The Coffee Cantata

"I don't know whether this is a miracle or a curse," the psychiatrist said, and Lindsey nodded her head.

"I wonder what I would want, under the circumstances?"

"As the parent, or the child?"

"I can't even begin to imagine what her life is like, but right now I think it would be very confusing."

"Exactly. Her mind has had no frame of reference, little connection to external reality for months at a time. I think it must be like falling asleep and waking up a few months, or even years later. Always trying to play catch up, to grab hold of all the things she missed before she falls asleep again..."

"But knowing it will be the same next time?"

"Terrifying, isn't it?"

"I'm not sure I'd want to live that way."

"Perhaps because you have a frame of reference that's a bit different from Lacy's. This is all she's known for years, and though I suspect this life is as precious to her as yours is to you, we judge her expectations through the prism of our own experience. We can't imagine living as she does, but maybe she can't imagine living as we do."

"A different reality..."

"Precisely. Her's is generated internally, but she describes places and experiences she can't possibly know, like the inside of a cathedral in Spain where many of these rituals she experiences occur. I've taken her under hypnosis several times, examined these experiences, and her ability to recall detail is shattering."

"Are you saying she was actually...?"

"I'm not saying anything, Miss Hollister. I have no explanation -- period. You could claim she's seen images in books or online, but again, the level of detail troubles me. If I didn't know better I'd say she'd been there -- and made a thorough examination of the building."

"And you know the details are accurate?"

"No, not without actually going, and comparing my notes of her recollections to what's on site."

"Interesting. Do you plan on making such a trip?"

"I would like to, yes. Actually, I have notes from several patients I'd like to examine."

"I'm curious. How many involve, well, sacred spaces?"

"Nicely put," Tremble said, smiling at the irony of her choice. "I don't suppose it would surprise you to learn that all of them do."

"Not really. When I was in Mississippi, most of the really, well, the delusional sorts, were buried knee deep in religious symbolism. Crosses on walls..."

"Let me guess. Russian Orthodox iconography."

"Yes. How'd you know."

"The Russian Orthodox, probably more so than the Greek, is the most rigidly adherent of the Christian ideologies."

"Rigidly adherent?"

"They stick closely to the original, central mythologies. Modern American Evangelicalism is much more syncretic, readily incorporating, for instance, such things as the Prosperity Gospel, overlaying these concepts on Christ's teachings. Most Christian theologians would view this as subverting Christ's message, and this diminution of Jesus' teachings has not gone unnoticed to many who've come of age -- away from the suburban evangelical impulse that informs the prosperity adherents. And as those people -- who may for whatever reason be susceptible to psychotic manifestations -- encounter external splits in their belief system, such fragmentation of their core beliefs may lead to..."

"Wait a minute...just wait a minute..." Lindsey sighed, her eyes almost fluttering with excitement, "are you implying that 'culture' can become schizophrenic. That society can, in effect, experience a collective psychotic break?"

"Isn't that obvious?"

"What? No, it isn't. Not at all."

"Ah. Ever read Jung?"

"Just Man and His Symbols."

"Ah, coffee table Jung, but good enough. You recall the concept of the collective unconscious?"

"Sort of. Kind of like Freud's Id?"

"Not really, but that's not the point. Jung held that some parts of the unconscious mind were informed by a collective force, and before you roll your eyes just think of something as banal as instinct. Most people would hold that when you see a coiled snake readying to strike, you simply don't walk up to it and try to pet it, or pick it up. Even a child sees that danger -- and instinctively, yes? Jung added another layer, however, when he posited that a snake, for example, takes on a deeper meaning through our instinctual understanding of such things as symbols. A woman, for instance, taking off a stocking resembles a snake, shedding it's skin."

"And these symbols, our understanding of these symbols, is inherited?"

"It's been almost impossible to prove, Miss Hollister, but advances in the neurosciences are leading us closer to a real understanding of this role. One neuroscientist, Antonio Damasio, believes that the brain stem, even the so-called reptilian brain, may be the locus of human consciousness, and not the forebrain. If that proves to be the case, all psychiatry, indeed, our understanding of neuropharmacology and psychobiology in general may be turned on it's ear, but if it does we'll be moving psychiatry right back into the Jungian realm."

