Frank Klus - Azaleas Don't Bloom Here

“Ah, you’re awake, Mr. Sulke. Good, good,” the man said. “Do you know why you’re here?”

“No.”

“You’re here to get better.” He said this with a silly smile, like a doctor talking to his patient.

“I don’t understand. I’m not sick. Why am I strapped down? What is this place? Let me go.”

“Aren’t you facing a dilemma, Mr. Sulke?” Eugene just stared at the man, flashing an angry expression. He started to say something else but the guard slapped him with an open hand, striking the side of Eugene’s face. He screamed in protest, and the soldier struck him again. Eugene tried to stand up, but he couldn’t get out of the chair. He could sense blood oozing from his bottom lip, and his left cheek felt numb from the blows. The guard was about to hit him again when the man stopped him. “Now, now, Hurd, you made your point.”

Hurd stooped down until his head was even with Eugene’s, and then he put his angry face directly in front of Eugene. “You answer the doctor properly. When he asks you a question, you answer directly to that question, understand?”

“Yes,” Eugene said, bitterly.

“Yes, sir, mister,” Hurd said. “Now, this is Doctor Sistrunk. You say ‘yes, doctor’ when you talk to him. Understand, shithead?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Fine. Now, we can start afresh,” Dr. Sistrunk said as Hurd resumed his normal position of parade rest. “Tell me, Eugene—may I call you Eugene?”

“Yes, doctor.”

“Good, good. Tell me, Eugene, how did you meet Cassandra?”

“It was about a few months ago, I think.”

“Try harder, Eugene. Was it in September?”

“I think it was August.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I just remembered. It was right after I was invited out for a barbecue by my friend, Dennis.”

“Would that be Dennis O’Reilly?”

“Yes, doctor.”

“Good, good.”

Eugene noticed the austere man with a permanent frown typing away as he answered the doctor’s questions.

He then turned back to the doctor. “What is this place?” Almost as soon as he got the question out he was viciously struck again by Hurd. Eugene shrieked in pain.

“You answer the doctor’s questions, understand?” Hurd said. “And you don’t ask questions—we do the asking, understand?”

“Yes, sir,” Eugene answered meekly.

“Good, good,” Sistrunk said. “Now tell me all about Cassandra.”

Eugene told the doctor everything he could remember about her. He corrected himself numerous times. He couldn’t stop his mind from wandering when the doctor asked him another question. When he hesitated or looked puzzled Hurd would beat him again.

At last, Dr. Sistrunk stopped the interrogation. “Good, good, good, Eugene.”

Sistrunk wore a supercilious smile almost the whole time. He walked around in his lab coat like every move was carefully scripted. He had an unctuous manner, a haughty profile, and a slow, deliberate style of speaking.

“I think Eugene is hungry and thirsty, eh, Hurd?” Hurd was silent, but stood at parade rest next to Eugene. “Unstrap him, Hurd.”

Hurd did so, but as soon as Eugene was free he leaped up, pushed Hurd aside, and made a dash for the stairs. He didn’t get far, however. Hurd was too quick and strong for Eugene, who was out of shape. Hurd grabbed him from behind, shouted for the upstairs guard, who then hurried down, and the two forced Eugene back into the chair, strapping him back down. The upstairs guard went back to his post, while Hurd disappeared out of sight. When he returned a few minutes later he was carrying two truncheons. They were black, and about two feet in length.

Hurd had a vicious look on his face. “You shouldn’t have done that, man. You shouldn’t piss me off like that.”

He hung up one truncheon and grabbed the other. He then beat Eugene over the head with it. It was soft, so as to inflict pain without cracking the skull. Hurd struck Eugene in the head with it several more times, and then struck him about the neck and shoulders; Eugene screaming each time. Then he turned to his feet and ankles and struck him there.

When he finished with the soft one, he hung that one up and grabbed the other one. This one was made of a hard polymer. He swung it horizontally, striking Eugene in the stomach several times. Eugene wasn’t sure how much he screamed, but when he tried to speak he could barely utter a sound. Tears streamed down his bloodied and purplish face.

After Hurd finished his punishment, Dr. Sistrunk emerged from the hallway. He was no longer smiling, and wore a crooked frown. He was a little man, about five feet-six, skinny, and sometimes had glasses on and sometimes not.

“That was a very bad thing you just did,” he lectured. “What did you hope to accomplish, Mr. Sulke? You could never have gotten past Hurd; and even if you did, you’d never make it past the upstairs guard. What did you get for your troubles? You got punished, Mr. Sulke.”

“I’m sorry… I’m sorry, doctor,” Eugene uttered in a raspy voice he didn’t recognize as his own.

Sistrunk’s frown was gone now and he put on a haughty look. “Eugene, I’ve treated many men. I assure you, there is nothing that you can do to avoid treatment. I’ve treated soldiers, politicians, journalists, and ordinary people such as yourself. I even treated a Blue Squad soldier. He was a tough one. He was angry, vicious, and stubborn. He would sit right in that chair you’re sitting in now and spit in my face. Of course he would be punished, but he’d take it like it never bothered him. This went on for a week. Oh, I tell you, Eugene, he was full of threats, and the look he gave the guards… it was like he wanted to kill them, but of course, he couldn’t.

“By the second week he was a beaten man. He still refused to answer questions, and when he could muster up the strength, he’d spit at me; but he was beaten, and he knew it. Once he began cooperating, the punishment would cease. He’d get regular meals and water, and eventually he was cured.”

Eugene tried to muster the strength to speak. “What am I being treated for?”

Sistrunk looked surprised, and then his mien turned to understanding. His crooked smile was back. “You don’t fit in, Eugene. Your thoughts are scattered. You don’t understand the world around you. You think life is unfair; hostile. You are afraid of your government. You don’t believe the Constitution works anymore. You think the courts are against you. You think there are malevolent—”

“No, that’s not it—”

“DON’T TALK BACK TO ME.”

Hurd struck him in the face with an open hand, and then he grabbed the hard club, whacking him in the mid-section again. “You don’t criticize the doctor—understand, shithead?”

All Eugene could utter was a pathetic, “I’m sorry, doctor.”

“That’s all right, Eugene. I understand. You understand too, don’t you Mr. Hurd?”

“Yes, doctor. Eugene’s just like the rest of them when they first get here: angry, resentful, and snotty.”

“Now that we understand each other better, let’s go on with Professor Harold Zinney. Shall we begin with how you met him?”

“Please doctor, my stomach hurts a lot. I think I might have a broken rib.”

Sistrunk motioned for the nurse, who was sitting at the utility table. She opened up the display cabinet and reached in for a bottle of something. She gave Eugene what appeared to be aspirin with a glass of water. Then he repeated his question to Eugene.

Eugene began answering all the doctor’s questions, wincing through the pain, and then asked for some water. Hurd didn’t take the straps off, but squirted bottled water in Eugene’s mouth. He spit it up, and Hurd and the doctor began laughing.