WEEK TWO
Day 8—Morning
On Monday morning reality hits, and a heavy hopelessness descends in the form of my mother hovering in the doorway of Dr. Alvarez’s office.
Her features are in shadows, her blond hair illuminated at the edges like expensive gold thread. Likewise, the threads of her Chanel jacket catch bits of light complementing her hair. Her bracelets jangle. Is she coming from a meeting? Why does it always seem like she’s dressed to impress?
“… My dearest M … You are perfection…”
My stomach roils and bile rises into my throat. Did I say she could come today and forget? I don’t know what I was thinking.
Yes, I do. Guilt. When she called again. Or, false hope, maybe. Or it was the medication talking. Or maybe I was still high off my first Chutes and Ladders win.
Dr. Alvarez looks at me for information, her expression changing quickly to concern.
“Your mother said you were expecting her? That you said it was okay if she came in?” She gives me a half smile, half grimace, as if to say, “Now that she’s here, how bad can it be?”
Bad, Dr. Alvarez. Bad.
I can’t stop the images from coming.
“My dearest A … My good man…”
“Klee?”
“I shouldn’t print these, but I want to carry your words…”
I lift my head from where I’ve lowered it onto the throw pillow in my lap and stare at my mother in the doorway.
“Do you want me to go? I can leave.” I hear the tears in her voice. Her arms hang helplessly at her sides. She looks to Dr. Alvarez, then away.
I want to believe her. I want to believe that her upset isn’t an act, but she’s lied about so much already.
Dr. Alvarez opens the drawer to her left, rummages around, and tosses a yellow stress ball next to me on the couch. “That’s up to Klee,” she says.
I sit up, and roll the ball in my fingers. “The chief danger in life is that we take too many precautions.”—Alfred Adler.
My eyes shift to Dr. Alvarez, and she asks, “What say you, Klee? Do you want to try to discuss some things, or do you need another day?”
I need many more days. I need a century.
“No. Let’s get it over with,” I say.
“Come in, Mrs. Alden. Sit. We’ll talk for a bit. See how we do. If Klee needs more time, we’ll adjourn. It’s flexible, how we do things in here. Whatever is best for him, you understand?”
My mother nods and steps in. Her features reappear. Her lip trembles and she gives me this apologetic look. No, not apologetic. Expectant. Like she’s hoping for something I can’t give.
I don’t get up. I have nothing to offer at this point.
She sits on the other end of the couch, her leather bag perched on one knee, her thin fingers clutched around it.
“Would you like some water?” Dr. Alvarez asks.
“Yes, please.” My mother reaches out, and her gold bracelets jangle. She uncaps the bottle and sips.
Jangle, jangle, jangle.
Every move, every sound is exaggerated.
My mother puts the bottle down, takes off her jacket, folding it perfectly over the arm of the couch.
Jangle. Jangle.
“Forgive me,” Dr. Alvarez says, “this office is always warm. It’s the forced heat. I keep requesting a humidifier to counter it. If we’d had a warmer week, they’d have turned off the heat altogether. Any day now. It’s much more manageable in the spring.”
My mother nods, fidgeting, and drinks some more water. Dr. Alvarez seems more uncomfortable than usual. She pulls her clipboard to her lap, waits patiently for my mother to say something.
My mother drinks again. A drop of water from the mouth of the bottle lands on her cream silk blouse and spreads outward in a darkening circle. I wonder vaguely if it will ruin it. A minor chute against her many, many ladders.
She recaps the bottle and twists it in her lap. Finally, she turns and looks at me. I don’t know if it’s for show or not, but her eyes are filled with tears.
“Klee, honey, it kills me to see you here.” I close my eyes, and she says, “Dr. Alvarez, please, I don’t know what I’ve done. I just want to help.”
But I don’t want her help. I want my father. I want Sarah. I let Sarah crawl toward me on her knees.
Wait! No. Not that day.
That day got messed up.
Not that one. Not now. Not with my mother here.
* * *
We’re doing it again, but this time I’m lasting.
Sarah feels amazing, and I’m lasting.
I think the condom I bought is actually helping. We move in rhythm, in sync, until she whispers my name, and squeezes my back before relaxing quietly beneath me.
Only then do I let myself go, too.
She brushes back my hair and kisses my forehead. I feel giddy. Happy. Happy because I made Sarah feel good.
I get up and go flush the condom, grabbing my jeans, to pull them on in case her mother gets home. We’re in the basement, and her mother’s filling in on someone else’s weekend shift.
“Nice abs,” she says, lowering herself onto the floor and crawling over. She sits on her knees, looks up at me with her gorgeous blue eyes that I can never get enough of, and runs her hands up the length of my torso. “You’re skinny, so I didn’t realize how much you must work out.” She moves her hands back down my stomach and over the front of my boxers.
If she wants to, I can go again.
“No so much,” I say. “I do crunches. But there’s a lot you don’t know about me, Sarah Wood.”
I glance down my thin frame and feel myself disappear. All I can see is my father. In his striped pajama pants. In his sunny studio. Painting.
I have the same build as he did. I’m staring down at myself but keep seeing my father.
“Okay. So tell me.”
“Tell you what?” I flinch, reeling, slammed by how badly I’m missing him.
“Never mind.” She laughs, goes down on all fours again, and crawls toward me. She’s still in just her panties.
She sings softly, words to a vaguely familiar old song I know she likes because she plays it on her phone.
“Every cloud must have a silver lining…”
She watches me intently, her long black eyelashes batting up at me, and I’m trying to focus, to concentrate.
“Wait until the sun shines through
Smile my honey dear
While I kiss away each tear…”
I’m trying to smile, and I’m sure that I’ve managed, that I’m smiling, but I can’t clear my father from my brain.
“Or else I shall be melancholy too.”
“Klee…?”
And I’m crying.
Jesus. For some dumb-ass reason, I’m crying.
I don’t mean to. I don’t want to be.
I hate myself for letting it happen.
Maybe it’s something in her voice, how lilting and beautiful it is, or maybe it’s the lyrics, or maybe it’s because despite trying not to, I already love her so much. And love is trouble. Love is broken and wrong. The people we love don’t stick around.
Whatever the reason, Sarah is naked, and singing, and I’m the motherfucking asshole who is crying.
I hate myself for it.
Sarah sits back and looks at me.
I swipe at my eyes and say, “Don’t stop, please. I’m just moved by how pretty your voice is.”
But she gets up, pulls on her clothes, and walks back to the couch where she left the remote, and turns on the TV, putting the volume up loud.
I should leave. I should just go home and never come back. But I don’t want to leave us like this.
I sit on the couch and pull myself together. Fuck me, but I pull myself together.
We watch Family Feud. That’s what’s on, so we watch it. We watch until the Cutler Family wins. When it’s over, I reach out and take Sarah’s hand, but she slips her fingers out of mine and says, “I’m sorry, Klee. I told you I like you, and I do. I like you a lot. But, I don’t know…” She shakes her head, eyes looking so, so sad.
“Are you breaking up with me?”
She turns and stares at me, says, “What? No. God, no.” But she shakes her head again and wraps her arms to her chest. “I just think you want more from me than I’m ever going to be able to give.”
Copyright © 2018 by Gae Polisner