"So, these collective elements are shared...?"

"Across humanity, yes. And Jung was concerned, later in his life, that splits in a culture's collective unconsciousness could occur as easily as they do in individuals. When looked at in this way, phenomenon as disparate as paranoia and delusion can become cultural phenomenon, and one look at events in the 1930s, as well as recent events, tends to bear this out."

Doug came out of the room, his eyes filled with tears, and he walked quickly down the hall and into a bathroom.

"Oh, no..." Tremble said, and he ducked inside Lacy's room, closing the door behind him as he disappeared, and Lindsey walked down the hall, waited outside the bathroom -- for Doug -- and all his impossible dilemmas.

+++++

He took the backroads, heading west until he wound through the streets of Santa Barbara, then he turned up the hill to the mission, then crossed over to the El Encanto. He parked and helped Lindsey out of the car, and they walked in and waited for a table.

"You ever been here," he asked as they walked out on the terrace.

"No. Heard about it a long time ago, but I rarely come to Santa Barbara."

"This is my favorite place in California," he said as the hostess put menus on the table and left them.

"The view is incredible. What do you usually get?"

"The King Salmon. Every time."

Their waiter came by and took their order, then he turned and looked at the ocean, still not talking about Lacy. Not one word, since they'd left the hospital...

"Do you love me?" he asked, out of the blue.

She looked him in the eye. "Yes."

He nodded. "Would you like to get a room?"

She nodded her head. "I think so."

He sighed. "It's a lot to take in, to process. Thanks for coming with me."

"You're welcome."

"She told me she's done. That she doesn't want to go on like this. She told me she could feel herself slipping away. Like she could hear the voices standing just outside her room, waiting for her."

Lindsey looked away, then reached out and took his hand. She felt his flesh on hers, the warmth inside, the strength -- and she wondered when he was break down, fall apart and shatter into a million pieces.

"The thing is, my love, I think I understand her now. What she's been through, what lies ahead."

"She's decided?"

"Yes," he said, his lip quivering. "You know what?" he added, brightening a little. "My birthday is this coming Friday. What say you and I run down and get a blood test, maybe get a marriage license?"

"Get married...run away from it all..." she sighed. "Wouldn't that be fun?"

"Oh, I'm serious."

"And the laws against polygamy have been suspended?"

"We're moving Madeleine to hospice tomorrow."

"What? When did this happen?"

He laughed, an edge of hysteria creeping in. "It's been happening, all my life."

The waiter came by and put salads on the table, and Doug looked at the waiter. "You know, could you bring me a dark rum collins -- a big one?"

"Of course."

"Thanks," he said, then he turned to Lindsey again. "Either you're driving or were staying here. I'm going to drink about ten of those things, then go find a bed and sleep for a few years."

She smiled.

When the waiter brought the drink she took it from him and tossed it off in one long pull, then handed the glass to the waiter. "Better bring another," she said, and after the waiter left she turned and looked at Doug. "You know, I don't drink hard stuff. For a reason."

"Oh?"

"I get horny as hell, Doug. I mean, the proverbial, insatiable she-bitch from hell kind of horny."

"Do you, indeed? I wish you'd told me sooner."

"I'm telling you now. What are you going to do about it?"

"What do you want me to do about it?"

She saw a few diners at a couple of the closer tables turn and look at her. "I want you to start on my cunt, Doug. I want you to eat me raw. Maybe for an hour or so. And I really want you to eat out my ass, get it nice and loose, then I want you to fuck me up the ass."

A man sitting behind Doug wiped sweat from his brow, the woman by his side grinning wildly.

"Oh?" Doug said, his voice cracking.

"Yes, and I want you to shoot your load up my ass. Think you can do that for me?"

"I think I could give it a try..."

"Nope," she said, "not good enough." She flipped off a shoe and put her bare foot on his crotch, began massaging him. "Not good enough, at all."

He wiped the sweat from his forehead now.

"Is it warm out, Doug? Or is it just me?"

"No, it's getting warm."

A woman at another table looked at Lindsey's leg stretched out under the table and grinned, pointed it out to the man with her. He looked, then nodded his head, and the woman slipped off her shoe and moved her foot up into the shadows. The man leaned back and started laughing, then he grew focused, and he too wiped sweat from his brow.

