Chapter

 48

Fifteen minutes later, we had crisscrossed through the scrub brush and rocks and were standing on top. We were both a bit out of breath as we stood on the slabs of graffiti- covered rocks scattered about the plateau.

“Not very complimentary to the view, is it?” Mathews said, skewing his head to read an inscription. “Rocks are a bitch”

He was still catching his breath as he dropped down on an outcrop.

“God...this is strange,” I muttered, “but...let’s try again.” I laid down on the parched grass that was trying to stay alive on this all but lifeless piece of ground.  I closed my eyes.

“Anything?” Mathews asked.

“I don’t know. I think so.” As I try and write this in the journal, I’m freighted. For me...right at this moment, this was the closest I’d ever felt to finding more of the memory. But… I wanted more.

It only took a few moments for Mathews’ familiar encouragement to put me under. “Are you still comfortable, Charles?”

“Yes.”

“There’s sage up here. Take a deep breath.”

“Don’t smell it.”

“Smell anything, Charles?”

“Air...salt. Wet salt and sand.”

“The grass, Charles. Do you remember the grass up here?”

“No. The yellow lines.”

“That’s out on the highway?”

“Yes.”

“What else?”

“The turn off and that voice.”
“What voice, Charles?”

“The voice telling me to leave...”

“The second time you were here at The Cove?”

“Yes.”

“Is that where you are now?”

“Yes.”

“What happened to the first time, Charles. The first time you were here?”

“Too dark.”

“The first time?”

“Yes.”

“Are you here the second time, now?”

“Walking around on the beach. Looking up at the cliff. Didn’t want to come up the path. Got on the bike. At the gate... “

“Yes...what at the gate?”

“He said to get the hell out of here.”

“‘Get the fuck out of here,’ I believe you said.” “Yeah, something like that.”

“No. Not something like that. ‘Get the fuck out of here, Charles’ is exactly what you related to me. Doesn’t that tell you something?”

“No.”

“Say it.” “Say what?”

“Tell me again exactly what the voice told you.” “I already did.”

“You need to hear yourself say it again. Again.”

“They aren’t my words. They’re his.”

“Who?”

“I was on my bike. All I had to do was gun it.”

“Whose voice, Charles?”

“His...Charlie. I don’t want to think about it.”

 “Okay.”

“I don’t like it here.”

“Where, Charles?”

“At the gate.”

“Do you want to leave?”

“Yes.”

“OKAY. Take your time. Come back slowly.”

I slowly opened my eyes to the familiar sound of Mathews snapping his fingers. I had only been under a few minutes, but I felt like it had been a long time.

“Feel okay?” Mathews asked me.

I nodded and stood up, turning toward the ocean.

“Anything more?”

I looked around me again. Down to the sand below...and the dock. “I’m not sure.”

“Charles? Just answer me one question. Does it bother you to say the word fuck?”

I laughed, feeling embarrassed. “Course not.”

“Then do me a favor, Charles. Let me hear you say fuck again.” “What? Why make a big deal out of a word, Doctor?”

“I think you should try it.”

“Why?”

“Because as your doctor, you’re paying me to help you. It’s just one simple word.”

He wasn’t going to let me out of this one for some reason, so I...I remember rather painfully, I said, “Fuck.”

He wasn’t satisfied. “No, Charles. I want to really hear you say fuck.” “This is ridiculous. Fuck.”

“Not quite. Again.”

“What do you mean, ‘not quite’?”

“Again.”

He now had me by the shoulders, demanding.

“Fuck,” I said with as much conviction as my reluctance allowed. “No. You don’t mean that. Say it like you mean it.” “Mathews...you’re... Okay. Fuck.”

“No. Once more, damn it. Let me hear you really give it to me. Let me hear your memory say the big ugly ‘f word.’ Say it!”

“Fuck.” I wasn’t feeling the same...something was different. “Fuck! Fuck you. Fuck you and all your bullshit therapy, Dr. Mathews.”

