Chapter - 32

"I brought you some books," says Sigyn from the door, awaiting permission to enter.

Loki does nothing to shoo her away, and she takes a few steps in, ready to leave if Loki asks her. She takes her treasure out of a heavy duty grocery bag and spreads it on the bed, by Loki's legs.

Loki picks a heavy, hardback ex-library copy, plain, faded marine blue cardboard cover, golden lettering. He smiles very faintly.

"Moby Dick," he says.

"I read in an interview that it was one of your favourites."

Loki lifts his eyes to her, assesses her. She is biting her lip nervously, bless her. He thumbs through the yellowing pages. It's an old book, not old enough to be venerable, not too well-read. It smells dusty. There are small engravings of generic whaling scenes at the start of each chapter. Loki thinks it's a sad edition, unloved.

"Have you read it?" he asks.

She bites her lip, dimples appear on her cheeks as she smiles.

"I tried," she confesses. "Lots of whales."

Loki chuckles. He hasn't laughed in months. He sounds rusty. Sigyn purses her mouth, probably to reign in a broader smile.

"Yes, lots of whales," he says. He leafs through it some more. "At school they taught us it was about fanaticism. About the fight against evil turning into evil itself, dragging sane people after it, and destroying all that is good in the process. Or something like that." Loki licks his lips. They're dry. He has not spoken so much for ages. "To me, it was about insanity. Was it Shakespeare who said that madness has its own orbit, like the sun."

Sigyn has listened quietly and intently.

"Perhaps not the best choice then." She grins. Loki actually smiles back, a bit. Well, well, the mousy little girl has a cheeky streak, who'd knew. I like her, he thinks to himself.

"No, it's fine," he says. "I don't think I can manage it though. Not right now."

She picks up a thin, white paperback and hands it to him. The Little Prince, with illustrations by the author, reads Loki.

"I guess you know this one," she says. "I picked it because… when I was really low, in the white room, as I call it, this was the only book I could read. The only thing I could do, really, apart from crying and thinking. And it made me cry too, but it was good crying, you know? Not the one when you stop just because you've run out of tears, and you're feeling raw and left hurting, and ready to start again, but the other one, when you're just sad, and after crying you feel a bit better. I have thought about the reason why. Maybe because you're crying over something that's not yourself? It made me feel good, to come out of myself and suffer for the pain of another, and wanting to console that other person who was suffering, or just cry for them, if you couldn't help them."

Loki frowns deeply.

"I haven't read it in a long time," he says. And he reads out loud.

" If you could fly to France in one minute, you could go straight into the sunset, right from noon. Unfortunately, France is too far away for that. But on your tiny planet, my little prince, all you need do is move your chair a few steps. You can see the day end and the twilight falling whenever you like...

"One day," you said to me, "I saw the sunset forty-four times!"

And a little later you added:

"You know -- one loves the sunset, when one is so sad..."

"Were you so sad, then?" I asked, "on the day of the forty-four sunsets?"

But the little prince made no reply."

"You have such a beautiful voice," Sigyn says.

Loki doesn't like that. It doesn't feel good to hear anything good about himself. He snarls inside that she should know that. Whoa, bitch, calm down. Don't be an arsehole about it. She means well.

"Thanks," he says.

Then there is poetry. She's done her homework. Yeats, Whitman, Rimbaud, cummings.

"Because you struggle with your concentration," says Sigyn. "They're short."

He doesn't say that, to appreciate them, it takes not only concentration but a whole lot of spirit he does not have.

"You're very thoughtful," says Loki instead.

She shrugs, cheeks rosy.

"Is no bother. Is there anything in particular you would like me to get for you next time?" she asks.

He ponders, nothing comes to mind.

But as she is going away, folding the grocery bag smaller and smaller on itself, Loki stops her.

"Gyn," he says. He meant to pronounce the "Si", his dry throat has not cooperated. But she turns around with dazzling eyes, delighted with the nickname. Fair enough. "Do you think you could get me a book called The Secret Garden," he asks.

"I'll see what I can do," she says, with an expression that says that she's got him. And she goes her merry way, happy with her little mission.

