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Slipping stealthily along the hallways, Panakeia made her way back to the psychiatry department. She had no intention of running into that Jung character again or of being locked up, thank you very much. She glanced at a directory on the wall to find Dr. Sigmund’s office, then hurried in its direction, her scarf pulled tightly over her cheekbones. A few minutes of walking found her back outside the fateful office door from which she had recently fled. She took a deep breath and knocked on the door. “Come in!” came a somewhat muffled reply. She pushed the door open and almost wished she hadn’t. Freud sat in an overstuffed chair, lips in the one hand that had rejoined his body. The other lay in a dark corner, knocking on the wall. “Ah ha! Zere you are,” called the lips. The renowned psychoanalyst walked over to the corner and picked up his other arm. He pushed in back into his shoulder joint, where it settled with a decided ’pop.’
“Forgive zis current confuzion. Have a zeet.” A finger pointed to the room’s large couch. “I have heard about you from my colleague. I find it surprising zat you returned, given his report.”
“Well,” began Panakeia, “I’m somewhat surprised myself. But I came back specifically to see you. After all, you are the greatest analyst of them all. And I do need help. I know it.”
The teeth on the remains of Freud’s face would have formed a smile had his lips only been in place. Panakeia struggled to suppress her disgust at his condition. “Vell, zat is more like it. I zink my colleague may have been mistaken about you. Zere iz just ze matter of zis voice you hear and your delusions. Both clearly ze sign of some childhood trauma.”
She burst into tears, only half feigned. “Yes, that’s right,” Panakeia sobbed. “I never recovered from the shock of learning I came from a family of common thieves! Worse yet, they disappeared, and I never had the chance to say how much I…I…loved them.” She sobbed into the couch’s arm. “Then I turned charlatan, which I always vowed I’d never do. And I just realized what a waste I’ve made of my life. And that‘s when the voice, the voice of my conscience came back.” Freud looked at her sympathetically. “I’m not crazy, am I?”
“Of course not,” came the quick reply. “Zroubled, yes. Insane, no. I am shocked at Mr. Jung’s misdiagnosis. To zink zat he vas my student. No, you may go. I vill handle Mr. Jung.”
Panakeia smiled through her tears. “Thank you. You don’t know what this means to me.”
“Oh but I zink I do.”
Panakeia fought the urge to slap the sanctimoniously smiling lips out of Freud‘s hand. Then she thought of something else. “There’s just one thing. This couch. I think it‘s helped me so much. May I take it with me? It would be such a comfort.”
Freud stared at her through a mangled eyelid. “Vat a strange fixation. But that is my most valued couch. In fact, I zink that couch means more to me than anyzing else.”
I guessed right. “I know it’s asking a lot. But it would help me so. I may never be able to come back, but I’ll always have a connection to this place through it to help me through my problems. Please?”
He mulled it over. “Very vell. You need it more zan I. But I vill miss it.”
Panakeia beamed. “Thank you so much. Thank you.” She waved her farewells and dragged her new acquisition out the door. As she made her way to Poisoned Vale, Panakeia hoped the couch would fit in her dorm room.
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