"Doing what?"
"Organizing the patients into a revolt. Somewhere along the way, he'd commandeered one of the leather mats from an isolation room. Then he recruited the more 'with it' patients into creating a disturbance. When the AN appeared upstairs, the patients charged him with the mat, knocked him out cold. But Eola had made a slight miscalculation. We had another patient here at the time— Rob George. Former heavyweight champion. He spent his first two years in the hospital catatonic. But just three days earlier, he'd walked all the way to the Day Room by himself. The AN on duty got him back to bed without incident, only to find him sitting up an hour later. Clearly, he was coming 'round.
"Well, the night of Eola's revolt, the whole unit got hopping. And apparently this got our boxing champion outta bed. Rob appeared in the middle of the Day Room. He looked at the AN, unconscious on the ground. Then stared at Christopher, grinning back up at him.
" 'Good news, man—' Eola started to say.
"And Mr. George pulled back his fist and knocked Christopher out cold. Good solid left-hand hook. Then he went back to bed. One of the other patients went down to the office at that point and took the phone off the hook. Without Eola, no one knew what to do.
"The ANs arrived, got everything in order. Next morning, Rob woke up and asked for his mother. Six weeks later, he was released. According to him, he never remembered the events of that night. I understand from the doctors, however, that upon emerging from a catatonic state, most patients' first movements are reflexive, a matter of muscle memory. Like sitting up. Or walking. Or, I guess, if you're a former boxing champ, a solid left hook."
"So what happened to Christopher?"
"His fellow patients ratted him out, and given his history, Admin had enough to transfer him to Bridgewater, which handles the criminally insane. I never heard about him again. But Bridgewater is like that. This place here"—Charlie pointed to the ground beneath his feet—"was a treatment facility. Bridgewater… once you go in, no one expects to see you again."
Sergeant Warren raised a brow "Charming."
Charlie shrugged. "Just the way things were."
"But he could've been released," Dodge prodded. "By the late seventies, weren't patient populations shrinking everywhere? Deinstitutionalization didn't just close Boston Mental, it affected everyone."
Charlie was nodding. "True, true. Damn shame, if you ask me." He cocked his head. "You know what kept me here? Working for four years, volunteering for six years after that? I've told you the scary stuff, the stories people want to hear about a mental institution. But truth is, this was a good hospital. We had patients like Rob George, who, with proper treatment, emerged from a catatonic state and got to go home to his loved ones. Second guy who almost killed me was a street kid named Benji. He was a good-looking kid, handsome Italian stock, but feral as they came. Police brought him in. First week, Benji stayed in a seclusion room, stark naked. He'd painted the wall and his body with his own feces. All you could see were his white eyeballs glowing in the dark.
"One day, when I was tending him, he sprang onto my back and damn near strangled me before another AN pulled him off. But you know what? He turned out to be a good kid. Regression, the doctors called it. Some kind of trauma had reverted him to a nearly two-year-old state; he wouldn't talk, eat, use the toilet, or dress himself. But once we started treating him like a two-year-old, we all got along great. I'd come in on Sundays, read him children's books, play silly songs. With a little bit of time, treatment, and human kindness, Benji grew up again, right before our eyes. He started wearing clothes, using the toilet, eating with silverware, saying please and thank you. Two years later, he was doing so well, a member of our board got him enrolled in Boston Latin. He went to school during the day—and slept in his room here at night. You'd find him studying in the middle of complete chaos in the Day Room.
"Eventually Benji graduated, got a job, moved out on his own. None of that would've happened without this hospital." Charlie shook his head sadly. "People think it's a sign of accomplishment when a mental institute closes. Three thousand people used to receive treatment here. Do you really think it's all gone away? Mental illness has just moved underground, into the homeless shelters and the city parks. Out of sight, out of mind for the taxpayers. It's a crying shame."