CZ Studio and Radio Verte presents The Wild Wind by Corey Zimmerman.
Chapter 4
The Bronson Building Dayroom was where the patients could relax by one of the colossal windows,
providing a magnificent view of the river valley below. They could listen to the phonograph,
or read a book from the library, or eat its pages, play the piano, pound the keys,
or if one chose, play chess, checkers, chew on the checkers, or an everlasting staring contest
with the wall. The dayroom was full of a spectrum of characters, such as Jesse, a young man in a
wheeled chair, who would grow frustrated watching the flies bump into the window, trying to escape
the invisible wall preventing them from moving toward sunlight. The flies would grow somewhat
disoriented as their confused visual signals miscalculated what they were seeing. The glass's
smooth surface allowed the flies to hold on using the hairs on their sticky pads. However,
as the glass prevents them from succeeding in escape, a sustained effort over time had finished
off any reserved body fat, leaving them to lie dying of exhaustion. Jesse had watched the flies
continually bouncing and buzzing against the glass for so long he was aware of their impending fate.
This made him nervous, which caused him to squirm about anxiously in his wheeled chair,
until it made the other patients nervous, who would call again and again on a nurse
to open the window for the fly to escape. Another character, Big Ben, was a giant of a man
trapped inside a child's mind, or vice versa perhaps, a child trapped within a giant of a man.
Despite his girth, Big Ben was a gentle soul, only one thing on his mind, and that was pie.
He spent most of his days waiting for the pie to be served after dinner.
And on one Thanksgiving, Ben dragged six male attendants across the dining room floor upon
his belly with nothing but the tips of his fingers, trying to gain access to the table of pies.
He succeeded.
Heartbeat
There was Mabel, who suffered from the rare phobia of her own heartbeat,
and frankly, that of her own existence. Her anxiety and clenched jaw had caused most of
her molars to shatter. She spoke all of her thoughts aloud, pacing back and forth, muttering,
My heart, my heart, it's going to stop. Someone please help me, my heart. Sir William, as he
preferred to be called, was a young man in his early thirties, who spoke with a feigned British
accent and elected himself the caretaker of the grandfather clock, always making sure to keep it
wound daily. In fact, he rarely left its side. Sir William would count the ticks and talks second
after second, minute after minute, hour after hour, from sunrise until sunset, until he noticed its
pace slowing even the slightest, a thirty second of a second. He then used the key he kept on the
string around his neck to give the old clock a good old crank, counting the seconds to ensure the time
was just right. And when asked why he did this, he would say, I got somewhere to be.
Franklin, a simple old man, it was supposed on average, managed but one thought a minute.
More often than not, that word was shouted aloud, and it was simply cow, cow, cow, cow, minute after
minute, throughout the day, cow, cow, cow, cow, cow, cow, cow, cow, kill. Surprisingly perturbed no one,
as it echoed throughout the day room, as he never attempted to kill anyone, nor could Franklin move
an inch without assistance. Most assumed he had a previous life in a slaughterhouse.
If one could hear the day room orchestra, it would have sounded something like this.
One, two, three, cow, oh my heart. Four, five, six, cow, oh my heart. Seven, eight, nine, cow,
oh my heart. Nine, ten, eleven, cow, somebody please help me, I got somewhere to be. Twelve, thirteen,
kill, and so on. While an actual conversation may have sounded more like this, so nicely was it done
that not a drop of blood was spilled. I only laid them to sleep. Snakes, snakes, snakes, snakes,
I don't know, I don't know. I stuffed cotton in my ears not to hear them. My child is dead, my child
is dead. I was elected by a majority of 64,000 votes I tell you. My ears never stop ringing,
they never stop ringing. I am a man, just like any other man. But well, you know I don't know how to
explain it. But I suppose the gospel says so anyhow. I set a house on fire, that's the third
house I've burnt. They didn't want to give me something to eat. I went off hungry and sat down
and saw it burn. Somebody upstairs wants to kill me. Don't say anything to anyone. The day room was
a noisy place, mostly when Slim was around. Slim believed everyone looked at him with wonder,
as his tales and stories never ceased to amaze nor annoy. He had been a cowboy on the western plains
since he was old enough to straddle a bronco and throw a lasso, and was always spoiling for a fight
in his youth. And Slim joined the militia the moment he thought there was a chance for active
service in the war. He was one of those fellows, always guilty of some escapade. How he managed to
get into the army, only a recruiting officer can tell. Slim would talk to anyone who would listen,
and if there were no one around to listen, he would go on preaching as though he was preaching
upon the hatch of a ship en route to war, with a crowd of eager young admirers surrounding him.
