Everybody Needs A Friend by Bruce Zimmerman

It’s Wednesday again. I see my shrink at the VA every Wednesday at 10. Dr. Johnson’s office is antiseptically white and she sits in a chair made of steel tubing and white plastic. She is blonde, sort of, and maybe 10 years older than me but gravity has been kind.

We start out with familiar ground. How have I been sleeping? Am I still having the nightmares? How much have I been drinking? Am I still attending the meetings? She’s a stickler about the meetings. I lie at first and say I think they’re helping. I like the doughnuts.

Truth is I’ve been up most of the night again, staring blankly out the window and listening to the rain falling from the dark air and forming puddles on the pavement outside. Seems like it’s always raining here.

The nightmares keep me up. They keep coming, like bats that fly at night to feed and they feed on me.

I spent a year deployed to Delhi Sector, witnessing all manner of human carnage, narrowly avoiding becoming part of it myself. Standard issue amphetamines and implanted SSRIs helped, dulling the horror and wringing short-lived euphoria from my exhausted psyche, but eventually reality wins out. Now, I’m in the sticky Caribbean living in a cheap apartment off base and trying not to go crazy.

We’ve been over this ground before but Dr. Johnson seems to keep hoping for something new. So do I.

Turns out she has something new.

“There’s a website you might like to take a look at,” she says, and she writes down a web address on a piece of paper.

This is not entirely new. She has suggested I look at websites before or read things online, and she doesn’t make a special point of this one.

“You might find it interesting.” She rearranges her crossed legs and sighs. “You have what we call a refractory condition…,” she sounds apologetic, like it’s her fault. I’ve done the talk therapy, then the virtual reality guided imagery, finally the drug induced attempts to reprogram my fried amygdala. Six-months now.

“I’ll see you next week,” she says.

When I step outside it’s raining.

#

When I get home, there’s a message in my inbox. Turns out my tramp of an ex-wife is getting remarried. That’s mean-spirited, I know, but I can’t change the facts.

Since I got back, my female companionship has been limited to trips to the optimistically named Pleasure District, a depressing area of garish neon and dirty gutters. The women, if you can call them that with their surgical enhancements and dead, disinterested eyes, appear almost clownish sometimes. On the other hand, grotesque is in the eye of the beholder. I prefer Naturals when I can find them even though they cost more. “I’ve got what you want,” the woman always says, and sadly, she does.

Anyway, I don’t care, better him than me. I get drunk for the rest of the afternoon.

When I sober up, I sit at my computer and call up the website.

It starts out: Are you tired of the violence in the world? Images of war, poverty, mayhem loop, collapse into the head of a blonde, late middle-aged vaguely Nordic man. He smiles serenely, like Jesus might have smiled at his disciples. The website says there will be a meeting tomorrow morning, and an address is displayed in large block letters. Meet like-minded friends.

I look at Matilda across the top of my computer screen, blue and orange, hovering in her tank. She usually goes about her business, but now she’s staring at me. She’s a Butterfly Fish. I got her because Dr. Johnson said fish are relaxing. Sometimes I think Matilda is the only one who understands me.

I’ll go to the meeting. If you’ve got a refractory condition you’ve got nothing to lose.

#

So the next morning I trace unfamiliar streets into a neat but neglected industrial section of town. The building looks like a partially renovated warehouse, with a single metal door which is heavy when I open it.

It turns out to be a small meeting, just me and the blonde man.

“We’re not for everybody,” he says. “But you’re here. That’s excellent. I’m Joseph.”

There’s coffee and only two coffee cups, and it occurs to me that Joseph wasn’t expecting anybody but me.

He begins, saying they are a low-key organization, focusing on anti-war activities and human rights issues: lobbying politicians, writing op-ed pieces, public education.

“So, where are the other people?”

“We prefer to keep a low profile, but you’ll meet some of them if you decide you’d like to join us. It’s entirely up to you. Think it over.”

There’s not much to think over. At least it’ll get me out of my apartment.

#

The government has these night-time pro-war rallies with laser light shows, including images projected onto buildings and drone fly-overs with lights flashing like beacons from the gods. A few B-list celebrities are trotted out. I meet another guy and we set up a booth off to one side, with a projector that projects holographic images of villages decimated by drone strikes, dead burnt corpses, fleeing refugees. Painfully familiar. We have leaflets. The public response, those who notice us at all, is not aggressively hostile, but one of indifference, as if we are delusional, like a schizophrenic gone off his meds, to be pitied or ignored. We can’t compete with the drones and laser light shows.

