In A Country Of Mothers Read online

  She waited until it was no longer possible not to tell her parents. She pulled her mother into her room and sat her down on the bed; but when Claire started to speak, no words came out.

  “Is something wrong?” her mother asked, starting to get up. “Maybe you should suck on a lozenge.” Claire pushed her back down on the bed, lifted her blouse, pushed down the elastic waistband of her skirt, and turned to the side, so her mother would see the bulge. In profile, it looked like what it was.

  “Oh my lord,” her mother said, covering her mouth with her hand, as if to push back a longer stream of words, the stream that turned into an overflowing river when her father found out.

  Her mother ran out of the room and into the kitchen, where she made hushed phone call after hushed phone call. Then she ordered Claire into the car. She drove her to the doctor — not the family physician but a different one in downtown Washington — to make sure the protrusion wasn’t something else. Claire imagined her mother wishing it was some complicated disease, something there would be no shame in dying from. Cancer would have been good.

  “It’s true,” the doctor said, as though he too had first believed Claire was concealing a tumor under her skirt.

  Her mother leaned far over the doctor’s desk and whispered, so softly that later it would seem as though she’d never said it, “Is there anything that can be done about it?”

  The doctor shook his head, leaned forward, and whispered back. “Too late for that.”

  Claire’s father rented a truck and made a point of going up and down the street telling the neighbors he was taking a load of old furniture down to the “poor folks” and that if they had anything to add, he’d be glad to take it. Claire ended up alone in an apartment in Baltimore with all of Hillside Street’s discarded furniture. It was depressing as hell. It was also the only time she’d been away from her family since spending two weeks at Christian Fellowship camp when she was thirteen. In 1966, maternity wear was basically huge cotton underpants and tent dresses in frightening prints, not the kind of thing that looked good on a nineteen-year-old, so Claire stayed indoors unless it was absolutely necessary to go out.

  For no reason other than her determination to embrace everything and anything she was not, Claire decided that if the baby was going to be given up for adoption, it should go to a Jewish family. They’d make a better home for it. They understood sorrow, suffering, loss, what it meant to be an outsider. She thought of the holiday Mark had told her about, the one where they welcomed strangers; they would leave the door open and set a place for a mysterious prophet who’d come in and sit at their table, drink their wine.

  “You’re crazy,” her father said. “Always have been. If the boy had been a decent Christian, you’d be married now.”

  Claire didn’t bother telling him that Mark was already married. There was no point.

  “They’re like that,” her father said. “Slimy sons of … Go ahead, give it to one of them. The further from us, the better.”

  It almost went wrong. A family was found, but three weeks later they backed out. The lawyer said it was because they knew, in a roundabout way, who the father was.

  “Of course they knew,” her father said. “What do you expect? They all know each other.”

  “The family wanted a child with no background at all,” the lawyer said.

  Claire tried to conjure a child arriving with no past, only a future.

  A second family was found. Through the lawyers sanitized descriptions were exchanged. No one wanted to take chances; it was getting late. Only the most minimal information was passed along. “A lovely family. A mother, a father, a little boy. Because of complications they can’t have more of their own, and yet,” the lawyer said, winking, “they have a lot of love to give.”

  He meant money, Claire understood. She wondered how much it was costing them.

  “Upper-middle-class. College-educated. Jews.”

  Claire was glad they weren’t first-time parents. A baby wouldn’t be a surprise. And it would have a big brother; Claire had always wanted a brother. When she thought of her baby, she imagined a girl named Rachel splashing in a wading pool with all her cousins and the neighbors’ children. She saw her daughter going off to school in a brand-new dress, new shoes, carrying her brother’s old lunch box. She pictured her sitting on a braided rug during story hour, playing with the curls of the girl in front of her, giggling. She figured there would be an extended family; grandparents coming up from Florida with sacks of oranges and grapefruit, and stubby old fingers just right for pinching cheeks. She saw love and comfort. The child would never know she’d started off belonging to someone else.

  Claire knew her daughter only as she grew inside her. She loved her by rubbing the child’s kicking foot through the walls of her body.

  A woman came charging into the clinic and stopped in front of Claire. “First time?” she bellowed.

  “I’m waiting for someone,” Claire said, startled.

  “Oh,” the woman said, as if she didn’t believe her. “This is my third. It’s nothing, really. I’m sure your daughter will be fine.”

  “Oh no,” Claire said, shaking her head. “It’s not my daughter.” It came out sounding drastically different from how she meant it. The woman shrugged and didn’t say anything else. Claire went up to the desk and asked the nurse how much longer it would be. The answer was hours, not minutes.

  “I have to leave,” Claire said. “I’ll be back.” She hurried out of the office, sure that if she didn’t get out in less than thirty seconds, she’d lose consciousness, and masked men would haul her into the back room. They’d give her an abortion even though she didn’t need one. They’d get her anyway, suck whatever they could out of her, just because.

  • • •

  That night, when Sam reached across the bed and pulled her toward him, Claire screamed.

  “I know it’s been a while,” he said. “But has it really been that long?”

