Psychology and Other Stories (32 page)

“What
wouldn't
we be doing,” Mike muttered.

“Getting our ass whooped,” said Joan, the oldest girl.

“Got that right,” Roz said.

“Playing basketball,” said Clarence, the oldest boy.

Strickland put down his cup. “Oh?”

The children ran around the blacktop. Clarence got ahold of the ball, bounced it off Clamantha's head, and executed a perfect layup.

Mike shouted, “Now you know better than that! You gotta get behind the line before you throw again.”

The girl looked over at her mother, who stood with her arms crossed at the edge of the court. “Don't look at me,” Roz said. “Get him back.”

“That's travelling,” Mike called. He was agitated, hopping in place. “And that's holding, Clem, goddamn it. Okay, give me the ball, give, me, the ball. There's no point in playing unless you're gonna play proper.”

“I'm captain!”

“I'm captain,” Mike corrected him. “Me … and Dan.”

“Oh no,” Strickland laughed.

The children stared at Strickland, then clamored: “I'm on Pop's team!”

“I pick first,” Mike said, “and I got Clarence.” The boy hooted and yanked the ball out of his father's hands.

Strickland looked at Roz, who shrugged and rolled her eyes.

He nodded at Clamantha. “Do you want to be on my team?”

The others laughed. “He picked
Clammier
!”

Mike picked the next biggest boy.

“You playing?,” Strickland asked Roz.

“Everybody plays,” said Mike.

“He picked
Ma
!”

Mike crouched in front of Joan and grimaced. “You feeling it?”

“I'm feeling it.”

“You bringing it?”

“I'm bringing it.”

“Then let's do it.” They slapped palms and knuckles together solemnly, then let out a wild war cry. “That's my team,” he told Strickland, “you can have the other two.”

The two youngest children looked at each other, crestfallen.

“Team meeting,” Strickland said. “Emergency team huddle. All right. Now. Listen up. As your uh, team captain, I have only one thing to say. I order you … to go out there … and have fun.”

Roz said, “You heard the man. Now let's see some hands.” She put hers out, and the children slapped theirs down onto it. Strickland laid his on top.

“C'mon, you lazy slop-buckets!,” Mike screamed. “We're starting without you!”

They played basketball. Strickland and Roz and the kids tripped over one another and fell laughing to the ground. Mike's team danced around them, scoring point after point.

“We're the best!”

“The best at
sucking
!”

“The best at sucking at being
losers
!”

Strickland lifted Clamantha into the air, but before she could shoot, Mike, gibbering with glee, slapped the ball out of her hands. Soon the youngest children grew discouraged and drifted to the
sidelines, and without opponents the older kids grew bored, till only Mike, radiant in triumph, and Strickland, ruddy with exhaustion, stood alone on the court with the sun going down behind the apartment blocks.

“Forty-one to one,” Mike said. “Not bad.”

“I wasn't keeping score.”

“Losers never do.”

“I'm parked down here,” Strickland said.

Mike shook his hand. “Good game, man. You don't give up.”

“Neither do you.”

“I like to win.”

“See you next week.”

Strickland stood in the street, staring at a gap in the row of parked cars.

Mike opened the door. “Forget something?”

“This will sound funny.”

Strickland stood on the sidewalk with his hands in his pockets while Mike paced back and forth in the street, muttering, “Motherfucker. This is my neighborhood, man.”

A car honked at him. He slammed his fist down on the hood but stepped aside.

He joined Strickland on the sidewalk. “This burns my fucking ass, man.”

Strickland smiled, but then his face went blank. “Oh no.”

Beryl told Ben, “Just pretend that no one is watching you. That's all acting is: pretending you're all alone. Now try it again.”

Ben put down the teddy bear and looked at it. “I wish they didn't kill you,” he announced.

“Yes,” Beryl cried, “but without words! We don't talk when we're alone, do we? Only crazy people talk to themselves.”

The doorbell rang.

“Speak through your actions,” she said on her way to the door. “Your body is your instrument.”

Ben laid his head on the bear's breast.

In the car, Ben said, “And her husband is a famous movie director and if we had a VCR we could watch his movies when we got home like we did at her house.”

In the driver's seat, Mike said, “Listen, I been thinking. Cops ain't gonna do shit. Bunch of goldbricking dogfuckers.” He glanced at the rear-view mirror. “Pardon my Portuguese. What I'm saying is, give me a couple days to check it out.”

“Check it out?”

“Make some calls. See what turns up. I know some people work in this shop. Sometimes these shitheads try to move hot cars through them. What is it, a '77?”

Strickland said, “I'm bad with cars.”

Martie watched Ben get into bed.

“Brush your teeth?”

He showed her the inside of his mouth.

“Good man.”

“Mom? The brown man is going to help Dad find the car.”

“So I heard. And we don't say brown man.”

“How come?”

