The Good Explainer (Stories) by Kurt Vonnegut

Author:Kurt Vonnegut [Vonnegut, Kurt]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-440-33951-9
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2009-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

When young Peter was gone, Dr. Abekian called Joe into his office. He had a directory open on his desk. He explained it. “I was trying to find,” he said, “somebody with a name remotely like mine—somebody who might be really famous for handling cases like yours.”

“What luck?” said Joe.

“There is Dr. Aarons—who’s done a lot with a psychiatric approach,” said Dr. Abekian. “His name is vaguely like mine.”

“Look,” said Joe, patiently, earnestly, “the name of the man we were coming to see, the name of the man who was going to do so much for us, the name wasn’t Aarons, and it wasn’t a name we could very well mix up with another name, because it was such an unusual name. My wife said we should come to Chicago and see Dr. Abekian—A-b-e-k-i-a-n. We came to Chicago, looked up Dr. Abekian—A-b-e-k-i-a-n—in the phone book. There he was—A-b-e-k-i-a-n—and here I am.”

Dr. Abekian’s sharp, gaudy features expressed tantalization and perplexity. “Tst,” he said.

“You say this Aarons uses the psychiatric approach?” said Joe. He was undressing now for a physical examination, revealing himself as a chunky man, with muscles that looked powerful but slow.

“The psychiatric approach is meaningless, of course,” said Dr. Abekian, “if there’s anything physically wrong.” He lit a cigarette. “I keep thinking,” he said, “this whole mystery has to have something to do with Cincinnati.”

“I’ll tell you this,” said Joe, “this isn’t the only crazy thing that’s happened lately. The way things have been going, maybe Barbara and I ought to go over and see Dr. Aarons no matter what the physicals turn up.”

“Barbara?” said Dr. Abekian, cocking his head.

“What?” said Joe.

“Barbara? You said your wife’s name was Barbara?” said Dr. Abekian.

“Did I say that?” said Joe.

“I thought you did,” said the doctor.

Joe shrugged. “There’s one more crazy promise down the drain,” he said. “I was supposed to keep her name a secret.”

“I don’t understand,” said the doctor.

“Who the hell does?” said Joe, showing sudden fatigue and exasperation. “If you knew all the fights we’ve had this past couple of years, if you knew how much I had to go through before she’d agree to see a doctor, to find out if there was anything we could do …” Joe left the sentence unfinished, went on undressing. He was quite red now.

“If I knew that?” said Dr. Abekian, himself a little restless now.

“If you knew that,” said Joe, “you’d understand why I promised her anything she wanted, whether it made sense or not. She said we had to come to Chicago, so we came to Chicago. She said she didn’t want people to know what her real name was, so I promised I wouldn’t tell. But I did tell, didn’t I?”

Dr. Abekian nodded. Smoke from the cigarette in his mouth was making one eye water, but he did nothing to remedy the situation.

“Well—what the hell,” said Joe. “If you can’t tell a doctor the whole truth, what’s the point of going to one? How’s he going to help you?”

Dr. Abekian responded not at all.

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