  They started again. When it seemed certain that neither Jake nor Adam was going to stumble in, Claire reached into her night-table drawer, pulled out her old diaphragm, and filled it with jelly, thinking she probably should turn on the light and check it for holes.

  “Are you off the pill?” Sam asked.

  “No,” Claire said, handing him the gooped-up disc.

  He disappeared under the covers. She could feel him playing, pretending he didn’t know what to do. He ran his mouth over her thighs, blew a stream of air inside her, teased her with his teeth, and finally the diaphragm popped into place.

  “What’s up?” he asked, reappearing, tickling and kissing her.

  “I feel like I need to be very careful,” Claire said.

  It was a major regression. When Claire met Sam she was taking the pill, had an IUD, and a diaphragm in the drawer, and was also trying out this new kind of foam that was like shaving cream and gave some guys a rash. The joke among Claire’s friends was that men needed special protection to keep from turning impotent around her.

  “I just don’t want to get pregnant. Is that asking too much?” Claire would demand. She’d stand naked at the foot of the bed ranting and raving about responsibility, starving, unwanted children in third-world countries, the war in Vietnam, anything and everything, until finally, exhausted, she’d collapse onto the water bed and allow herself to be taken.

  “Do you not want to do this?” Sam asked twenty minutes later, when nothing was happening, when it still seemed like Claire was somewhere else, not even phoning it in. “I could just put on a videotape and do it myself,” he said.

  Claire didn’t respond.

  “Maybe I should take a shower.” Sam moved to get out of the bed.

  Claire reached down under the blanket and grabbed him by the balls. “I’ll kill you,” she said.

  “Now we’re talking.”

  “I’ve had a very long day,” Claire said, squeezing Sam until he was on the verge of real pain. “Don’t give me a bad time.”


  He pulled away and hurried out of the room, his half-hard dick leading the way. He came back with an old bottle of Jack Daniel’s and something hidden behind his back. “I can do this to you or you can do it to me,” he said, opening his hand, flashing the heavy-duty handcuffs Jake had brought home from school the day before with no explanation.

  “Do you have the keys?”

  Sam swung the little skeleton keys back and forth hypnotically. He opened the bottle and took a slug. “Who’s it gonna be?”

  Claire reached for the Jack Daniel’s, took a long pull, another, and another, then lay back and let Sam handcuff her to the bed frame.

  “Let me ask you something,” Rosenblatt said, leaning forward in his chair, pressing his palms together. “Do you ever have fun?”

  Claire looked confused. “I’m not sure what you mean,” she said.

  “It sounds like you don’t have fun.”

  “I wasn’t aware I said that.”

  “You didn’t say it,” Rosenblatt said. “But you never talk about enjoying yourself. Enjoying your family.” He leaned back in his chair, his hands crossed behind his head. “What gives you pleasure?”

  “My work,” Claire said. “I work very hard, and it makes me feel good.”

  “Besides work. Tell me what you enjoy — the theater, eating out, sailing on weekends? There must be something.”

  Claire shrugged. He was pissing her off again. Every time he did this, she swore she wouldn’t come back, and every time she made another appointment. It was humiliating to be constantly asked if she wanted another appointment; it was like being forced to get down on your knees and beg for more help. A normal therapist would suggest the next week at three, keeping the process going without constantly addressing the issue of needing help. Rosenblatt, she knew, did it to feed his ego.

  “Why are you here?” he asked.

  “You know why I’m here.”

  “Tell me again.”

  Claire was glad she didn’t have to sleep with him. Fucking this guy would be hell. He’d do his thing, come, and then fall off snoring before his dick was even dry.

  “I’m having a hard time with my children,” Claire said.

  “Could it be because you don’t have any fun? You don’t play?”

  Now Claire was getting really angry.

  “Do you ever laugh?” Rosenblatt asked.

  “Of course,” she said.

  “When?”

  “Whenever I see a new Woody Allen movie,” Claire said.

  “You’re very defensive,” Rosenblatt said. “I could tell you to relax more, to try and enjoy yourself. But the real issue is why you don’t have fun. I suspect that you simply won’t allow yourself. That’s why you like your work so much. I know what you do for a living. It’s constant torture.”

  “Then why don’t you stop?” Claire said, shifting in her chair.

  “Why don’t you stop?” Rosenblatt asked. “Because you have to punish yourself. Because everything has to be taken so seriously. Because it would be wrong for you to enjoy anything.”

  Claire shrugged. So Rosenblatt was right, big deal. So what? Most people didn’t have fun. She didn’t need to have fun. She liked being miserable. That was her fun.

  “I’m right,” Rosenblatt said.

  “Perhaps.”

  “The question is, What horrible thing did you do? What made you so guilty that you’re not allowed to have any pleasure? What crime did you commit?”

  Claire didn’t answer.

  “We’re out of time. Would you like to come back again next week?”

  “I’m afraid I’m pretty much tied up for the next few weeks,” Claire said.

  “You’re afraid, that’s right. How about on the twentieth?” Rosenblatt asked. And then, before Claire had a chance to answer, he added, “I was thinking it might be useful for you to bring your son in with you. I’d like to meet him. No big deal. One session.”

