Pic up the Pieces

Dr Zoptic: Part 11 Aftermath: Picking Up The Pieces

Good morning Ms Ehrlich," the psychologist began, "I'm Dr Handley Plume, a psychologist retained to conduct an interview in connection with the case of," shuffling his papers, Dr Plume declared, "Aha!" Looking down at the document, Plume exclaimed, "Ehrlich v University Hospital and Dr Rebecca Barton." Dr Plume, squinting one eye open its focus trained on me, commented, "Reading these papers, I detect a bit of hostility from you."

"Hostile to you? No!" I delivered a repartee, "It such a joy to undress in front of strangers so that insurance consultants can poke and finger - fuck me."

"Hmm, studying the photos in your file, I can see the basis for your claim you were fired by the Hospital under the Rehabilitation Act. The hospital employed you I read here..." Dr Plume leafing through his papers shot me a pained smile, "you were once an anatomical model. Undressing was part of the job ..."

"For which I was paid," I snapped. "Since filing this case, I have had to strip naked for insurance consultants to allow them to feel along my breastbone, cop a feel off my stunning cup A boobs, and look up my fotze and look me over with a stupid grin that asks without saying -- `Did you enjoyed it?'"

Laughing Dr Plume continued, "...but I'm only a psychologist. You need not disrobe -- unless of course you'd want to."

"What a privilege," I snickered tartly.

"For a lack of hostility, that was quite a blast of acrimony!" Dr Plume exclaimed.

"Hostile no, Angry, maybe not," I replied, "Disappointed more accurately. Rather than going through the stages of what -- do -- they -- ma -- call -- it Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, the in -- disease of the moment, I should tell you my story."

===

"'Oh my god. It's Erica!' Dr Zaftig, my roommate, hoovering over me, cried out," I, drifting into consciousness, found myself stripped naked lying on the rough broken sidewalk in the rundown Central Avenue Renewal Area. My head had been swimming. I had taken a sucker punch to the head and knocked to the ground. "Oh my god. It's Erica!" Zaftig cried, "What do I do now?"

Lying on the debris strewn sidewalk, I, as the haze which clouded my eyes cleared, realized that when I turned the corner, I had walked into the middle of my roommate's Emergency Response Team's disaster exercise. I had been accosted by a male, tossed to the ground while a female jabbed me with a needle and cut away my clothes. My expensive red sweater and dungarees lay in shreds nearby.

Stupid thoughts came to mind. Damn, I pondered, that sweater was expensive.

When Zaftig chided me that I spent my paycheck from the medical modelling job she had gotten me, I told her "A red sweater, Dolly, I use to symbolize the passion I feel for my chosen profession."

"Hmm," Zaftig laughed, "prostitution or law. Is there a difference?"

The curly dark-haired male standing over me looking down came into focus. Running a fingernail along the scar that went down the hollow of my concave breastbone, he grimaced, "I didn't expect a freak show. Hey -- did we examine any mutations this morning?"

Still kneeling at my side, the female mumbled some comforting words before she turned to lecture the male, "Pectoral excavatum occurs in every 300 -- 400 births, mostly observed in males rather than females ..." The female droned on. "The condition warrants surgical intervention in extreme cases. This vertical surgical wound eh--healed well."

Geeze, tonight, I looked forward to a pleasant dinner with Zaftig, I hadn't expected to be dissected and put on display as part of a medical presentation. Oh, I had pestered Zaftig to put my name in as a crisis actor, but she had forgotten. Zaftig did place me as a temp to fill in for her secretary Sherry who took an extra day on the holiday weekend. "With me out on the drill and the Department closed for the day, you can study and get paid for the day."

"You know," I complained, "the mass disaster exercise pays in cash, several times what I get paid for the day. Damn I forgot my scarf. I feel naked without it."

"I can accommodate you there," Zaftig promised. "I have red silk scarves to issue. Pick me up around 5 PM on Central Avenue. I'll treat you to dinner. 5PM, sharp I shouldn't want to be on Central Avenue after dark."

I was looking forward to a pleasant dinner with Zaftig which would melt some of the icy frost that crept in between us and lead to some kiss and make up. Instead, I was stripped naked and treated to a medical lecture.

====

"Zoptic? Did I hear you right," Dr Plume interrupted, "Court papers indicate that the doctor named as defendant is," the psychologist, impetuously leafed through his file, "I have Dr Rebecca Barton."

