CZ Studio and Radio Verte presents The Wild Wind by Corey Zimmerman.
Chapter 2
He may have been mute, but he surely was not stupid.
He was mentally as sharp as a tack, maybe too sharp, since not a detail missed his gaze,
nor could a tack hit the floor going unnoticed, none of which did a bit of good for his nervous
condition.
He listened to the man muttering nonsense three rows back, a woman across the aisle
by the window chewing her fingernails until the nubs of her fingers bled, and each of
the 1,200 crisp pages of the Bible's 800,000 words a nurse four rows directly behind him
flipped through during the three-hour voyage from Chicago to Grandview.
Of the hundred or so patients who filled the train carriage that day, the grinding, gnawing,
snoring, whispering, moaning, rambling, drowning, shuffling, nor the calming voices of the half-dozen
nurses accompanying them went unnoticed by the mute.
He listened to the rail squeal, the slipping of the wheels across the top of the tracks,
and to the calming rhythm that matched his own heart rate, 120 beats per minute on average.
He was a tense man, and when the train whistle blew, he grasped his grimy nails tightly
around the petite hand of a nurse named Kate sitting next to him.
Nurse Kate squeezed the man's hand tightly in her own, in an attempt to anchor him to
the slightest thread of human existence.
The nameless mute, full of sorrow, a frayed soul, wore an old worn-out cap atop greasy,
unkept hair that curled out cowardly, bangs attempting to hide his face.
Dark circles not under, but around the eyes, peering eyes, and knees now protruded from
the thin threads of a pair of old worn-out corduroy jeans and a belt tightened around
his heart.
Nurse Kate resembled his opposite, young, girlish, clean, relaxed, as she made an effort
to sit like a lady of confidence in her starched white uniform, as terribly uncomfortable as
it was.
The regular passengers who found themselves passing through the carriage tightly packed
with the insane whispered amongst themselves and grasped onto one another's arms in fright.
Upon seeing Nurse Kate's petite stature and youthful appearance, she was often given
a glance of pity and concern, along with the occasional shunning, as though caring for
the mentally ill was some kind of wrong turn taken in life.
But having escorted many patients with a vast spectrum of odd behaviors and ailments, Nurse
Kate knew the importance of confidence, and she was rather good at her job, and shrugged
off any sideways glances thrown her way.
She simply sat there, warming the man's hand in her own, wearing proudly the same smile
her ma had gave her.
Nurse Kate was but eight years old when her ma asked her, sweetie, what do you want to
be when you grow up?
The question confounded Kate, seeing how most women stayed home caring for their husbands
and babies, and if they did work, it was most certainly as a seamstress or rolling cigars
at the factory uptown.
Her brother and dearest friend in the world, John, was always telling her what their ma
said was right and true, that you can be anything in the world you want to be, although John
ended up at the mill, though fate was of no matter, or rather, the day John came down
with a fever, typhoid.
For weeks Kate's ma woke her each morning with a hot cup of tea and biscuits as she
laid curled up at the foot of John's bed.
It was a small house with four rooms, built with wood from the mill, and a lean slightly
to the left with age.
The average family income was $490 at the turn of the century, but Kate's family lived
on much less.
Her pa died when she was but a child, and John was the sole breadwinner for the family.
Kate, John, two younger sisters, their ma, and their grandfather, who rarely left his
bed and could not hear a word, as he had given his own hearing to the mill, often could not
afford much more than biscuits, with a small wad of cash constantly dwindling in an old
tin can, its label a cheery little gal in overalls hugging a giant pumpkin.
I suppose everyone quietly worried if John were to succumb to fever, who would buy the
flour for $12.50 per five pound bag?
They were salt of the earth people, in other words, good honest folk, warm-hearted and
heartbroken as John grew increasingly ill.
They each carried a similar weariness in their eye, and sympathized deeply with John's
violent tossing and turning, and shouting in terror.
They replaced his sweaty bedsheets daily, bedsheets that tangled his legs during wicked
hallucinations, as next to the bed, a dresser upon which postcards from a sweetheart piled
up.
Others with an immature cursive, smeared over with a pink lipstick kiss.
On the front, glittery flowers on most, while one bore a nude man wearing nothing but an
empty cake, scolded by a stiff police officer with a baton in hand.
