Black Iris: Chapter Twenty-Nine
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I wake up the next morning to the sound of my father yelling at Lincoln for being on the couch with wet paws. My old alarm clock is flashing 12:00, but the light coming through the window tells me it’s about 9:30 a.m. For the first time since that fateful night with Kweena, I’m not compelled to draw her flower. Now that I know what it is, I’m going to miss that image, though it’s freeing to not have an obligation first thing in the morning. It’s like waking up the next day after being fired from a job.
I look up at my old Samantha Fox poster. It’s dusty and faded, but her nipples are as delightful now as they were 25 years ago. As I plunge my hands down my boxers, I feel like a teenager again.
After several minutes, that feeling fades when I realize that my dick isn’t getting hard. I try moving into the shower, which was always my masturbation Fortress of Solitude. Still nothing. The vision Kweena shared with me wasn’t a dream or even a memory; it was an actual experience I had in real-time, with real sensations. Since I was able to get it up in that situation, I was hoping things were back to normal. I guess they aren’t.
I dry off, then join my father and Lincoln downstairs for breakfast. The sizzling of bacon and its accompanying aroma perks me up.
“Since when do you sleep so late?” my father asks. “When you were a kitten, you’d be scratching at my door by 5:30 a.m. wanting to be fed.”
“I guess I was tired.” Maybe it was the absence of city noises or the fact that I actually got to sleep in a real bed. More likely, it’s the lingering effects of that fancy stun gun combined with the draining experience of an alien mind-meld.
“How’d it go last night?
“I hopped the fence and got nabbed by security, then spent the rest of my night convincing them not to have me arrested.”
He eyes me suspiciously as he pushes a stack of pancakes in front of me. I don’t like lying to him, but in this case, the less he knows, the better.
The pancakes are airy, and the bacon is thick and fatty. I share some with Lincoln, but he whines until he gets his own plate. As we eat, we listen to a show about gardening on the old-school radio my father keeps on the counter. It’s the best meal I’ve had in a while and exactly what I needed to recharge. Tomorrow, it’s back to reality.
***
For my next session with Dr. Bell, I bring my own stress toy: Mousy, my catnip-filled stuffed mouse. Or, at least it used to be filled with catnip. Since Lincoln commandeered it from me, I haven’t bothered filling it. It’s just as well — if I’m going to bother doing therapy at all, I might as well do it sober.
“Tell me more about your suicide,” Dr. Bell asks as she taps her pen on her notebook. “You said you killed yourself because you were suffering from impotence. Is that right?”
“Yeah, pretty much.”
She purses her lips. “And did everything work out?”
“What do you mean?”
“You said when you’re brought back to life, you’re made whole again, but I sense there’s still a great deal of sexual frustration.”
I give Mousy a firm squeeze. “What makes you think that?”
“Pretty much everything you’ve said since I met you. But if I had to pick just one thing, it’s mostly what you said about Gia.”
I let out a long breath. “Ok, you’re right. Even though there’s nothing physically wrong with me, things still aren’t working, and I have no idea why.”
“Could age be a factor? You wrote on your form that you’re 35 years old, but I have no idea what that means for someone like you.”
“My body stopped aging once I reached full maturity, which was when I was 19 years old. So, no, age shouldn’t be a factor.”
“I see. Do you know what caused your priapism?”
“No, because it happened during that night I can’t remember.”
“What about recreational drugs?”
“Uh, you know… just the occasional wooden rod soaked in vodka crammed up my ass. That, and catnip once in a while.”
“What’s this rod thing?”
I explain my method of getting drunk in vivid detail, hoping she’ll be so repulsed that she won’t ask any follow-up questions. She assures me she’s heard worse.
“How many lives do you have left?” she asks.
“This is my last one, actually.”
“And what does that mean to you?”
“It’s not really a big deal. Most people I know only have one life. Plus, I’m still more or less immortal. I just have to be more careful now.”
“Right.” Her smile tells me that she doesn’t believe me. “You seem a little distracted today,” she says, turning to a blank page in her notebook. “Did something happen since the last time I saw you?”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m wondering if you contacted Gia.”
“No. Why would you even ask?”
She raises an eyebrow. “Experience.”
“Ok, I may have run into her at the museum the other day, but that was just, you know… a coincidence.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“It’s fine. Trust me, I barely even thought about her since I last saw you. In fact, the other day I watched a sex tape I made with this other woman.”
“You’ve met someone new?”
“Not exactly. It’s someone I hooked up with a while ago. Right after Gia and I broke up.”
“And how did watching the video make you feel?”
“It made me feel like maybe I could have sex again. But then I tried to masturbate, and I couldn’t get hard.”
“It sounds like you’ve got a few things going on here. You’ve got this depression over your relationship with Gia ending, you have this anxiety over being down to your last life, and you have your sexual issues. They’re all connected. The sexual problems may in fact just be a symptom of the stress caused by the other two, though it could be the other way around if there is actually something physiologically wrong. You might want to see a urologist if the problem persists. For now, let’s assume it’s psychological. My suggestion is to focus on what you can change and let go of the things you can’t.”
I nuzzle Mousy with my cheek. “That’s great and all, but what exactly am I supposed to do?”
“For starters, stay away from your ex. No showing up at places where you know she’ll be and pretending it’s just a coincidence, that sort of thing.”
“Ok, but that sounds more like a thing not to do. I want an example of a specific action I can take.”
“Stop drinking, and maybe attend some AA meetings.”
“Maybe I’ll cut back on the dowels, but I’m definitely not going to any meetings. Again, this seems more about not doing something.”
She taps her pen on her chin. “How about focusing on work? Maybe take on a new case or two.”
“I can do that. Actually, I’m working on a case now.”
“Good to hear.” She turns to another fresh page. “Now. About your mother…”
I look at my wrist where there could be a watch but isn’t. “Would you look at the time? I best be going. You probably have another patient coming in soon and — ”
“There’s still 17 minutes left.”
“Yeah, but I have to go to the bathroom.”
She frowns. “One of these days, I’m going to get you to talk about your mother.”
“Maybe next time.”
If there is a next time. Just in case, I make an appointment with her receptionist on my way out.