"The nickname I used for Becky--Dr Barton was Zaftig, but Zoptic is what tin ears and small brains hear," I chuckled. Detecting his confused look, I added, "it means a full, rounded figured, plump woman." I insisted, "You want to hear the story or you want I should explain how I came up with my pet name for Becky--er Dr Barton.

====

Called to the scene Zaftig, Dr Barton, fell to her knees crying, "How did I get a real casualty in a play mass disaster drill? Why is this happening to me?"

Happening to her? I wondered, but I'm the one whose clothes were cut away and left naked on the sidewalk.

Standing behind Zaftig, a tall thin woman, my size and weight, hands on her hips wearing a bright red scarf and sweater demanded payment. "I showed up and was on hand, even if Emergency Response hadn't used this mutant," the woman pointed at me, "instead of me."

To either side of Dr Barton the two first year med students were babbling that "we couldn't have known, she wasn't a crisis actor. She was wearing a bright red sweater and crimson scarf when she came out of nowhere at the corner. 'The victim' put up resistance. So, we cold -- conked her."

On the street, Central Avenue, coming up behind Dr Barton, a burly capitol land firefighter in a blue utility uniform, gruffly dismissed the med students, "I'm sure Dr Barton will give you ugh -- an A+ for courage in face of adversity." Turning to the shrieking actress, the fireman ordered her to collect her pay. "You got a free ride," he told the actress as he squatted to take my pulse with his hand, "on someone else's ticket. Collect your pay before I change my mind."

Rising Zaftig thanked the fireman. "My head was bursting from the cacophony of the blathering medical students, pleading innocence, ignorance and inexperience."

Looking into my eyes, the fireman diagnosed, "no serious injuries. She'll ache and be groggy for quite awhile." Shaking his head, the firefighter grunted, "Veteran's Day Holiday weekend -- Damn, with Vets Day coming before Halloween, I guess your friend experienced quite a trick - or - treat. Still wherever they drop a holiday, people, even in emergency services or medicine, get sloppy trying to stretch that three -- day weekend into four days."

"Bob, I'm a newly appointed director. In my job, there is no A+ for the effort. I can't afford this on my record," Zaftig pled, "What do we do now?"

Looking around, the Fireman sighed, "Everybody took off. Time to scoot. We'll call a report in anonymously. She'll get picked up right away. We have to bury this story. Rescue service's positive public image might be destroyed by an incident like this."

As Zaftig walked away with the firefighter, she turned to look around before she asked, "What happened to her purse?"

"How long have you been around hospitals?" the firefighter snickered, "Everyone in a hospital is an opportunist. Forget it! You have to be more concerned with preserving the," he snorted, "godly image of medicine. Remember, you're supposed to be Dr Good -- bee, the guy on TV. The doctor is always right!"

I might have interjected `or is that Dr Fair -- Weathers -- bee?' if I could. Sprawled naked on the ground, woozy with a blow to my head and reeling from drugs that I had been injected with, I found myself gripped in laughter, though I couldn't make any sounds.

"What happened to her purse? Are you sure you didn't see it?" Dr Barton repeated her question.

The fireman waved a hand contemptuously to brush her off as they walked toward the boxy Rescue vehicle. A few instants later, the boxy Rescue ambulance paused near me. From the passenger side Zaftig peered out and sighed. The fireman assured her, "I'll call the cops. Let them pick up the pieces."

Then, the vehicle took off as the last glittering rays of Indian Summer sun as it died sending sparkles across the cobblestone pavement of Central Avenue here in Capitalland.

===

"It sounds like a touch of melodrama. Are you're painting a picture or writing a script for a made -- for TV movie?" Dr Plume the psychologist interjected.

I smiled, "Training. Paint a picture. Tell a story. That's what you're taught in law school. Make it real," I replied. "Flat on my back, I found myself unable to move -- someone had jabbed me in the arm. Lying naked on the broken concrete sidewalk in this desolate area, I didn't think of it as real. Really, it seemed unreal. I thought it was a joke, a prank my partner--roomie Zaftig played to get even with me."

"Why would your eh--roommate need to get even with you?" the psychologist questioned.

"That's what I thought but I was confused," I recalled, "as the image of Zaftig emerged from the haze clouding my mind, I wondered: Were there actually tears in her eyes? Zaftig was a tough little girl. Crocodile tears, perhaps, or was she crying for herself?"

"Zaftig or Zoptic was a derisive term, you used for your roommate?" the psychologist, with a cynical smile, teased me, "Are you jealous of her?"

