Diana's barely twenty-five. I hate to lose her, but she's entitled to a future. I talked to her this morning. She refers to the 'old me who did that very bad thing' and how, though she knows that 'old me' was definitely her, and wouldn't dream of not taking responsibility for her actions, she feels emotionally disassociated from the person she used to be and thoroughly incapable of doing what she knows she did.
Thanks to you, Bev, she's practically cured! And I thought I'd never see the day. Anyway, you know that people who kill close family members are almost never dangerous to anybody else."
Ha! That's what you think, twerp!
Carl turns slowly toward you again, places his hands ceremoniously on his desk. "Look, she's your case. Whatever you decide I'll back you up. But think about this: If you don't want to take on responsibility for ini ating a release, and be 1 ve me, I can un(erstan w you might not, I'll be happy, with your consent, to take that upon myself. Believe me, Bev, every shrink on staff will join the cause." Carl's eyes dance merrily in their sockets.
Remember what she was like that first time? Young Murderess Ready to Strike. She had the killer eyes, the kind you'd seen so often in sociopaths, the fear and hatred raging to get out. Those kinds of eyes tell you there's no compassion, no identification with another human's pain. You have those very eyes yourself sometimes but never show them to the world. They're turned inward, and over the years you've worked up a mask so you can play the healer and make the troubled girlies think you care about their wearisome anorexia or tedious bulimia attacks.
She, Diana, Tool-to-be, had the true killer's glow and, fairly rare in combination with that, a deep, deep need to submit. She was a storm trooper waiting impatiently for orders, a gladiator frothing at the mouth to fight. She craved authority, a coach, a savior, and as she met your eyes, she knew you would be the one to give structure to her rage, focus it down until it became a pure blue torch point of fire.
How could you both tell so much from just a glance? Because you'd been looking for each other all your lives. You'd been rummaging for years in prisons and mental hospitals, searching always for a certain look, and Diana had been seeking you, too, even though she didn't know she had. So when you walked into that little room, she saw in you the governess of her dreams, and you saw in her a fine young ward who would help you balance up all your old accounts. It was, as,they say, love at first blush.
"They're calling you little murderess around the hospital," you told her, speaking passionately and looking straight into the little murderess's killer eyes., "They're frightened of you. they think you're dangerous. they say I'm a fool to sit down in here with you alone. But I am not afraid, Diana. I know you won't harm me. I understand why you did what you did, and I'm going to say this to you now, before you even speak a word: You were right to kill them, and you oughtn't to be,feeling any guilt over it. None! None at all! they abused you and by doing so brought everything that happened upon themselves. Mother, grandmother, sister-are you supposed to bear unendurable suffering just because it comes from your blood relations?
Everyone's got murderous feelings toward family members, but few have got the guts to take up an ax and pay them back. You're different.
You have got the guts. So whatever happens between us now, Diana, I want you to know how much I respect you for your bravery."
Having made your passionate personal statement, you assumed a cooler, more professional demeanor. "Now listen carefully, we're going to be working together. I'm going to be your doctor and help make you well. After I prove to you that what you did was right, we're going to take a good hard look together at who you are and what you ought to be. You have a whole lifetime ahead of you, Diana. In a few years, when you're ready, I'll get you released, and then I'll show you how to realize your potential. I'm going to help you first by building you up, making you feel strong and confident.
Now tell mewhat do you feel about what I've just said? Tell me your true feelings. I want to hear." The girl started to sob almost at once. You hugged her to you and urged her to weep on.
"It's okay. Let it out. Cry it all out of yourself. Clean yourself out with the tears, Diana. You'll feel better afterwards, I promise… 11 In the end, after the weeping gave way to sporadic little moans and sobs, she spoke the golden words you'd been waiting for: "I feel at last "Go on, my dear."
"I've met-"
"Yes. Tell me, who've you met?"
"Finally someone-"
"Yes, go on." ,-who understands me. Really does."
"You believe that?"
"Oh, yes." She nodded shyly. "I do."
You immediately hugged her to you again, then gently rocked her in your arms. "That's right, Diana. You have, you have, sweet girl."
And it was true! You did understand her! You truly, truly did!
The method was to envelop her in an alternate reality, a fictive world of your own creation existing parallel to the so-called real world, yet which to an outside observer would appear the same. to Diana, however, confined within your web, every so-called normal value would be subverted. Purposes, motives, principles, matters of morality and personal honor-in your alternate world such things would not have the same meanings as they did outside.
She's down there now in her dank little hole of a room in the basement, dreaming through her mission. She's imagining the feeling of popping the pin into the posterior of some unsuspecting man, the way it'll sink so nicely into his cushy ass. And then his yelp, squeal, cry, little chirp of pain, and how she'll record it as she runs by and how the pitch'il change because she'll be in motion. You smile to yourself: The exercise, if questioned, could be construed as a practical demonstration of the Doppler effect.
You went to watch her work out at her dojo at Broadway and I 10th, a big hot, humid room on the second floor above a supermarket, where you were greeted by the deep-throated cries of zealous young fighters and the tangy aroma of their bodies at work.
Diana was in the first line with the best of them, energetically slashing at the air with her strong young arms. You loved the way Tool threw fast kicks and punches in unison with the others, mostly giant males. She looked so right among them, cute, too, in her white canvas gi jacket, white pants, and black obi. But you'd seen the backs of her hands after a workout, raw from hundreds of knuckle push-ups ordered by her instructor, and occasional marks, too, across her back from hits delivered with a bamboo stick, penalties for poorly executed exercises or that obscure and thus endlessly punishable offense of the dojo, insufficient respect.
There was another girl in the class that afternoon who caught your interest, reminding you of someone from your past. She had blond hair cut into a wedge, beautifully tanned skin, and a smile that lit up her entire face as she punched and kicked the air. You watched her carefully during combat exercises. She easily overpowered her opponents. She was taller than Diana, though just as perfectly proportioned, and her eyes were entirely different. While Diana had cold killer's eyes, this girl's eyes blazed clear gray like a warrior's.
And while Diana had been trained to sneak attack her targets from behind, this girl was the sort to approach hers from the front in fair, refereed competitions.
That evening, as you ministered to Diana's bleeding knuckles, you asked her the other girl's name.
"Oh, you must mean Jess," Diana said. "Sensei says she's the best fighter in the class."
Remember Bertha Parce, Mama? That old mean bag of a bitch English teacher at Ashley-Bumett? Yes, that one, who enjoyed making fun of certain selected kids in front of all the others. Remember the time I told you about when she read a story of mine aloud to the entire class? The story I wrote about you, Mama, the true one about your opening night at the Fairmount Club Lounge, when Millie and I hid in back of the curtain behind the orchestra and you belted out those great Porter tunes, "You're the Top," "I Get a Kick Out of You," "I've Got You Under My Skin," and the crowd went wild. "More! More!" they shouted, and you grinned and belted out a couple more: "Let's Do It,"