Psychology and Other Stories (37 page)

“I was hired by Massick, and I never promised that I would— Everything was contingent on whether or not I, on the results of— I'm sorry it took so long, but these things take time.”

Mike kicked the box; glass broke.

“Man, what, the fuck, you talking about! Who you think hired Massick, man? Who the fuck you think pays
his
bills?” He kicked the box again. “Not me! That's for sure as fucking sure. You think I got money? I don't got shit. It's that motherfucker out there who's got the money. I don't got shit, I ain't shit, unless that motherfucker says I'm shit.”

He punched the top box and the whole stack came crashing down. Jack Daniel's came gurgling out of the boxes and spread slowly across the floor.

“There! That's what I'm talking about! Now who the fuck you think's going to pay for
that
shit? It sure, as fuck, ain't gonna be fucking Massick!”

He began kicking and stamping on the fallen boxes.

“And I sure, as fuck, ain't going, into, fucking, clink again, and getting my other, fucking, kidney, cut the fuck out, by one of that spic, fag, DiRosa's, fucking, brothers!”

Panting, fists clenched, he turned on Strickland.

Strickland took a step back and said, “I don't think this is a very intelligent way to discuss this.”

*

As the sound of breaking bottles reached them, the men around the pool table looked at one another, then at the man with the toothpick. The man with the toothpick took the toothpick out of his mouth. He placed it on the edge of the table. He said, “Shit.”

Mike went limp when the door opened, which allowed Strickland to get out from under him and grab him by the throat.

“What's all this fuss?” said the man with the toothpick.

Strickland let go. They got to their feet.

“You need some help with this … friend of yours?”

“Naw, Andy,” said Mike.

Strickland tugged his shirt into place. “We're fine, thanks.”

The man with the toothpick said to Mike, “You need to take a little time out?”

Mike said, “Naw, Andy.”

“Let me see. How about this. Take yourself a little time out. Work whatever this shit is out. Just be back before first rush. Then clean this fucking mess up.”

Out in the street, they shuffled towards Strickland's car, blinking and shielding their eyes from the sun. Strickland had the VCR under one arm.

“I just about had you there,” Strickland said.

“Aw man, forget that.”

“No kidding. Another two minutes … Did you like that hold?” Strickland cocked his free arm to show which hold he meant.

“You fight like a fucking school kid. Kicking a guy's fucking legs out.”

“That's because I haven't been in a fight since school!”

They stood next to the car, looking down at the city as the sun set.

“So what am I supposed to tell them?” said Strickland. “I can't— I won't lie.”

“Shit, man. Who the fuck said shit about lying? Tell them the fucking truth. Tell them that asshole got what he fucking asked for.”

“Mike,” Strickland said. “What happened on July ninth?”

“Man, what the fuck do I know from July ninth? How the fuck do I know what I'm doing July ninth or tenth or any other fucking day? That shit's a long time ago.”

“You know what day I mean.”

“Man, you mean the night I
killed
that motherfucker, say so.”

Mike Burger and Antonio DiRosa in the foyer of The White Grape, shouting into each other's faces.

Man, what you fucking looking at, man?

What you think
you
looking at?

I'll look at whatever the fuck I feel like, my friend.

I'm not your friend and you better back off, man.

Yeah? Or what.

I'm just telling you now, you better just about back the fuck off, man.

“Nobody talks to me like that, man.”

Strickland said, “But what did he say?”

You think you can tell motherfuckers what they can or can't look at, motherfucker?

Who you calling motherfucker, motherfucker? Go fuck your own mother.

Mike's friends, who have been holding him back, suddenly meeting no resistance.

*

“Some punk piece of shit spic motherfucker tells me to fuck my mother, what the fuck you expect me to do? Take that shit lying down? Fuck that. Nobody says shit about my mother, man.”

Mike got back in the car. Strickland joined him.

“She got enough of that fucking shit when she was alive.”

“All right,” said Strickland. “All right, all right, all right,” he said. “Tell me about your mother.”

Q. Are you familiar with the phrase begging the question? Strike that. How do you know when your treatment has been effective? Do you do follow-up studies? Do you get other psychologists to assess your results? Do you in fact make use of any of the tools of science? Analysis, comparison, evaluation, validation—do these play any part in your clinical work, Dr. Strickland?

MR. MASSICK: Now I do beg Your Honor's pardon but—

A. Let me explain something to you, Ms. Lattimann—

THE COURT: Now just a minute, Doctor. There is I believe going to be an objection to what was clearly a compound question.

MR. MASSICK: Thank you, Your Honor.

MS. LATTIMANN: Your Honor, with all due respect I would appreciate it if you left the objections to the defense counsel. I have my hands quite full enough without—

THE COURT: Ms. Lattimann, I would advise you to stop right there. Anyone can see that that was a compound question and therefore improper. You may rephrase, provided you limit yourself to one question at a time.

DR. STRICKLAND: May I say something, Your Honor?

THE COURT: Jesus and Mary. No you may not, until you are asked a direct question.