Joseph suggests I take a turn moderating an anti-war social media chat group that he has set up, but I quickly tire of the rants and of having to filter out posts that incite various forms of creative and obviously illegal violence against public officials.

This seems like a waste of time. The nightmares have not relinquished their hold. Dr. Johnson says again it’s up to me, but suggests I stick with it for a while longer. She doesn’t seem surprised.

#

Friday nights I’m in my PTSD group. I love those guys, or at least some of them. They’ve been where I’ve been.

Jarod is still struggling with his guilt because he barely survived an interference field ambush in the Gobi and most of his squad didn’t. Jarod’s job was to monitor the field detection panels and he didn’t see it coming. I don’t know what to tell him that we haven’t already said. If I did, I would, but absolution is not mine to give.

It’s my turn to talk. “I dreamed about the kid again last night.” The guys are probably tired of hearing this, but it’s supposed to help if you talk about it.

I was back south of Delhi, on a recon patrol. We thought we had e-field coverage, but something went wrong. And there was this kid, Jason something. He was a few meters from me, up on a small hill. He had wandered outside the Faraday cage field created by the M7. Serious mistake. He shrieked when the thermal locked onto him. His eyes pleaded for help just before the convulsions started, but there was nothing I could do except listen to the screams and watch his skin begin to shrivel. It would have gotten me, too. Fifteen seconds, maybe, before the screams stopped. I expect fifteen seconds is a long time when the flesh is being melted off your body.

So far talking about it doesn’t in fact seem to be helping.

I tell them what I’ve been doing lately with the peace group, if that’s what you call it.

Jarod stops chewing his doughnut and says “The Asians are war criminals.” I point out that it was basically us who started the war.  You could make the case that we are the war criminals.

I get more worked up than usual, though I’m not sure why. Lately my emotional trajectory has not been hopeful.

When the meeting is over I swallow a couple of Red Lesbos and head to my car.

There is a makeshift homeless camp nearby. An aggressive panhandler stops me, blocking my path, looking menacing with disheveled olive jacket and scraggly beard. I’m not in the mood and tell him to get the fuck out of my way. I still have my Army bio-enhancements and I have no trouble avoiding his clumsily thrown fist, or planting my own into the approximate area of his trachea. I could have hit him a lot harder, possibly could have killed him but he is not seriously hurt. Of course the altercation is picked up by a surveillance drone which automatically calls a medical drone as well as the cops. I am questioned briefly, the video download from the cam supports my story: self-defense.

“You’re ex-Army, aren’t you?” the cop asks, eyeing me. He’s probably seen it before. “I’ve got a buddy whose ex-Army.” His expression softens slightly. “You’d better get it under control.” He lets me go with a citation for disorderly conduct.

#

I’m sitting once again in the warehouse with Joseph across from me. I’m here because last night I got an email from him saying he needs to talk to me.

“We’ve been monitoring your progress. You haven’t been doing very well.”

I’m not sure who “we” is, though I can guess. But I didn’t know I was being “monitored” and I’m not sure if I’m angry.

Joseph leans forward in his chair and says there’s something he needs to explain. He says Dr. Johnson sometimes contacts him about particularly difficult PTSD cases, though she can’t directly refer patients to him, if she did she might lose her license.

“All she can do is give you the website address, and hope you choose to respond. You see, we have some therapeutic approaches that are not exactly approved and which we are not prepared to make public.”

“So you’re not talking about setting up booths and running chat rooms.”

“No, I’m not, though we were at one point hoping those activities might prove beneficial for you. They don’t seem to be, based on your recent altercation with the homeless individual. We follow our candidates closely.”

“Candidates for what?”

He asks if I have heard of TMS: trans-cranial magnetic stimulation. “It’s generally used to treat depression and sometimes other neurological problems. It’s completely noninvasive and painless.” It sounds vaguely familiar. He says he thinks it can help me.

“So what’s the big secret if it’s a known therapy?”