"Things getting -- hard, Doug?"

"Uh...yup."

The waiter brought the second drink and she took it, tossed it down, then handed the empty glass to him.

"Madame would like another?" he said, trying not to smile.

"Madame would, yes." She kept her eyes on Doug's now. "You know, that thing sure feels awfully hard to me. You think he's getting ready?"

"Uh-huh."

She stroked faster now, and he held on to the edge of the table. "Would you like me to stop now, Doug?"

"No...please God, no..."

"Ooh. You know what Doug? I think he's ready? What do you think?"

He leaned back, began to groan...

"Yup...he's ready..." she said -- and she began a frenzied, staccato burst, then watched his back arch, felt him pulse beneath her foot, then the spreading stain of warmth that soaked through his pants. "Good boy," she said to him -- as the waiter arrived with her third drink.

"Your entrees will be out in a moment," he said, smiling now as he handed her the drink.

"Yes, I'm sure they will," she said, biting her lower lip -- trying her best not to laugh.

+++++

She went to work early the next morning, yet when she saw Sara she wanted to turn away from her friend. Why had she implied Doug had done something improper to Lacy? Had there been a rumor going around? Was there something going on between them she hadn't picked up on? Still, the more she thought about it the more she wanted to just let it go -- to move on -- yet she felt a layer of anger lingering just underneath the surface of the day.

"How was your weekend," Sara asked -- with a wink and a nod -- at one point.

So Lindsey told her, first about their second visit with Tremble, and then of Lacy's decision to move on to hospice.

"Oh my God," Sara whispered.

"But that's only fitting," she added. "Madeleine's moving to hospice, as well. Later today, I think."

And Sara blinked, then turned away without saying another word.

Lindsey got on with making coffee, setting out baked goods in the counter display, and began taking care of customers when the first early morning caffeine hounds started dragging in just after six. Not long after she heard an altercation break out between customers.

"You goddamn liberals brought it all on yourselves!"

"And what? You want to live in a theocracy...like Iran, maybe?"

She moved over to quiet them down, and as soon as she drew near the men stopped talking. "What's going on?" she said. "Why the shouting?"

The 'liberal' picked up the LA Times and showed her the front page: "Theocracy!" -- it shouted.

"What happened?" she asked.

"The goddamn president signed another executive order late last night -- all publicly funded universities must sign an oath of allegiance to the Christian church, must center their academics on an approved Christian curriculum -- or face a total withdrawal of public support..."

"What? That's ridiculous," she said.

"And why is that ridiculous?" the 'conservative' cried. "Universities don't teach anymore, they indoctrinate! All the president is trying to do is level the playing field."

"Well," she said, "if you want to fight, go outside and fight on the sidewalk or, better yet, try congressman Wellburn's office -- it's just three doors down. Go fight in there, if you have to fight, but stop shouting in here. Understood?"

She heard their grumbles as she walked away, yet all she could think about was John, her brother John, and his desire to burn down the world, and as she worked through the morning she could hardly think of anything else. She saw her first book as an attempt to shine a light into the darkness, as an attempt to help illuminate the problems people face in a society that seemed driven to succeed at any cost, even if millions of people were pushed aside in the rush -- and crushed. And people, even 'important' people read her book, they studied her results, carried her observations into everyday conversation -- yet in the end had such shared knowledge really made a difference? Well, now the people pushed to the wayside had stood up as one, and in their righteous anger they wanted to stop progress in it's tracks -- to 'burn the fucker down' -- and John had seized the moment. And there was no quicker way to tear down the Enlightenment than to bring back the Church.

Everything wrong with John's world, the world that started to go wrong when love was taken from him, would be sacrificed on the alter of his need to extract his own 'pound of flesh'.

What, she wondered, would it take to sate his dark need. Could she move to Washington, be by his side, be the conscience he claimed she was. Could she stop the howling madness that threatened to seep into the fabric of American life? But she had seen the darkness in his eyes, and she knew better. Like Doug, enough was enough.

