best friend, who sat beside him. “Is this youngblood giving me orders?”

  His friend shrugged noncommittally.

  Both men wore threadbare sport coats. Under these were their patient-issue blue pajamas; theirs were bright and stain-free. Both had on worn-down loafers, too. They looked sharp, especially in here. Compared with everyone else, they looked like Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway.

  The orderly raised his voice now. “You’ve got to think of everyone in the room.”

  “Fuck everyone in the room,” Mr. Mack muttered.

  “Language!”

  Mr. Mack put up a hand in a gesture of peace. “I mean I’m trying to help these people learn about current events.” Mr. Mack looked back at the orderly. “And Frank Waverly doesn’t think I need to listen to you anyway.”

  The orderly said, “Frank Waverly is no fool. It’s you who’s being defiant.”

  Mr. Mack grinned at this as if he’d just been complimented. He raised the remote again and lowered the volume. But just one bar.

  Pepper, meanwhile, had settled himself at his table, ignoring the skirmish. Instead of the staff and patient, he watched the sunlight as it lit up the half-court outside the lounge.

  He didn’t notice he had company until they sat.

  Loochie, Coffee, and Dorry.

  At the other end of the lounge, Mr. Mack’s hand rose again, the remote aimed at the screen, and the little green volume bars appeared again. The sound went up.

  “Mr. Mack!” the orderly shouted.

  Dorry reached over and put her hand on top of Pepper’s.

  “So,” she said, when he looked at her.

  She leaned toward him without smiling. She squinted, as if trying to see deeper inside. Loochie spoke next, though.

  “It’s been around long before any of us. I mean any human beings. They found it living here and built Northwest just to hold it. You understand? Northwest is a cage.”