On the back was written, Dear John, I was thinking about what you said last Sunday night.
Oh please tell me you meant every word of it.
Another simply said, Right back.
XO XO.
Kate's ma kept the curtains wide open during the day, to keep the shadows with such darkness
to light.
Yet come nightfall, Kate was bedside when she saw the shadow approach in the corner
of her eye.
The day's postcard had little bluebirds in each corner and read, Hello John, Love Anna.
Below in large letters, S W A K. Sealed with a kiss.
John was but 20 years of age, Anna 16, when the bluebird held tight between Kate's thumb
and forefinger fell to the floor.
It was the moment Kate looked down upon her brother and saw him staring back up at her
in the slightest grin, his pink skin now pale, the blood invisibly pooly at the back of
his brain, the bottom of his limbs, organs, and his chest cavity, his heart now still,
his eyes, damned beautiful eyes.
Typhoid killed 26 out of every 100,000 people that year and John was one of them.
Kate placed her palm upon his cheek and stared into that peculiar gaze and his bizarre stillness
startled her.
Dying people will whisper, if even brief, single words, as that's all they have the
energy for.
But John went without a word, without a single mutter to Kate, who spoke his name only once
before collapsing to his side.
Her young sister stood confused in the doorway, afraid to enter, and her grandfather, well,
death was no stranger to him.
Kate's maw closed John's eyes with every dream cast into blackness, never to open again.
Kate wept and wept.
She wept until a vast desert overcame her, curled up within the corner of her mind, irreconcilable,
refusing to leave John's bed for weeks at a time as the seas poured out of her eyes.
All was now empty and numb, John's pillow, a sea sponge, absorbed with his memory with
each fallen tear.
Lost cold and pale as the winter sky, crows abound, waiting for his funeral.
Meanwhile Kate's maw began to fear she might lose another child to the winter earth and
begged Kate to eat something, anything, but Kate heard no words, nor smelled the biscuits
which sat burnt bedside.
Denial, anger, pleading, melancholia.
When she blinked, her glazed over eyes spotted the stack of postcards, and she dreamt of
the life the young couple must of themselves, dreams they had shared in their hearts, a
life buried with John, and the glistening of the wetness returned to her eyes, her knees
damp at the base of his grave.
She hugged his pillow and wrapped up in his quilt, shivered and remained planted in his
bed.
Kate remembered how Anna had said nothing at the funeral, heart lost, and Anna had to
be carried away, the poor thing.
Her vast, radiant confusion, a heart too young to be shattered, Anna was doomed.
Kate then heard the most beautiful bluebird sing, somewhere beyond the fogged over plain
of glass, beyond her fogged over eyes.
Kate remembered how they used to toss the Blue Jays' biscuits in the winter.
She stood, her nude body with a shiver.
She looked up at the warm sun rays, walked into the sitting room where her ma sat knitting
on a bench upholstered in a rough floral fabric that gave Kate a rash on the back of her soft
bare thighs.
I know what I want to be, ma, I want to be a nurse.
Ma gently smiled and wrapped her arm around Kate saying, I'll cover up, my dear, you'll
catch a fever.
Acceptance
Placing her foot upon that first step that spiraled up the bluff on a bitterly cold day
with a strong gale blowing through the trees, Kate carried her suitcase in a silly hat box.
It was a long walk from the depot to the asylum and by the time she reached the top, her hands
were frosted over.
Kate was directed by a plump nurse named Nancy to the dormitory for girls as a mentally challenged
but polite man took her luggage.
There, a rather friendly girl told her the all pervasive whistle was the breakfast call.
Soon they sat together at one of the very long tables, above which enormous platters
and heavy bowls sailed by but once, allowing one to grab what one could.
The food was fresh, eggs, bacon, and vegetables steamed with a bit of seasoning.
After breakfast, Kate met with the chief nurse, a strict and idealistic woman named Mary Bird,
who had served in the Spanish Civil War.
Miss Bird watched that no skirts were more than three inches off the floor.
Of course, every woman's hair was long.
The only frivolity permitted, Miss Bird explained, were silk scarves, which one was the pulse
snuggly over their nest of hair.
