As a psychiatrist of over 20 years, I’ve seen my patients come in many different types. All of them with their own personal flaws, some worse than others. There have been some instances in which I’ve met people with problems so bizarre that I’ve dwelled on them for days. These are the ones who’d come in, tell me their story, then right away I’d know they were screwed. Obviously as a mental health professional I’m not supposed to spill the beans on their situation so quickly. My job is to stretch out the treatments for as long as possible until the inevitable occurs.
One patient in particular stood out. His name was Adam, and he was one of the unfortunate ones. It was hard for me to tell at first, as his life story wasn’t exactly unusual or bizarre. However, he did have a condition that was rare - Narcolepsy; A sleep disorder that would cause him to randomly fall asleep at inappropriate times throughout the day.
This disorder tormented him his whole life. It caused problems throughout his childhood, and he had trouble holding down a job later on. Despite this, he managed to find a wife that would stick by his side and assist him. She had a well paying job as a nurse, while he collected disability checks due to his ailment and inability to work. Other than being his lover, she was also a great caretaker. His wife was the best thing to happen to him. Before she came along he had spent many years alone, confined to the dark and silent shadows of his home.
Unfortunately Adam had to return to the shadows, as his wife went missing ten years ago. Apparently it took a great toll on him. As if dealing with his narcolepsy wasn’t bad enough, he soon fell into a deep depression and went days without eating. His sleep habits grew even worse and he developed insomnia.
Months after his wife went missing Adam made his first appointment with me. When meeting him I got a strong impression of a shy and timid middle aged man. He failed to make eye contact with me. He wouldn’t stop looking at the ground and staring off into the space beside him during every pause in our conversation.
From then on Adam has been seeing me on the regular, and over time we both kind of formed a bond. Compared to my other patients, I was invested in Adam’s life and progress the most, and really looked forward to seeing him every week. I’ll admit, after a few years I started to consider Adam as a part of my life - an acquaintance. But we had to meet later in the day. Sometimes at night. Technically my office closed at six, but I didn’t mind making an exception for Adam and allowing him to come in an hour later past closing time. His narcolepsy wouldn’t allow the appointments to be worth it if they started too early. So we used his insomnia as leverage for our sessions, although he’d still randomly fall out on me from time to time. But for the most part, it would work out.
The first time the strangest thing happened was when Adam was in my office as usual, during one of our sessions.
“You’ve still been using your journal?” I asked him.
Adam sat across from me on the other side of the coffee table that separated us. He slouched forward and rested his head on both his hands, staring at the carpet below him. He didn’t seem to be all the way there at the moment.
“Adam?”
He snapped out of it then looked me in the eye.
“Y-yes, I actually have,” he replied.
About two years ago I gave Adam the task of jotting down his thoughts and feelings in his own personal journal. He told me it was a great way of venting. Expressions of himself that only he could see.
“Have you met any new friends or acquaintances to occupy your time?”
Adam shook his head. No surprise here.
I would ask him this question every month or so. As expected, I’d always get the same answer.
During the past ten years Adam hadn’t put much effort into meeting new people, as he rarely left the house for social gatherings. Outside of other personal occasions the only time he stepped foot out of his house was for our sessions.
“I - I’ve been going to some bars and late night comedy shows,” he said.
I paused, then raised an eyebrow before grinning.
“That’s great!….You go by yourself?”
He nodded.
“But I don’t meet anyone when I go. At the bar I usually just sit and drink alone, just to get out. And I find the comedy shows to be so enjoyable I often forget that I’m alone,” Adam explained.
“It’s all good. You’re finally starting to progress in this area. We’re just taking one step at a time.”
I wrote down some things in my own journal, and was about to ask him another question. But when I glanced up I was met with Adam staring off into space. He was just staring at me…or so it appeared.
I smiled then leaned forward, waving my hands in front of his eyes.
“Adam?”
No response.
I did that a few more times but nothing changed. Even after standing out of my chair and walking around him to get a reaction.