No, his madness would overwhelm even her presence. He would turn their love into something dark and perverted, burn even that to the ground. And then what? Would he do what he had always promised to do? Turn liberal against conservative in one final push -- to outright war? Would he go behind the scenes, again, and motivate 'liberals' to march on Washington -- and then orchestrate an even bigger push by 'conservatives' -- and then set up open confrontation? Would he bring the military in, set in motion the final repudiation? Tear the very heart and soul from America?

Had America finally split in two, suffered it's own psychotic break? Had division replaced unity?

She saw the country as a family in that moment, a family riven by disparate needs, a family unable to cope with it's own inherent contradictions, and the image she saw in her mind's eye just then was of burning cities and endless war, of fathers and sons at each others throats, clawing each others eyes out -- until blind and unable to breathe -- both laid down and died.

'Nothing lasts forever,' she heard herself say at one point in the morning. "Maybe John's right. Maybe all this needs to be burned to the ground -- maybe something new and stronger will grow in the ashes.'

She looked around the coffee shop and she saw this little world as a slice of life, frozen in time. A snapshot of America, and of an age. Coffees from around the world, from literally every corner of the globe, all within easy reach, and people coming together here to enjoy the fruits of their labors. What would happen when all that was gone, she wondered, when people pulled back from the world. When inward looking fathers and sons lay gasping in their final throes -- would they stop even then, take one last look around before darkness fell?

Yet she knew in her heart that nothing good could come of dissolution, that darkness would come just when humanity needed all the light gasping minds could lay their hands on, if only to pull crushing hands from humanity's throats -- and daggers from their backs.

+++++

Clive Martin looked out the window, at people walking on the sidewalks far below, at an airliner clawing it's way back into the sky over Flushing Bay, at the Empire State and Chrysler buildings uptown. All that freedom, all that movement...all that energy...

And he felt like a prisoner, locked in a gilded cage.

When he heard a knock on the door, he turned as the condemned might on his last morning. He went to the door and looked through the peephole -- then relaxed and opened the door.

"I thought you were off to London today?" he asked as Ben came in the room.

"I am. Have to be out at Kennedy around three-thirty."

"The brothers at the bureau still hounding you?"

"Nope. I went in yesterday with a friend from the embassy. They set things straight."

"Who? Who came?"

"Thomas Eden. Know him?"

"Sir Tommy? Hell, yes."

"He knows you're walking a tightrope."

"He's a good man, Ben," he said as he read the note Ben handed him.

"Well, I just wanted to drop by, see if you need anything before I head out."

"No, doing fine old top. I'll see you when you get back."

Ben took the note back and read the scribbled numbers, then took the note and tucked it inside his hat before he walked from the room. He walked down to the elevator and dropped his hat by the elevator door, and a man picked it up, handed it to him.

"Thanks," Asher said.

"Not at all," the Englishman said, pocketing the note.

He got in a taxi and told the driver to go to JFK, and the driver turned to him. "Is he ready?"

"Be down in about five."

"Righty-O! Well done, Ben," the driver said, pulling out into traffic.

Asher got out and walked inside the terminal building, went to the newsstand and picked up an International Herald Tribune, then walked to the counter to pay for it. He left the line and met a Captain, and they walked off to the dispatch office together.

"You look pretty good in that uniform. Maybe you should apply for a job?"

"I hope this works," Clive said.

"Me too. If it doesn't, I'll be applying at BOAC..."

"After we get out of prison."

"Oh. Yes, well, there is that..."

+++++

Doug came by the coffee shop just before she got off, and he looked careworn and tired, not at all like he had after she finished cleaning his clock in Santa Barbara. She smiled when she thought of him in bed, falling into her diversion, letting her pull him back from the abyss, but today was a brand new day. Today -- he had to confront all his demons -- come to terms with his past, and their futures.

"I see Bud's not here yet?" he said as he walked up to the counter.

She shook her head. "Haven't seen him today."

"Damn," he said, looking at his watch, "I want him to see his mom this afternoon."

"Is she...?"

"Yes, I got her settled in early this morning. She's off her meds now, and all supportive fluids."

Lindsey shook her head. "I don't know how you're doing this."

"Cops and docs do pretty much the same thing, I guess. You put a wall up, between your feelings and perception. You hide behind the wall until you can't any longer."