Kate was told to check a list posted in a glass case in the main hall and there, she
found an old man in a wheelchair pushed up against the wall.
He sat alone, ancient, muttering, staring down at his lap, fingers fidgeting incessantly
upon his kneecap.
The list was long and Kate thought she heard the old man whisper and she looked down to
see the most beautiful pair of brilliant blue eyes looking right into her own.
He had a wide, toothless grin and she froze as his liver-spotted hand reached out, just
as a short man with deep-set eyes and long bushy eyebrows approached in a brisk stride.
Kate politely asked the man for directions back to her dormitory.
Miss, may I ask your name?
Kate, she answered, with the slightest grin she had ever seen.
Kate, I wouldn't touch Jonesy if I were you, and she pulled her hand quickly out of reach.
Entering the lecture hall the following day, all the nursing students anxiously awaited
the doctor's arrival, chirping little birds in the back of the room.
Kate sat in the front row with posture and silence, waiting for the moment the revered
Dr. Zola would arrive.
When the erect, sober, yet relatively short man entered, whose shoes were shined immaculate,
whose deep-set eyes sat under a pair of comical eyebrows, Kate recognized him at once.
With one clearing of his throat, one could have heard a bobby pin drop and thunder struck
Kate's heart as he spoke.
Where there is no vision, the people will perish.
Persons with mental illnesses have been dying inside as the mental health service has had
no vision.
To envision a future when everyone with a mental illness will recover, a future when
mental illness can be prevented or cured, a future when mental illness is detected early,
and a future when everyone with a mental illness at any stage of life has access to effective
treatment and support, essentials for living, working, learning, and participating fully
in a community.
We need to maintain a vision.
Here upon the hilltop, we have a vision, a vision not necessarily well received by all
as some still do not believe that recovery is possible.
Many are afraid of giving false hope and fail to recognize the very definition of hope defies
any connection to true or false.
Yet, science has shown that having hope plays an integral role in any individual's recovery.
The winter of 1904 was to be unforgiving, yet as the century of progress thundered southbound
across the vast expanse of barren farmland, frozen solid and buried beneath a blanket
of pure white nuttiness, a blank page as crisp as the air, a long column of coal-black smoke
rose high into the clear blue sky, leaving a trail of tarnish in its wake.
Nurse Kate was the definition of mercy, compassion.
The nameless man kept his keen eye upon that plain, fixating on every black smudge upon
the void, a far-off tree, a barn, a herd of frozen cattle, steam pouring from their snout,
and he followed the telegraphed line with his eyes, up and down, up and down.
The light changed so that he suddenly saw his own eyes in the window's reflection,
and he stared off into a timeless hall of mirrors.
However, his gaze soon focused on a flock of late-season geese and the mighty power
behind the batting wings, slapping the river's still water until they rose into the sky,
escaping the tremble of the engine that sent tiny little reverberations across the water's
mirror-like surface.
The nameless man squeezed Nurse Kate's hand in enthrallment.
Kate looked over and noticed a slight grin on his face, as the very outer ends of his
lips just barely curled up, but it was his eyes, the sparkle they lacked, which now glistened
up toward the heavens as though he saw angels.
Kate looked out over the river, and her thoughts ran deep.
Nurse Kate thought of the doctor, how she admired him so, and how it was impossible
for him to speak of his boyhood without speaking of the dear old river.
After all, he was born less than a hundred feet from its shore.
In Dr. Anthony Zola's life, he would watch the sun disappear through the Golden Gate,
in mid-ocean, on the vast prairies and deserts, and beyond high mountain ranges.
He would live under the Southern Cross, and see and do things one could only imagine.
But I am confident nowhere did he find a more restful end of the day than when the sun sank
behind the bluffs opposite his childhood home.
By the time of Anthony's birth, middle America had outgrown its pioneer days, leaving his
generation to enjoy the fruits of sacrifices of the past.
In his time, he claimed to have witnessed the disappearance of the sundial for the grandfather
clock, the quill for the typewriter, the telegram for the telephone, the wagon for the automobile,
and the steamer for the barge.
Yet it was the continuous presence of the Illinois River that made the greatest oppression
upon his youth.
But he was later certain it had determined his fate.
His pa tried to keep him busy in the gardens, but there was always the temptation of the
river.