"No," I answered, "Zaftig attached to her from the very first as descriptive. Later, as our relationship grew, it became a term of endearment. Should I go on or you want I should debate you over semantics in pseudo psycho -- babble? Let me go to the very beginning. How I met my roommate might be the place to go."

"Tell me about Zaftig?" the psychologist demanded.

=====

I learned of Zaftig's search for a roommate from a tall, dark faced, pretend English Al Mandy, a friend studying medicine in the University Hospital. "Rebecca Barton does tend toward a tad peculiar. Solid downstate family," Al intoned in his polished English accent, "Clintonville Heights."

"Clintonville Heights?" I replied a faking a cockney accent, "Mightn't I, a lass from The Fenlands, luv, be a mote down - market for'n the likes of her?"

"You might find," Al replied, "despite your working-class affectations, you two have much in common. Both," Al smirked as he mocked me slipping into a lower-class accent, "youse two." Reverting to his practiced English polish after a pause, Al continued, "were carried along in the 1970s revolution ban -- the -- bra, push -- ahead -- programme.."

"Peculiar, you mean, like flotsam carried along in a hurricane storm surge raging through the saltwater marsh land of The Fenlands neighborhood I come from," I suggested.

"Pater knows her people from hospital. Becky Barton had been sent up here to a Capitalland convent school. She wanted to be a nun. Then the push -- ahead -- program propelled her to University, then Medical College," Al explained. "Looking at her, Becky fits that image, a cute face, but a rounded bum. You Yanks might call her a `Butterball.'"

"A Zaftig? Think of it me shacked up with the stereotypical chubby little Nun!" I exclaimed.

"Ah, Becky is a rare bird indeed. At University, she won the title, `Ice Queen,' for the way she can disconnect from people and the situation going on around her. As far as the Nunnery, I think that fancy passed. She sings a different anthem these days: `I am woman!' You colonials, in the day of women's liberation, might say our dear Butterball Becky went from one Sisterhood to another," Al quipped. "Your alternative is to crash in one of the dorm rooms," Al suggested, "Your presence likely would pass unnoticed for a train of days. Mightn't that buy you a fortnight to devote for your search or a flat -- mate?"

"Not possible," I shuddered. I couldn't imagine taking off my clothes and exposing myself in communal facilities."

"Remarkable! Becky's conclusion was the same when her people cut the stipend which covered the rent. Go see the lass," Al advised, "Give Becky a fair go."

==================

"What intrigues me is the concept of 'Dr Barton getting even, in the context of your diverse backgrounds. There's a measure of jealousy I'd like to explore." the psychologist prodded me.

"Let me go back to the beginning. May I?" I asked, "Where was I? I was in my first year of law school, I when I was introduced to Zaftig by Al Mandy. We were both looking for roommates to share space with..."

=================

I admit when Zaftig opened the door, my eyes almost came out of their sockets just like a character in an old cartoon. If I hadn't been so stunned, I might have run away. Pleasingly plump wasn't the word. Rotund, perhaps, No Zaftig. "Al was certainly right about you," Before I realized what was coming out of my mouth, I blurted out, "Here's my face, my ass comes later.".

Zaftig took my Freudian slip with a laugh. "My Ex -- boyfriend didn't mind the preeminence of my gluteal prominence, until the day he broke it off. Seems everything happened at once. Father cut the stipend, my boyfriend broke it off with me and my roommate didn't like the rent increase the landlord wanted. She took off. What comes next?"

"Me," I declared, "The solution to your problems. I'm boiling in the same kettle, Dolly. I've lost my flat -- off campus rooms -- my previous roommate from college years got herself married," I explained, "and wanted the place to herself. I had been in that apartment since undergraduate days. I was there so long I thought of it as home. Problem was my name wasn't on the lease. I outsmarted myself."

"Oh?" Zaftig prompted me.

"Even though I promised to tiptoe around her doing her guy on the floor in front of me any differently than I had when she did him or any other guy -- or gal -- huh," I paused to laugh, "before the marriage. Heck, I'd've done them both just to keep the flat."

Zaftig's eyes widened. "Al told you that I went to a convent school -- St Athena's right here in town."

"Dolly, we have much in common!" I exclaimed, "My saintly father threatened the family doctor with sending me to St Athena's of the Holy Virgins Convent School to force the bastard to write gym excuses." I looked up to the heavens with a crazy smile. "There were many virgins at St Athena's?"

"I couldn't tell," Zaftig made cute repartee, "from all the dental impressions I noticed on mammary glands in the communal shower."

