Tom Mendicino - Probation

“Don’t worry. No one can hear you.”

He waits until the tears have stopped and I’m dabbing my nose obsessively, worried about stray strings of snot.

“I really wish you’d reconsider your decision,” he says.

I shrug and mumble.

“We have one more session. And you can do something for me.”

“What?”

“Write your own evaluation and report. We’ll see how it compares to mine.”

I agree. I work on it all week. On planes, in hotels, at counters, in my little book where the customer thinks I’m scribbling measurements. I edit, revise, tinker until it’s perfect. The honest, unvarnished portrait of the salesman as a no-longer-young man. This is what I write:

Subject: Caucasian male homosexual floating through his late thirties. Divorced, no children. Above-average intelligence and uninvolved in current occupation. Pleasant, unremarkable appearance. Average social skills, but no friends at present time and emotionally detached from family members despite current residence with mother with end-stage lymphoma for whom he acts as primary caregiver.

Pathology: Subject demonstrates certain narcissistic qualities and exhibits tendency for self-obsession without self-awareness. Subject has difficulty forming intimate emotional relationships and his resultant isolation is further exacerbated by a fear of exposure. Subject’s prime motivation in personal interactions is to avoid reviving residual sense of shame created by paternal disapproval of his childhood mannerisms and conduct.

Subject is currently in thrall to deepening depression over recent dissolution of his long-term marriage and the anticipated adverse outcome of mother’s treatment. Subject’s current medication regimen is yielding diminishing results. Subject has difficulty sleeping and self-medicates by increasing alcohol intake and using marijuana when available. Sleep, when finally achieved, is unsatisfactory, coming in fits and starts, seldom extending beyond four hours and often accompanied by hallucinatory images that force his eyes open and render him unable to fall back into unconsciousness.

Subject is morbidly preoccupied, no, obsessed, with death and disease. His current personal situation requires him to spend endless hours in hospital cancer centers where he is constantly confronted with, no, assaulted by, evidence of the precariousness of life. Subject cannot differentiate himself from the fragile creatures surrounding him. Broken things, crumbling, shattered by disease, shriveling to dust, noses plugged with tubes and clamps, lips too dry and cracked to form words, they must rely on their hollow, bruised eyes to communicate their message: Now it’s our turn, soon it will be yours.

Subject experiences panic attacks, hyperventilating as he compulsively calculates and recalculates the ever-dwindling pool of days and the shrinking distance between himself and the intubated and catheterized population of the hospital. Subject responds by seeking temporary relief and gratification in sexual contact. Subject’s panic intensifies at the recognition that his impulsive conduct could be accelerating his projected arrival time at his final destination.

Prognosis: Poor. Subject’s few remaining meaningful contacts are falling away like fish scales. Subject is becoming delusional, with fantasies of drifting away, a Dowager Empress in Splendid Isolation, freeze-dried in the lotus position, afloat, miles above the chaos and cacophony of human interaction. Subject has conversations, dialogues with himself, as there is no one else to listen and respond. The sound of subject’s own voice assaults his eardrums. Subject is exhausted by the endlessly repetitive content. Me. Me. Me. Subject has reached the end of the journey, there’s no fresh laundry in his baggage.

Subject is not, repeat not, planning anything dramatic or irreversible, being, after all, at his deepest core, a good Catholic boy.

Recommendation: Ignore all of the above. Subject has not dropped to his knees in a public place in a year. Ergo, Subject has been cured of what ails him and should be set free.

“Why do you insist on being so hard on yourself?” Matt asks after reading my assignment.

“I think I’m letting myself off pretty easily.”

I light a cigarette, self-conscious about my shaking hand, a side effect of drinking too much, secretly, alone with the lights off. Matt doesn’t comment on the slight tremor.

“I’m going to break the rules for you. I trust you’ll keep this between you and me.”

At last, a secret he’s willing to share!

I race through the document and, astonished, reread his conclusions:

The therapeutic regimen has been successful with the patient exerting appropriate impulse control. His sexual habits are unremarkable in the sense that that there has been no reoccurrence of public sexual activity. It is this observer’s professional opinion that the patient is unlikely to revert to prior behavioral patterns. Further therapeutic treatment is recommended to facilitate his successfully achieving his self-realization goals, but such further treatment should be voluntary and not imposed as a condition of any further court-ordered program.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Why did you do that, break the rules?”

“I thought it needed to be done to reestablish your trust in our relationship.”

“Do you like me?”

“Yes.”

“Why couldn’t you just say you did it because you like me?”

“Because that’s not why I did it. I did it because I didn’t want to risk invalidating the work we’ve done together over the last year.”

“But you do like me?”

“Yes, Andy. I like you.”

“Well, would you sleep with…no, let’s not use euphemisms here, would you fuck me if you weren’t a priest?”

“No. I’d still be your doctor.”

“Would you fuck me if you weren’t my doctor?”

“No, I’d still be a priest.”

“Fuck you.”

“Go ahead and ask.”

“Ask what?” I say, playing dumb.

“Would I fuck you if I weren’t a priest or your doctor?”

Does he really think I’m going to give him the opportunity to reject me?

“Why does a fucking priest become a fucking doctor?”

“He doesn’t. At least, I didn’t. I was a doctor who became a priest.”

I’ve learned that meaningful silence can elicit more information than the most probing questions. He recites his curriculum vitae. College (Loyola, summa) and medical school (Georgetown, with highest honors). Residency training program (Penn, selection as chief resident, of course, let no one mistakenly believe these Jesuits take a vow of modesty). Board certification. Novitiate. Dual master’s in theology and health care ethics (Georgetown again). Ordination. Practice. Ministry. All black and white, clinical, just the facts.

“Very impressive. But you haven’t answered my question. Why?”

“Because I believe I have two callings.”

“How did you know that?”

“I didn’t, at first.”

“When did you learn it? I mean, how did it happen? Was it like Saul on the road to Damascus, were you knocked off your horse?”

“Very funny.”

“I didn’t mean it to be. Really.”

“No. It was a decision I made after much thought and prayer and spiritual counseling, not unlike what we do here together.”

“If you had to give one up, which would it be?”

He shakes his head, signaling he’s done answering questions, and smiles.

“Would you struggle with it?”

“Everyone struggles.”

“Even you.”

It’s an affirmation, not a question.

“Even me.”

What is it you struggle with? I know I can’t ask you that question. Well, I can ask, but you’ll never answer. You’ll turn the tables, ask why it’s so important to me. And I would tell you I need to know if you and I struggle with the same thing, if you use that Roman collar the way I used Alice. Why would that matter? you’d ask, crossing your legs as you settle back in your chair. Because I need to know if, unlike me, you’ve kept your vows. I hope you have. In fact, I need you to. I need someone to be winning their battles.