Dragged into Darkness

by Simon Wood

  "Dr. Troy?" Nurse Kuo prompted. "Is everything okay?"

  "Yes," he answered after a pause. "I'm just thinking."

  Arthur claimed he had suffered with Body Dysmorphic Disorder since he was eight. He always felt his legs weren't a part of him, just clunky optional extras bolted on for appearances. Psychiatric counseling had been a regular part of Arthur's life for over twenty years. But a biking accident two years ago had got him what he wanted—almost. The accident was minor but it left his left leg scarred, scars that Arthur saw as abhorrent disfigurement upon abhorrent disfigurement. Threats of suicide were ignored until a botched attempt. His therapist caved and approved amputation above the knee.

  Except, it wasn't what Arthur wanted. He hated the sight of both legs. Just because one was uglier than the other didn't matter. To him, both legs were an abomination.

  Troy knew exactly what Arthur meant. He recalled their first consultation. Aesthetically, the man should have ended at mid-thigh. He didn't look the way Troy did. Troy's body flowed effortlessly from limb to torso. Arthur's didn't. He looked mechanical, artificial—wrong.

  Less is more, he thought.

  "Nurse, prep Mr. Arthur's right leg too. Both are coming off."

  "Doctor?"

  "You heard me, nurse."

  "Gareth," Ensmann blurted. "Are you serious?"

  Troy locked stares with his assisting physician. "I'm deadly serious. This man wants both his legs removed and we're going to give him what he wants."

  "But we're only authorized to remove the left leg."

  "It's not what the man wants."

  "What do you want me to do?" Nurse Kuo interrupted.

  "You have your instructions," Troy replied.

  Nurse Kuo glanced at Ensmann for confirmation.

  "Gareth, I can't let you do this. Hell, I can't let me do this. Our medical licenses are at risk here."

  "Then I'll do it alone."

  "You can't."

  "But I will. I have a responsibility to my patient. This patient asked me to remove both legs. Removing his legs will cure him. How can I say no? I have his consent."

  The operating theater was silent. The surgical team stared at cracks in the ceiling while the two doctors exchanged burning glances.

  "Can we get on now?" Troy asked.

  Ensmann shook his head. "We're going to burn for this."

  ***

  Troy was too busy trawling his neighborhood to answer the persistently ringing cell phone. Anyway, he knew who it would be. It would be his office or the state medical board asking why he had removed both of Mr. Arthur's legs and not one. He didn't know what the fuss was about. Todd Arthur was overjoyed with the amputations. For the first time in his life, he felt complete. As far as Troy was concerned, he'd done the right thing. He had a happy patient, one far happier than the patient who had first come to see him.

  But none of this mattered. He was searching for the woman with the birthmark. However, after thirty minutes, he had come across neither the woman nor her poodle.

  His preoccupation with the poodle-woman dogged him when it shouldn't even have been a priority. He had other things to worry about. An investigation by the state medical board to determine negligence on Troy's part was in full swing. His medical license had been suspended pending the outcome of the investigation. The only thing going for him was that against legal advice, Todd Arthur wasn't going to file a suit.

  Troy made it his lawyers' business to save his practice. That was why they were paid the big bucks. He made it his business to find the poodle-woman. Every day, at the same time, Troy drove the street where he had first seen the woman. After two days of fruitless searching, he widened his search to mornings, afternoons as well as evenings. When that didn't work, he expanded his dragnet to cover Beverly Hills and beyond.

  Although the poodle-woman was at the forefront of his search, he came to realize that many others were in similar need of his services. Everywhere he went, he found deformity. In a convenience store in West Hollywood, a Korean clerk had a callus on her middle finger as big as her fingernail. Troy quizzed her and discovered it had come from holding pens and pencils too tightly as a child. Waiting to pay for gas, he noticed the man in front had crippling arthritis that reduced his hands to angry claws. A Safeway checker failed miserably to hide a harelip under his moustache.

  Troy knew he could help these people. He understood their deformities were a source of great personal pain. From the stories he'd heard from his patients, he guessed all the tricks these people had tried to conceal their ugliness.

