A Child Killer's Soliloquy : Chapter 1

It is undeniably a sign of worsening times when a man is persecuted, or, as you will say, prosecuted for helping his wife when she is ill. Please do not bring up that I should have sought medical help. I did do that. I spoke to experts from every field of medicine. General practitioners sent me to hematologists who sent me to oncologists who sent me to psychologists who sent me ever further onwards to meeting more useless experts. Every single one of these men, with letters after their names, in white coats and with diplomas in the place of wallpaper, told me nothing but that their particular field of expertise could do nothing for my beloved wife.

Some offered medicines which, in addition to not working, inflicted terrible side effects on the poor woman. Without again consulting these doctors, all of whom I was now suspecting of being quacks than anything professional, I removed my wife from these medications. I’d rather her deal with this illness on its own as opposed to vying for her own survival with both this mystery illness and some chemical poisons. Besides, all medicine today is designed to make one sick. A patient cured is a customer lost is the first rule of medical school.

Of course I kept looking. I would, and still will, do absolutely anything for my wife. In fact, I believe that’s why you’re here with me now.

However, I began to expand my search. Of course, I still took my wife to see various doctors and other so-called medical experts. All of them were unable to help, though they each offered some expensive therapy or addictive prescription. I also consulted faith healers and self-described apothecaries who, rather than source their medicines from large chemical factories and assemble them into pills just as poisonous as any bacteria they might be fighting …. I am sorry, I rant sometimes. The incompetence of modern medical personnel still makes my blood boil. 

As I was saying, these apothecaries who source their medical ingredients from the earth. Various plant roots pulverized and mixed with another plant’s boiled leaves, or a strict diet regimen, some even suggested she just smoke more pot. These last ones I quickly realized were no better then the pill pimps in white coats, but at least the marijuana had no terrible side effects on the love of my life.

I think, before I continue, I should describe her symptoms to you. I think you’ll find this quite interesting, and perhaps lend greater credence to what I am telling you.

First and foremost, my wife became extraordinarily sensitive to sunlight. This began with sunburns becoming for common for her, but within what I remember to be nothing but a matter of weeks, these sunburns had more in common with second or third degree burns. Her initial solution was to wear thick layers of sunscreen, cover herself as much as possible, and don a wide-brimmed hat. This worked a couple of times until her outdoor activities, namely tending to her lovely garden – which I maintained throughout her sickness, by the way – caused her to do actions which exposed some square inches of her skin to the sun’s burning beams. She would scream, and another hospital run it would be.

Eventually, the two of us agreed it would be better to confine her to remain indoors at all times. Careful coordination was done for any trips, all of which had to prove mandatory for her, so that she would not once be exposed to sunlight. I felt terrible seeing her like this, no better than a prisoner.

She began to sleep during the day, and remain awake at night. This proved best, as it was easy to sunproof the room in which she slept, and nighttime gave no threat of the sun so she was free to wander the house. She didn’t really want to go outside, since, as she had been inside and her skin had become so sensitive to the sun, she had become, in her own head at least, hideously pale. I still thought of her as beautiful.

It’s for the best though, as crime where we live is not altogether under control.

Another symptom she began to experience was an allergic reaction to garlic. She would vomit whenever she ate anything with the slightest hint of it. She would cry that her mouth burned. We opted to ask doctors about it, who were of course no help whatsoever, and also begin making all our meals in our own kitchen, where we could carefully choose each ingredient to eliminate garlic entirely from both of our diets.

Some of her symptoms were strange, and I still believe them to be psychological. But I amended our house to deal with them anyway. First, she felt that silver burned her skin just like the sun did, though no wound was noticeable. Still, I replaced all the silver in the house with equivalents made from some other metal. I the case of decorations, I simply trashed what few sterling silver possessions we had around.

She had a real phobia of anything depicting two lines intersecting perpendicularly. Some hack shrink smiled at this condition, calling it quatrogonophobia or some shit like that. I wanted to punch that old man straight in his wrinkled nose, breaking his glasses and hopefully killing him. He was happier to have found some fear of four right angles, all opposite one another, than he was interested in helping my wife.

Still, all the crosses and criss-cross knick knacks we had in the house found there way to the city dump.

The last of these psychological symptoms was a fear of running water. The poor woman could not be in the kitchen any time I had to run the sink to, for example, wash vegetables. She couldn’t even take a shower. Our solution was to run a bath for her.

But the last and most serious of her symptoms was another all-too-real physical one. And I have kept this one last to tell you because I think it justifies what I have done. She began to rapidly age. About a year and half into trying to find some treatment or cure for whatever sickness she had, she began to wrinkle. Now, we are a young couple, and she several years younger than me. There is no reason for a woman like her to being looking as if she were fifty something. And the wrinkling got worse. Her hair also began to gray and as it grayed, it began to fall out.

This told me that she was close to death if I didn’t do something. Luckily, one of the faith healers I visited, a woman who sold some powders or something, upon the failure of her recommendations, did tell me of an old man who might help. She gave this advice free of charge, with a look of compassion and empathy and had not seen on a face throughout this entire ordeal. And despite the failure of her own prescribed remedies, I knew I had no choice but to follow up on her lead. And I am happy I did.