Anthony went out in the boat at every opportunity in search of wreckage along the shoreline.
And every spring when he and his buddies found the occasional upturned rowboat, the corpse
of some floater usually had washed ashore.
Nothing was rarely possible, and there were numerous graves in the cemetery six miles
back in the hills to the east, whose tombstones remained nameless.
The secrets of so many swept away, deprived of the opportunity of leaving a final farewell.
Two or three streamers lowered their gangplanks a day at the landing, bringing sugar and salt,
and they took away pork or beef from the local slaughterhouse, along with wheat and corn
from the nearby farms.
Anthony's best buddy Peter never ceased to wonder at the rust about faces, and they quickly
got to know the boats by the sound of their whistle, the Ginny Whipple, the Lady Lee,
the Grey Falcon, and the Saint Louis.
Late one night, Anthony awoke around midnight to a whistle he did not recognize.
It was so loud that it awoke many of the villagers from their sleep.
As Anthony snuck out and ran to the riverbank, he found he was not alone in his curiosity.
At time of year, the river was flooded, and this year more than usual, as it had been
an exceptionally wet spring.
Everyone was in wonder as to who was mad enough to brave the currents and the steamer, for
even the most experienced pilots dare not such a feat.
The strange whistle blew once again, piercing the heavy damp mist, and the steamboat finally
appeared.
And despite the heavy current, it moved rather slowly, and silently, in an eerie glow.
Bright apparitions appeared on its deck, and then a faint song could be heard echoing
off the bluffs.
Sweet, bye and bye.
Everyone stood frozen, hypnotized by the chorus.
Sweet, bye and bye.
Until as suddenly as it had appeared, it was swallowed once more by the heavy mist, along
with the echo of the chorus.
Sweet.
When the river wasn't flooded, the bay in front of Anthony's house was a beautiful
sheet of clear water.
During the hot summers, Anthony would go swimming as often as six times a day.
Already barefoot, he'd throw off one suspender and slip his shirt over his head, and in ten
seconds flat, he was diving into the mighty depths, the depths of his youth.
One fall, after an unusually dry and hot summer, the river shrank, and an epidemic of typhoid
fever broke out.
One after another of his schoolmates fell ill, and eventually he too felt it wearing
his coming over himself, but persisted in attending class.
Until one day, when Anthony felt chilly, and sat down in the sun, and drifted off.
Alongside the road, he was found unconscious, and he was amazed when the delirium left,
and he awoke in bed five weeks later.
Anthony began to have flashbacks from the throes of his fever, memories of being out
of his body, of floating through the house.
He even recalled the moment just before he came to.
He'd been hovering above his paw, when suddenly he could see the whole world through his paw's
eyes, even looking down upon his own self, lying in bed the moment his own eyes had opened.
Within an instant, Anthony had returned to his own body, peering back up at his paw,
who smiled lovingly down upon him, as he placed his large warm paw upon Anthony's chilled
brow.
There were many empty desks in the schoolhouse when he returned, as several of his buddies
had succumbed to the illness, including his dearest friend Peter.
Although still weak, Anthony rode his pony to the funeral at the cemetery six miles back
in the hills, and he watched as Peter was buried under a large elm tree, on a small
bluff overlooking the river valley's rolling hills.
During the winter, when the river froze over, there was no smoother skating anywhere, and
the skates his paw bought him were the most appreciated gift he had ever received.
Anthony usually went skating on Sundays, but one afternoon, his paw asked for his help
mixing medicine in his office, when he heard a loud cry from the riverbank.
He ran down to see what the commotion was all about, and found a dozen neighbors wringing
their hands as his classmate Timmy clung to the ice twenty yards out, with two-thirds
of his body submerged in the frigid water.
A few men had attempted to save him with an oar but had given up, and everyone stood around
helpless.
Anthony spotted a boat nearby and quickly dragged it onto the ice and got in, and with
the help of a few willing hands, was able to pull Timmy into the boat.
In the days following, Anthony felt he was giving much more praise than he deserved,
believing saving Timmy was a perfectly rational thing to do.
Later that summer, when the pier was again half flooded, Anthony and his friends were
on their way to swim when they passed Timmy and his little brother.
