Reticent Rain, Page 4

  Axis VIII

  “The leaf of the oak is carried upward by the gusts of wind and breaches the chain link.”

  Lunchtime for the rats in the labyrinth had always been a test of the odds of will striking against the grain of society’s ilk. Most of the cretins stirred aroused at the latent scent of meat soaked gruel being sloppily ladled from oversized hotel pans. Their paws couldn’t wait to get a hold of the plastic square shaped bowls filled to the brim with some of the state’s most basic of nutritional standards. More gruel painted their clothes than what had managed to make it into their mouths as they sat end to end on the cafeteria seats being feed like hogs to a trough. This was the only order for the disorderly for, if they got out of hand, their only delight was taken from them. The meals were a natural pharmacology to the herd as their faces happily stuffed the brown mush down their infested throats.

  This place was their only joy in the regime between sleep and medication. It had happened to be an old gymnasium retrofitted to be a makeshift cafeteria. The shiny planks of treated oak lining the old basketball court floor resonated their mumbled moaning of ecstasy between each slurp of slop. The walls were of the brightest glossy white that the state could manage to paint them with and there was an open twenty foot high ceiling of metal trusses that towered above them. Just below the trusses were a single rectangular row of windows on all of the walls of which would let in all natural light to shower down glowingly angelic on their mush. The cafeteria had been nicknamed “The Cathedral” by the rats especially by the schizo’s whom claimed to have heard Abide With Me echoing amongst the walls from time to time.

  This place seemed at odds with Dr. Pierce as he was being escorted through this shortcut to the outside by Stanley; it was well taken care of in regards to the rest of the hospital. It was a gleaming and pristine façade in transit to the outside world of Westwood. The young intern was too also going to partake in his own lunch which he purposely left within the confines of his car. This was Pierce’s way of separating the two worlds of normalcy and abhorrence; a safe and physical haven from the crumbling walls of the institution. He was away from the subvert abnormalities obviously at play. It was a physical separation from the constant fear and lament that the hospital came to represent outside the crumbling ramparts. As he walked through the shortcut, the patients had openly shown their gruel covered jagged pearls and toothless mush painted grins and even nodded to him like he was a priest walking to the pulpit. This was their personal sacrament of normalcy as well. Their joy was carried out amongst the trap of walls that made up ‘The Cathedral”. But even with all of the regimens outside of it, the cadence of medication and sleep, all of the rat’s ills had temporarily faded to the dust of memory or delusion as it will.

  Stanley’s massively burley body blocked most of the four sets of heavy wooden doors that lined along the wall of their approach. Starting from the far left, there were bronze plaques above each; H-377, H-378, H-379 and Garden. The plaques had shimmered in the natural light that towered from above but each was indifferent from one another. There were thick square safety glass plated windows just above the key latches on each of the doors to peek through to warn of any assailant attempting to fly through an open door. The panels of glass were sandwiched with a cross hatch of thin wire lattice; shatter proof glass. The wooden doors themselves appeared to be carved out of the most beautiful solid pieces of stained red oak any craftsman could find.

  “Remember, go through the garden door and you’ll be all right” Stanley had said to Dr. Pierce.

  “These some of the other wards, I suppose?”

  “Yep, these are the ends of the hallways that connect up to the cafeteria, ‘cept you wanna go through the garden to get to the outside.”

  H-377 had caught the intern’s eye with a flickering fluorescent rhythmically strobe lighting through the cross hatched window drawing him to the door. He had pressed his face to the glass and squinted to try and see into the distance of the massive hallway beyond the window. The walls had appeared red with black graffiti spray painted on all the walls. The smell of the mush subsided and the stench of decay filled the air, a sordid cadaverous compost smell.

  Just then, H-377 had begun to be struck hard from the other side by a patient trying to ram the door open. The young doctor had been startled backwards in his tracks. The patient had tried with many successions to use his whole body as a battering ram against the solid chunk of wood. Stanley quickly ran to the door and let out a small sigh as he fumbled for his keys to open the door. Once Stanley shadowed the window, the patient stopped and pressed his bedsore covered bare ass to the window with his flesh flattening out like blueberry covered pancakes on a griddle. Stanley had begun to chuckle a bit as he opened the door making sure to press his foot against the bottom like a doorstop. The patient with all of his might still kept on battering the door with all of his might. The glass was starting to spray with tiny droplets of blood from the patient throwing all of his weight against the heavy wooden door. He had finally managed to jar open the door against the tip of Stanley’s foot flopping to the ground in the process.

  “You know the d-d-drill Adam.”

  “I didn’t know it was you Stan, honest!”

  “I’ll be right back Doc.”

  Stanley wrestled up the long bearded patient like a sack of potatoes and dragged him feet first through the door. The patent tried to latch into the shiny oak floor planks with his shit encrusted overgrown fingernails. As Stanley dragged him in, his nails had begun digging into and etching the oak. His beard had cushioned his face against the beautiful wood like a dirty mop sopping up a spill. A fingernail had broken off from one of his pincers embedding deep into the grain of the oak.

