Silence.
“Lark?”
“Donna,” she says quietly.
“Donna? Who is Donna?” Larry asks this as he surveys the group. “Lark? Who is Donna?”
“She sticks up for Lark. She tries to protect Lark sometimes,” she says in a childlike whisper. “But sometimes she can be a bully.”
“Like when?”
“Larry?” It is Keisha.
“Yes, Keisha?”
“I was thinking that maybe Donna comes in when Lark can’t defend herself.”
“An interesting observation. Tell me more about that.”
“It’s like, um, maybe when Lark gets pinned down or somethin’, like with her daddy, Donna comes in like a wrestler to try to be strong for her when she can’t be strong for herself.”
“What made you think of that, Keisha? That’s a very good point.”
Keisha tips her chair back so far that it is teetering precariously on its two back legs.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t?”
“Ain’t nobody gonna hold my arms down, know what I’m sayin’? Nobody. When I leave here? Ain’t nobody gonna ever hold me down again. Uh-uh.”
Me, neither.
“I know you’re leaving, Keisha, and I want to address that in a little bit. For now, though, let’s stay on this topic. Why does it bother you to have someone hold your arms?”
Keisha turns to look out the window. “That’s what they did to me,” she says. “I don’t really remember it, but my therapist here told me that’s what the police report said. That they held me down.”
“When they raped you?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you remember anything about that afternoon?”
“Naw,” she says, turning her attention back to the group. “Thank God for that, know what I’m saying?”
Lark is still staring at the chair.
“Lark? What do you think about what Keisha just talked about?”
“I wish I couldn’t remember,” she says.
Silence.
“Keep going,” Larry gently urges her on.
“That’s it. I wish I couldn’t remember.”
“Do you think about it a lot?”
“No.”
“No?”
“No.”
“Do you think that when you do think about it someone else comes in and sticks up for you so that the memory can’t hurt you? Like Donna? Maybe she comes in when you start thinking about it and she takes all the bad out of it for you? Lark, do you know what yesterday was?”
“Yesterday?”
“Yesterday was Father’s Day, Lark.”
Isabel looks at Lark, who is nodding her head.
“I know.”
“Maybe that’s what was so difficult for you. Maybe the fact that yesterday was a day for all of us to think about, to honor, our fathers was upsetting for you. It’s not an easy day for you, I know.”
More silence.
“It takes a lot of fortitude for a woman—for anyone—to overcome abuse at the hands of a man,” Larry says. “That abuse colors everything we are and everything we will encounter. It’s incredibly difficult to move past it, to trust again. And even then it’s an incomplete trust. So patterns develop. We repeat them because they’re familiar. In your case, Lark, the abuse started with your father and since then—and correct me if I’m wrong—you have continued in other similarly destructive relationships.”
“What’s that?” Katherine pointed with her triangle of toast at a mark on Isabel’s leg.
“What? Nothing. I don’t know,” Isabel said, brushing off the inquiry.
“It’s a huge welt, Isabel.” Her mother continued chewing. “You don’t know how it got there?”
“Mo-om,” Isabel whined, knowing it wouldn’t be too difficult to deflect her mother’s probe since her parents had become quite accustomed to her adolescent mood swings. They were quick to back off and give her space when she started turning their names into two syllables.
“I told you, I got it somewhere…I don’t remember. What’s with the third degree?” Isabel knew the bruise was ugly. But she thought it looked far worse than it was. The accompanying cut and scab turned the black-and-blue mark into special effects material.
Isabel and David had been dating for six months—since the first week of freshman year in high school. One night he began pressuring her to have sex, and what began as a gentle rebuff while kissing turned into a fight and, before David stormed out of the truck he drove, he punched the seat in frustration. But he missed the seat and caught Isabel’s leg instead. Later, when Isabel was alone, she tried to reconstruct the scene to figure out how it was that he punched the side of her leg instead of the seat and couldn’t. So she bought David’s explanation of a misdirected right hook and let it go. The mark had been easy to cover up, since her school uniform hit her just below the knee. But her mother noticed the bruise on this particular day because she had a tennis match and her game uniform was short.
Dating David was like being caught in a light spring drizzle. At first the infrequent drops of water are cool, refreshing even. Isabel had never had a man wanting, almost needing, to know everything about her. She reveled in this newfound attention. It no longer mattered when her father missed a play—David was there. When her father canceled dinner plans, David was there, ready to whisk her out for pizza. But the drizzle that had been light ultimately soaked Isabel to the bone.
David told Isabel his father had given his mother six stitches on their honeymoon. Though it horrified her, Isabel was strangely drawn to this troubled guy who had had to grow up so fast. She loved feeling needed: his insatiable fascination with the wholesomeness and stability she represented was intoxicating for her. It became an addiction for both of them. David’s sad stories about his family, the hardships he had to endure, and the pain he was in as a result, touched Isabel in a profound way. To David, Isabel’s home life was idyllic and dangled in front of his desperate eyes like a carrot in front of a hungry rabbit.
