Everything Has Its Time

3. Rachel

Erin began to tire from the journey to the Central Psychiatric Hospital in Northern Nottinghamshire. She had been driving her two-year-old, beige-coloured Peugeot 307 quite fast, and without stopping, but there was still an hour and a half until her destination, even if she drove quickly. She was enjoying the warm yet wet weather, despite a soft wind blowing, but inside she was somehow anxious, confused, and grim. For a moment, something like a ray of light caught her eye and she looked up to the sky, but she saw no sunshine. She saw a few single clouds and a small gaggle of sparrows overhead, followed by a small gaggle of rooks. Hills and uplands were replaced by lowlands and thick woods, fertile lands of broad pastures and wild grasslands with cultivated fields. Brave yet skinny deer appeared along the road, hungry foxes ran past in search of fat partridges, and fat wild rabbits crawled into bushes of boxwood…

Finally, Northern Nottinghamshire came into view, with its landscape of rolling hills and large ducal estates. Once there were mining towns here, they reached up to the north out of Nottinghamshire and into Yorkshire. But of these mines, workplaces for thousands of able-bodied men, almost all were closed by the Conservative government in the 1980s, and all that was left to remind people of their former existence were abandoned windmills standing over the mineshafts. On the bright side, another interesting attraction came into view, Sherwood Forest, or at least what was left of it since the Middle Ages. Robin Hood, leader of the forest bandits, took refuge in this forest along with his merry men… And there was the family home of Lord Byron: Newstead Abbey. Erin remembered that in Nottinghamshire once also lived the father of Lemuel Gulliver, who she believed was a minor landlord, and the main character of Jonathan Swift’s novels «Gulliver’s Travels».

She caught sight of the building of glass and metal off in the distance, rising menacingly through the trees and shining with a brilliant white. An unidentifiable magnetism emanated from the building, beckoning to nonchalant and careless souls. Erin stopped the car and felt a cold biting through her body, causing her to seize up and clench her teeth. This hospital was considered one of the best in Britain, and possessed the highest level of security, which gave a deceptive air of comfort and protection. These conditions were considered the most important, for it was here that patients were brought who had mental health problems making them a danger to those around them. The appointment with her sister had been booked in advance by telephone, and agreed to by Rachel’s doctor. And now, having arrived, the first thing she wanted to do was talk with Doctor Johnson.

Waiting for the doctor, and having made herself comfortable in an armchair in the visiting room, she got her new iPhone from her bag and began taking pictures of the room to show to her father later on. Before long, Doctor Johnson arrived, a woman with a no-nonsense appearance, she reminded Erin that her sister needed calmness and positivity, so she must under no circumstances excite her at all.

«Your sister, Miss O’Brian… can at times manage to make a good first impression on people, because she can be charming, enchanting, and witty. She thinks very highly of herself… But she is unable to build long-term bonds with people, since the more they get to know her, the more they begin to see her darker side,» the doctor was clearly tense, and her tension seemed to grow in the course of their conversation. She straightened up in her chair, bore into Erin with her penetrating gaze, and continued: «Miss O’Brian, I should tell you that as an experienced psychologist, I have managed to «get the hang of’ her, even though she is a master of trickery and manipulation. This is a common for sycophants like your sister. In addition, she is displaying signs of schizophrenia. She has no guilty conscience whatsoever. Quite to the contrary, she very often blames others for her own actions, twists others’ words, and is skilful at distorting a situation so that others are always to blame. She considers everyone else to be beneath her…

«How are you treating her, doctor?» Erin asked anxiously.

«I hope that you’re in the know, Miss O’Brian. You don’t think, contrary to common myths that have come about, that psychiatry is frozen far in the past? We haven’t been using lobotomies, electroshock therapy, or other dangerous experiments as a means of treatment for about 50 years now. Understand?» She looked at Erin in a kind of severe, anticipating way, fixing her cold, analytical eyes on hers, and the latter heard the clear stolidity and starkness in her question. Recognising medical terms the doctor had used, Erin felt a shudder run through her legs. She remembered that not long after Rachel was put in the hospital, Erin happened to come across a long article in a magazine, in which the darkest and most truly disturbing aspects of psychiatry were described.

