In A Country Of Mothers Page 8

  “It’s been done before,” Jody said, breaking an egg yolk with a corner of toast, mopping up the yellow.

  “What do you mean, ‘done before’?”

  “Shot in the crotch. I can’t remember the name — a French film with Gérard Depardieu, and that old Frenchwoman, maybe Jeanne Moreau. In the end she puts the gun inside her and pulls the trigger, makes a huge mess, and takes a long time for her to die. Very symbolic. Almost heavy-handed.”

  “You’re telling me my life’s been done before? My nightmare?”

  “Everything.” Jody flagged the waiter for more coffee. “Can I ask you an intensely personal question?”

  Ellen nodded.

  “Do you always wear sunglasses indoors at seven a.m., or is it something you want to talk about?”

  “I have a boo-boo.”

  “What, like the stranger’s fist met your face?”

  “Unfortunately, more embarrassing.” Ellen took off the glasses for a second, flashing a semicircular black-and-blue mark at Jody.

  “I’m listening.”

  “We were, shall I say, engaged, and I kind of reared up and came down hard on the edge of the headboard.”

  “That metal thing?”

  Ellen nodded. “Completely knocked me out, only I don’t think he noticed. When I came to we were still doing it.”

  “Well, you must not have been out very long.”

  “If I go to work like this, they’ll think someone did it.”

  “Someone did. So say you were in a cab accident, they smashed into a truck, your face was slammed against the Plexiglas. Happens all the time.”

  Ellen laid her hand out on the table. On her right hand, fourth finger, was a shiny diamond ring. “Rob gave me this yesterday. What do you think?”

  “He gave you an engagement ring and you brought a stranger home?”

  “He didn’t exactly say it was an engagement ring. He should know better than to try and marry me.”

  “You’re nuts.”

  “You’re just jealous. Here, try it on.” Ellen took off the ring and tried to slip it onto Jody’s finger. “With this ring, I thee wed.”

  Jody pulled her hand away. “You need professional help.”

  Ellen shook her head. “Every time I go to a shrink all they want to do is fuck me.”

  “Go to a woman.”

  “What makes you think she wouldn’t want to fuck me?”

  “Ellen, I know this will be hard for you to accept, but not everyone wants to sleep with you, and that’s all right. It’s supposed to be like that,”

  “I couldn’t. I hate women. Disgusting. I can’t imagine what I’d tell a woman.”

  The waiter brought the check and Ellen grabbed it. “Whoever does the most talking pays.”

  “Thanks,” Jody said.

  “You never said anything about L.A. — how was it?”

  “Nice. Very nice. Sunny, warm.”

  “Is everyone really good-looking?”

  “I didn’t notice.”

  Ellen tapped her face. “Do you think I can cover this with makeup?”

  “Take a piece of gauze, tape it over your face, and tell people how long you had to sit in the emergency room waiting to get your skull x-rayed.”

  “Do you think about your brother a lot?” Claire asked. Five minutes into the session, Jody was starting to space out. It was pouring rain outside. She looked past Claire and out the window. Somehow it was easier to look over Claire’s shoulder than to deal with things inside.

  “Would it be better if I closed the blind?” Claire asked.

  “No. Sorry,” Jody said.

  “How would you describe your relationship to your brother?”

  “My relationship? He died before I was born.”

  “Do you think of him as your friend? Your enemy?”

  “My ghost,” Jody said. “I am him, he is me.”

  “What does that mean?” Claire asked, eyebrows raised.

  Jody shrugged. This was getting a little too close for comfort.

  “Did your parents want a boy, or did they purposely adopt you because you were a girl?”

  “They adopted me before I was born,” Jody said, annoyed. “The deal was, whatever the baby was, it was theirs. The guy who was in on it called my parents when I was born and said, ‘Your package is here and it’s wrapped up in pink ribbons.’ Isn’t that incredibly queer? ‘Your package.’ What did they do, mail-order me?”

  “People didn’t talk about adoption very openly twenty-five years ago.”

