Miles Johnson-Foreman `23

It was an abnormally hot Saturday morning and Eric was sitting in his kitchen eating Corn Flakes to the morning
weather report from the radio.
“If you can help it, do not go outside!” The reporter warned. Eric wished he could stay inside where there was air
conditioning but he knew he had to be on the move. Today was the day Eric’s girlfriend Beatrice Loretta was to be
released from the Psychiatric Pavilion of Louisiana and he wasn’t going to waste any time getting there.
Eric looks himself in the mirror as he dragged a thin toothed comb through his stringy dirty blonde hair. After seeing
himself in the mirror again and realizing that the comb had made no difference, he decides to throw on an LA Dodgers
baseball cap with aviator sunglasses his father passed down to him from his father. “This is good,” He moves the stray
strands of hair from in front of his face.
Eric scoops the keys to his ‘74 BMW 2002 and begins shuffling through different notes of directions he took that will
lead him to the Pavilion.
It’s about a 30 minute drive and as Eric pulls into the Pavilion parking lot, he finds the nearest space that’s close to the
building. Inside, he approaches the service desk lady who’s chewing 3 hour old tasteless bubble gum extremely loud and
looking at herself in the mirror while she combs out her hair. The receptionist sees Eric from the corner of her eye and
sucks in her teeth with attitude.
“Can I help you sir?” the lady asks arrogantly.
“Yeah,” Eric raises an eyebrow. “Beatrice Loretta, she’s supposed to be released today and I’m picking her up. Is there
someplace I can wait?” He crosses his arms, not about to take anything other than “Right over there sir,” as an answer.
The desk lady refuses to make eye contact with Eric “Can you wait a minute please? Sit right over there and I’ll have
someone escort her to you”
The receptionist orders a nurse to summon Beatrice over “Yeah, I have someone over here to pick up Beatrice Loretta…
is she due to be discharged today?”
The nurse haphazardly shuffles a few pieces of papers around before declaring that Beatrice was in fact being discharged
today. She passes Beatrice who is still on a few sedatives over to the receptionist who then moves her over to the waiting
room. “Good luck out there,” The woman says without even trying to mask the sarcasm. “And you too,” She finally
makes eye contact with Eric. “You’re going to need it with this one,” she tells Eric as she twirls her finger next to her
head.
Beatrice is silent as the receptionist wishes Eric luck and pokes fun at Beatrice’s condition. Once she’s pushed over to
Eric by the lady, she stumbles the tiny distance over and delicately falls into Eric’s chest.
“Hey,” Eric takes her from the receptionist and pulls Beatrice away to get a good look into her face. “You guys giving me
the right one?” He asks and the receptionist doesn’t know if he’s joking or not.
“We double and triple checked,” She assures him.
“Cool,” He throws her arm over her shoulder once he feels her starting to slump over.
“She’s still on a few medications, that’s why she’s looking so frail right now. “Just take her home, keep her in bed, and
monitor her for a few days.”
“Yeah. First thing I’ll do is get her some real food. I heard stories…why would you feed these people things that you
know you wouldn’t eat yourself ?”
11
The receptionist gives Eric a soulless, corporate grin. “That’s not my decision. I wish you luck!” She says, ending the
conversation and showing Eric the way back out.
Eric puts his hands on Beatrice’s shoulders and pushes her back gently just to get a better look at her. Her face was
noticeably gaunt and there was a look of shock in her eyes, the same shell shocked look the guys fighting in Vietnam
were coming home with.
The receptionist waves Eric and Beatrice on their way and Eric leads his significant other out to his car and opens the
passenger side door for her.
“Get me far away from here,” Beatrice finally utters.
“That’s the plan,” Eric responds as he puts the car into gear.
Eric makes the half hour drive back to his house and as soon as Beatrice crosses over the welcome mat, she raids Eric’s
refrigerator before Eric has a chance to even show her where the kitchen is. “Help yourself,” He says in passing of
Beatrice who is making herself the thickest turkey sandwich using all of Eric’s lunch meat for the week.
Eric sits down by the phone and spins up Tiffany’s number with the old rotary dial. “B, I’m about to call Tiffany! She
might want to talk to you, is that okay?”
Beatrice nods as she stuffs her face, smearing mayonnaise and ketchup about the lower half of her face.
After gorging herself on Eric’s pantry, the two of them come together in his living room where they catch up on each
other’s lives and make a loose plan for the future of their relationship.
“Well, do you want me to help you make an appointment with one of these therapists? Y’know, I’ve seen one of them
myself when I was living in Los Angeles. They’re not just for crazy people you know.”
Beatrice looks up at Eric with a deadpan expression. “I was the one that was in the mental hospital. Of course they’re
going to think that I am a maniac.”
“Just tryin’ to relate to you,” Eric deflates into the chair.
Beatrice scoffs. “You know what I want to do?” Beatrice stands up and begins making charade like motions with her
hands. “I want to go to Bourbon street Eric! Take me to the bar that serves the heaviest stuff in town!”
Eric tilts his head and squints. “You just get out of a mental hospital and the first thing you want to do is something that
will potentially put you back?”