Every now and then Adam’s narcoleptic behavior would surface, but he’d fall asleep for seconds then be right back with me in no time. This is the first time he just zoned out like this.
“Hey Adam…what’s going on?” I said.
His blank expression scrunched up into a face of sadness. Then his eyes began to water.
“I’m sorry Sasha,” he cried, as tears streamed down his cheeks.
His wife.
“I don’t think I can do this with you gone!,” he continued, speaking to no one in particular.
The tear streams on his face grew heavier.
“Now I just need you to do one thing….forgive me,” Adam sobbed.
“Adam!” I exclaimed.
Saying his name did no good. It was obvious he wasn’t even present.
“Forgive me!”
“Come on Adam, get back with me now!” I begged.
“Forgive me!”
“Adam!”
“Forgive me!”
After repeatedly shouting those two words for the next ten seconds or so, Adam abruptly stopped, then blinked two or three times before glancing around the room. He stiffened when our eyes met again.
I was startled, and I figured he could tell by my heavy breaths. My heart was racing.
“What?” he muttered, “Did I fall out on you again?”
I nodded.
“Very,” I replied.
After that episode I ended our session and sent Adam on his way, not bothering to tell him about the outburst. I wasn’t sure if he was even aware himself. It was clear that he thought he’d just fallen asleep as usual.
But that wasn’t the case.
I’ve never had a patient just start talking in a trance, mid-session. And what was he even talking about?…forgive him for what?
At the time, my guess was that I wouldn’t see an odd outburst like that from Adam again. Maybe he was just having a really rough night and his issues just took a bizarre turn?…
I think you know where this is headed.
Ten minutes before our next session the following week, I sat in my office filling out paperwork, waiting for Adam to walk in at any minute. As usual, it was about an hour past closing time. What had happened last session had me thinking. I couldn’t wrap my head around what could’ve triggered Adam like that - or how something like that could even happen. I thought about it all day at home, to the point I even went to the internet looking for answers. I didn’t find much on what I was looking for. Mainly because I didn’t know exactly what I was looking for myself. Trying to describe what I had witnessed was almost just as challenging as figuring out what was behind it. I visited many pages on the net about narcolepsy and other sleep disorders, but only came across generic and typical info.
When Adam finally came trotting into my office, there was a slight jump in my chest upon laying eyes on him. He carried that typical blank and carefree expression I’ve looked at for the past decade now. That tense and anxious bodily posture as he came and took a seat in the leather chair across from me.
I gave him a slight welcoming smile. Then I noticed he was carrying a small black booklet in one of his hands. There was a band of elastic wrapped around it.
His journal.
Our session began, and it was off to a pretty good start. He gave me some more good news. He went to another comedy show and gave the bar a few more visits throughout the week. But this time he built up the courage to be more social and talkative. Apparently Adam’s been approaching and meeting people more often. During the past week at the bar he hasn’t been drinking alone. He enjoyed some meals and had drinks with a few guys there multiple times the previous week.
“Well, you made one hell of a leap!” I said, growing excited for him.
Adam smiled a little. It wasn’t much, but it was still the happiest I’ve seen him since forever.
“I’ve tried asking a few of them to go to some of the comedy shows with me….but they all said they were unavailable,” he explained.
From there I dug deeper, and was informed of many more updates on Adam’s life and mental health.
Surprisingly, things only got better as minutes passed. Adam made eye contact with me more often and was more expressive when he spoke.
It was the best session we had in a long time. But like all things good, it didn’t last.
“So, how do you think Sasha would feel about you finally opening up to someone else?” I asked.
When I asked that question Adam froze with a smug grin stuck on his face, and he was silent for seconds.
“Adam?”
I waved my hands in front of his face and got no physical reaction - Staring into space.
It was happening again.
“Sasha wouldn’t feel anything….she’d run away at the sight of me,” Adam blurted out coldly.
He’d lost grip of his journal and it toppled to the floor.
“I hate myself for this, I really do,” he continued.
I gulped, starring Adam right in his unaware eyes.
“W-what do you…hate yourself for, Adam?” I asked reluctantly.