  “Tell me about it,” Jody said.

  “Why don’t you tell me,” Claire said.

  They were silent. Rain splattered down onto the air conditioner outside, and Jody forgot where she was for a minute, slipping back and forth in time and geography.

  “The whole year I was nine,” she said, “I thought I was going to die. Every day I waited. I didn’t know how it would happen — if it would be a sudden, quick snapping thing or something that would creep across me for days or weeks. After that, regardless of what happened, I always felt like one of those miracle cancer patients who lives despite the odds.”

  “What made you think you were going to die?”

  “He was nine when he died and somehow in my head I figured all children died. That was just the way it went.”

  “Depressing,” Claire said.

  “Very,” Jody said.

  “Did you ever have fun?”

  “Yeah,” Jody said, laughing. “I played funeral home with the kid who lived next door. I made her lie down flat and then I covered her face with baby powder.” Jody paused. “You’re looking at me funny.”

  “You say the most upsetting things and somehow they sound funny. I’m not sure whether you’re kidding.”

  “The funnier it gets, the less I’m kidding,” Jody said dryly. “Can we change the subject?”

  “Do you find it difficult to talk about your family?”

  “No, it’s like eating a York Peppermint Patty, uplifting, refreshing, get the sensation.”

  “You’re very angry.”

  “Annoyed, not angry. When I get angry, little flames start coming out of my ears, it’s a whole different thing.”

  What do you want from me? Jody was tempted to ask.

  “I’m curious why you’re having such a hard time today,” Claire said. “The trip to L.A. went well, so there should be some acknowledgment of success, but you don’t seem willing to discuss that, either. Maybe you want me to know that despite your ability to succeed, there’s still something you need me for.”

  Jody shrugged. She was nailed. She tried to play it cool.

  “I’m here,” Claire said. “You can tell me the most horrible thing in the world or the most wonderful thing. Either way I’m still here.”

  “My life, my brother, my family has made me into a very different person from the one I was born as,” Jody said. “When I think about it, I have the sensation of being separated from myself. I’m not into this adoption thing, okay? I love my parents, I really do. But there’s something, some strange something. Maybe it’s from being adopted, maybe it’s just me, but I don’t get too attached to anyone. To anything. I don’t want to. I’m convinced that if do, I’ll get fucked over. Call it fear of rejection, whatever.

  “When you’re a baby you look at your mother’s face and it’s your face. She smiles at you and at that moment she is you. When you’re a little older, you smile back at her and somehow the smile on your face is her smile, it’s you becoming her.”

  Jody paused and looked at Claire, who was nodding intensely. Though she didn’t usually wear makeup, Claire had lipstick on, and one side of it went up above the lip line, making her look a little demented. Jody forgot what she was thinking for a second.

  “But when you’re adopted, you look up at your mother and she’s trying to look at you, to understand you, and in my case there was also this ghost of a child between us. What I saw was not a mirror; it was neither myself nor
my mother, but something confusing and much less clear. The root it plants is a strange kind of detachment, an insecurity.” Jody stopped and fixed on Claire.

  “Do you still feel the insecurity?” Claire asked.

  Jody sighed. She wondered if shrinks made their families stay up late at night and talk about everything in microscopic detail. So fucking obsessed, no surprise that they worked in offices by themselves. No one could stand to be around them.

  “There is something, some lack of something.”

  “What?”

  Jody flashed Claire a hard look. Even if she knew, she wouldn’t tell anyone, ever.

  Claire didn’t react except to glance at the clock and then pick up her appointment book and start flipping through the pages. Were they out of time? Jody wondered. It was as if they’d been under water and suddenly had raced back to the surface for air.

  “There’s a lot to talk about,” Claire said.

  Jody nodded.

  “Would you like to keep going?”

  Jody didn’t know exactly what Claire meant.

  “We could have a double session,” Claire said. “I’m not seeing anyone until five. What do you think?”

  Jody shrugged. She still wasn’t clear about what was going on. She’d never heard of anyone going overtime. Didn’t Claire have better things to do? Didn’t Jody have a job? A life?