This scientific field very often subjected patients suffering from psychological problems to horrible operations… Erin couldn’t remember the name of the Portuguese psychiatrist, Monish, maybe. This doctor conducted an operation on a chimpanzee to remove the frontal lobes of the brain, after which he claimed to have changed how it behaved, that he had made it become obedient and calm. Later, he proposed to drill a hole in a patient’s skull, and to insert a wire loop into the brain, rotating it to remove the white matter from the frontal lobes. For this he received a Nobel Prize in Medicine. His successors conducted tens of thousands of such «operations», using electroshock therapy as pain management. A new instrument was devised for this kind of operation, which brought an ice pick to mind. The sharp end was pointed at the eye orbit to penetrate the thin layer of bone with the help of a surgical hammer, and the instrument was inserted into the brain, inflicting irreversible damage, and turning every third patient into a vegetable. There was even a special «Lobotomobile’, a van in which psychiatrists travelled around different countries, offering miraculous healing and conducting operations in front of live audiences, in the same manner as a circus. They even put restless and simply uncooperative children under the knife, it changed them permanently… The operation permanently destroyed part of the person’s personality and individuality. Many of them then had meningitis and epileptic seizures, and if they did not become vegetables, then they committed suicide.

Erin remembered that victims were men with alternative sexual orientations, as well as women. Women, who never had as much social status as men, were more likely to suffer from depression, anxiety and hysteria, and the simple solution was to declare them insane and have them hospitalised, where a lobotomy keenly awaited them. These operations may have been arranged by their close ones; the woman lost her individuality, and she became far easier to control, she would become completely dependent and obedient, provided she survived the operation…

One of the women described in the article was Rosemary Kennedy, the oldest sister of the American President John Kennedy. Doctors concluded that she had made little progress in comparison to other children. For 20 years her parents did not know what to do, Rosemary became uncontrollable, she developed a nymphomaniac propensity and aggressive behaviour. The doctors convinced her parents that it was necessary to try a lobotomy, and this immediately became popular as the latest method of treatment for these patients. That was in 1941. As a result of the operation, Rosemary remained a feeble, incapacitated invalid until her death, with the developmental level of a two-year-old.

Remembering that chilling article now, Erin felt her skin become covered with sweat, her eyes darkened over, and her mind began to pound, as if an ice pick had penetrated her skull under the strike of a surgical hammer.

«Are you alright?» she heard the doctor’s voice. «What are you thinking about? Your sister?»

Erin forced a gulp and answered quietly, «Yes, about a sister… Kennedy’s…» In these endless seconds she felt as though the doctor’s glaring eyes had crudely penetrated her brain and seized control of her very consciousness. «Alas, the poor Rosemary, there was nothing for her in those days… Nowadays, I wouldn’t turn down such an opportunity… But you, Miss O’Brian, should really be thinking about your own sister…»

«Maybe she needs something else? Some sort of stronger medicine? I can have a look for something…»

«Don’t worry. We have the whole range of essential means. We have looked at her clinical picture, as well as the development and stage of her illness, to prescribe an effective course of therapy for her. This includes antidepressants and neuroleptics which, I hope, will help her overcome delirium, hallucination, and aggressive behaviour. But you have to understand that, unfortunately, a sure-fire method of curing schizophrenia does not yet exist.»

«No?» Erin repeated, and felt her wild heartbeat rising in her throat.

«No, it does not. But in most cases, carefully selected treatment can allow the patient to work, have a family, and carry-on life as they did before,» but her words were not convincing.

«And what do we, as her relatives, have to do now? How should we treat her?»

«It is most important not to push her away. Remember, it is the illness turning your sister into the unstable person she is at present. The world these kinds of people inhabit is entirely different to our own. It’s a different planet. At this point in time, she remains a threat to society, so there can be no question of discharging her home for some time yet. By the way, I wanted to ask, when did you first notice this abnormal behaviour in her?»

«She’s been like this since she was a child, Doctor Johnson,» Erin answered. «She was cruel to other children, she also liked torturing animals. When she got a bit older, she became violent, damaging others’ property and getting into fights. She stole things from school on two occasions. Then she ran away from home a few times, started to drink, and even use soft drugs… The paediatrician called it «social deviance’…»

«As I suspected,» the doctor cut in suddenly. «The clinical picture was very precise. I’m certain this is genetic.»

«What do you mean?» Erin was nonplussed.

«Was there anyone with a similar illness in your family? Amongst your very close relatives, members of your immediate family maybe? Is there anything you’d like to tell me about that?»

«No, there weren’t,» said Erin firmly.

«Are you sure?» the doctor narrowed her eyes, and it struck Erin how masculine she now looked.

«Yes, of course.»