But love only fed the flame on the slow burn that was David’s anger. Over time he tired of having his face pressed up against the glass and his anger turned to bitter resentment. She began feeling the heat of David’s hate directed at her. Isabel began to represent all that had been denied him.
Isabel was shocked the first time he hit her, but David was sufficiently apologetic and all was soon forgotten.
The next time the slap was backhanded, with more force. And then, mixed in with apologies was subtle blame: I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, I love you, I’m sorry, but you did twist my wrist backward when we were wrestling and it hurt like hell. But I’m sorry. Please forgive me.
It was ingenious: slowly but surely David was making Isabel feel she deserved to be hit.
Isabel withdrew from her friends and allowed her relationship with David to consume her. The bruises became a part of who she was and she made an unsettled peace with it.
“Now, Keisha, I know you are getting ready to leave and I want you to know that we here in the group support you and wish you well. Does anyone have any parting words for Keisha?”
“Bye, Keisha,” Ben dutifully replies.
“Yeah, good luck,” Regina says.
“We’re all pulling for you,” Kristen chimes in.
Isabel doesn’t say anything. Instead, when the session ends and before Keisha stands up to go, Isabel moves to the seat next to her.
“I wish you didn’t have to go,” she says.
Twenty-Three
“What are you thinking about, Isabel?”
She looks up.
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Yeah. Nothing.”
“Your mind is blank, then,” Dr. Seidler prods.
“No.” Annoyed, Isabel answers as though she is explaining something to a child. “I’m thinking of nothing. I have nothing. There’s nothing in my life, not one living thing. My plant was the only living thing i
n my life that was still mine and I came back from my last out-of-town trip and there it was, all shriveled up. Dead. The perfect metaphor, really. When you think about it.”
The tears that had been balancing precariously on her lower eyelids finally push past the dam and make tracks down her hot cheeks.
“Are you thinking about suicide, Isabel?” Her doctor looks earnest, concerned.
“Yes. If you must know, yes. There. I’ve said it. I know that means I’ll never get out of this place, but shit, yeah I’m thinking about it. I could walk down to the end of the driveway and step in front of an oncoming car.”
“There are other options, you know.” Dr. Seidler’s tone is urgent. “You have a lot to live for—”
“Before you go on and on about how many people would miss me if I died you can just save it,” Isabel cries. The therapist lets her continue. “It would be a relief.”
“A relief for whom?”
“For me, first of all. I wouldn’t have to figure out each and every single goddamned day how I am going to haul myself up and into this meaningless world. I wouldn’t have to fight the silent scream—you know that painting? Actually, I think it’s called The Scream—the one where that person has its hands on either side of its scary face? People look at me and they see this happy face, but inside I’m screaming. It’s just that no one hears me.”
Dr. Seidler waits for her to continue.
When Isabel doesn’t she asks, “You don’t think anyone would be sad if you killed yourself?”
“Who?” she challenges. “Who? My parents? I haven’t been close to them in years.”
“Can she call you back, Katherine?” Alex took a sip of his cappuccino. “She’s taking a nap and I hate to wake her since she’s been so tired lately.”
Sip.
“I know, I know,” he said, trying to make his voice sound as if he were smiling, “she’s terrible about returning calls. But I’ll make sure she calls you back this weekend, okay?”
Sip.
“Good to talk to you, too. I will, I will. Okay, bye!”
“Who was that on the phone?” Isabel rubbed her eyes as she shuffled out of the bedroom. She yawned.
“Oh, no one.” Alex turned toward his sleepy wife. “Telemarketer. How’d you sleep?”
“Like a rock. What time is it?” Isabel turned Alex’s wrist so she could see the face of his watch. “Why’d you let me sleep so long? Damn! I have so much to do today.”
Alex stroked her hair. “You need your sleep, Isabel.”
She curled up on the couch alongside her husband. “You take such good care of me,” she purred. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“You won’t have to find out,” he said somberly. “You won’t find out.”
“Plus, my parents have two other children to think about. My brothers are healthy and successful and happy. No. They’d be sad for a while but they’d go on.”
“That’s depression talking, Isabel,” the doctor says. “It’s hard for you to see beyond your feelings right now, I know that, but a lot of people would be sad, very sad, if you killed yourself.”
Silence.
“I just want to go.” Isabel is exhausted. “Just let me go.”
“I can’t do that and you know it.”
Why? Why can’t you just let me go?
The next morning it is impossible for Isabel to pull herself out of bed. She lies on top of the covers and stares at the acoustic-tiled ceiling, focusing on the mess of holes punched in each square.
Someone has the mind-numbing job of running a machine that pokes the holes into each of those perfectly measured squares. How can they live with themselves?
A knock on the door breaks the embryonic whoosh of her sound machine. “Yes?”
“Isabel, you’ve got to take your meds.” The nameless nurse pokes her head in the door.
“Okay, okay,” she sighs, not moving from her bed. “I’ll be there in a minute.”