“We say black.”

“But he's not black.”

“That's just the way it is.” She sighed and sat on the edge of the bed. With some difficulty she explained, “It has to do with equality. Now, your skin isn't exactly white either, is it? But we say white people and black people because white and black are the most common, the most basic colors.”

“So Penny is black too?”

“No, Penny is oriental. It's a little complicated at first, but you'll pick it up.”

“Mom? What's a goldbricking dogfucker?”

After a pause, she said, “Well, it must be some kind of idiom. Tomorrow maybe we'll look it up.”

“Mom? I want to be an actor.”

“You can be anything you want, dear.”

“I want to be an actor.”

After a pause, she said, “Then that's what you should be.”

Strickland was at his desk.

“I just had the funniest conversation with Benderson,” Martie said.

Strickland sighed. “I didn't know what else to do,” he said. “You weren't here, I didn't exactly want to take him along to the home of a— And Stephanie wasn't home, it was supposed to be your day to pick him up I thought, and I'm not leaving him with that Barbara girl anymore I've decided, she doesn't even talk to him, she just listens to that Walkman the whole time, it'll stunt his socio-intellectual development and I didn't think that was what we wanted.”

Martie looked at him sadly.

“I'm sorry,” he stated. “Did I raise my voice?”

“No. You never do.”

“Maybe I need a time out.” He rubbed his neck. “It's been a long day.” After a minute, he chuckled. “Believe it or not, I played …”

But when he looked up she was gone.

*

Q. Now, Professor, in your testimony to Mr. Massick you mentioned, I believe it was, let me get this right, intermittent explosive disorder. Is this correct?

A. That was my diagnostic impression, yes.

Q. When you say diagnostic impression, do you mean diagnosis?

A. Yes. That is what I mean, yes.

Q. Because when you say an impression, it sounds like, I don't know, something less than a diagnosis.

A. Thank you for bringing that to my attention. I should have said diagnosis.

Q. By what date precisely had you arrived at this diagnosis?

A. I don't think I could pinpoint the date with any degree of exactitude.

Q. Well, was it January first? Was it yesterday?

A. It took some time. These things take time. It is not the same as with medical diagnosis, where you can simply tally up the presenting symptoms and arrive at a conclusion.

Q. So symptoms and conclusions play no part in psychiatric diagnosis?

A. I don't believe I said that. Of course they do. But psychiatric— psychological symptomatology, etiology, these things lie beneath the surface, you must get at them, it is a gradual process and often there is resistance.

Q. You mean, your patients lie to you?

A. Not exactly. Not consciously. They—there are things they don't like to talk about.

Q. Such as the murders they committed?

Strickland said, “Huh?”

“I said,” said the cabbie, “twenty-five eighty.”

“Jesus.”

*

Massick said, “Come in, Doctor. Have a seat if you like. You'll forgive me for standing, I've been in court all morning. Well. Now. You'll forgive me for cutting straight to the chase scene: What can you tell me about our mutual friend, Mr. Burger?”

“Well …”

“Quite a guy, isn't he. Quite a character. Family man too, which is always a bonus in my line of work. Beautiful wife. Bunch of rug rats, I understand. In the army too. Good citizen. Likable guy. Full of beans. Can't keep a man like that down, no, not for long. Says what he means and means what he says. No damn good at all on the witness stand. Though don't think I wasn't tempted. He'd win over eleven of them and get stuck in the craw of one bitter old little old lady. But that's the jury system for you: any twelve meatheads picked out of a hat know the law better than one intelligent man who's dedicated his life to it. Imagine if they tried that in any other line of work. If you had to get twelve people off the street to fix your car, or take out your appendix—or do what you do, Doctor! But what can I do? Every man wants to go before a jury of his peers. Every man wants to be found not guilty. In this case, not guilty by reason of insanity is the best we can do. So be it. All right. So give it to me straight. Mike Burger. In your professional opinion.”

Strickland opened his briefcase. “Well, I've prepared a preliminary report, and I thought—”

“No no no, just give it to me in your own words.”

Strickland looked at the thick sheaf of paper in his hand. “These are my own words.”

“Summarize it for me, doctor. I'll be reading reports and motions and counter-motions and responses and counter-responses and affidavits till the Los Angeles River wets its bed and one thing I can tell you is they're not worth the paper they're printed on. When you're paid by the page, why say in ten words what you can say in a
hundred? No, I'll take it from a man's mouth every time, thank you, and when the courts start reading cases instead of hearing them,
well
, that's when I'll know it's time to shuffle off this jurisprudent coil and retire back home to Alabama. In the meantime here we are, mano a mano, so give it to me in your own words.”

Strickland put the report down on the desk. “I haven't come to any firm conclusions, of course, but judging from what I have seen so far, I think the most likely diagnosis is going to be something in the nature of an impulse-control disorder.”