Dr. Zola recorded one of Slim's sermons, and it sat in his case notes. Shut up you rookies. Don't
you know an enlisted man got no right to laugh? You fellas are coming over here to get killed,
I say. And my business is to haul your asses off the field and see your bodies properly thrown in
a trench. Oh, I'll see your graves kept green. It's an easy job, seeing the grass sprouts almost
far the earth unsmoothes over your grave. It's much pleasanter to be the buried corpse than to be the
buried corpse. I told them, rookies. I tell you it's a ticklish business, driven over a rice field
after a fight and not run over the fellas lying in the grass who is still alive. I know how it is
myself, being more in danger of being trampled to death by them mules than from the bullet that tore
away half my face. Most of us that got hit got it right there in the noggin. It was afternoon, March,
I recall. A little Filipino boy came crawling up from the river and told us there were damn near
a hundred Americans killed when suddenly the lights went out. You don't know when you're hit.
Next thing I remember was waking up with a headache. When I put my hand in my head,
I found only part of me was there. And the little boy, he said, the soldier's all gone off.
I looked around and couldn't see one of my comrades, and I knew they'd charge the line
as they intended to for dark. Hell, the doctors wanted to cut out my tongue, but decided on the
left eyeball instead. They said my jaw was sprung, so it would be impossible for me to subside on
army ration. And they said my missing eye would prevent me ever again being a good marksman.
But many a time I've thrown my hat in the air while I'm full gallop on the plains
and put all six of my Colts bullets through it before it hit the ground. So hell, what do they
know? You don't aim to do that. You just bring your gun in line with the jerk and pull the trigger.
Now imagine the day room with slim in your left ear and Raymond in your right. Raymond had been
catatonic for over 30 years, decades before arriving at the hilltop. Raymond had no relatives
and no visitors. Raymond usually sat in a chair, smoking a cigarette the nurses would place in his
lips. But one random day Raymond decided to stand up and talk. And just like that, every day thereafter,
he chain smoked his cigarettes in one drag as he rambled and rambled and rambled, leaving everyone
yearning for the old catatonic. You sat silent by the window.
None of you jerks have a brain, but here you all think I'm the stupid one because I want to sit
here by the window where I can seize the trees. Here are the birds. I like the birds, but you
fool creatures fail to understand that. I want peace. I just want peace and quiet. But no,
everyone is always talking, talking, talking, talking about nothing. Absolutely nothing of any
substance at all. Shut up about the damn war. It's over. Get over it. Talk about something
intriguing, entertaining, anything that doesn't make me want to saw off my own head. You could
talk about the weather for all I give a damn or better yet the birds. I can't even hear the birds
singing over that damn yapping, yapping, yapping. We could all sit in silence and look at the trees.
Now, is that not a glorious idea? Hell, let's name off every damn tree in the great state of Illinois,
shall we? Silver maple, sugar maple, Ohio buckeye, horse chestnut, red buckeye, tree of heaven,
Persian silk tree, devil's walking stick, river birch, paper birch, trumpet creeper, mussel wood,
bitter nut hickory, pignet hickory, sweet hickory, shag bark hickory, American chestnut, red bud,
dogwood, stiff dogwood, hazelnut, cocksper, half thorn, washington half thorn, eastern leatherwood,
autumn olive. Yeah, and we got the eastern wahoo, American beech, white ash, black ash, and the green
ash, and the red ash, and the blue ash, honey locust, tucky coffee tree, carolina silver ball,
eastern red cedar, golden rain tree, sweet gum, the old wild crab tree, the prairie crab tree,
cork tree, even the nine bark tree, and the jack pine, and the red pine, and the wine pine,
and the white pine, sycamores, white poplar, cottonwood, big tooth aspens, wild plum, peach,
the wild black cherry, the choked cherry, the wafer ash, black jack oak, got the door folk,
goat willow, pussy willow, blabber nut, northern white cedar, and the eastern hemlock,
southern arrowwood, prickly ash, slippery elm, and the almighty American elm.
