Gillian Anderson - A Vision of Fire

Gaelle made it clear by her proper, unrelaxed manner that she had no interest in small talk. Caitlin asked her some basic questions about her family’s medical history, and Gaelle answered. Caitlin marked her answers in a small, unintimidating notebook.

“I want to make sure you understand,” Caitlin went on, “that you don’t need to feel embarrassed or ashamed about our talk.”

“This happened through no device of my doing,” Gaelle replied frostily. “What have I to be ashamed of?”

“I was not referring to the incident,” Caitlin said. “I meant my questions.”

Gaelle seemed embarrassed by her own defensiveness. She softened a little. “Please ask the questions you need to help your patient.”

“Thank you again. You said your mother died a few months after you were born. You were raised by your father?”

“Until I was sixteen, four years ago. Now he lives in the Dominican Republic. He works in a hotel.”

“Why did he leave?”

“The money is a little better there. I encouraged him to go.”

Caitlin smiled. It had no effect. “Dr. Basher explained to you what happened in the market? That you showed symptoms of drowning and hypothermia?”

Gaelle nodded once.

“Have you ever come close to drowning?”

“No.”

“Do you go out with your stepmother on the fishing boat?”

“Rarely. I have my work and my studies. I have little free time.”

“Do you ever swim in the ocean?”

“As I said, there is little free time.”

“What about when you were a child?” Caitlin pressed. “Might something have happened then?”

“Dr. O’Hara, I am from a town in the mountains where we walked for an hour to get our daily water. We moved here in 2012. An organization offered to establish fishing businesses for Haitians.”

“So you were inland during the 2010 earthquake?”

“Yes. I was not near the tsunami that struck Jacmel. I only saw trees falling, shacks collapsing onto the people inside them.” She closed her mouth, lips pressed tightly together.

“Gaelle, has anything happened recently—anything upsetting?” Caitlin was thinking of Maanik and the assassination attempt.

“Life is not easy here,” she said. “That is upsetting.”

“I understand,” Caitlin said. “I was asking about anything specific. Something that made you fearful, afraid?”

Gaelle took a moment. Her pinched expression did not suggest someone who was trying to remember something. Rather, she seemed uncertain about what to share.

“There are gangs who come out at night, from Port-au-Prince,” she said. “We go inside to escape the biting insects—but then the other hunters, they know where to find us.”

Caitlin felt a wave of anxiety rise as she imagined being afraid to walk in the town at night, being afraid of strangers.

“Were you hurt?”

Gaelle shook her head brusquely.

“Threatened?”

“They touch, they push, they grab,” she said with disgust in her voice. “Sometimes too much. That is not new. I am all right.”

Gaelle was not all right, and Caitlin hurt for her while resenting her own helplessness. But the psychiatrist accepted that she wasn’t getting anywhere with this conversation. And worse, she sensed that Gaelle was pulling up the drawbridge. She had to try something more direct.

“Gaelle, are you familiar with therapeutic hypnotism? Using a trance to access your subconscious?”

“A little. I researched psychiatry online last night.”

“Because…?”

“I like to know things,” she answered evasively.

“So do I.” Caitlin smiled.

The girl sat stony-faced. She did not want to bond.

“Gaelle, I have been using this technique with my other patient. I would like very much to try it with you.”

Before she even made the request Caitlin knew that Gaelle would say no. This young woman had fought for control in a country that afforded little. Structured time and a structured mind were as close as she could come to feeling safe.

“Before you answer,” Caitlin jumped in, “I want to explain that I am not asking this lightly. If I thought there was any other way to identify the cause of your episode, I would suggest it. This is emergency psychiatric medicine.”

Gaelle stared at her, placed her chin in her hand. “Do you believe that I am mentally ill?”

“I told you over the phone, I do not,” Caitlin said emphatically.

Gaelle stared at her a little longer, then stood. “I will discuss it with my stepmother. Please come back in a half hour.”

Caitlin spent the time watching waves slide across the beach. She had always enjoyed going to Coney Island or Jones Beach as a kid, but back then the ocean was an adventure. Now it was a mystery. She remembered her dream, the black wave rolling toward her.

Is that the ultimate paradox of life , she wondered, that the universe should become less clear with age?

Yes , she decided with a last, admiring glance at the sea as she dusted sand from her butt. She looked at a grain among grains on the tip of her index finger.

“You were here before we were,” she said.

Caitlin did not brush the sand away but left it, like a second skin, and headed back to the pale green house. Now, away from the fresh sea breeze, she was starting to sweat through her blouse. The afternoon heat surpassed 90 degrees, typical for October in Haiti. Sunset and stronger winds from the Caribbean would provide some relief in the evening, but then mosquitoes and fleas would become plentiful. The universe had a cruel sense of humor.

A dozen people had clustered on the street by the Anglade office, not too close to the veranda. They were all Haitian and were loosely divided into two groups, those staring mutely at the house and those who were chatting with each other. Word had apparently spread about the Anglades’ visitors, but was it Caitlin or the Vodou clergy from the city who were attracting the attention? As soon as one person in the gathering saw her, they all turned their heads, fell into a stony silence, and watched her approach. There were no smiles, only cautious eyes and defensively lifted chins.

A man in a priest’s collar called to her in French or Creole, she wasn’t sure which. She replied only, “ Excusez-moi. ” Although she heard him start again, Caitlin didn’t break her pace toward the door. It was not the time to engage with anyone else, not now.

The door to the office was open, in keeping with tropical etiquette. Madame Langlois, her son, and Aaron had arrived before her. Houngan Enock had been speaking fervently to Marie-Jeanne; he stopped when Caitlin entered. The madame was perched in a corner holding her blue tarp bag on her lap with the patience of ages. Aaron was on his cell phone in the room behind the office. He was talking to the clinic and hydrating with a two-liter bottle of water.

As Caitlin made her way across the room she watched Gaelle, who was sitting at her desk in a semblance of normal working life, a cup of jasmine tea losing steam in a saucer nearby. The young woman was drawing on a small notepad and Caitlin leaned in for a closer look. She saw crescent marks in the shape of triangles, grouped into one large triangle. The symbols meant nothing to her but she didn’t have long to examine them. Gaelle moved the notepad aside and pulled a brochure over it. Gaelle’s guard was back up, and Caitlin thought better of asking about the drawing she had just hidden away.

“Is everything all right?” she asked instead.

Gaelle nodded.

“Have you had time to think on your own?” Caitlin did not emphasize the last three words but her meaning was clear. “This is your decision,” she added.