Beatrice tilts her head back and blinks her eyes dramatically. “Yeah? Come on, you should be dying to want to do
somethin’! What could you have been doing while I was away that you’re so turned off at the idea of a night out with
your girlfriend?” She begins to trail a finger down his chest as if it were the sharpest kitchen knife. “You got someone
who’s been keepin’ you occupied? Is it Tiffany? I swear to God…”
“Stop it Beatrice,” Eric shuts down the sudden accusation. “We’ve been talking the whole time you were in there, I never
forgot about you.”
Beatrice’s grin manifests into a sadistic yet oh so alluring smile to Eric. “I know you wouldn’t ever do anything like that,”
Her smile maintains but her eyes pierce into Eric’s soul.
“Right,” Eric emits in a low rumble of a voice and then puts the original topic of discussion back into play.
“I just don’t think it should be that. Let’s take a walk through a park or something.”
“That’s boring. I spent the last couple months being boring. It’s time to be fun.”
Eric caves. “Alright. But I’m not drinking.”
“Well, someone’s got to be the driver!” Beatrice laughs. “So we leave around 6 this evening? What do ya wanna do until
then?” Beatrice asks.
“I had some errands to run. I had to go to the camera store to get some film for my Polaroid. After that, we could
probably make our way to the Bourbon.”
Beatrice smiles. “I’m glad I sold you on this.”
“Yup…” Eric trails off.
12
At 6:37, Beatrice and Eric are moving through Bourbon Street with Eric making sure Beatrice doesn’t stumble over any
of the uneven concrete.
“Did you see the look on that guys face as soon as I walked in? I’m sure he couldn’t stand to see a Black person in his
establishment!”
“I’m sure it wasn’t that. It was probably because you came in so drunk that you couldn’t remember your own name,” Eric
rolls his eyes. “Thank God you had those burgers earlier or I’d be carrying you. Aren’t you still on that antipsychotic
medication?” It comes to him.
Beatrice looks at him and busts out laughing loud enough to capture the attention of the people nearby. “That’s what
makes it better!” She play punches Eric. “Lighten the hell up!”
“Jesus Christ. Let’s start walking back…We’ve had enough fun for the night. I don’t want you doing something that gets
the cops called on us. I hear there’s this new detective in town and he’s a real-”
Eric’s words fall on deaf ears as Beatrice takes off down the street in the direction of Eric’s car. Once Eric sees that
Beatrice is at least not taking off in an opposite direction, he takes his time catching up to her.
In front of Eric’s BMW, Beatrice is waiting for her boyfriend to walk up and unlock the door. While she’s waiting, two
mid twenties guys appear out of one of the bars looking to start trouble of some kind. Beatrice not being in the right
frame of mind happily invites this trouble as being a pretty girl in front of a pretty car gets their attention.
“What is happenin’ Ms. Brown Sugar?!” One of the guys swaggers over to Beatrice. “This your car? Mm, look at you! I
ain’t even know BMW was givin’ out cars to people like you!” His words puncture Beatrice’s heart.
Beatrice remains silent as Eric finally makes his way over. “What is going on here?” He surveys the situation and notices
Beatrices balled up firsts. “Do you know these guys or something?”
“Oh this must be your car!” The same guy projects his voice over Beatrice. “And you’ve got a real nice girl to go along
with it. I wish all nice cars came with girls like thi-”
At that moment, Beatrice blacks out. She lunges forward towards the man gripping a scratch awl she produces from her
jean pocket. He’s caught completely off guard, feeling a surge of pain once the business end of the awl makes contact
with his left chest. The young man emits a harrowing wail of agony as he clutches his chest and his friend comes to his
aid.
“You’re crazy…!” The other man yelps.
Eric snatches Beatrice out of her dazed pose and literally throws her into the passenger seat before screeching off down
the street. While he’s driving off, he still hears the moaning and groaning of the stab victim along with the promises
from his friend that neither Eric or Beatrice will see the light of day following this attack.
Five minutes down the road, Eric pulls his car up next to a pay phone as the humidity breaks into a light drizzle. Eric
darts to the phone and inserts his ten cents into the coin slot to call who but Tiffany.
“Christ…” Eric looks around as the dial tone begins to chirp. He hoped to God that now wasn’t the time for the police
or even worse- that detective he met earlier decided to make a cameo in Eric’s horror home video.
“Hello?” Tiffany asks, lifting her sleep mask from over her eyes.
Mm“Hey Tiffany!” Eric swivels his head around once again. “It’s Eric.”
“Hey Eric,” Tiffany sits up in her bed. “Are you…” She pauses for a second as she looks over at her clock seeing that it’s
going on midnight. “Are you okay?”
“Course not. Beatrice just stabbed someone on Bourbon street!”
Tiffany cups her mouth with her hand. “What the hell… Where is Beatrice now?”
“She’s with me. She’s all covered in blood, she’s really messed up right now,” Eric says as he looks back at Beatrice who is
giving him a thousand yard stare.
“You’re gonna owe me for this big time. Come over to my place right now.”
“Okay,” Eric agrees in the absence of any better ideas of his own. “See you in a few minutes.”