Strangers

let you go. You might've been hit in traffic."
        A passing driver, maneuvering around the Mercedes, angrily shouted something unintelligible at them.
        "I've hurt you," Ginger said. Sickness throbbed through her at the thought of the violence she had done.
        Other drivers sounded their horns with increasing impatience, but Rita ignored them. She took Ginger's hands again, not to restrain her this time but to offer comfort and reassurance. "It's all right, dear. It's passed now, and a little iodine will patch me up just fine."
        The motorcyclist. The dark visor.
        Ginger looked out the side window; the cyclist was gone. He had, after all, been no threat to her, just a stranger passing in the street.
        Black gloves, an ophthalmoscope, a sink drain, and now the dark visor of a motorcyclist's helmet. Why had those particular things set her off? What did they have in common, if anything?
        As tears spilled down her face, Ginger said, "I'm so sorry."
        "No need to be. Now, I better get us out of the way," Rita said. She pulled handsful of Kleenex from the box on the console and used them to grip the wheel and gearshift, to avoid spreading bloodstains.
        Her own hands wet with Rita's blood, Ginger sagged back against her seat and closed her eyes and tried to stop the tears but could not.
        Four psychotic episodes in five weeks.
        She could no longer glide placidly through the gray winter days, defenseless, docile in the face of this vicious turn of fate, merely waiting for another attack or for a shrink to explain what was wrong.
        It was Monday, December 16, and Ginger was suddenly determined to do something before she suffered a fifth fugue. She could not imagine what she possibly could do, but she was sure she'd think of something if she put her mind to it and stopped feeling sorry for herself. She had reached bottom now. Her humiliation, fear, and despair could not bring her to any greater depths. There was nowhere to go but up. She would claw her way back to the surface, damned if she wouldn't, up toward the light, of it of the dark into which she had fallen.

----
        

    THREE
        

    Christmas Eve-Christmas Day

----
        

    1.
        

    Laguna Beach, California
        
        At eight A. M., Tuesday, December 24, when Dom Corvaisis got out of bed, he went through his morning ablutions in a haze resulting from the lingering effects of yesterday's indulgence in Valium and Dalmane.
        For the eleventh night in a row, he had been troubled by neither somnambulism nor the bad dream that involved the sink. The drug therapy was working, and he was willing to tolerate a period of pharmaceutically induced detachment to put an end to his unnerving midnight journeys.
        He did not believe he was in danger of becoming physically addicted to - or even psychologically dependent on - Valium or Dalmane. He had been exceeding the prescribed dosage, but he was still not worried. He had almost run out of pills, and in order to get another prescription from Dr. Cobletz, he had fabricated a story about a break-in at his house, claiming that the drugs had been taken along with his stereo and TV set. Dom had lied to his doctor in order to obtain drugs, and sometimes he saw his action in exactly that harsh and unfavorable light; but most of the time, in the soft haze that accompanied continuous tranquilization, he was able to dress the shabby truth in self-delusion.
        He dared not think about what would happen to him if the episodes of somnambulism returned in January, after the drugs were discontinued.
        At ten o'clock, unable to concentrate enough to work, He put on a light corduroy jacket and left the house. The late-December morning was cool. Except for a few unseasonably warm days now and then, the beaches would not be busy again until April.
        As Dom descended the hills in his Firebird, heading for the center of town, he noticed that Laguna looked dull under a somber gray sky. He wondered how much of the leaden gloom was real and how much resulted from the dulling effects of the drugs, but he quickly abandoned that disturbing line of thought. In acknowledgment of his somewhat fuzzy perceptions and impaired responsiveness, he drove with exaggerated care.
        Dom received most mail at the post office. Because he subscribed to so many publications, he rented a large drawer rather than just a box,