  “Do you want to stay?” Claire asked.

  Of course Jody wanted to stay, didn’t everyone? But at the same time, she’d had enough. She’d said the things she’d said knowing that within the hour Claire would throw her out. There were no major consequences. You didn’t have to live with your words for more than fifty minutes. That was the beauty of therapy, you always ran out of time. You could always say something incredibly important in the last five minutes and there was nothing the shrink could do except say, We’ll have to talk about that next week, or, It’s so interesting how you save the very best things for last. No matter what, you left when the hour was up. That was one of the rules.

  “Well?” Claire asked.

  Jody shrugged.

  “Are you leaving it up to me?”

  She nodded.

  “Then let’s keep going — but first I have to go to the bathroom. I’ll be right back.”

  Claire walked out, leaving the door open. Jody never had a shrink who went to the bathroom before. She’d always thought they were like teachers: they just didn’t go.

  Claire’s purse was on her desk along with a huge stack of notes, a pile of yellow legal pads. Jody could have gone through everything. She could have stolen Claire’s wallet and then played dumb. She could have flipped through her appointment book, making a list of the names and numbers of all her other patients. Later that night she’d be able to sit down with a bowl of popcorn and make crank calls.

  Hi, I’m calling for Claire Roth. She asked me to let you know that you’re so incredibly neurotic that it’s driven her crazy and she had to be admitted to the hospital. Hi, this is Claire Roth’s secretary. She asked me to leave you a message: get a new shrink.

  The phone rang just as Claire was coming out of the bathroom. “Don’t answer it,” she yelled, running back into her office, picking up just as the tape clicked on. “Hello,” she said, breathless.

  From her side of the room, Jody could hear a woman’s voice squeaking through the receiver.

  “I’m with someone now,” Claire said curtly. “Can I call you later?”

  “So,” Claire said, hanging up and sitting back down in her chair. “Tell me how your parents adopted you.”

  The mood had completely changed. They’d come back to the surface and now, with barely a breath of air, Claire wanted to go under again. Jody wasn’t sure she could do it. If she’d been the person she wished she was, the great pillar of strength and wisdom, she would have explained that while she was grateful for the offer, she’d had enough for one day and really had to get back to work.

  “Do you know the details about where you came from?” Claire asked.

  “Yeah,” Jody said. “The sperm bashed its head against the egg and here I am.”

  “How romantic,” Claire said. “But did you come from an agency or an orphanage?”

  “You really want to hear all this?”

  Claire nodded.

  “My parents told me I came from an agency.”

  “How old were you when they told you?”

  “Just born,” Jody said. “I came home from the hospital and they said, ‘Hi, how are you? This is the house, this is the kitchen, this is the front hall, we’ll take you to your room. Oh, and by the way, you’re adopted, but don’t think twice about it.’”

  “Do you remember them telling you?”

  “They always told me. They had this book, not something in general circulation, but like something an adoption company would sell you. A two-volume boxed set, The Adopted Family. One book was a picture book for the kid, and the other was the more serious stuff for the adoptive parents, things like what problems you might have, how to love the stranger’s child, blah, blah, blah.”

  “Was finding out you were adopted traumatic? Do you wish they hadn’t told you?”

  “It’s like learning your name. You don’t remember learning it, it’s just there, it belongs to you. I’m adopted. A-D-O-P-T-E-D. It’s the first word I learned to spell.”

  Claire grimaced.

  “Kidding,” Jody said. Every time she said something, Claire’s face flashed a reaction. At first Jody had really liked that — it was proof that a human being was sitting across from her — but sometimes she wished everything wasn’t so damn interesting, didn’t mean so much to Claire.

  “Everything is not a natural disaster,” Jody said. “‘Adopted’ … I know the word, but what does it mean? I have no idea.”

  “Do you feel adopted? Earlier you were talking about your mother and not mirroring her.”

  “Yeah, but I don’t know if that comes from being adopted or having a dead brother.”