"May my heart always be open to little birds who are the secrets of living…" reads Loki inside his head, in Frigga's voice. He takes a deep breath that breaks into a sob. He burrows in his bed and closes his eyes. He cries.

*

"My name is Banner."

It's a stout, big-eyed, round-faced little man he has seen often around the ward. Sensual lips, a greying stubble, wild, wavy hair, an air of the scatterbrained mad professor about him.

"Are you my new shrink?" asks Loki. He's been told he'll have to be reassigned to someone who will be able to see him when he is not an in-patient anymore.

"No, I'm a social worker," says Banner. His words come slow, with an American slur. "Do you mind if I sit down?"

Loki thinks he must be getting better if he's already at social worker stage. And how are we feeling about that?

Banner sits down with his elbows on his knees, shoulders slumped, looking up to Loki on the stupidly tall, altar of sacrifice-like metal bed. He says he works with a few charities for young people in crisis. They know he was homeless when they found him. Banner has options for him. A room all to himself in a refuge to begin with, then a half-way house for as long as he needs, until he finds his feet. Training courses, to get a job or to go back to school. How does any of that sound, apart from terrifying, he smiles. He talks as if there's no rush, weighing his words cautiously before he speaks them out. Loki finds it calming.

"They call you Doctor Banner" asks Loki instead or replying.

Banner smiles, looking down.

"I used to be a doctor."

"Used to be?"

"Lost my license. Forfeited it."

Loki rests his head back.

"I sense there is an inspiring story of rebirth and redemption there you're dying to tell me," he says.

"If you want to, sure, why not," volleys back Banner.

Oh, I see, thinks Loki.

"Please, do tell," he pulls the full, 32-piece crocodile smile. Wow, he had not done that in ages.

"I was a very good doctor, very ambitious," begins Banner. "In the US this job is a big deal, and at my level, it can be a dog-eat-dog profession. I was under a lot of pressure. I started to suffer bouts of psychosis. I did not want to seek help. Because I didn't want people to know, and my research post to be jeopardised, and because I thought I was such a damn fine doctor, I could treat myself just right." Banner smiles a sad smile. "It turns out, I was not such a good doctor after all. I harmed people while under an episode. I was put in a mental hospital. I lost my job at the university. I could have gone back to treating patients, but I had lost all confidence in myself, and I was simply not able to ask people to put their trust in me. I forfeited my license and I moved to the UK, trying to find some fresh air, and a new career. And here I am."

Loki thinks about that for some time.

"I'm surrounded by uplifting tales of successful recovery and rehabilitation. Is it like a requirement to work here or something." He walks a strange path between snark and genuine astonishment.

Banner smiles some more. He has a sweet, gentle face.

"People want to give back," he says. "They can understand the suffering, the hopelessness, but they've seen the light at the end of the tunnel, if you don't mind my falling back on tired old expressions. They know it's there, and they want to show it to those who are struggling." A smile. "Is this the first time you're in a mental hospital, Edward?"

Loki assesses him carefully before he replies.

"No."

"So you have your own story of recovery, then."

"Not a very good one, since I'm back here."

"Yes, it's a constant struggle. With depression in particular, I find with some people it's like giving up smoking. They relapse a couple of times, before they learn how to identify the first symptoms, and also learn some… humility, shall we call it. That they won't make it simply out of sheer force of will, but with some help. Hopefully, they have also learned from before that it does get better. They learn to see the illness for what it is, not as a part of their character they have to put up with. Because the thing with depression is, it's so devious. Other mental illnesses can be perceived more as a loss of control or a foreign body, but depression manages to change someone's pattern of thought in such a way, the patient never suspects certain thoughts and behaviours are not a development of their own character or their own self, but symptoms. Nobody would consider a backache derived from a hernia a part of one's personality, would they?"

Loki listens quietly, keeping all his buts to himself. He should be patting himself on the back, because this one nut, he has cracked -some humility. You don't know it all, Loki-boy. You're not the expert here, not even when it comes to yourself.

Listening is one thing, believing is another. It's alright. He has time and nothing better to do at the moment.

About Banner's question on rehousing, his only thought is what did the E.R. people do with his key pendant. When he gets out of here, he's going home.