«Strange…» the doctor remarked doubtfully. Clearly the conviction with which Erin had refuted her authoritative opinion had made her less certain. «Very well, if you don’t want to talk any further, then I’ll leave you. I have other patients… Goodbye!» she frowned one final time and then got up, marching out of the room along the large, yellow corridor with quick yet heavy steps.

Erin did not have to wait for long. Rachel appeared at the end of the corridor, moving slowly in her direction. Her frightened red eyes darted from side to side from under dishevelled black hair, as if searching for something. She was wearing a knitted jacket with a small collar with edging. She was also wearing trousers, and her hands were in her pockets.

«You’re right on time,» she said coldly, coming up to Erin.

«Rachel! Sis! Give me a hug!» Erin held out her arms for a hug. But Rachel recoiled, saying spiritlessly, «Must you?»

«What do you mean? I don’t understand…»

«Must you arrive bang on time?» she repeated her question in a demanding and meticulous tone.

«Punctuality shows respect to the person waiting for you.»

«You’re nothing but a killjoy, always on about your sense of duty. And who said I was waiting for you?» her initial coldness was replaced by a chilliness.

«Sorry, Rachel. Were you busy?» asked Erin apologetically.

«Busy? Hmm, sounds interesting… was I busy?» she asked again mockingly. «Don’t know. Give me a moment and I’ll ask for you…» she turned her head to the left and whispered loudly, «Hi Rachel, you busy?» this charade made Erin’s heart seize up. But then her sister turned sharply to face her again, saying, «No, the voice says she isn’t busy. As it happens, I have heaps of time. So, my dearest Erin, Daddy’s little girl, I courteously invite you into my world! Welcome, ha ha ha!» this mean-spirited jeering reverberated in Erin’s ears as a disturbing, repetitive echo.

Rachel rubbed the armchair very intensely three times with her hand, the same armchair on which Doctor Johnson had sat before, before sitting down on it. Dishevelling her black hair with even more force, she gazed at Erin with indifference.

«You’ve lost weight! Do you eat at all?» Erin asked with concern.

«That’s not my fault… that’s all them…» her hands began frantically waving along the length of her body.

«Who are «they’, Rachel? What are you talking about?»

«The tapeworms. They’re taking over my body, gnawing their way through and eating me from inside out.»

«Rachel! What are you on about? That’s all in your head.»

«You mean your big sister is lying? No, it’s not in my head. And my blood is not flowing through my veins in the right direction, it’s going in the opposite direction. Granted, that odious little doctor does not agree with me. I know her intentions…»

«What?»

«She’s a bad person, Erin. A real monster! She dreams of drilling into my brain and digging out my gyrus. But I won’t let her!»

«That’s rubbish, Rachel! She can’t do that! Please…»

«Have you brought Mum’s beads she promised me?» she suddenly asked quietly, changing the subject.

«Yes, here,» Erin reached into her bag for them.

«Beautiful!» she said, taking the amber coloured beads and studying them with interest. «Thanks! Help me put them on. Appearance comes first for a woman, right? You like them?»

«Stunning! No need to do yourself up now.»

«Really? It’s a shame you’re not a man saying that. I’d never leave you alone… Give me your little mirror, I want to admire myself.» Having studied her reflection in the impartial, oval-shaped surface of the mirror, she immediately pursed her lips, and started to get worked up:

«I don’t recognise myself anymore…»

«You’ve not changed at all. You’ve just lost weight…»

«You’re a great liar! Mastered it, have you?»

«But it’s true, Rachel!» said Erin, trying again to reassure her, but her sister remained unconvinced.

«Look at me! I see a completely different person. Are those my arms, my legs, my nose, my face, my body? Where’s my small and shapely nose gone? It’s massive now! I’m ugly now… From head to toe… Don’t you see, my bones have disappeared? Dissolved by Valium,» she raised her arms to the ceiling, and at once threw them down again. She was now becoming angry and aggressive.

«But it doesn’t matter!» she said belligerently, «I’ll get him back… no matter what…»

«Get who back, Rachel?» asked Erin calmly.

«Luke! Who else? You don’t know him?» she said surprisedly, «My man.»

«Who is he? Is he here too?»