“A good question, and one I can’t answer just yet. But it will become obvious if you decide you’re interested in pursuing the treatment. It can be quite effective with especially difficult depression and PTSD cases. However, it also produces some other effects. You need to experience it. Let’s just say it has an effect on your overall perception of things. It will give you a different outlook, a more insightful outlook.”
He says that initially the effect is temporary but with repeated applications it’s permanent.

“Dr. Johnson and I have discussed your case and would like to offer you an initial experience with this treatment. We think you would be an excellent candidate, but as I said it must be entirely your choice.”

I think about it for a moment, not very long really, and say that won’t be necessary, I know I need to try something. Joseph seems pleased.

“In that case, we can begin immediately.” He stands up and motions me toward a side room.

#

I am settled into a chair. He produces an elastic skull cap, placing it on my head, connecting various wires.

“Now just relax. It’s just magnetic fields. You should feel the effect beginning almost immediately.” He turns a knob and watches a dial.

I do feel the effect. Initially I feel intense relaxation, not unlike certain semi-legal drugs, but then it goes beyond that. It’s like a weight being lifted, or a fog dissipating.

“Oh,” I say. “Oh.”

“Just relax. Just relax,” and then “Now, let’s talk about some things. Tell me about the war.”

I tell him about the war, about my experience of it, but it seems different now, like I’m seeing it through a clear lens for the first time.

“It’s all so… pathological,” I say.

“Yes,” he says, “Yes. And what else?”

I think for a moment. “There have been so many wars, for thousands and thousands of years. It’s horrible, and so… sick. As I continue to talk, I suddenly see it all and the horror and sorrow of it all washes over me. The march of human civilization now seems like a long death march, the evolution of human beings a terrible mistake.

“We’re a race of monsters!”

Joseph says “I think that’s enough for your first session,” and he removes the cap from my head.

I feel that I’ve seen things clearly for the first time in my life and it feels overwhelming. I ask him what just happened.

He settles back in his chair. “These human behaviors are, of course, based on instinct, the result of evolutionary baggage encoded in certain area of the brain.” He pauses for a moment. He says they have identified some of those areas and learned how to target them with TCM. What I just experienced is my own perception temporarily free of these encoded behaviors, or at least with their influence on my thinking temporarily reduced.

“Someday, we hope this use of TCM will become common. Human beings don’t need to be burdened with so much inherent evil. It would be sort of like curing Original Sin. There’s a growing number of us, some in important positions, but for the time being we must remain hidden or risk a backlash. Many people, authorities, would not understand.

“We refer to ourselves as Friends, or sometimes as a Society of Friends. You may have heard that term, it is somewhat archaic. It was once used by the Quakers. In a sense we are a continuation of that movement, updated with modern technology. With TCM we may finally be able to achieve something they only dreamed of.

“If you wish, you can join us.”

#

When I get home I open a beer and sit and stare out the window and try to process what just happened. It’s raining again, though only lightly and dusk is settling.

Curing Original Sin seems a little grandiose. Still, I feel better now than I’ve felt in a long time. Maybe I can even sleep tonight.

Do I trust my perception of things while the TCM was working? Still, everything seemed so clear and obvious, and I want to feel that way again.

Down the street there are some neon signs framed by two palm trees. I see the familiar blue and yellow sign from the Chinese restaurant, with the dragon that twists its blue tail and breathes yellow fire every few seconds.

As I continue watching, tears start welling up in my eyes, like sometimes happens when I think about that kid killed in Delhi Sector. Except this time it feels different, for a different reason.

Matilda swims over to the front of her tank to look at me. She is staring at me again, hovering in the water.

I shutdown the computer and walk over to Matilda’s tank, sprinkle in some meal worms, her favorite treat. She rushes for them and starts gobbling them up.

I should get Matilda a friend, another Butterfly Fish, I think.

Joseph said the effect of the TCM is temporary in the beginning. With repeated treatments it becomes permanent.

It seems clear what I want to do, what I need to do.

I guess everybody needs a friend.

—

Bruce Zimmerman spent over 40 years as an engineer at the Department of Energy’s Hanford nuclear facility in Washington State, and also served as an officer in the Navy nuclear submarine program. He is now retired and lives in eastern Washington State, regularly hiking the desert buttes and trying not to step on rattlesnakes. This is his first story.