“I wasn’t very nice. Not as much as I should’ve,” he replied, “I let the wrong emotions consume me…and now I’ve turned into something that resembles another person I don’t like very much.”
At that point I was starting to worry again. But something made me want to ask more questions. My curiosity was sparked, and I wanted to hear what else was on Adam’s mind.
Before I could get another question in, Adam was present again. Like before, he blinked multiple times before glancing around him.
Also like before, I didn’t tell Adam about the outburst, and continued our session as usual.
Over the next few weeks the sessions with Adam remained similar to the ones as just mentioned before. Except Adam seemed to grow happier after each week. As the weeks passed, he walked into my office with more confidence. The slight smile I saw before was growing wider. Our conversations were smoother, and it became more rare to lose eye contact with him.
The good news he continued to present escalated. He was still meeting people at the bar, and increasingly grew comfortable communicating with them. They were starting to feel more like friends - something he hasn’t really had since high school. He even started talking to a woman regularly, and eventually managed to get her number. But he still complained of not being able to contact her outside the bar, as anytime he called or texted her he wouldn’t get a response. He also seemed to have trouble getting any of them to go to the comedy shows with him.
Other than some small misfortunes, Adam claimed that his life was finally getting better. But his random outbursts said otherwise.
Despite the fact that the sessions were overall drastically better after so many years, there were still moments when Adam would stop responding to my questions…and give me that hundred yard stare. Every time this happened I knew the comfort of the session was about to be sucked away.
Surprisingly, it became easy to get comfortable with Adam’s outbursts. He started out pretty subtle and innocent with the things he was saying. At first he’d tell me about small random things from his childhood.
He told me about his dog he was gifted at six years old, and how he named him Toby. Toby was his first best friend, and would be waiting for him in the driveway everyday when he got off the bus. Toby had to be put down two years later.
“The only real friend I’ve ever had was taken away early,” Adam sobbed.
He was crying hard as he told me this.
One week Adam shared his experience as a member of his baseball team in middle school.
“Wasn’t that great of a player, and was benched for the majority of games. But when I hit that home run for the first time and got the win for the team, man everyone was proud of me!” Adam boasted, laughing joyfully.
I heard more random things about his childhood, even the small and insignificant moments. Like when he was caught staring out the window several times in the middle of class, and the other students laughed at him when the teacher called him out.
At other times he’d mention a name….Someone by the name of Kettlekucker.
“I heard a joke from old Kettlekucker, and it was funny as hell,” Adam would say.
He’d suddenly just mention this person randomly, but never tell me exactly who it was. If I tried to ask about this person, he always changed the subject.
I’d try to ask Adam questions while he was in his trance. Sometimes I’d get good responses, as if he was actually fully aware. But most of the time anything I said wouldn’t reach him, and he’d continue rambling.
As more weeks passed, I still hadn’t told Adam about what he was doing. I wasn’t sure if he’d still want to keep coming if he found out he was spewing out facts about his life on a subconscious level. The more curious part of me wanted to see how far things would go.
If only I wasn’t so nosy.
Adam’s subconscious path down memory lane took a dark turn. The decent memories of Adam’s childhood that was once a breeze to sit back and listen to, soon sent chills throughout me.
Adam informed me that the first signs of his narcolepsy occurred in sixth grade, and he frequently fell asleep in class. His father was very impatient and aggressive, and having to deal with Adam’s ailment made him no happier. His father would shout and yell at him in frustration anytime he randomly fell asleep at home, and beat him down if his teacher called and said he dozed off in class.
“The bastard knew I had a sleep disorder. But he’d still beat my ass anyway!” Adam once shouted in a rage.
Apparently that’s when he started to hate his dad, and he’s felt that way about him all throughout childhood. This suppressed rage led him to getting into a couple fist fights with his father as a teenager.
Adam told me he’d come home drunk when he was fifteen, and his father shoved him outside on the porch, where he later fell asleep. He woke up in the same spot the following morning.