  “Please! I’ll stop. I’ll be good!”

  “T-t-hat time is over now!”

  The patient had scuffled some more before succumbing to the might of Stanley. His rat face had begun to tear up in his failed attempt at freedom. The long face was starting to bury into the grain of the oak as well while Stanley was shuffle boarding him into H-377. The door was then firmly shut echoing throughout the long red corridor.

  “Don’t ever go in there without somebody with you.”

  “What classification is that ward?”

  “That’s where they throw ‘em away, the ones that can’t be saved.”

  Dr. Pierce had put his face flush up to the window peering in. Adam just walked down the hall backwards while glaring at Dr. Pierce with his wide open zombie eyes. As he furthered away towards the end of the hall he began raising his left hand. He waved goodbye but not before going out of sight by extending his middle finger. The hallway was empty once again and every time the light flickered he could clearly see that the spray painted graffiti was actually one of the many feces smeared musings all over the walls, he could only make out one:

  When Thou didst descend unto death

  then didst Thou slay…

  And when Thou didst also raise the dead

  all the Hosts of Heavens cried out…

  “Alright Doc, sorry to rush you and all but I gotta get going back on the ward. This is the door you wanna go through.”

  The garden door’s window was beading with the sweat of condensation and the handle to the door had a little give to it as if the wood had been replaced by wet cardboard. The young doctor inserted the key and had begun to open the door. He almost pulled the handle right off of the mushy red oak. A slight mist had emanated from out of the cracked door and the once cadaverous smell that had stuck into his nostrils was now replaced by the aromatic scent of Plumeria. As Pierce entered into the garden, while closing the door, he saw that the back of the heavy mushy oak had this inscription carved deep within the grain of the oak:

  Quisquis homo sceleris funesti mole gravaris

  Pre foribus Domino merens prosternere summo,

  Haud secus intratur

  This was truly a garden and was like no other he had seen before. The walls, which joined
together to form an octagonal room, were matted with thick ropes of the same overgrowth of blooming morning glory that had implanted itself upon the outside façade of Westwood. All of these ropes were methodically woven like a quilted bed comforter all of the way up to a vaulted ceiling, of which was made entirely with frosted hexagonal shaped plates of glass. Eight hinged plates were affixed in the center of the ceiling to a thick octagonal shaped brass framing that had held all of those pieces into place. Two of the eight frosted plates were hinged upward so as to let some of the thick sweet smelling plumerial condensation escape. The floor of the garden was tiled in a checkerboard pattern with alternating heavy slabs of granite and quartz each representing the black and white grids of a chess board. All along the walls adorned waist high tables filled with a colorful assortment of plants.

  His eyes smiled as they perused the many vivid colors that were contained amongst the tables. Pierce did not know any of the species of plants but marveled in the fact that this garden had existed amongst the squalid surroundings of Westwood. In fact the only recognizable thing in the garden to him was that of a great majestic willow tree that had been growing right in the center of the floor. Its’ perfectly manicured branches grew guarded by ceiling high trellises made out of the strongest pieces of aged mahogany. The trellises themselves had all different varieties and colors of grapes that were just beginning to bud.

  “Beautiful is it not?” A voice from behind Pierce affirmed what they had both marveled at.

  Pierce turned around to look at what appeared to be the gardener. His one piece dirt stained cover all barely fit the nearly elderly frame they were meant to cover. He had an unbuttoned embroidered long sleeved flannel shirt with the name of “Simon” and his dark black hands were poking out to shake Pierce’s hand.

  “I’m Mr. Peter. I don’t think I’ve ever met you… nice to meet you”

  “Dr. Pierce. Nice to meet you as well. I am the new internist.”

  “I take it by your awe that you’ve never seen such a place.”

  “It’s very beautiful. How long has the willow been growing here?”

  “Oh, it’s ages old. It was part of the original grounds before the hospital was built here.”

  Both the young doctor and Simon exchange a brief albeit awkward and uncomfortable silence. Both had seemed to be searching for some sort of conversation catalyst but both stood perplexed at coming up with anything interesting to say to one another. The both of them just placed their attention to the tall wispy leaved willow tree in front of them.

  “How do I get to my car from here?” Pierce had given up and simply tried to stick with his original task at hand.

  “Outside?” Simon questioned Pierce rhetorically.

  “It’s my lunch hour and Stanley said this is the shortcut to my car, I usually have my lunch in my car.”

  “Stanley is always playing tricks on the new people.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “There is only one door in and out of here”

  I finally felt this thing I have always felt before

  The knife that cuts so deep leaves behind a lonely sore

  Real life is nothing but turnips and dandelions masquerading as flowers

  Real life, it seems, is nothing but memories and loosely stitched sensory