"Fortunately, Dolly, the family doctor relented and signed the script exempting me from gym. Unlike you I stayed in the public schools. Like you," I acknowledged, "I was swept up in girl power--the push ahead program." I pushed Zaftig with the ribald promise, "I'll give you the same respect I gave my previous roomie, Dolly."

====

Dr Plume's eyebrows knotted. His face bore a quizzical look. "Quite an introduction! And she let you in?"

"Oh, Zaftig and I, she short and fat, me tall and skinny; her with double DDs, me in a trainer bra and a camisole over it. What a pair of opposites!" I shook my head, "I liked her from the very start and I enjoyed watching her reaction whenever I scandalized her."

====

"I wouldn't know what to say to that," Zaftig's face had this dumb expression, like she knew what I was saying but just playing stupid.

"I'm embarrassing you, Dolly," I gave Zaftig a friendly poke, "Forgive me Dolly. I'm picking up the pieces, recovering from a bad break -- up with my roomie--she wouldn't cut me a break by keeping me until the end of the semester."

When her laugh turned into a stare fixated at my hawkish nose, she looked down trying not to be impolite. In a weak voice she apologized. "Proboscises show great structural variations in human physiology."

"Pro -- bos -- cis!" I exclaimed tripping over the words deliberately. Laughing I threw Zaftig a hug. When Zaftig looked at my arm quizzically, I reassured her, "I've heard you're a third-year med student. Oh, my pro -- bos -- cis, you say!" I covered my nose with my free hand, "If you should manage to graduate, Dolly, you can maybe fix my needle nose for me--and a lot of more interesting other stuff too."

"Oh!" Zaftig replied in a serious tone, "I don't intend to take up one of the traditional roles reserved for women in medicine: teaching, gynecology, obstetrics, or Craniofacial reconstructive surgery."

"Dolly," I declared, "It isn't what you say, but sure you say it. Maybe I can get an English translation."

"Huh?" Zaftig was taken aback. That was the first time she shot me that look, like she was disconnected uninvolved in the scene, like there was no personal relationship.

"Dolly, are we going to have fun together!" I exclaimed, "Dolly? It's an impersonal way of being personal, like the way the Gabor sisters say it." I could see that unknowing, quizzical look come across her face. "You never saw Eva and Zza Gabor on Classic TV re -- runs?"

"In family, Father imposed a strict regimen of studies and insisted on a high level of academic performance," Zaftig expressed ignorance.

"How culturally deprived!" My tone turned serious, "Never you mind. We'll make a pair. Speaking of pairs," I sighed, "With that pair of Double DDs," I studied her chest so intensely, Zaftig covered them with her hands, "hanging on my long lean frame, I could work the strip clubs. I wouldn't have to flip burgers for $2.10 an hour -- Did you know the minimum wage is going up to a whopping 2.30 in January."

"I wouldn't know what to say to that." Zaftig was red faced.

I sighed. Taking her hand away from those bazooms, I assured her, "I may be Supergirl, but I don't have X -- ray vision. Clutching her hand in mine, I led the way into the apartment. "Now, down to business, let me see my room and I need to know the rent. How much you pay? My share, how much?"

I gulped when I heard the rent but Zaftig, while sympathetic to the recent what she called, "calamitous episode," explained, "my own former roommate regarded the apartment as spacious, warm in these frigid northern winters and quiet, but too expensive."

Looking around at the high crown ceiling in the living room and the weak light in the medallion ceiling, I commended, "the old stuff chairs, the fireplace and parquet floor make this look like something out of `Life with Father.'"

"Father did say something like that. We had to let the apartment as is with its furnishings," Zaftig reminisced.

"Dolly, how did you land here?" I asked.

"A funny thing happened to me on my way to the novitiate to become a nun when surprise -- surprise the Equal Opportunity Push -- Ahead -- Programme suddenly opened professions to women. I had to scramble to find a place. Father would have wanted something cheaper, but this was what came available. So, I landed here in a spacious first floor apartment in this old Brownstone." Zaftig's massive chest heaved. "Lately, everything seemed to have gone wrong at once. Crisis after crisis left me devastated in the midst of a demanding opportunity in Emergency Medicine that was sapping my strength and taking time from my regular studies. What else could go wrong? I ask myself."

"I'm a law student, Dolly," I replied, "Docs are in a pissing match refusing to treat lawyers. Would I be a problem for you imperious Deities cowering behind the curtain of silence?"

"Things have gone so badly for me, of late," Zaftig responded, "I'm ready to cope with any exigency."

"I guess I'll be flipping more burgers to pay the rent," I supposed.

=============