At sixteen he often stole his father’s booze and snuck out in the shed at night to drink.
“I needed some kind of escapism, since actually leaving was off the table,” Adam slurred, still giving that long distance stare.
One night while getting sloppy drunk out in the shed, he spotted a sledgehammer hanging on the wall. The thought of going into his father’s bedroom with it crossed his mind.
“I was gonna bludgeon that fucker, but unfortunately I didn’t have the guts to act on it,” Adam blurted, “I didn’t shed a tear when the bitch drunk himself to death and destroyed his liver.”
That was the first time I’ve heard Adam use profanity. It caught me so off guard that my eyes widened.
“I bet if I had old Kettlekucker around back then, he’d cheer me up in a heartbeat. Man does he say some funny shit!”
He mentioned him again. Kettlekucker.
Who was it?
His thoughts would get even worse whenever I mentioned his missing wife.
“Have you ever told Sasha about the relationship you had with your dad?” I asked him one week.
This was one week in particular when I got lots of good responses from him in his trance.
Adam took a deep breath, then to my surprise he started crying.
“No. I’ve never mentioned a word to her about it,” Adam sobbed, “but it doesn’t matter anyways…..Sasha hated my guts.”
I stared back at his emotionless face in confusion.
“What?” I said.
“I used to be a total brute towards her. I yelled and cursed at her a lot, and the slightest of mishaps would cause me to punch or slap her until she cried.”
He started bawling uncontrollably.
“But I - I took it too far one morning,” he continued, ” Sasha fixed me a hot breakfast on a tray. When she brought it to the table, she dropped the entire thing, spilling everything on the tray in my lap - including some scolding hot coffee. In a rage, I repeatedly bashed her in the head with my fists, and killed her.”
My eyes widened again. Then I swallowed in fear, still staring Adam up and down.
He was grasping his journal tightly by his side.
“I buried her in my backyard, then after some time I called the police, pretending that I hadn’t seen her in a few weeks, “ he whimpered, “The only person that ever gave a shit about me is gone…and it’s all my fault! Now all I have is Kettlekucker to keep me company. He always makes me laugh, or at least puts a smile on my face to distract me from my piss poor life.”
Kettlekucker.
Now scared shitless I ask,
“Um Adam….who is this Kettlekucker guy?”
In the middle of tears, Adam grinned. Then he started laughing.
He was genuinely creeping me out now.
“Kettlekucker? Only the funniest old fart alive!” Adam blurted.
Obviously his answer brought me no closer to figuring out anything. So at the moment, I left the mystery alone.
Days after that specific session, I sat at home ruminating once again. This is the most concerned Adam has made me in a while.
Did he confess to murder?
I mean, he’s been saying some pretty wild stuff but I wasn’t even sure how much of it was true. If any of it was true.
I didn’t know what action to take next. Contacting the police would’ve been questionable, as Adam wasn’t even in a fully aware state of mind when he made these “confessions”.
The thought of seeing Adam again the next week now seemed more terrifying.
What possibly true event would he reveal next?
I wouldn’t get the chance to find out. Adam didn’t show up anymore after that. In the following week it was a half hour past our starting time. I sat in the office waiting, but there was still no sign of Adam. This was odd because he’s never skipped a session without calling me ahead of time.
I called his phone a few times but couldn’t get an answer.
The same happened over the next few weeks.
Now I was considering calling the police. Taking into account the fact that Adam has never ghosted me once, let alone three times without notice, combined with his “confessions”, made me decide to eventually pick up the phone.
I turned the television on one day and found that the authorities had already beaten me to it. The five o’clock news was on.
I was shivering from head to toe when I saw Adam’s picture appear on the screen. In the background there were many paramedics carrying zipped up bodies on stretchers.
After listening to the reporter go on in the background for a few seconds, my heart began racing again.
Adam was being charged with multiple counts of murder. I could see other people standing out in front of his house, crying and staring at the scene in disbelief. A few officers stood by to make sure they didn’t get too close.
I felt sick when I saw Sasha’s picture appear on screen shortly after. There was a caption, “missing woman found” beneath in large red text.