DR. STRICKLAND: It seems to me I was asked several, and it seems to me that everyone else in this court is given a chance to speak
up whenever they like whereas I am not even allowed to elaborate on my answers, when it should be obvious to anyone with a, it should be obvious to anyone that there are some questions that cannot be answered with a simple yes or no, and I would also like to say for the record in respect to Ms. Lattimann's, well I don't know, I want to say argumentative and sarcastic question that yes—

THE COURT: I will decide what is argumentative, Doctor, thank you.

DR. STRICKLAND: As a matter of fact I do know what begging the question means, and furthermore that if she means to imply that my method is not scientific because I do not use double-blind studies or choose to hop my patients up on speed or downers or goofballs—

MS. LATTIMANN: Mr. Massick, perhaps you could please control your witness.

THE COURT: Ms. Lattimann, it is not for you to make requests of that nature to Mr. Massick.

DR. STRICKLAND: You give a hundred people a drug in a double-blind placebo-controlled study and lo and behold, sixty of them seem to do a little better, so the drug works, and a hundred doctors start prescribing it to a hundred patients each, but what about the forty it doesn't help, or makes feel worse? That's modern medicine. The individual is swamped by the average. And that's what you'd have us turn psychology into, Ms. Lattimann. Let me tell you, there is more wisdom, and compassion, and insight in one good case study of one unique and troubled person than in any number of tables of figures added up and smoothed over by mathematical frippery …

THE COURT: Thank you, Doctor, that will do nicely.

DR. STRICKLAND: All right, Ms. Lattimann, we all see what you're trying to do. You want to discredit psychology as a science? Fine. I'll do it for you. Not just clinical psychology but I'll throw in experimental, and popular, and social and personality and depth
and all the other kinds of psychology for free. They're all bunk. Of course they are. They're just stories we make up to explain why we do things, but none of us even knows why we do things ourself so how can we expect to make a science out of why everyone does everything that they do?

THE COURT: This is not the way things are done in a court of law, Doctor.

DR. STRICKLAND: You think if you find it in the DSM then it's science? Do you know anything? Yes, let me ask you some questions for a change. Did you know, Ms. Lattimann, that the manual was produced by committee consensus? That means they chatted about the different categories and decided by vote what should be included and what should not—isn't that correct? And isn't it true that there were disagreements, and that in fact a few years ago, wasn't there a big outcry when the Committee on Nomenclature voted that homosexuality was not a mental disorder, and wasn't that controversy resolved by sending ballots out to members of the American Psychiatric Association and having them vote on whether or not homosexuality is or is not a mental disorder? Now, that is not a scientific procedure, is it, Ms. Lattimann?

MS. LATTIMANN: Your Honor, I trust that you will instruct the jury correctly when the time comes to strike this tirade from the record if you are not going to clear the courtroom now or hold Dr. Strickland in contempt of court.

THE COURT: Ms. Lattimann, the next person, male or female, white or black, witness or counsel or juror or bailiff, who tells me how to do my job, will be the one held in contempt of court. As for you, Professor, Doctor—

DR. STRICKLAND: All right. Just let me say one more thing. Ms. Lattimann wants to quibble over definitions and diagnoses. It should be clear by now why I do not. Call it impulse dyscontrol or explosive
personality type or any of the hundreds of things it's been called. None of the names says anything. A label isn't an explanation. The point is this. Could Mike Burger have acted differently? Could he have conformed his conduct to the law? My answer, in my professional, clinical opinion, is no. He could not. Not when you know who he is, what he has been through, how he relates to the world. A man in a restaurant told him to fuck his mother. So he beat him up, and the man died. He had no choice, when you consider his upbringing. His father was a violent, hateful man who beat his wife when their children—
her
children, he called them—acted up, or acted out, or did not behave exactly as he wanted them to behave—that is, as blocks of wood. Mike Burger as a child saw his mother thrashed till she was black and blue for
his
mischief, for
his
misdeeds. So when Antonio DiRosa told him to fuck his mother, something snapped. Maybe DiRosa became in that moment Mike's father. Maybe the man's unfortunate choice of words seemed to accuse Mike of himself being his father, or like his father. In either case, he was not a child any longer and he was not going to stand for anyone insulting or harming his mother anymore. So he attacked. What else could he do? Now tell me, Ms. Lattimann. Where are you going to find any of that in a textbook of psychological disorders?

THE COURT: Now we've simply got to have some kind of order and reason here. This isn't the way things are done. We've got to have order, or we'll be left with nothing but chaos.

MIKE BURGER: I'm sorry, man, but that's a load of fucking shit. I hated that bitch.

The judge cleared the courtroom.

SIX WEEKS LATER

The anxious young man said nothing for a long time. “It helps me sleep, too.”

“Well, that's fine,” said Strickland. “Just, you know. Be careful. Those things can be addictive.”

“I guess.”

“… Should we work on relaxation?”

“I don't know. I guess I'm probably relaxed enough already.”

“Well … I'm moving to a new office. So, if you want, we can meet there from now on.”

The young man looked around his kitchen. “I don't mind.”

Melanie and Ben helped Strickland carry boxes from the interview room out to his car.

“Blind corner!”

“Beep beep, coming through!”