  “How long before you were born did he die?”

  “Six months.”

  “It is kind of close,” Claire said.

  “I know.” Jody was tempted to tell Claire to take a tranquilizer or to point out that therapeutically speaking, all Claire’s expressions might not be a good thing. If Jody were not Jody, if she were a seriously disturbed maniac, someone who couldn’t take a little criticism, all Claire’s heaving and hoing might throw her right over the edge. Fortunately, what Jody was saying was old hat. There were no shocking new revelations about her past. She was telling the story of her life, and the facts came easily.

  “Barbara used to hound me about didn’t I think it was strange that an agency would give an infant to a family whose child had just died. She kept pestering me, like maybe she knew something I didn’t, but she never came out and said it. Anyway, I used to bug my mom for information, I always had the feeling that there were things nobody was telling me. I’d hit her up for a recount whenever I knew she’d be weak, like the kid’s birthday or the anniversary of his death.”

  “How did you know when his birthday was, or when he died?”

  Fucking detective, Jody thought. “My mother would say, Today’s Blank’s birthday. Today it’s ten years since Blank died.’ I never heard her tell anyone else, but she’d always tell me in a kind of conspiratorial whisper.”

  “That wasn’t very fair, was it?” Claire said, then quickly added in a soft voice, “I wish you’d tell me his name.”

  Jody shrugged, her stomach turning in on itself; it was as if Claire was asking Jody to share her brother. Jody was aware of the betrayal, the obviousness of leaving her brother’s name out, but she had to keep something for herself. Claire couldn’t have everything.

  “Anyway, I’d hit her for info, and then when I was about twenty, it came out that they didn’t get me from some agency, but on the black market, and the lady who lived next door went to the hospital to pick me up because my mom was too chicken to
meet my real mom. They traded me in the back of a cab for an envelope of money.”

  Jody glanced at Claire, who looked as if she were having an allergic reaction. Her nose and eyes were all red. “The thing that kills me — well, among the things that kill me — is no one will tell me how much they paid for me. I mean, I’d like to know. I asked and my mom said, ‘Whatever it was, it wasn’t worth it.’”

  Claire looked surprised.

  “She was kidding,” Jody said. “The other thing that kills me is that it’s still not clear to me if Barbara knew something or not, and if she did, how come she played along and didn’t tell me?”

  “I don’t know,” Claire said. “You’d have to ask Barbara.”

  “No one ever tells me shit.”

  “Do you feel like people are purposely deceiving you?”

  A fucking obvious test question. Did Jody also think people were out to get her? That everyone was working together in a plot to ruin her life? She looked at Claire as if to say, Don’t you think I see what you’re getting at? Don’t fucking condescend to me. Fuckwad.

  “Is there some reason why people would keep the truth from you?” Claire asked.

  Jody shrugged.

  “What else do you know?”

  “Why are we talking about this?” Jody asked.

  “Why?” Claire said.

  “Yeah, what does being adopted have to do with going to UCLA?”

  “You tell me.”

  “No, you tell me.”

  Claire looked at the clock. “Well, neither of us can say much more today. Let’s talk for a minute about your schedule. Do you work every day?”

  Jody nodded.

  “Are you going to keep working until you leave for California?”

  “That’s a big subject if we’re out of time,” Jody said.

  “So let’s talk about it more later,” Claire said. “What’s tomorrow like for you?”

  “Fine,” Jody said, wondering how the hell she’d pay for all this. All of a sudden she needed to see Claire all the time. Not once a week but every day. She had the urge to tell Claire everything, even the things she really didn’t want her to know. It was as if Jody needed to unload herself, her whole self, to empty everything onto Claire and then, scrubbed clean, leave for California. And Jody also had the strangest gut feeling that Claire somehow needed her as well; she reprimanded herself for it. That was truly sick, a sure sign of major neurosis. Of course Claire didn’t need her, she had a life of her own: a husband, probably kids, and a million other patients, including the one who’d just buzzed into the waiting room.