«Yes, he’s a writer. If he gets his hands on even a single scrap of paper and a stump of pencil he’ll write anywhere, about anything… He says that, for a good novel, he really needs imagination. And he finds it in me. He says I’m his muse, and the other day, he said that I was the most beautiful… But Doctor Johnson says he says that because he’s ill, what’s it called… I think it’s „graphorrhoea.“ I heard that, a few days ago, she told him he has worms, but not like mine. A different kind. His are huge and dusty bookworms. They torment him and force him to write. But the doctor insists that his works have no cultural value. That she can cure him. To do that she is trying to cause him a writer’s block, a chronic block… But Luke told me in secret that he’ll write anyway, with his own blood, if need be, on the yellow hospital walls… But I don’t know if I should take his attraction to me seriously or not. It might all just be a joke…» her conscience was a ceaseless train of thought. «I know that Luke and Doctor Johnson make fun of how I feel, and he cheats on me with her behind my back… Jealousy is wearing me down, and I sometimes have an insatiable desire to strangle the pair of them with my bare hands, with great pleasure…» there was now no warmth in her eyes whatsoever.

«What are you on about, Rachel?» Erin interrupted her. «You’re acting like a headcase…»

«I’m living my own life. You wouldn’t understand. You think I’m stupid because I’m waiting for a shining engagement ring on my nameless finger, waiting for his kiss on my lips? You have to make the most out of life, it is so fleeting, and you have to share your body with someone! If I have one weakness, then it’s sex…»

«I don’t recognise you, Rachel! What I’m hearing, you’re going mad!»

«If there’s one thing I do not need right now, it is a high-and-mighty lecture from my younger sister… What do you know? I happen to be being tormented by hopeless love. Nothing on earth can come close to the bitterness of love rejected. But life goes on. Do you remember how to dance? The second partner changes places with the first, the third with the second… And you dance while you can, whilst you’re young! And live life to the full, whilst you can. But macho men, so untrustworthy and faithless, so depraved… I was depressed, and felt like a right moron, before I realised I had to forget about them! Put them out of my mind. Idiots! They rejected me!»

«I know, you don’t deserve that, Rachel…»

«Yes, I’m unhallowed. I prayed and confessed to all my sins in expectation of a miracle. And Jesus came to me, and he told me that I was the most faithful Christian myrrh bearer Mary Magdalene, and that I was worthy of his love. He gave me a jar of incense, and ordered me to pour myrrh over his legs and to dry it with my hair. Then he pronounced that it was for my sake that he died on the cross and resurrected, to cure me of the Seven Sins…» she nodded her head with certainty, continuing her nonsensical narrative, not letting her sister get in a single word.

«He warned me that my clothes will soon decay, but that my nakedness will be covered by my long hair. I am growing it now, and he said my haggard body will be flown up to Heaven by angels every night for healing.» Erin was silent. She observed the unfolding scene and tried to avoid making contact with those familiar and darkened eyes opposite her, and gradually fought back tears. An indescribable horror gripped her, horror and sorrow. It had finally happened, Rachel had gone mad! And her entire world with it! «What will I say to them when I get home?»

Then she saw something new, something she was hard pressed to believe, Rachel had now begun to grin like an animal. But to her surprise, Rachel asked with sadness and naïveté in her voice:

«You don’t believe me either?» and she burst into tears bitterly. «You don’t believe that Jesus came to see me, a sinner? You’re asking why he is with me, and not you?» and then she suddenly broke out into a disturbing laugh, almost a guffaw, and exclaimed loudly, «It’s because he would never have come to visit the world of believers…»

«Rachel…» Erin was trying all she could to calm her sister down, «you’re acting like a headcase. Sometimes I think you’re only putting on this charade, this ham-fisted farce, just to get back at me?»

«Thank God, you get it at last!» she triumphantly raised her hands to the ceiling. «You had me locked up in here! Shame on you!»

«We had to, Rachel! You‘re ill!»

«You’re the sick ones! You decided to get rid of me… Even our wise father… To whom I’m useless…»

«You’re angry with us?»

«Angry? Don’t ask stupid questions! You’re all long dead to me. As I am to you! You have no place in my life! I’ll never ever forgive you! I’m sick of being goody two shoes!»

«What have I ever done to you, Rachel? Why do you hate me… we’re sisters. For basically your entire life Mum and Dad ran around after you like a child.»

«They never loved me, especially not after you were born. They did nothing but cherish you and pamper you. And for me? Nothing! It made me furious!»

«That’s not how it was, Rachel! Stop it! How could you say that now? Now, with Dad dying. He has cancer!» but the other didn’t raise an eyebrow. She just bit greedily into a juicy, bright red, almost blood red apple, and asked with annoyance, «All you ever think about are yourselves. Did you ever think ever about me? What was I even born for at all?»

«That was God’s will.»

«It was more likely Mum’s and Dad’s sexual craving… And did they ever ask me if I wanted to exist on this earth?»

