(Yet another type! This one, she went on to explain, described a well-to-do lesbian who looks “straight,” has her nails done, and drives to the Dinah Shore Open women’s golf tournament in a Cadillac.)
Finally the doctor said: But let us return to the point. The question is not why she took up with you. The question is, Why did you take up with her?
The patient did not answer for some seconds. The sounds of the street filled the pause: the blare of car horns, the roar of a truck’s engine, the machine-gun rhythm of a jackhammer from some far sidewalk.
What is wrong? asked the therapist.
Charlotte gave me an ultimatum.
And? asked the therapist.
She said, either come with her or consider our relationship over.
There was a moment of silence, then:
How terrible of her! said Dr. Schussler.
You think she’s being terrible, too, don’t you?
Of course I do. I think it is very selfish of Charlotte not to consider your needs, after what you have been through emotionally.
That’s what I thought. How could she do this to me? Now, when she knows what happened with my family … now … no sympathy for me … called me anti-Semitic! When she knows how much I need … oh, God, a holiday … enjoy Christmas … as a Jew? And with all my work … she makes fun of that, too … all the hours … I’m so tired … Oh, God, how I need a rest.
And she succumbed to tears.
They were drunken cries at first, bleary and whiny, but still: At last she had found her way to her tears.
Dr. Schussler let her patient cry without interruption. In any case, there was no reversing the flow of those tears. All that the patient had kept bound up inside her: now pouring forth in uncontrollable wails and sobs. It was an awful sound to hear, like the roar of a deadly swollen river. So much loss and helplessness. Loneliness so much like my own. I imagined her cries resounding in the corridor, through the halls, down the elevator shaft, to the cherubs with their black, startled eyes.
I glanced at my watch; only ten minutes of the session remained. Dr. Schussler must not lose control of the clock again, I thought. She was performing rather well; her consultation with Dr. Gurevitch seemed to have had some good effect (against all my expectations). Yet she again seemed unable to manage the hour; her patient was sobbing uncontrollably—and she must not let the patient walk out into the cold of Christmas alone, raw. I could barely stand still. Perhaps I should move, I thought, make noise—cough—somehow shift the therapist’s attention, even at the risk of losing my position as a silent audience, even at the risk of losing the patient, my life’s blood. I loved her so much that I would do anything.
The therapist sat without moving; the patient wept quietly now. And then came our savior: With only minutes remaining, the church carillon played the three-quarter hour.
Dr. Schussler stood; walked over to the patient.
Here you are, she said. Here are more tissues.
The patient laughed. Thank you, she said, beginning to blow her nose, cough, inhale deeply—all the things people do to try to bring their endless sobbing to a temporary end.
What do you think I should do? the patient asked between gasps and hiccups. I mean about the vacation. Why do you think she’s doing this? I don’t understand.
The doctor sat quietly for a moment. I could hear the words she was not saying: Charlotte wanted to break up but was making the patient do it for her. The patient was not ready to hear this; how good of the doctor to keep this to herself.
Finally the doctor laughed. Well, she said, I can tell you without any hesitation that I do not believe you should go to that granola resort.
Ah, sighed the patient. Thank you.
You did not need my permission.
No, said the patient between ebbing sobs. But I need your help.
The therapist inhaled, exhaled. Do you want to stay home? she asked finally.
Home? the patient echoed.
A sob stabbed her.
Home? You mean that place where I’ll be eating breakfast alone under Charlotte’s Holly Near posters? Where you can’t open the cupboards without getting buried in an avalanche of saved yogurt containers? And all the avocado pits. No avocado eaten in our house ever escaped the fate of getting speared all around with toothpicks and hung in jars like prisoners. In every windowsill: empty