Timmy was shy, embarrassed, and could not make eyes with Anthony.
And not a half hour later, Timmy's little brother came running stark naked down the
pier, shouting.
Timmy had jumped off the pier where he always had, figuring he'd touched the bottom as
he always had before, but his head had sunk below the surface, and he panicked and flopped
about.
But by the time Anthony found Timmy, his arms and legs were spread wide, and he brought
Timmy's full body to shore once again.
He carried him home where Timmy's ma was sitting on the porch drinking a glass of lemonade,
and the glass shattered at her feet.
His poor ma had just lost her husband but weeks before, and once more, Anthony rode
the six miles to attend the funeral of a childhood friend six miles over the hills to the east.
Anthony stood and watched the funeral from under the old elm tree on the bluff where
the breeze blew, and when a single leaf landed on his shoe, Anthony felt the weight of the
world.
As the train arrived at the asylum depot, Nurse Kate put her arm under the nameless
man's own and walked him off the train.
He carried nothing but the clothes on his back, engulfed by a dark tattered overcoat,
his dark eyes hidden beneath the brim of the old worn out cap.
He kept his head down all the way up the icy planks, knees trembling in the cold, until
he stopped cold in his tracks at the sight of a chimney in its plume of smoke rising
above the trees and beyond.
Nurse Kate noticed his concern and said with a slight giggle,
Don't worry, silly, that's just the cloud machine.
It's nothing to worry about.
Oh, and I can't feel my toes, and your hands, they are so cold.
Let's go get warm, shall we?
The receiving unit was pure chaos as they arrived, case notes being scratched off everywhere.
Imagines himself very rich, possessing thousands of dollars, when he has not a cent.
Says he owns a sawmill and has the means of making hundreds of dollars a day.
This young man imagines that for the last two years he has been drugged by his sister.
This boy is of a quiet and retired nature.
His mother says that he masturbates himself to complete exhaustion.
He then becomes furious and dangerous to himself and others, and has attempted suicide twice,
once by hanging and once by throwing himself off the roof.
This old man is unable to carry on a natural conversation.
He says he is 24 years of age, and five minutes after says he is 82 years of age.
Incontinence of urine.
Dr. Zola was doing his best to keep order over the order list when he noticed the man's
hand quivering under Nurse Kate's arm.
Sensing the burden the bustling scene must have had upon such a fragile sensibility,
he knew to remove the man at once from the receiving unit to a more tranquil environment.
It was often a mystery as to what plagued the reasoning of newly arrived patients, which
was the case for this man as well, as all anyone knew was that Nurse Kate had brought
him to Grandview from Chicago with a hundred other patients and that he had been a bookbinder
at a publishing house.
He was thin and frail, most likely looking much older than his age.
All Kate knew was that he was most likely a mute, if not from birth, then by some unfortunate
tragedy as he was obviously suffering with nervous energy.
Good morning to you my friend, the doctor said jubilantly, I am Dr. Zola, the superintendent
here at the hilltop.
I apologize for the chaos, we've had many unexpected arrivals this morning.
You've had a long journey I see.
Tell me, did you get anything to eat this morning?
But the man said nothing.
I gave him a biscuit but that was hours ago said Nurse Kate.
Come we'll fix you up a plate said the doctor, fully aware of the less than ideal fare that
had been provided at the poor house.
Do you like freshly baked bread with butter?
Maybe some jam?
I know I sure do.
The man looked back at Nurse Kate as the doctor led him away.
He was afraid and didn't want to let go of Nurse Kate's arm.
Get him admitted to Dr. Mouth.
Freed of his grasp, Nurse Kate approached Nurse Nancy who sat on a rather desperate
wooden stool behind the admittance desk.
Sex male, race white, marriage status unknown, age unknown, nativity hometown home state
Chicago, I imagine.
Cause of admittance?
Nervous breakdown, I am almost certain.
Occupation?
All they told me in Chicago was that he was working at a publishing house when his malady
seized him and he lost all coherent speech.
The officer who took him into custody merely reported that he was a manual bookbinder.
Name?
The poor soul didn't come with one.
Now Nurse Nancy was kind enough but prone to rolling her eyes with a sigh.
And with the stroke of her pen, the man with no name became a manual bookbinder.