that anyone was awake at that hour. It had been a week since he'd last had a pair of gloves, and his hands felt raw with the accumulated weight of ten thousand souls, some of whom he'd met but most of them strangers, their violence and their sorrows coagulating in him like oil from a tanker that had broken apart on a reef.
To pass the rest of the August night, its air as thick as boiled blankets, he broke into the neighbor's storage shed, shoved the lawn mower out of the way so he'd have enough room to stretch out. While lying on cool concrete he looked up at a blue square of moonlight on the wall, crosshatched by the windowpane, and in a moment of epiphany he saw the hatchet hanging from a pair of pegs.
He fumbled it down from the pegboard and ran a finger along the honed silver edge of the blade. It told him nothing, except for how much it wanted to meet the flesh and bone of his wrist.
After she'd run him through the whistle and the prayer bell and a half-dozen other items, Cam looked visibly tired and Liz decided that was enough for one session. All of this was as new to her as it was to him. She was going mostly on instinct here, but Director Manning had professed nothing but faith in her, kept telling her, "You'll do great, you'll do great." She wasn't convinced his blind faith in her was warranted, but one thing was sure: She damn well needed to do great.
The program she'd put together for Campbell was an extrapolation from aversion therapy, with a side helping of creative visualization. Under controlled, serene circumstances, within the cerulean walls, she would present him with a series of objects--early on, items whose backgrounds and owners could be fully accounted for, to minimize the risk of nasty surprises--and while holding them in his remaining hand he would "read" them at his leisure. Little by little, she would teach him to build filters inside, between his perceptions and the external impressions that sought to impinge on them. They would be like membranes, never more permeable than he wished them to be.
He could be in control; he had to know that. If the reading was pleasant, non-threatening, then fine; let it in. If abhorrent, then close the filters, thicken the membranes, stop the assault...and eventually he could explore whatever was there without letting it ruin him.
But they were at the easy part now. Whistles, prayer bells, old hairbrushes. What would be rough was when she had to take him back to the ugly stuff, bringing in items like the firearms and hacksaws that had put him on his downward spiral. Because he had to be able to handle it all, whatever the world and its darker corners might drop in his path.
"Question?" he said as she was boxing things up.
"Sure."
"What was it like with you? How'd it start?" he asked. "I mean, I overheard a couple of things, something about an accident, but..."
"Yeah. An accident. A really bad accident." And she wanted a cigarette, a really big cigarette, as she usually did when this subject came up. "Why not just leave it at that?"
"Because you've got just about the saddest eyes I've ever seen, and I'd like to know what made them that way, is all."
She snickered. "It might help get you somewhere if that didn't sound like the world's lamest pickup line."
He blushed, actually blushed. "I'll know sooner or later, you have to realize that. You'll leave a pen around, or your lighter, or something, and then I'll have it. Or I'll ask somebody else. I just thought it would be more upfront to ask you."
"Can't fault you there," she said, and reached for the Tibetan prayer bell, let it toll in the room, so delicate, like air condensed to a chiming note. Nothing at all like the clanging of fire bells. "I was eleven years old when it started. I was just playing in our yard and minding my own business. Then the neighbor boy came over from next door. He was a hateful little turd whose mission in life was making other people miserable. It's been more than twenty years
To pass the rest of the August night, its air as thick as boiled blankets, he broke into the neighbor's storage shed, shoved the lawn mower out of the way so he'd have enough room to stretch out. While lying on cool concrete he looked up at a blue square of moonlight on the wall, crosshatched by the windowpane, and in a moment of epiphany he saw the hatchet hanging from a pair of pegs.
He fumbled it down from the pegboard and ran a finger along the honed silver edge of the blade. It told him nothing, except for how much it wanted to meet the flesh and bone of his wrist.
After she'd run him through the whistle and the prayer bell and a half-dozen other items, Cam looked visibly tired and Liz decided that was enough for one session. All of this was as new to her as it was to him. She was going mostly on instinct here, but Director Manning had professed nothing but faith in her, kept telling her, "You'll do great, you'll do great." She wasn't convinced his blind faith in her was warranted, but one thing was sure: She damn well needed to do great.
The program she'd put together for Campbell was an extrapolation from aversion therapy, with a side helping of creative visualization. Under controlled, serene circumstances, within the cerulean walls, she would present him with a series of objects--early on, items whose backgrounds and owners could be fully accounted for, to minimize the risk of nasty surprises--and while holding them in his remaining hand he would "read" them at his leisure. Little by little, she would teach him to build filters inside, between his perceptions and the external impressions that sought to impinge on them. They would be like membranes, never more permeable than he wished them to be.
He could be in control; he had to know that. If the reading was pleasant, non-threatening, then fine; let it in. If abhorrent, then close the filters, thicken the membranes, stop the assault...and eventually he could explore whatever was there without letting it ruin him.
But they were at the easy part now. Whistles, prayer bells, old hairbrushes. What would be rough was when she had to take him back to the ugly stuff, bringing in items like the firearms and hacksaws that had put him on his downward spiral. Because he had to be able to handle it all, whatever the world and its darker corners might drop in his path.
"Question?" he said as she was boxing things up.
"Sure."
"What was it like with you? How'd it start?" he asked. "I mean, I overheard a couple of things, something about an accident, but..."
"Yeah. An accident. A really bad accident." And she wanted a cigarette, a really big cigarette, as she usually did when this subject came up. "Why not just leave it at that?"
"Because you've got just about the saddest eyes I've ever seen, and I'd like to know what made them that way, is all."
She snickered. "It might help get you somewhere if that didn't sound like the world's lamest pickup line."
He blushed, actually blushed. "I'll know sooner or later, you have to realize that. You'll leave a pen around, or your lighter, or something, and then I'll have it. Or I'll ask somebody else. I just thought it would be more upfront to ask you."
"Can't fault you there," she said, and reached for the Tibetan prayer bell, let it toll in the room, so delicate, like air condensed to a chiming note. Nothing at all like the clanging of fire bells. "I was eleven years old when it started. I was just playing in our yard and minding my own business. Then the neighbor boy came over from next door. He was a hateful little turd whose mission in life was making other people miserable. It's been more than twenty years
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