"Well, Peter, now that you're on the couch, let's discuss in detail the reason you came to see me."
"I've already told..," I said, lifting my head from the couch Professor Schlotheim had laid me on.
"A patient lying on the couch is always more open to his inner feelings and experiences," the professor returned my head to the cushion with a slight movement of his hand, then pulled a chair over and sat down at the headboard. "This property of the couch was discovered by Dr. Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis. So you say that you often feel being pressed down by some psychological tension of inexplicable nature."
"Yes, Professor. I feel this pressure on me. But not all the time, but only at work."
"And where do you work?"
"I work at a strip club," I answered.
"A male stripper?"
"No, I am not," I smiled. "The strippers are all girls there. I work as a waiter there. "
"I thought they employed girls as waiters in places like that."
"The dancers and strippers, they all are girls. You're right, most strip clubs have girls working as waiters. But the owner of our club, she's different, and decided to hire guys as waiters."
"What's her reason?"
"Our club's main goal is to get as much money out of our guests as possible. Male guests. The girls first dance on stage, as well as between the tables, undress themselves completely, then just join the guests at their tables. The overjoyed men start offering the naked girl a drink. That's where the waiters come in. We bring drinks to the guests and the girls. But the thing is, our girls don't drink liquor at work, though they ask the guests to treat them with alΡoholic beverages. In fact they drink something non-alcoholic under the guise of an expensive drink, like apple juice instead of brandy. All the stuff they order from me, like those expensive, exotic cocktails, are in reality a cheap mixture of some soft drinks."
"Don't the guests notice this kind of fraud?" asked the Professor.
"They're too aroused to notice it. That's the trick."
"I see "
"So, my task is to bring the girl something non-alcoholic, which I will then put on the bill as an expensive alcoholic drink. Most importantly, I have to keep a record of all the fake drinks the girl orders through me. Then at the end of the shift, each girl gets half the price of those drinks she asked the guests to buy for her."
"I presume it's called consummation."
"Correct. The owner of our establishment, it's called Tootsie Club, wants drinks and food to be served by guys only, so that the aroused guests don't harass or distract us, and we in turn carry out our duties totally undisturbed. So, the waiters' main duty is to keep a proper record of consummation. That's where I fail. I get my notes confused all the time."
"How so?"
"I get things mixed up by incorrectly writing down the girls' names and the drinks they order."
"What's the reason for this absent-mindedness? Are you distracted by the sight of naked girls around you?"
"That's not the main reason, I assure you, Professor. Yeah, there are naked girls me all the time, they're dancing on stage, walking in aisles, sitting at the tables with the guests, standing at the bar. They are everywhere. And they get real angry with me, and yell at me when they find out I wrote down their orders wrong again. After that I get even more confused.
"Do their yelling and anger affect you?"
"Yes, it does, but it's not what's really oppressive to me."
"Then what is it?"
"It's hard for me to explain it. I feel something in their presence, in their nakedness, in their conduct, in their dancing, in the way they undress, in the way they behave. I feel something inexplicable, and this thing pressures me, weighs me down, makes me get confused in my notes. It lays heavy on my consciousness, but I feel this oppression only in the girls' presence. I hope you can figure out what my problem is."
"Peter, you yourself have just identified the cause of your problem."
"You're kidding, Professor."
"You said that the problem is that there's some heavy weight lying on your consciousness."
"Exactly," I confirmed. "But what kind of weight it is, I don't know. I just feel it but can't identify it in any way.'
"Very well, Peter," Professor Schlotheim smiled slyly. "Let me first tell you a little fable, if you don't mind "
"No, I don't," I said.
"Once a donkey was loaded with heavy panniers, and the beast hadn't gone halfway before he collapsed under the weight and could not get up. Three wise men passed by, and watching the donkey, began to tell his master their thoughts about what had happened."
"One of them said that the donkey must have eaten too much thistles, the second declared that the donkey must have fought with other jackasses, and was now resting after the fight, and the third surmised that the donkey must have had his horseshoes worn off."
"Then a peasant passed by, and said to them all - the donkey is dying under those heavy panniers, just take them off him quickly, and then go on making your assumptions."
"Well, Peter, I, like that rustic man, want to take the heavy panniers off you first, and only then find out the reason why you can't carry them any longer."
"I see, Professor," I said. "But how are you going to take them off?"
"First, I'd like to administer a little drug therapy to your mind. I could, of course, write you a prescription for some known medicine, as I should. But I want to try something else, if you don't mind?"
"What do you mean?"
Professor Schlotheim rose from his chair and walked over to the glass cabinet at the opposite wall.
"I have my own laboratory," he announced. "There I managed to develop this new drug. It's not licensed yet."
The professor opened the cabinet and pulled out a small transparent plastic jar full of green pills.
"But I tell you - this drug has been tested on ten species of animals, and my assistant Bob has already tried these pills, with no harm to his health, but only benefits to his mental state. Now it's up to you to trust me. I'd like you to take this jar right away. All you have to do is take two pills a day for a week."
I sat up on the couch.
"What effect on my mental state do you expect, Professor?"
"Rest assured, Peter, you'll like it. It's all about your confidence in my scientific abilities. We'll have another session with you in a week, and believe me, by that time a lot of things will have fallen into place in your head. So, Peter, are you taking these pills?"
Three hours later I walked briskly through the staff entrance of Tootsie Club, changed into my waiter's uniform in the locker room, slipped the jar of Professor Schlotheim's pills into my apron pocket, and hurried into the club's hall.
The club had not yet been opened that night, and there was no one in the hall except Michael, the bartender, who stood behind the bar, wiping glasses.
"What's up, Peter?"