  Deformity was everywhere, in all corners of society. He didn't have to see it; he could listen to it. In stores, he overheard conversations about clothes never fitting because legs were too long or too short. In restaurants, people complained they could never do anything with their hair or their thighs were too fat. These people had problems and nothing ever worked, but he had solutions. Surgery could do wonders.

  He handed out his card to people who needed his kind of special help, with varying results. Some wanted to know what he could do to help them. Others didn't give him the time of day. Several got angry. But it didn't matter. He would help them all.

  Weeks passed and he neither came across the poodle-woman, nor received any calls from the people he had handed cards. He checked in with his office.

  "Janice, Dr. Troy."

  "Doctor, I wish you'd return your calls. Things aren't going well with the investigation. Your lack of cooperation doesn't bode well. You really need to speak to Dr. Johansen as soon as possible."

  "All in good time, Janice. What about the patients?"

  "Dr. Troy, your license had been suspended. You aren't authorized to speak to your patients. All your existing patients have been referred to other doctors."

  "No, not those patients. I'm talking about new ones."

  "New ones?"

  "Yes, I've been meeting a lot of people on the streets, giving out my card."

  "Doctor!"

  "I think there's a lot we can do for people out there. And I think education is the problem. If people understood what options were available, we could help a lot more."

  "Doctor."

  "Janice, no need to sound so concerned."

  "But, I am. It explains the calls."

  "Excellent. We received calls?"

  "Yes, dozens, but all were inquiring into plastic surgery. I had to explain that you didn't perform cosmetic enhancements, just amputations."

  "Can you fax me their contact details?"

  "No. After I explained, no one was interested. They were appalled."

  He didn't expect everyone to go for the idea. It took courage to go through with the procedures he performed. But he had never received a complaint after an operation. People thanked him for his work. Not having one new patient to follow through wasn't right.

  "Not one?"

  "No. I thought it was a hoax—that someone bogus was giving out your card to discredit you, to help build a case against you."

  "Janice, do you have any of the callers' details?"

  "No."

  "I'm struggling with this one, Janice. I'll call you back."

  "But what about Dr. Johansen?" Janice demanded.

  "I'll talk to him later."

  "But, Dr. Troy..."

  Troy hung up. He sank into his chair. How could he help anybody if they weren't willing to help themselves? Janice was a waste of time. She didn't understand what these people were going through. Only he did. And he was the only one qualified to speak to them. He called Janice back and told her to redirect all calls through to his home phone. Janice protested. But Troy was insistent, to the point of reprimand. She conceded. Now nothing could blight his doctor/patient relationship, no interfering doctors, no ill-informed personal assistants, no one.

  His answering machine racked up messages but not from potential patients. Janice, Ensmann and Johansen made up the bulk of the calls.

  It was depressing. Here he was, a healer with
no one to heal. The situation was made worse since he knew people out there needed him. Well, if the mountain wouldn't come to Mohammed, then...

  ***

  "Can I speak to Mary, please?" Troy asked the slim-faced Asian girl at the checkout.

  Her face showed suspicion. "Who's asking?"

  "Dr. Gareth Troy." He showed his identification. "We spoke a week or so ago about some treatment."

  "Most doctors don't do house calls, especially at this time of night."

  "I'm not most doctors." Troy smiled.

  The girl shouted Korean to the back of the store. The woman with callus that Troy had spoken to appeared. There was another exchange in Korean and the older woman beckoned to Troy. She led him into the rear of the store and into a small office.

  "Do you remember me?" Troy took the seat offered to him.

  She nodded. "Yes, you doctor. You can help with my finger, yes?"

  "That's right. I can help and I want to help. I can help with your deformity."

  Mary frowned. "My English not good."

  "I can help you with your finger."

  "Yes." Mary nodded again. "You make pretty for me."

  Troy smiled. "I make pretty for you. Let's do it."

  "How much?"

  "Free of charge."

  Mary looked doubtful.