  Claire didn’t say anything. As much as the problem was Jake, she didn’t want to involve him in all this stuff, not yet.

  “It would be helpful,” Rosenblatt said.

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “I have some Saturday hours. Why don’t we make an appointment for then. That way, he won’t miss school and you won’t be working.”

  Claire scribbled the time and date into her little black book and stood to leave.

  “A homework assignment,” Rosenblatt said. “Before you come in again, do something fun.”

  11

  The session wasn’t going well. That happened sometimes. Jody wondered if there was a way to mathematically compute how often it went sour and why. Did men or women have more bad sessions? What were the demographics?

  She was definitely coming down with something. When she swallowed, it felt like razor blades were shredding her throat — not a sensation that inspired her to be particularly chatty.

  “You look tired,” Claire said.

  Jody nodded. She’d been up half the night deciding to tell Michael that she’d only work part-time from now until she left for California. That way it would be easier to spend time with Claire. But there was something dangerous in her thinking, something that worried her. She remembered in eighth-grade gym class, during sex education, the teacher stood in front of them and talked about masturbation. “It’s not dangerous,” she said. “It’s not a bad thing, unless you start avoiding social activities in order to do it.” In other words, playing with yourself was a mini-perversion, a bad habit that, like having a drink before dinner, was basically all right as long as you kept it in check.

  “Do you want to talk a little bit about your plans?”

  “Not today,” Jody said. “I have a sore throat.”

  She couldn’t believe she’d said that. Claire would think she was a hypochondriac. Oh, so you’re worried about going to L.A.? Well, have a sore throat, and if that’s not enough to stop you, what about chest pains or shortness of breath? Hey, I even have a little dizziness left from the last nut case, you want it?

  “Do you have a fever?” Claire got up out of her chair and pressed her palm to Jody’s forehead. Jody tensed. Shrinks were not supposed to walk across the room and take their patients’ temperatures; they weren’t even supposed to believe in physical illness. According to almost any self-respecting shrinky-dink, even cancer was something you willed upon yourself.

  “You look flushed‚” Claire said, moving her hand from Jody’s forehead to her cheek.

  Jody hated it when people touched her. She hated it when near-strangers kissed her goodbye or hello, when her friends insisted she hug them. Everyone read her discomfort as a marker of immaturity, but in fact it was something more — a refusal to partake in false intimacy. She wished Claire would just keep her hands off her.

  But Claire stood there for a minute or more with her hand on Jody’s face, looking worried.

  “It’s fine,” Jody finally said.

  “I think you’re coming down with something. Do you have a headache?” Claire went to her desk, rummaged around, and found some aspirin. “Here, I want you to take these,” she said, going out of the office into the bathroom and returning with a tiny cup of water. “Go on,” she said, and Jody was obligated to swallow the pills even though she really wanted to say “no thanks” and hand them back.

  “Finish the water,” Claire said.

  Jody swallowed the rest. “Do you believe in illness?” she asked.

  “Do I believe in illness?” Claire asked. It was a standard shrink technique to repeat a question. Penny for your thoughts. Question for a question.

  “Do you think people actually get sick as opposed to wanting to get sick or getting sick to avoid something?”

  “Of course people get sick,” Claire said. “In fact, most people don’t admit they’re sick. Everyone used to say things were psychological in origin; but now, especially here in the city, between TB, AIDS, cancer, and who knows what, it’s pretty clear that we’re not all that crazy an
d repressed. There’s a lot of denial.”

  “I was sick when I was a little kid,” Jody said. This was something she’d never discussed with anyone.

  “What was wrong with you?” Claire asked.

  Jody tapped the side of her head, “My ears,” she said. “I had surgery, even x-ray treatments. Any moment now I could get a brain tumor from all the radiation.” Jody smiled. “My earliest memories are medical.”

  “What was the problem?”

  “Don’t exactly know,” Jody said. “According to my mother, I was losing my hearing and they decided to shrink the tissues by x-raying them. See my teeth?” Jody rolled back her lip and flashed a row of gray teeth. “They didn’t know that if they give you tetracycline before your permanent teeth come in, they show up gray like this.” She flashed her teeth again. “It probably wouldn’t have been so bad if there hadn’t been another kid before me. According to Barbara, my parents got me to make them feel better after the kid died, and then I got sick and they freaked. It was too much. Nine years with one sick kid and then the new one turns out defective too.”

  “Do you remember them being upset?”

  “Not exactly. I remember other things; being taken to the hospital, lying on a metal table, a huge x-ray machine hanging over me. Through a little window in the door, I could see my parents’ faces on the other side. And all anyone said to me was, ‘Whatever you do, don’t move.’”

  “What else?” Claire said.

  “My grandparents visited, brought me a tiny stuffed dog I still have. Then my mom drove me home in our new car, and right when we pulled into the driveway, I threw up. My mother took me inside, gave me some apple juice, and then went back out to clean the car. I felt really guilty.”

  “How old were you?”

  “Three.”

  “And you remember all that?”

  “More,” Jody said.

  “Go on.”