Bedeviled Ham - Chapter 3
Ham froze as if the phone were a deadly spider that had injected paralyzing venom into his brain. Words wouldn’t form. The alien creature, seemingly affixed to his head, had to be dealt with.
“Ham, are you there? Ham, can you answer me?”
Having pried the phone away from his head, Ham stared at it as he tried to get his brain to instruct his fingers to manipulate it in a way that would stop the voice from emanating. A simple task that now seemed impossible.
“Ham, it’s Nathan. Is everything OK?”
In terror, his reflexes took over and he just released the phone and watched pieces skitter across the hardwood floor. It went silent as the battery-powered guts lay exposed.
After a series of shallow breaths, he heaved several more labored breaths. Ham realized that Nathan wasn’t dead after all. The voice on the phone certainly sounded like his resurrected therapist. Great. Now he was not only the guy who didn’t call for help when the guy died, he was also the guy who hangs up on the dead guy now that he clearly wasn’t dead anymore.
He had been right. He was cursed. Or crazy. Right now, that seemed a better answer. He should be used to this sort of thing by now but it seemed to be getting harder to deal with. Why hadn’t he realized last night that this would all be fixed, just like all the previous mishaps? Why hadn’t he just slept on it. After months of therapy he seemed no closer to coping with his situation. But, until last night, he had taken for granted that things would right themselves.
Having steadied himself somewhat, he took to the task of reassembling the cell phone. The familiar glow of the screen told him it was in working order and then the notifications of several missed calls and voicemails from Nathan appeared.
This was Ham’s chance to redeem some level of humanity. The more the events of his life seemed to perfect themselves the less perfect he felt as a human being. How could he just leave his therapist glassy-eyed and crumpled? And what would he now say to that same therapist who clearly had no memory of Ham’s version of the previous day’s events?
Pressing the button to bring up the voicemails, Ham turned on the speakerphone and set the spider-turned-communication device on the nightstand and plopped down on the edge of the bed. Listening to the messages would buy him a few more minutes before he would have to speak.
“You have three unheard messages. First unheard message.”
“Ham, this is Nathan. I’m concerned that something has happened to you. Call me back.”
“Next message.”
”This is Nathan again. I’m going to be in the office all day. I’m sure we can talk through whatever you think happened.”
“Next ….
Ham hung up before listening to the final message. He had gotten the point. Nathan wasn’t going to give up. He pressed 4 on the phone and it rang straight through to the therapist’s office. He had no idea what to say, which turned out not to matter. Nathan did most of the talking and told Ham to come to the office right away.
Emotionally spent, Ham didn’t have as much resistance left as he would have needed to refuse to his victim’s request. He made sure he had enough clothing back on to go out in public without drawing too much attention. He didn’t care that the wine-soaked evening of the night before had left a few tell-tale signs beneath his eyes and his hair had clearly been styled by a sweat-soaked pillow.
Unexpectedly the In Session sign was flipped up on the door to Nathan’s office so Ham had to spend time in the waiting room. Ham paced in the entranceway and stared at the finger-painted images on the wall with such intensity that he thought he could see the colors swirling a bit. Shifting. Blurring.
Just then the door to the therapist’s office swung and a girl came scurring out and brushed past him as she headed for the exit. It took a moment for Ham to stop registering all the motion and realize that she was the same girl he had seen on his first visit.
“Is she getting any better?”
“Why don’t you come in the office and we’ll talk about everything.”
“You have kids?” Ham seemed momentarily frozen again.
“Just come inside.” Nathan gently reached out a hand to beckon Ham toward the inner office. Ham flinched but moved in the intended direction clearly not wanting Nathan’s hand to come into contact with his body.
For the first time in several weeks, Ham opted for the couch. The chair suddenly looked menacing and he imagined straps appearing to restrain him as if it were an electric chair. Perhaps he deserved to be punished. Bad things were happening. And he wasn’t convinced that the fact that no one else seemed to know about them exonerated him of responsibility.
“I killed you,” Ham finally blurted out.
“What?”
“I killed you. That’s why I didn’t call last night. I knew you couldn’t answer.”
“Now, Ham. Clearly I’m OK.”
“Well, clearly I’m not. And it’s getting worse, not better. I can’t keep coming here.”
Nathan tried to calm Ham down but the dialog just ricocheted around the office and Nathan made little progress settling his patient down. Finally he suggested that maybe it would be best if they took a break and Ham got some food and rest. They could try again in a few days. He wasn’t sure if Ham was really in agreement but he finally left the office.
Nathan waited to hear the sound of the second door closing, signaling that Ham had left the outer office. Then he picked up his pen and made a few additional notations in the growing file of session notes about Ham. Leaning back in his chair, Nathan sat motionless for several moments and then reached for the phone.
“I may have pushed him too hard and need some help with this case.”