And then there was Rose. Rose never said a word. Her body had long atrophied and doubled up,
so she resembled more of a toad than a human being. She loved hopping around on her hands,
however, chewing and spitting tobacco everywhere, which made at times a horrible mess to slip
around in. So Rose spent most of her time sitting next to a spittoon on a mattress on the floor,
having stripped off her gown in the warm rays of the sun.
By the time Rose arrived at the hilltop, she had lived in the poorhouse for some 40 years.
The first few, she lived in a basket lined with straw. And then after too many violent outbursts,
she was confined to a locked crib, where she was cared for solely by other patients.
Obsessed that old scratch was watching her, with her fingernails,
she had scratched out her own eyes, and with her fists, beat her own face until her front teeth
were missing. Rose had become a cursed and hideous object, hidden away in a dark and damp corner,
with no ability to speak. Rose was quiet, and from what I gathered from her file,
most likely didn't want to go to the dance at the pavilion that night. But her sisters had insisted.
You see, Rose was a shy girl, but her mother held on to hope that she might meet a boy from a family
who owned some land. So together, the family enticed her to attend the village social.
Unfortunately for Rose, a combination of her odd disposition and her grandmother's penchant for
witchcraft, undoubtedly provided Rose an unfavorable reputation amongst the community,
let alone any suitors. So her chances of meeting one were slim, but Rose was beautiful back then,
a 17 year old girl, though a bit awkward, very easy on the eyes. Easy enough at least,
for the boy who asked her to dance. Rose's sisters dropped their jaws as he whirled her
around the stage in delight, and soon he pulled her by the hand off into the night,
where he must have told Rose he adored her beautiful smile, anything to get a kiss of her
sweet, succulent lips. Rose must have been surprised when he pulled his warm lips away to ask,
is your soul as cold as they say? Yet before she could answer, he laid her down in the straw of the
old barn out back his house. He tore off his shirt, and she ran her fingers down his chest,
then exposing her breast of which she devoured like a hungry dog, just as his ma noticed a
lantern aglow in the barn. The boy squirmed like a worm on top of Rose, unaware his ma had entered
with a butcher knife. Rose screamed and covered herself, and crawled back into a corner as a
slap came across the boy's face. Profanities flew, and his ma dragged him away by his ear,
as he made one excuse after another. He didn't even turn back, but as ma did, she stopped right
at the barn door, looked Rose deep in the eye, and warned her never to return. Tears rolled down Rose's
face as she put on her disheveled dress in the dark, and walked home in shame.
But something came over Rose, and the two continued to meet in secrecy until the day the boy asked for
Rose's hand in marriage. A few days later, there was a knock on her door.
So you intend to marry my boy? asked his ma, as Rose's sister spied from inside. Rose stood
speechless. In a deep, dark, horrible tone, his ma threatened a curse on Rose, and she
was left to die. She was then taken to the hospital, and she was taken to the hospital.
Rose was left speechless. In a deep, dark, horrible tone, his ma threatened a curse Rose if she ever
came near her boy again. Threat sank so deep into Rose's heart as she feared both the hoodoo
and losing her husband to be. I love him! Rose said, with a shriveled, snarling face, his ma
then cursed. If you ever even think of seeing my boy again, I'll send old Scratch your way,
to your grave. You'll never close your eyes without seeing his face again. Old Scratch,
Old Scratch, Old Scratch.
Rose fell to her knees in tears, and her sisters came out and stood silent. At sunset, Rose
sat alone until midnight in the trees waiting for her love. But this time he never showed.
She came again the following night, waiting in the dark as she chewed off her nails. On
the third night, she wept until she thought she heard something, calling out his name,
relieved to see him again. But a shadow crossed the corner of her eye, and it was then she
spoke his name, Old Scratch.
Rose jumped to her feet and ran all the way home. Startled, her sisters found her jumping
on her bed, laughing hysterically. They told her mom that Rose was spinning around on the
floor, on her head like a top, repeating again and again, Old Scratch, Old Scratch, Old Scratch.
Rose's disturbing behavior went on for days until it drove her maw to her wit's end, and
she grabbed the shotgun and unloaded it from the front porch into the sky, screaming for
Old Scratch to go on and get now.
