Chapter 2
Of course by admitting guilt I slotted myself neatly into the legal system's overflowing filing cabinet and was forgotten about by the Hoppers of this world. Their job came to an end with my signature on the confession. I thought I caught sight of the other cop at the back of the courtroom during my first appearance, but then again, I couldn't swear to it. The only thing that stopped me from a life sentence in Saughton was my lawyer's plea of insanity. And that's what got me transferred here to Carstairs, waiting for my latest psychological evaluation in this interview room, strapped down like Hannibal Lector to this chair.
She’s older than I imagined she’d be. She opens the door slowly that way they must practise and gracefully smooths her white skirt out before sitting down opposite. Years of dealing with people like me have worn lines into her face. She smiles a little. It’s a re-assuring, but tight-lipped smile.
There’s a formality that passes between us as she opens her mouth to speak. We’re getting into the confidential zone; the client-doctor privilege, even if that legally doesn’t extend to murderers like me, we’re certainly there.
“Daniel,” she starts, holding me eyes. “How are you today?”
I can’t believe she’s just asked that. She must guess I’m pretty riled up by today. don’t really want to start stating the obvious. But I do anyway, “Good and bad. Much the same since I woke up a killer.”
“Still using that sense of humour to defend yourself then.” I didn’t know psychiatrists were supposed to be that direct or confrontational. I liked it. “Well, I guess it is clear that a meeting was inevitable given the outcome of your parents’ visit. That was not exactly unforeseen.”
My parents had visited me yesterday. It had not gone well. And I stop myself from thinking about it now.
“Not unforeseen.” I say. “Then why’d you let it go ahead if you thought it was going to be as pointless?”
“We couldn’t be certain, Daniel. It may well turn out to be successful. Your own memories may revive or something may stimulate it as a result of your interaction. We have no way to measure the success that you may be now experiencing.”
“But you’ve also no idea of the damage that you could’ve caused either...”
“Yes, I admit we’re in uncharted territory. Let us see every possible change as a good opportunity at the moment. Tell me your side of the interaction.”
I tried to shrug, but my shoulders only met with the unbudging metal of my restraints. “Fair enough. Change must be good. You want to know about my parents' visit. Fine. They came in and told me a million stories about a boy called Danny and how happy that boy was and how squeaky clean. I tried to make that boy me. But the more they talked about him, the more I wanted them to stop. I felt sick the whole time they talked. If I analyse it, I guess I wanted to spit any residual 'Danny' out of my system.”
“Leave me to do the interpreting Daniel, if you can.” She smiles at me to continue.
“I dunno. A guy kills someone like the way I did, does not make mince pies with mummy or go to work with his dad because he wants to help those poor kids get an education and rise out of the gutter. A guy that kills someone like I did, is not Danny. And to be honest, really honest. I’m glad he isn’t. All the Dannys get to grow up and live nice lives in nice houses with those kinds of parents and that’s great. But it’s pretty far from where I’m at right now.”
She looks at me while all this is coming out. I think it’s part of their training, just sit and listen, let the mental case hang himself with his own words. Silence just makes people fill it, no need for questions; questions just get in the way. She’s waiting, but I’m done.
I want her thoughts. Those lines on her face aren’t from laughing. I’m hoping to carve some more up there while she figures me out. I’m hoping, but life doesn’t give answers, just infinite questions for me.
“Daniel,” good, she’s not giving 'Danny' any credibility. “For someone whose memory is what it is, feelings of dislocation and very natural. Not only this, but for any adult who has ever changed in their life be it relationships, religion or even just postcode, will feel some sense of anxiety or separation from reality. And this is especially true when you become an adult, as you have been for some time now. It is not a unique experience to feel like you’re not that weak, insular kid that might have wanted to go the toilet every time his teacher asked him a question in class. Embarrassment and in some cases fear about becoming that child again is utterly natural.”
The stirrings of some kind of rebellion or want to play the devil’s advocate begin to play, but I want answers so I just open out my palms and turn them upwards and give her the silence to fill.
“In your case. You have no connection in your memory to your old self, to your personality as it was and then became. Your personality is now writing itself according your current perceptions and the reality that you are presented with. Since your reality is extreme, your personality that is writing itself is being challenged to match itself against it. There is the added complication that there’s some residual coding from your old self that remains, buried. Thoughts, ideas dreams. These may be trying to write on your personality at the same time, like another person playing piano with you, but using different sheet music, if they’re even playing the same tune. To mix metaphors a bit, your slate is no longer blank.”
She finishes all this with a wide-eyes, neck-cocked look that wants to check if the brain-freeze in front of her has taken any of that in. This brain-freeze unfortunately does and is more than a little bit worried about whose hand is playing his piano.
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