“Then what exactly do you think we should do, Gary?” This is David, who usually stays above the fray in these meetings.
“Send him somewhere else!”
“That’s ridiculous. We are the ‘somewhere else.’ This is the last stop. Would you rather he was out on the street? With no treatment? No chance?” Me, wiping coffee stains from the conference table.
“Look, I mean, I just don’t want him on my caseload. I don’t have a lot of extra time on my hands, and being tasked with completing an entire file of pre-intake data in addition to everything else needed for him, for a guy who will probably stab me and doesn’t even talk? No. I’m sorry, but no, thank you.” Gary folds his arms across his chest and leans back in a huff.
“Then why are you working here?” Shirley immediately regrets these words, and she cowers back into her seat, hoping this comment didn’t open her up to the possibility of being the new guy’s counselor.
Rachel jumps in, taking control of the discussion. “It’s important for all of us to have a forum in which we can discuss the concerns we have with the patients, and to bring everything out in the open. These meetings are exactly that forum. We are not here to attack each other. I want you all to talk to me and each other about what you’ve heard and what makes you so nervous about our new patient Richard. But I will continue to caution you—rumors are usually unfounded, and we need to be careful how we color this man.”
Gary slumps farther down in his chair and disengages from the discussion. Julie, the bubbly princess, pipes up that she is fearful for her safety, and she worries that she’s too physically weak and defenseless to effectively treat someone who intimidates her. Other female staff members coo in agreement. Julie has wormed her way out of taking anyone else onto her caseload for weeks.
“Why was he in jail?” Shirley.
“I honestly don’t know.” Rachel. “As I said, I have access to the same records as you, and I don’t have that information.”
“But isn’t that weird? Shouldn’t we know?” Julie.
“What difference does it make?” Me. “If he were in jail for racketeering or armed robbery or whatever. It doesn’t make a difference. It could be drugs. It could be the third offense for something small, and with the ‘three strikes, you’re out’ law, he could have been in jail forever. It’s not a sex offense, because he isn’t registered—I looked it up. It really shouldn’t matter what he was in jail for. But it’s important to know that he was in jail. His perspective is obviously altered, and he has probably been subjected to some pretty horrific stuff in there.” As I say all of this, it occurs to me that I am completely uncomfortable with not knowing why he was in prison for so long.
“I heard he doesn’t talk, at all, and that he is very aggressive. He refuses to follow protocol, he doesn’t get along with other patients, he doesn’t do paperwork.” Shirley.
“Well, I think it’s clear that he’s not cooperative with doing paperwork, but beyond that, I am going to ask everyone to chalk this all up to speculation and the tendency to fill in blanks with drama when we don’t have sufficient information. The fact of the matter is he is here, and he is going to be working with us.” Rachel is no longer looking at anyone and getting ready to drop the bomb. She’s stalling. Everyone starts to shift uncomfortably.
“Sam—” she looks up and tightly smiles in my direction “—and Gary.” He slumps back into his chair, defeated. “I’m going to put Richard with you, Gary, and Sam will be your backup. You can learn a lot from this patient, and I think you’re up for the challenge. And, Sam, you have the best success rate with difficult patients, and you’re a ranking member of the clinical staff. I prefer to start Richard with a male counselor and see how that goes. We will all be here for extra support should you need it, but I’m sure you’ll be able to handle this.”
Shirley and Julie give each other exaggerated looks of relief, and everyone breathes a sigh. David gives me a conciliatory squeeze on my shoulder. Gary huffs up to Rachel and lolls his head to the side as she hands him a copy of Richard’s intake materials. He says nothing, and instead looks to me with wide eyes and an impatient bend in his leg.
“No problem, Rachel. I’m on it.” I gather my papers and coffee, and as we all bleed into the hallway, Rachel hands me my own copy of Richard’s file.
Gary assures me that he has no problem taking Richard’s case, and I will not need to participate in his supervision. Gary is an idiot.
“Well, that’s all well and good, Gary, but I’d like you to come to my office so we can discuss a plan of action. Not because I don’t believe you can manage this, just because I want to stay in the loop if I’m going to be your backup.”
“I really don’t have time right now, and I’d like to get an initial meeting with this guy done today.” He stands at the door to the conference room with his whole body and one outstretched finger pointed toward his office.
“Come on. It’ll only take ten minutes.” He expels a giant, frustrated moan and follows me down the hallway to my door. “Sit down,” I say, waving my hand at my patient chair. He flops down dramatically and lets his Gatorade slosh onto the carpet in front of him.
“I’m going to find him on the unit and bring him to my office for a meeting this morning. I’m going to talk to him like a man, and I’m going to treat him like he’s not scary and no big deal. I’m sure all this crap about him being scary is just because he was incarcerated and prisoners scare people. Well, not me; I’m not scared.” He rubs his Gatorade spill further into my carpet with his shoe.
“This is the extent of your plan? You’re going to talk to him like a man?” I’m not even bothering to write this down.
“Yeah. It’s not rocket science, Sam. He’s a patient and I’m a counselor. So, he has to answer me. I don’t see why everyone had so much trouble before.”
I shake my fragile, hungover head to try to clear the stupidity of Gary’s response. “Can you please give me something a little bit more specific? How do you plan on getting through to him when clearly no one has been able to until now?”
“Like I said, by talking to him like a man.” He slowly enunciates the last three words.
“What does ‘like a man’ mean?” I hover my pen over my notebook and avert my eyes. I can’t look at him for fear of his response.
“You wouldn’t understand because you’re not a man.” He stands up to leave my office and pats me condescendingly on the shoulder as he leans down to add, “I’ll make another meeting with you after I’ve gotten some answers out of him, okay?” And he’s out the door.
I have been avoiding garbage day for about a week now, and the recycling bin is overflowing. There isn’t much space under the sink in my kitchen, and since I drink more than I cook, I have the big recycling bin between the front door and the fridge. It looks more like a hamper.
The blue see-through bag has been pulled under with the weight of the bottles, and I need to yank it up by the red strings to get it out of the can. The clattering sound it makes is absolutely insufferable. There is a leak at the bottom, and the putrid stench of week-old wine and booze, mixed with the acidic smell of the Tropicana bottle from this morning’s screwdrivers, is making me gag. There’s a reason I always put this chore off until the last possible minute.
The noise the bottles make as I pull it along the carpeted hallway is not as bad as it would be if I were to pick it up and haul it over my shoulder, Santa Claus–style. I will have to carry it that way when I walk down the old marble steps to the basement.
I push open the refuse-room door, and I see skittering bugs as I turn on the lights. They’ve