Psychosis

No Good Deed

Kali hated being up early, especially on the weekends, but she was willing to make an exception just this once. Her father had woken her at exactly nine o'clock with a message from Dr. Taylor.

"She says dress nicely."

Most of Kali's nice clothes were still at her mom's house, but she managed to find a nice blouse and pencil skirt tucked away in her closet. She tried to straighten her hair, but soon discovered it was a lost cause and settled for throwing it back in a hair tie.

Kali told herself that she shouldn't be doing this. Her father was dangling bait in front of her face, and she was about to take it. And this Dr. Taylor character was at fault here too. Was this her way of trying to win Kali's favor? After what she had done to her family, Kali doubted this meeting was going to go well. Still, she felt compelled to shadow this woman, not just because she loved psychiatry, but because she was eager to meet the woman that had torn her family apart.

At nine-thirty she walked downstairs with a pair of black heels in her hands. Her father was waiting for her by the door.

"You look-"

"Don't," Kali interrupted.

He nodded and opened the door for her. It was a humid day in grey old Gotham. A thick fog had settled over night, casting a dark haze on the neighborhood. Kali was suddenly thankful she had pulled her hair back. Even if she had managed to tame her mane, this air would have caused it to frizz up.

Thankfully, the car's air-conditioning was fully functional. If it were up to her, Kali would have had it on full blast, but her father seemed perfectly comfortable with it set on setting two. In no mood to talk to him, Kali busied herself by putting on her shoes. It had been a while since she'd worn heels; she had forgotten how uncomfortable and pinchy they were.

"Nice," her father said.

"Excuse me?" Kali asked.

"You cut me off earlier. I was going to say you look nice."

"Oh," Kali shifted in her seat.

Dr. Taylor's office came into view. The psychiatry building was a large brick structure that towered over most of its surrounding structures. From a distance, it looked abandoned, but as they drew closer Kali could see light emitting from some of the closed windows. Her father pulled the car into the parking lot and put it in park. They sat there in silence for a minute.

"I'll pick you up in an hour unless you call me and tell me otherwise," he said before unlocking the car.

Kali started to open her door.

"Kali," her father stopped her, "I love you."

After a short pause, Kali rolled her eyes and stepped out of the car. She didn't see her father pull away, but she heard him. Once she was certain he was gone, she walked to the front door. There was a man sitting at the front desk with a phone to his ear. He saw Kali enter and gestured towards one of the many neatly lined chairs in the lobby. Kali took a seat. When the receptionist was finished on the phone, he turned to address Kali,

"Sorry about that. May I ask you name?"

"Kali, Kali Faye."

He shuffled through some papers on his desk, "do you have an appointment?"

Kali was about to respond, but Dr. Taylor walked into the lobby before she could. Dr. Taylor was a thin woman with even thinner brown hair that she wore in a tight bun on her head. She was a woman of plain taste and was clad in a white well-tailored suit. Her red dress-shirt matched the red color of her nail polish—which was the only make up she wore. A pair of round spectacles teetered on the tip of her nose. Kali made a mental note of how cleanly pressed her pants were; a clear sign of mild obsessive compulsive disorder. Kali's hypothesis was further supported when Dr. Taylor removed her already spotless glasses to wipe off nonexistent dirt.

"She's with me," she told the receptionist.

Dr. Taylor turned now to Kali, "Hi, Kali, your father's told me a lot about you. He says you're in the top ten percent of your class. With grades like that you're a shoe-in for any college you want."

Kali forced herself to smile at the fake flattery, "it's nice to finally meet you," my father's willingly told me close to nothing about you she added silently.

"Shall we?" Dr. Taylor asked.

Kali nodded.

"My office is on the second floor," Dr. Taylor told Kali, "there are five floors total. I deal strictly with mentally ill adults, so I see a lot of, erm, colorful characters on a day to day basis."

When Kali didn't interject she continued.

"I work a lot with the police. I do criminal profiling for them when they capture a particularly confused cliental."

"You don't need to water down. You preform psychoanalysis on criminals that are about to be convicted."

They stopped in front of an elevator. Kali stared at her reflection in the metal doors until they opened. A group of well dress men and woman deep in conversation stepped out. Dr. Taylor put her hand on the open doors to keep them from closing as the group exited. She ushered Kali in before removing her arm and walking in herself. With a quick flick of a finger, the level two button in the elevator lit up and the doors closed. Dr. Taylor fished a hand-sanitizer wipe out of her jacket pocket to clean her hands.

The silence in the elevator was finally broken by a ding as the doors slid open. Dr. Taylor walked out first.

"Here we are," she said, taking a key out of her pocket and unlocking the door.

Dr. Taylor's office was a quaint square room. The walls and floors were painted a soft blue color.

"Blue stimulates calming thoughts," Dr. Taylor explained.

Kali laughed to herself, blue reminded her of unopened veins. There were three chairs in the room: a typical chaise lounge chair for the patient, a pillowed one for Dr. Taylor, and a fold away chair for Kali.

"Sorry about you seating arrangement. It was the best I could do on such short notice," Dr. Taylor apologized.

Kali took a seat and watched as Dr. Taylor took a recording device out of her pocket. She pushed the record button and placed it on the only empty space on her wooden bookshelf.

"I like to record my sessions," Dr. Taylor informed Kali with a quick glance at the clock hanging above the door.

"We still have a few minutes before my patient gets here. Would you like to review the case?"

"Um, am I allowed?"

Dr. Taylor nodded, her glassed threatening to fall she did so, "this isn't anything I learned from our sessions. Everything here is public knowledge."

She handed Kali a clipboard with her patient's profile. While Kali studied the criminal's picture, Dr. Taylor took to straightening the pencils on the table beside her chair. Kali scanned the first page on the board. The patients recorded name was Gwain Green. Kali flipped through the papers. He was being accused of raping and murdering three woman.

"Have you been treating Mr. Green for a while?" Kali asked.

"This will be his first session with me."

"It says here that he's a rapist."

"Sometimes I have to treat people that have done inexcusable things. A lot of times felons will plead insanity, and it will be up to people like me to diagnose them. If they are insane, I personally recommend any mentally unstable felon be sent straight to Arkham Asylum. Just because someone is diseased doesn't mean they can get away with murder. They should still be locked up."

Kali nodded. Then, the door to the office opened.