He took his hands from my shoulders.  He let me go. He stood there smiling. “Wasn’t so bad, was it?”

I wasn’t smiling. I was like a tea kettle that had risen to a boil and had just had its flame turned off before it...

I broke away, flinging myself down the trail, my legs desperately trying to keep up with my determination to get out fast. Everything about the cove was chasing me...telling me to leave.

“Charles!” I heard Mathews yelling from behind. “Charles!”

It was probably the kickstand, not Mathews, that saved my sanity that day. It had managed to sink so far into the sand that with all the fear pumping through my veins, it wasn’t until Mathews reached over my shoulder and helped me pull the bike upright, that I realized I was spent.

“Take another one,” was all he said. “Take another pill, Charles.”

We sat together on the dock like two children at a fishing hole, our chins touching our chests as we peered into the water below. Mathews was either coming down to my level of vulnerability or I was climbing up to his.

I was confused.

“Reality is getting harder to deal with,” I finally uttered, having remained motionless for, I don’t know… fifteen or twenty minutes?

“Charles, are you feeling that way because you’re getting closer to all that was lost? It’s natural for the fear to build as you get closer to the past.”

I turned around and looked at the cliffs again. “Something happened up there, didn’t it?”

He quietly laughed. “You’re asking me?”

I turned back and confronted him eye to eye. “Yes.”

“I can’t answer that.”

“You have a way of getting me very close to things, and then...”  “Then...you run away, Charles. You don’t trust me yet.”

“Jesus...I don’t trust you? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just that. I know you want to. But, you’re not quite there yet. It’s okay. That too is normal as you get closer to the truth. Just don’t be so hard on yourself. Charles, you’re a remarkable man to be carrying what you do...as well as you do. You’re afraid to let yourself believe that, but you should. You owe that to yourself. I think the only thing holding you back from trusting and letting all that’s really you come out is simply fear of the unknown. We all have that fear. In you, it’s a heavier load because all the feelings you have...you don’t know where they come from. That breeds the fear, breeds the distrust, breeds the lack of confidence to let go. Let it, or him, or her...go.”

“You still believe I’m Charlie?”

“I believe it’s an unresolved question, and you’re fighting it.” “Fighting it.”

“You blinked with both eyes every time you said fuck, Charles, ‘till the last time. Why was that different? And why so bitter?”

“You know it wasn’t comfortable...it wasn’t me.”

“Who was it then, Charles?”

I stood up and stretched the shoulders that felt like they’d been carrying bags of cement. “Mathews, I can tell you only one thing. If it gets much worse, I’m going to ask you to do whatever is necessary.”

“Meaning?”

“I don’t want to do anything crazy. They have places for people like me. Just put me there if... “

He stood up and brushed himself off. “You don’t need to spend all your money supporting an institution, Charles.”  With that grin of his that could be interpreted as sarcastic or just… friendly, he quipped, “ You’re not crazy enough yet, anyway.”

He put his arm around my shoulder again and squeezed.  “Your answers are out here in the real world. Probably right here. Take another few minutes by yourself, Charles. Take a good look around.”

He slowly walked toward the bike. I wanted to believe again, for the umpteenth time, that he was a good doctor...that he knew what he was doing. God, he just wasn’t like I thought a doctor should be.

I looked around. The dock, the sands, the water, the cliffs...everything was the same. Nothing but abstracts...magnets from my past that indiscretion seemed to rule.

I started to walk back to the bike, but as I passed the firepit, I paused. The sound of crackling wood over a fire rushed through my mind. I turned and looked down at the very dead ashes. They were just that...ashes.

As I reached the bike, Mathews asked, “Anything?”

“No. Nothing important.”

I could see him take a glance back at the firepit as I climbed on the bike.

As we started back up the hill, I let the familiar sound of the motor drown out the crackling fire...the crackling fire that had followed me back to the bike...and was still with me.  “Fucking fire,” I muttered to myself.  Fortunately, or unfortunately, Mathews heard me.  And unfortunately, definitely, saying that word again, left me feeling helpless.