«A strange conversation. You know what, dear sister, I’ll tell you this, you‘re impossible! What are you trying to achieve here anyway?»

Suddenly she pressed herself up against the back of the armchair, burrowing herself into it, and requested sadly, «I want you to burn my slippers whilst I’m here. Otherwise they‘ll wither and die of lack of attention. And, if you want, you can sleep in my bedroom sometimes. It’s okay… Don’t you love me at least a bit?»

Joy emanated in Erin’s mind: «Hallelujah! Oh Lord, hallelujah! Is this anything less than a miracle?» It was as though there were several different versions of her sister which constantly fought with each other, buckling under pressure at first from the dark side of her, which was evidently more powerful, and then back to the lighter side. In that moment, her face perked up in a long-awaited and promising way, which laid bare the lighter side of her perception of life. This was a very good omen.

«I love you so much Rachel!» she answered joyously, «you’re my sister!»

«But sometimes I think you hate me…»

«Sometimes I really did begin to hate you. But even then I… I did love you. Wait, let me take a picture for Dad…» they hugged, wrapping their arms around one another, and tightly pressing up against each other. «Oh, your hair is caught in my earrings.» Erin, with an embarrassed smile, tried to disentangle her golden ear clip from Rachel’s dishevelled black hair. Rachel, helping Erin to free her hair, exposed her neck, upon which under her locks there was hidden a circular, brown birthmark the size of a small pea, so soft and coquettish. She had doubtlessly driven a few men, even those who had been round the block a few times, out of their minds with it.

«It’s never too late to start again! It’s most important for us to be together, Rachel. A burden has been taken off my shoulders and I’m so delighted. Peace?»

«Hmmm, not sure…» she was still slightly obstinate. «Maybe, but peace will take a while. It’s complicated. Do you remember when I taught those good-for-nothings a lesson in our pub?» Of course, Erin remembered the incident mired in scandal, which led to consequences so serious as to threaten the family business. Rachel had the job of helping the waiters in the pub. The incident occurred on a Friday night, when the pub was filled to the rafters. «Those two new customers, English ones, who placed that order? Remember? Those two little prissy girls did not like our Irish food!»

«I remember, I was serving their table,» thinking back to this incident made Erin feel uncomfortable, «then you came along and never let me get a word in!»

«Those Anglo-Saxons, so high and mighty, too proud to share a drink with me! Paid no attention to me! They were probably content just to be by themselves! Then they threw an off glance in my direction… Refused to pay for their food they wolfed down. Those beautiful pork ribs in gravy to induce drooling… They said they preferred vegetarian food, and demanded a vegetable salad on the house… A little voice inside me told me instantly how to ruffle their feathers…»

«You asked them what they were doing…»

«Yeah, those odious, pathetic penny-pinchers worked as archive rats in the London Museum of Modern Arts, and had come up to Birmingham for a romantic weekend…»

«To this day I have no idea what possessed you to offer them, these experts of modern art, the «masterpiece of culinary art.» How much balls to bring them faeces in the shape of a cracknel biscuit, calling this «dish’ spinach puree. And you happily wished them bon appetit! It’ll be a long time before I will have the strength to torture myself with awful memories like that. How much effort and how many means Dad needed to sort that one out!»

Rachel guffawed provocatively. People near them began to give sidelong looks in their direction. An older woman, a visitor, was listening in, and nodded her head, indicating understanding that it was inevitable for the inhabitants of the hospital to behave in this way. Stopping her laughter suddenly, Rachel opened her black eyes and, in a kind of secretive and conspiratorial way, whispered: «Listen! Do you hear a voice?»

«A voice?»

«Yes, Erin, a voice! A voice from the Heavens, they’re calling me, I must go… Leave me…»

Laden with a heavy burden in her stomach, Erin watched her leave. She then slowly exited for her beige Peugeot 307 and started the engine. Throwing a parting glance at the hospital, her eyes read the sign above the main entrance…

Abandon hope, all ye who enter here…

She gave herself a shake and returned to reality, realising that this was a trick of her imagination.

That night, in a dream, she saw Doctor Johnson. Her masculine figure with her smooth, naked torso leaned rapaciously over her bed. Alongside her, looking at Erin sadly, there was the quietly pleading and petrified face of the writer, Luke. Suddenly, her bewildered, maddened eyes met the wild eyes of the doctor, who hissed acidly, exposing her toothless mouth and clearly striking every word:

«I will prove to you, red-headed darling Erin O’Brian, that this is genetic! And I won’t bid you farewell, because I’ll see you soon!»