The Devil in Silver

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.”