Nonetheless, a week later, Rose was sent off to the poorhouse.
The interior of the poorhouse was as crisp as the air outside when Dr. Zola arrived.
His breath was visible, although he quickly covered his face with his hands due to the
awful stench permeating the air. A hall ran down each side of the building, the middle
cells resembling a prison. Each was no larger than 4 by 6 feet, the doors made of a rough,
hardwood plank, with a small bored hole in the center, which was the only source of light
and air for those trapped inside. The beds were on the floor, with nothing to separate
the inmates from where they sat except for a piece of plank set up edgewise.
The whole construction, a stigma of humanity. There were 30 sleeping rooms, initially intended
for one each, but were crowded with up to 5 inmates per damp, airtight cell, others as
many as 7. Each in the greatest state of helplessness and dependence, many in a state of complete
nudity, men, women, children, all living together in beds of straw, upon a damp, dirty floor,
into which external light could find no entrance.
Shocked by what he saw, Dr. Zola noted, he shall remember as long as he should live,
this 120 doomed to that living tomb. Listless, idle, and useless, blue with cold, and utterly
filthy in person, they lived in rows of which vermin scurried between, wretchedness in an
atmosphere whose odor exceeds offensiveness, beyond which the imagination can conceive.
A filthy naked woman curled up in a corner in a nest of straw screamed at the doctor,
�There�s the son of a bitch that did me wrong! There�s the son of a bitch that did
me wrong!� He then found another man who had been in a straitjacket for 6 weeks, and
a woman who had been fastened to a bed for days, yet she had the reasoning enough to
plead, �Please get me out of this. I need to see the doctor, please.�
He entered a dark room into which those deemed the lamest patients had been kept, where he
discovered chained to a wall by his ankle, a crippled teenage boy weighing no more than
100 pounds, having limbs about the thickness of a man�s wrist, but bent and twisted.
As Dr. Zola attempted to comfort the boy, he heard a rustling from the shadows, and
as he looked in the back corner of the room, he barely spotted in the darkness a padlocked
Utica crib. This is where he first found her, in that
crib, covered partially by a canvas tarp, curled up inside of it withered gargoyle-like,
crouched, a living mummy, skinny beyond any human comprehension, but impossibly alive.
She was completely naked and filthy, her eyes missing, the sockets dark and bruised and
empty. She was in constant motion, black and blue from head to toe. She laid in her own
bed of straw, covered in her own feces. Horribly deformed, her knees almost touched her chin,
as little mice and other vermin had nested at her side. He reached through the cage and
touched her on the shoulder, and she jumped, making an inhuman sound. �My darling, everything�s
going to be okay now. I am here to help you.�
It was just before 1 in the morning when the train from Davis County finally arrived at
the asylum depot, the engines headlight piercing the dark night as it approached, blinding
the nurses with tired eyes who awaited on the platform. They covered their ears as the
whistle blew, and steam rose from the brakes of the screeching wheels in the chill of the
winter air. Exhausted, everyone did their best to organize the entirety of the Davis
poorhouse insane who stumbled off the train, yawning and rubbing their eyes, in poor and
dismal condition as the nurses ran to their assistance.
A large and heavy clothes basket assumed to contain all the effects of the newly arrived
patients required two male attendants to carry. As they carefully carried the basket up the
long staircase that stretched up the hilltop, about halfway the basket began to move, and
when the mound of laundry began to shake, they each froze and looked at each other with
the same look of shock as they dropped the basket and backed away, and with the ghastly
sight of a filthy old skeleton sat up with a toothless shriek, eye sockets as dark as
the night, hissing and clawing, they each fell back on their bottoms with a scream of
terror and a tale to be told for decades forth.
The next morning Rose awoke in a clean bed with white sheets near a sunlit window. From
that very first day, Rose was very honoring. Still, each nurse cared for her every need
with compassion and with admiration for such a resilient soul as hers, and upon her new
bed she sat like a strange species grabbing and putting what she could into her mouth.
Dr. Zola, however, was the only one who could calm Rose when she grew frustrated, as she
responded amazingly to his voice and touch. And as each day passed, Rose looked remarkably
better and warmed up to the others. She was eventually allowed to roam free, and she did,
usually in search of her one true love, chewing tobacco. And in time, Rose would become the
most pleasant patient in the chaos of the day room.
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