  "Honestly, Mary. The operation is free. I just want to make people happy."

  "When do I come to the hospital?"

  "We don't need a hospital."

  "No hospital?" Mary gave Troy the same look he had received from the checkout girl.

  "I can do the operation here. It's not a major procedure. It would be over in minutes. Do you have a bathroom?"

  "Maybe I should talk to my daughter."

  "What's to talk about?" Troy rose and offered a guiding hand. "Let's do it."

  In the bathroom, the fluorescent lighting hummed. One of the tubes flickered spasmodically. It was a distraction but not a problem.

  Troy explained what he was going to do. He used fifty-dollar words straight from medical school. He found it subdued his patents. They trusted him because he sounded in control.

  He swabbed Mary's middle finger with antiseptic, which stained her skin olive. He injected an anesthetic into the flesh where her hand met her middle finger. The finger ballooned, cartoon-like.

  "In a minute or two you won't feel a thing."

  Mary didn't look convinced.

  He patted her shoulder. "Don't worry, it'll be over soon."

  When he was satisfied that Mary was suitably anesthetized, he held her middle finger like he was taking her fingerprint and placed it on the edge of the sterilized sink unit. He told her to keep very still and held her hand in place. His other hand slipped inside his bag. He brought out a cleaver. He was careful to shield Mary from the gruesome sight of his medical tools. Under normal conditions, he would have had a privacy curtain between him and the patient. Good misdirection would have to do today.

  He didn't know why Mary was screaming. The blow had severed the finger neatly and cleanly and he knew she was totally anesthetized. She couldn't have felt a thing. But she spewed manic Korean. She held up her four-fingered hand and stared at the pulsing stream of blood flowing down her arm.

  "See how beautiful your hand is now? No more ugliness."

  But Mary wasn't seeing it his way. She beat his chest with bloody fists, wailing the entire time.

  The bathroom door flew open. The Asian checkout girl burst in, then froze. Confusion muddied her features until she spotted the amputated finger with the unsightly callus.

  "What have you done?" she demanded.

  Troy struggled but held Mary off. "I did exactly as we discussed. She wanted rid of the callus and I helped her. She has such beautiful hands now."

  The Asian girl launched herself at Troy. He was thrown back against the wall by the weight of both women. Flailing arms slashed at his body but lacked the power to do him any harm. He knocked them aside and fled, snatching his bag on the way out.

  Troy blew through the store and onto the street, chased by his attackers. He flung himself into his Porsche and raced off, leaving squealing tires and screaming women behind him.

  He jumped two red lights and went the wrong way up a one-way street before he had control of himself. He was just as shaken up as Mary.

  But he didn't understand her reaction. He tried. He really did. Nothing like this had happened with Carole, Todd or any of his other patients. He'd done exactly as Mary wanted. He'd eradicated the callus. He was appalled by it as much as she was. It was unsightly. Removing the callus itself would have left a nasty scar, something that would have drawn as much attention as the callus itself. His way had made a clean break, drawn a line under the ugliness. Her hand had a fresh start, a new lease on life. She would come to understand in time. Maybe language had been the problem.

  Troy had intended cruising bars and clubs for others he could help, but after Mary, he couldn't face it. The episode had been too traumatic. He called it a night.

  Pulling into his neighborhood, he saw her. The poodle-woman was coming out of her front door with the dog on a leash. Troy skidded to a halt and leapt out.

  "Excuse me," he called.

  The poodle-woman tensed.

  "My name's Dr. Gareth Troy." He half-walked, half-trotted across the lawn.

  "Oh, yes?" She wasn't moving.

  "I don't mean to be insensitive, but I couldn't help noticing your birthmark."

  The poodle-woman whipped a hand to her face to cover the unsightly blemish.

  Troy raised a hand to calm her. "I understand it's a painful subject. I saw you a few weeks back and I wanted to talk then. I just wanted to say I can help you."

  "How?"

  She was curious, he thought. He had her attention. She would be open to him now.

  "I specialize in people with...I don't like the word but I want to be plain about things...okay?"

