This conversation was crazy, but by then I was getting used to her. Not only that, I enjoyed talking to her.
“What are you, an optometrist?”
She giggled and took a sip from her drink.
“What if I never took the stuff in the first place?” I asked. “I would have the same look then, right? ‘A kid’s eye.’ Sounds like a police drama episode.”
“You’re over thirty,” she replied. It wasn’t a question, but she paused until I fidgeted in my seat, shrugging. She continued then, as though making me feel uncomfortable had been some kind of a prerequisite for revealing the knowledge that was to follow. “If we’re talking about ‘industrialized’ areas of the planet, the odds of finding a clear-eyed homo sapiens are quite small. But to encounter a clear-eyed human being between the ages of thirty and sixty who never took antidepressants manufactured by Freedom Corp., the leader in pharmaceuticals, would be nearly impossible statistically.”
We stared at each other across the table. Plainly, the small talk was over. Iris had just sincerely shared something that was very important to her. She had just initiated me, a total stranger, into her inner circle. She had revealed the Ultimate Truth. Considering we’d only met an hour earlier, it must have been a sign of tremendous trust. Trouble was, I felt awkward rather than properly honored, because I was Luke Fredegar Whales. And Luke Fredegar Whales happened to have firsthand knowledge of the fact that Iris’s Ultimate Truth was a pile of crap.
“I don’t know where you got that from,” I started diplomatically, “but that’s a bunch of nonsense.” She did not reply, just looked at me intently. Undaunted, I cleared my throat and continued.
“I don’t know if I mentioned this, but I’m a well-known TV actor. I have dealt with Freedom Corp. personally. In fact, I did a commercial for them a couple of years back.”
“So?”
“So I, and people who watch television, have reliable information that ‘statistically,’ one out of every twelve Americans experiences frequent anxiety and depression. What is known to me as an insider is that also ‘statistically,’ out of those rough eight percent of the population, half never calls to get treatment.”
I fell silent. I had said all that needed to be said. She could do the math. Iris was a kook, but I liked her. She had helped me, so I didn’t want to hurt her with harsh words. I’d heard mentally ill people were really sensitive to that kind of thing.
I snuck a peek to check her reaction. Clearly, my clumsy attempts at diplomacy had failed. She sat motionless, staring at me. Squashing the cigarette in the ashtray, she immediately lighted another one. I felt bad. Had I not been in the situation I found myself in, I would probably not have said anything. In fact, under normal circumstances I would not only let it slide, but also would be well on my way of getting into her pants.
“I’m sorry,” I said finally. At that, Iris burst out laughing. I decided to stop being nice.
“What pills did you stop taking, exactly?” She ignored the question. She was catching her breath.
“You should have seen your face,” she said once she caught it. I didn’t know what to think about that, and it was obviously useless to argue the point with her. I should have known better than trying to reason with a kook. Shrugging, I took another sip from my glass and turned away. Because of the noise, without eye contact her words seemed to reach me from far away. “First you’re shocking me with reliable information you got from a TV commercial and the very people who turned you into a zombie for god knows how long, and then, to top it off, you say you’re sorry for me. You thought I finally saw how crazy I was or something?”
Despite my effort, I turned and looked at her again. She wasn’t laughing now. If anything, as absurd as it sounded, it seemed she was the one feeling sorry for me.
“Hey, I know what you’re trying to say,” I said. “I know all about commercials being a little spiced up for appeal, trust me. But no commercial is that wrong. I could imagine the number being slightly off, but not anywhere near the insanity you’re spouting. And why would they even lie in the first place? What’s the point? What difference does it make? A commercial is there to sell the product. That’s a fact. How is saying it’s one out of a dozen instead of one out of three going to sell more pills? How?”
“You know how they always tell you ‘you are not alone?’” She asked in a normal voice, which sounded like a whisper. Ah, so you do watch TV, a fleeting thought. And then it hit me. I remembered. “Remember that time you heard it and decided to ask your doctor? One out of every twelve Americans…”
“I never felt so alone in my life,” I said, leaning back.
“It became obvious you were the one screwed up, not the world, right? You alone were the cause, and they were the only ones capable of helping you. The only ones who wanted to help you.”
“And the truth is what? The world is fucked up?”
“Yeah.”
“Right. Blame it on the world. It’s the easiest.”
“Wrong. Blaming it on yourself is the easiest. I am only human. It’s human nature. Errare humanum est. Blah blah blah. Society is built around that stuff. Everyone will support you, help you, cure you, as long as you are the hero and take the blame. Admit that you are nothing alone. Confess your goddamn sins.”
She fell silent and leaned back. I had to admit there was some sense to what she’d said, but that made it no less insane to claim everyone was on the pill. There was no way to keep a thing like that secret. In search of a different topic I looked to the bar. There, I quickly located the bartender (in fact, it would probably be harder to locate the bar itself), who was presently shaking his bushy head at a thoroughly fed guy in a short leather jacket. The latter then turned around and, leaning on the counter with his elbows, began to survey the premises. There was a thick mustache on his face, which I, for some unknown reason, resented. I slunk back into the depths of the booth, keeping an eye on the man.
“What’s wrong?” Iris asked.
“I think that’s a cop,” I said, staring straight at her. She made a face and turned to look. “Don’t look,” I hissed, but it was too late. The guy began moving in our direction. Maybe it’s a friend of Iris’s, I thought hopefully, but one look at her puzzled face was enough to convince me otherwise. Run? What if he’s armed? Of course he’s armed, he’s a cop. It might have been reasonable to imagine there was a good possibility of me avoiding him in a dark, smoke-filled theater, crowded, besides, with civilians, if I made a run for it, but I was afraid of getting shot even more than of going to jail. I put both hands on the table in front of me and waited. Soon enough he towered over.
“Luke Whales?” he asked excitedly. Iris was looking at me.
“Who?”
“You look different with that beard, but not different enough.” I said nothing, waiting. “Anyway, we have to go. Now.”
“Where to?”
“Out. Flee. The cops have surrounded the place.”
“What? How?”
“An anonymous phone call, usually. No time to meditate on that now, buddy. We have to leave.”
“A phone call? But no one…” And then a painful thought pierced me right through. Paul. But Paul is my friend. My only friend. He wouldn’t sell me out. I told him I was innocent. God damn it, Paul. He could have made that call precisely because he believed me.
“If the police were near we’d know,” Iris said suddenly. Just as she did, the music stopped, and the “No Smoking” signs above the bar began to flash.
“Let’s go,” the mustached man said, and we got up. No one turned to look at us, although there seemed to appear a general annoyed tension.