Unfortunately that woman wasn’t alive.
Then another picture appeared on screen, of an older man with some gray hair. Strangely this person was found alive, tied up and bound in Adam’s basement. The name at the bottom of the picture caused my eyes to widen.
John Kettlekucker.
It was at that moment I realized Adam was spewing at least some truth in his trance-like states. I started looking back at the other confessions that he made, and the more I ruminated over our more recent sessions, the more I struck myself with abundant terror.
The thought of Adam sitting in jail made me feel relatively depressed. During the first few weeks after I saw the horrid news, I could do nothing but think about the fact that my time with Adam was now history. The bond we formed. It had lasted so long that regularly seeing and communicating with Adam was something my brain craved and expected. I’ll admit, I was starting to miss him…despite what he’s done.
It took a minute for me to face the fact that, yeah he really did kill his wife - and committed deeds much worse.
After seeing the news I did more research on the incident. As more time passed, more details and info made its way out to the public.
Turns out Adam’s life wasn’t improving like he tried to make it out to be. Adam actually was opening up and talking to people more, just as he claimed. However, his interactions were very awkward and reeked with timidness, according to the many interviews I saw with people who regularly visited the same bar Adam did. They had meals with Adam, and often did hold conversations with him. But many of the interviewees admitted that it was all out of pity and sympathy, as Adam’s lack of confidence was obvious.
Adam’s failure at creating a social life was internally making his feelings of loneliness worse, while also building up frustration and rage.
Some recorded interviews with Adam himself revealed that his new way of dealing with this loneliness and frustration, was to kidnap and hold some of the people he met at the bar captive. Adam made some real confessions during his interview, explaining how he lured his victims out to his car before using chloroform to knock them unconscious. Then he’d take them to his house and tie them up in his basement.
Oddly enough, the reason he gave for doing this was to simply find someone to keep him company. He kept them in his basement and pretty much forced them to be his buddy. He’d hold conversations with them for hours, spending most of his days in the basement communicating with total strangers. His victims were forced to watch tv with him, and he even cooked meals and brought them food.
If Adam found his victim to be boring, or in Adam’s words, “bad company”, he got rid of them right away. This was done by bludgeoning them to death with a sledgehammer, before burying them right next to his dead wife in the backyard.
‘The same hammer I almost killed my father with,’ Adam said in an interview.
Some of the bodies were discovered with terribly fractured skulls, or large pieces of their cranium totally missing.
He kept each person for about a week before killing them off and moving on to the next one.
Adam did this until he came across the older gentleman I saw on the television earlier; John Kettlekucker. He was the comedian that performed at the comedy shows Adam often attended.
After one of the shows, Adam wanted to personally speak to John. Adam met with John out by his car. After some friendly verbal exchange, John was of course chloroformed.
Unlike Adam’s other victims Kettlekucker was held captive for weeks. His talent at making people laugh is what ultimately saved his life. The only reason Adam found John to be “good company” was because he enjoyed hearing his jokes for hours on end. Other than his own life, he also saved countless others as Adam would’ve alternatively picked off John and continued taking the lives of many more on his quest to capture the “best” one.
For months going on I got a taste of what Adam has felt his whole life. Soon I was depressed, and couldn’t help but to constantly think about Adam; how he’s doing in prison. Whether or not he feels remorse for his deeds. Has he thought of me?
The idea of visiting Adam in prison even crossed my mind. But I knew that would be pushing it. I had to remind myself that he’s my ex-patient. Not family or a friend. I had to move on, and stop spending the end of every day in my office looking back at the version of Adam who was wearing a mask of someone he wasn’t.
While slouched up in the chair of my office one evening, I just so happened to see something stuck between the pillows of the sofa in front of me.
Adam’s journal.
I realized that it’s been there for some time now - ever since Adam last came in.
I didn’t plan on cracking it open and wandering into Adam’s mind anytime soon. Not that I wasn’t curious.
It’s just the fact that only god knows what madness lies inside.