Here we are, scurrying around like ants: “You have to take your meds, Isabel”; “Line up, kids”; “It’s time to file your income tax returns”; “Would you like this for here or to go?” Each person has their little job and they do it, then they go home, then they eat, then they sleep and then they get up and do it all over again the next day. What’s the point? We’re all just filling up space. Why do people want to reproduce? So they can bring more children into this already overpopulated world so they can fill up space with some meaningless job and then go home and do it all over again the next day? Like those ceiling tiles.
The knock comes again. “Isabel?” It’s the nurse again and this time she looks annoyed when she sees that Isabel hasn’t moved. “You have to come get your meds, Isabel. After that you can get back in bed for a little while if you want, but you have to come take your medicine,” she says emphatically.
I wonder what she thinks of her job. What does she do when she leaves here? Does she talk about all of us to her husband?
Isabel hauls herself out of bed and puts shorts on over her boxers.
“Okay, okay,” she says to no one in particular as she heads down the hall to the medicine distribution window. After swallowing the controlled substances that will beat back nature until the next dispensation—all have foreboding names packed with too many late-alphabet consonants like Serzone, Zyprexa, Trazodone—she shuffles back to her room and crawls back into bed, this time assuming the fetal position.
Doesn’t anybody else see how meaningless this is? How we are all consumed with our chores, which are ultimately useless because with the swipe of a broom we can all be swept away into the abyss. Here I am in a mental institution, trying to get better so that I can go back into the world and rush from job to job, killing time until I die of something other than suicide. I take medicine to help me deal with the nothingness of my life. Millions of us have to take pills to distract us from the sheer boredom of it all. We hurry from thing to thing like ants when we’re all going to end up suffocating, anyway.
“Isabel.” The voice on the other side of the door sounds like Kristen’s. “We’re getting ready for the morning meeting. You coming?”
Isabel looks at her watch. An hour has passed.
Twenty-Four
Another sign of failure.
Isabel is out of clean clothes. She has been out of clean clothes for two days but has doubled up on dirty underwear instead of admitting to herself that she has been in the hospital for so long she has cycled through her hospital wardrobe twice.
She bends over and starts gathering her clothes together in a bundle and trudges down the hall to the communal laundry room. The door is closed. Balancing her laundry on her hip, Isabel opens the door and is startled to find Sukanya.
Sukanya stands, wedged in between the dryer and the washing machine—which, Isabel notes, is in use—holding an open book and mumbling what sounds like a prayer. In front of her, on top of the dryer, is a single lit candle.
Before backing out the door Isabel watches the sixteen-year-old girl.
Sukanya looks up, sees Isabel and looks back down, without interrupting her prayer.
Isabel closes the door and thinks how nice it is to hear Sukanya say something other than “I’d prefer not to say.”
She dumps her laundry back in her room and grabs her pack of cigarettes.
“Kristen? Patio?” Isabel has started the question on her way around the corner into Kristen’s room but stops short when she finds Kristen immersed in paperwork spread out on her crinkly bed. “Oh. Sorry.”
Kristen looks up for a split second and then races on with her paperwork as if she is in the middle of taking SATs.
“What is this stuff? What’re you doing?”
“Application forms! Can’t you see? I’m trying to fill out application forms. I’ll talk to you later…” She trails off as she flips over the side of one form. On it is an unmistakable logo. A huge M formed by two golden arches. McDonald’s. Next to Kristen is a stack of what appear to
be a hundred more.
“Seriously, what’s up? Everything okay?”
“Yeah,” Kristen answers distractedly, not looking up from her work. “I love to fill out forms. Any forms, really. These are the best, though. McDonald’s. They’re the best because you have to fit each letter in its own square; it takes concentration. Other forms give you a line to fill in. That’s not as challenging. I love these forms.” Kristen is hunched over a fresh application and is carefully squeezing her name, letter by letter, into the appropriate boxes.
“You do this often?”
“Yeah. I have hundreds of the same forms. I take them everywhere with me. Want to do one?” she asks hopefully, as if these are New York Times crossword puzzles.
Um, yeah, Kristen, we’re so alike.
“Ah, well…no, thanks,” Isabel says. “I guess I’ll go, then. I’ll be outside if you want to come out.”
But Kristen does not seem to hear her.
Isabel goes out to the smoker’s patio and sits alone in an Adirondack chair flanked by two pots of fatally dehydrated geraniums.
A half hour later Kristen pushes through the door and looks relieved to find Isabel.
“There you are!”
“Hey.” Isabel is tentative in her greeting. She watches Kristen light her cigarette at the wall, noting her shaking hands.
“I’m glad you came and got me,” Kristen says as she pulls a chair up alongside Isabel. “I can get a little obsessive about my forms…”
No kidding.
“…but it calms me down when I start thinking about my mother,” she is saying. “After we talked about Billy the other day I talked more with my shrink and I guess that’s what got me going.”
Isabel feels Kristen looking at her, studying her. She knows Kristen wants to talk but does nothing to encourage it.
That does not dissuade Kristen.
“It sounds corny, but I feel like you get it,” Kristen says. “You understand me.”
“All I did was ask if you wanted to come smoke.” Don’t do this, Kristen. Don’t drag me into your personal hell.