  She nodded.

  "Deformities."

  The word stung. The poodle-woman's mouth tightened, offended by the classification.

  "It's an offensive word, isn't it? But it is an honest word. Deformities sum up the whole thing. It describes something ugly and upsetting."

  "Okay, okay."

  "Sorry. I get carried away sometimes. What I'm trying say in my clumsy way, is that I can help. What you are ashamed of, what has caused you pain and embarrassment, I can remove."

  "If you mean laser surgery, I've spoken to specialists..."

  Troy shook his head. "No laser surgery. I don't believe in it. It hasn't been perfected. It always leaves behind a residue of what once was."

  "Then what?"

  Her tone was one of interest. She was aroused by what he could do for her. His night wouldn't be a total shambles.

  "This." Troy delved in his bag and his hand found what he was looking for. His case fell to the ground. A scalpel was in his grasp.

  The poodle-woman edged back and crashed into the door.

  "I believe in removal over cosmetic cover-ups. Amputation is the only option." Troy eyed his scalpel like truth had substance.

  Then, he descended.

  Troy snatched the poodle-woman's throat. He pinned her against the door. Her hands grappled with his arm. Her feeble attempts were nothing more than a minor irritation. His surgeon's eye had mapped out the incision and positioned the scalpel for the first cut. She writhed under his grasp.

  "Keep still and it won't take a second. I'll make you beautiful."

  The poodle was a pest, barking and lunging at him. Troy kicked the dog aside every time it got in the way of his duty.

  The scalpel pricked the port wine flesh. The poodle-woman wailed. Her shriek silenced the mutt and it dropped to the ground.

  She went limp against the door, a whimper her only reaction. Troy smiled. He thought his work would be child's play. But as he pressed the scalpel deeper, her arm jerked out in reflex. Her fist connected with his nose.

  He staggered b
ack, doubling over. Waves of numbness spread across his face and nausea followed in its wake. His hand shot to his face. His nose felt hot and large. Snot and blood moistened his fingers.

  Seizing her chance, the poodle-woman flew through her front door and slammed it. Troy couldn’t let her go. He tried the door, but it was locked. He charged and kicked the door. It stood up to the punishment, but not for long. It flew back, slamming into the wall with twice the force.

  The poodle-woman had the phone in her hand and her dog at her feet. "I'm calling 911, you freak."

  “I tried to help you.” Troy stood over the woman, his hands fists, the scalpel crushed in his right. “I was doing what was best for you. Don’t you understand that?”

  The poodle woman held the phone out like a weapon. Her fingers clutched it so tightly her knuckles were translucent against her pale skin. The 911 operator babbled. “We have your location. Units have been dispatched. Find a room and lock yourself in.”

  “They’re coming,” she warned.

  Troy fixated on the birthmark. Although the woman’s complexion was fish belly white, the birthmark was richer, darker. “Won’t you let me help you?” he pleaded.

  “No,” the poodle-woman spluttered between chattering teeth.

  Troy sighed. He’d done all that he could, so he turned from her. Snatching up his bag on the way out, he raced back to his Porsche, ignoring the frightened faces peering from behind drapes. Firing up the car, he charged into the night.

  Pulling into his garage, Troy was consumed with defeat. The night had been a failure. He couldn’t understand people’s revulsion towards his treatment. But he was damned if he would give up. He took solace from a triple scotch.

  Putting his feet up on the glass coffee table in his study, he sank into a leather recliner, letting the cool leather caress him with tender affection. He lay back, holding his scotch to his forehead. He had to change his approach. The world wasn’t ready for radical treatment. Not many were. And that was where he was going wrong. He’d treated people on the fringes, but he was dealing with the masses now. He gulped down the last of his double malt and leaned forward to place the tumbler on the table.

  Nausea rocked him as he stared into the table’s smoked glass. He raced for the bathroom, flicking on the light. He stared at his reflection. His nose was history. It was pushed back and smeared to the left. Dried blood caked his nostrils. He touched the monstrosity, feeling a dull ache, not from his face but from his heart.