Chapter 2

The arrival of Dr Rubai meant that any hopes I had of a repeat performance right now would be delayed. It also meant that the power nap I was hoping for until round two would also have to wait. Heather had already composed her scrubs to at least appear that nothing had happened.

“We will need to get new sheets and change out your mattress cover. Then if you still have the energy we can shave your face and talk about those books you wanted.” Heather quickly said in an attempt to make it seem like everything was normal.

Day began rolling down the blanket and trying to hide the guilt that was written on his face. He stood and squared his chest while holding up his head on his 6-foot frame. Honestly, if it weren’t for his sandy blond hair cut in a high fade, and that southern drawl, I would swear he was Adonis or maybe Rocky from Dr. Frank-N-Furter’s lab.

Dr Rubai walked around the foot of the bed and pulled the chair closer to the left side of my bed. It didn’t go unnoticed by Heather or myself when the petite Doc took a deep breath through her nose and then looked directly at Heather.

“Mr. Shaw, are you feeling up to talking for a little bit about everything, you have been hit with quite a bit of news in the last day,” she spoke with a hushed authority.

“I’m not sure what you would really want to talk about Doc, I mean, I know less than you do about what is going on with me, and what I do know, seems like I would have been better off not waking up.” Sure, I knew I was being morbid and depressed, but hey, I was told that I wouldn’t walk, and still didn’t know what all happened.

“Let’s start with the easy topics then shall we? I heard that you became quite upset when Captain True used your given name. I don’t see anything wrong with the name, so maybe you can enlighten me.” The obvious way she was trying to shift me into a talkative mode instantly reminded me of the seven months I spent in Virginia during my interrogation training.

“Look Doc, I am sure that you have better things to do. I passed my mental health screening when I received my security clearance. I passed my screening when I was deployed. Now that my time here is coming to a close, I won’t need the clearance, and I can’t be redeployed if I am stuck in a bed. Does it really make a difference that I spent a childhood being asked if I was really Michael Jackson’s lover? Shortening it down to just BJ wouldn’t work either, especially after the trauma of knowing what a BJ was.” I couldn’t help but feel my blood pulsing as I wanted to rant and rave. This is probably what she was after, but I had already coped with most of my issues.

“Petty Officer Shaw, I won’t pretend to know what it feels like to face ridicule like that. I can’t even begin to pretend that I know what it is like to be in a war zone. I can however empathise with someone who had their childhood uprooted to another country. I can also empathize with someone who had plans for a future that took another turn. I have read your file, I have everything there that was entered, but that doesn’t mean it is how you feel, or how you operate. I get paid my salary to sit here no matter if you want to talk or if you want to stare at the wall. It is your choice, but I will say that I have two good ears and an open mind.”

Really, I wondered, an open mind? Not knowing everything that the doc had witnessed when she opened the door made me more worried for Day and Galnore, than for myself. When I received my clearance, I had to attend sessions with a shrink. They had all kinds of ideas about how childhood traumas should affect me, but they also were not prepared for me to begin sharing with them that I was able to not only survive trauma but thrive. I had been sexually abused, and I had been physically and emotionally abused, but somehow the bitterness didn’t hold. Even in my darkest hours being as sadistic as I dared with past lovers, the torture that I doled out was consensual. Was this doctor hinting that they could handle all the turns and twists that happened in my head?

“Doc, I will make you a deal. Let me sleep for a bit, and I will talk to you later.”

“Okay, Mr. Shaw, all you have to do is ask one of the staff to page me.” She replied as she stood to leave. “Oh, and try to be a little more discreet in your personal therapy routine.”

I laid my head back and started to process the last hour, however I faded into a dreamless slumber that was only momentarily interrupted by a shift in my bedding. Pain meds are a wonderful sleep aid.

I wasn’t aware of the hour when I finally woke up. I attempted to be a man of my word so I pressed the call button hoping that Doctor Rubai would be available at this hour. Heather entered my room and told me that she had the night shift. I asked how they were rotating shifts if she worked earlier that day and she told me that each staff had been assigned a limited number of patients. I was fortunate in that 2 of the 3 staff members were Heather and Day. I became worried that with her professional attitude perhaps earlier was a dream, a mistake, something. I asked her if we could talk about what happened earlier and she said maybe later but not now.

It didn’t take long for Doctor Rubai to show up after Heather went and paged her. I knew that it was outside of normal business hours because it was dark outside however there were no clocks in my room that I could see from my position. Doctor Rubai entered my room wearing khaki slacks and a white blouse covered with a black cardigan. She removed the cardigan and placed it on the back of the chair as she slid closer to my bed.

“Good evening Mr. Shaw. I wasn’t expecting you to be ready to talk this soon.”

“Sorry Doc, I didn’t know how late it was.”

“Nonsense, it is barely 8 and I hadn’t even left for the day yet,” she responded with a smile, “Now, where do you want to start”

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth,” I began, though the look in her eyes said that she wasn’t as amused as I was. “Jean-Luc Godard said that a story should have a beginning, a middle, and an end. Though not necessarily in that order. So I am not really sure where you want me to start Doc. I don’t know what topics you are open to, or what you don’t want to hear about.”

“Well, we could begin with how you are currently feeling. Your thoughts on things since you have woken. Where are your thoughts?” She said as she picked up a yellow legal pad and pen and crossed her legs.

“Okay, since I woke up. Hmmmm,” I paused a moment to attempt to process. “I was told that I am paralyzed and will never walk, but my toes feel hot, then cold, depending on the air pumping out of the vents in the ceiling. That would tell me that I have some feelings right? The positive now is that I am not pissing from a tube, so I at least feel that I have some control over things, but it will take getting used to a urinal. This brace they have on me restricts stretching, but the bed shifts, so I don’t think I will have to worry about sores. I would like to eat but who knows what that would do to me.” I rambled. Trying to go through the basics that I thought might be important.

“Those seem to be decent observations Shaw, but where is the feeling? How have those observations affected you emotionally?” she cut quickly to the center of the onion.

“Look, I know that you want to know how I feel, but if I don’t start with things I know, I will be a mess of tears and no one will gain anything useful. Why are you concerned anyway? Does it matter what I say, I am going to be out of the military now, so it won’t change much.” I bemoaned as I could feel the tears start welling up.

“Honestly, I am more worried about your emotions than anything else. I can process anything you have to say, and as long as you don’t tell me that you are selling state secrets to Al Qaeda or the Islamic State, then my report will only mention how I feel your emotional state is as we progress,” she stated matter of factly.