Maybe You Should Talk to Someon - Lori Gottlieb Page 0,119
and Margo. John glanced at it. Margo gave him the death stare. John remembered his instructions to his staff to call only in case of emergency—unless someone’s dying. He knew that today’s shoot was on location. Had something gone wrong?
“Don’t,” Margo said.
“I just need to check who it is,” John replied.
“God damn it,” Margo hissed, the first time she’d sworn in front of the kids.
“Don’t ‘God damn it’ me,” John hissed back.
“We’ve been away only two hours,” Margo said, her voice rising, “and you promised you wouldn’t do this!”
The kids went silent, and so did the phone. The call had gone to voicemail.
John sighed. He asked Margo to look at the caller ID and tell him who had called, but she shook her head and turned away. John reached for the phone with his right hand. Then they collided with a black SUV coming straight at them.
Strapped in their booster seats were five-year-old Gracie and six-year-old Gabe. Irish twins, born just a year apart and inseparable. The loves of John’s life. Gracie survived along with John and Margo. Gabe, seated directly behind John and at exactly the point of impact, died at the scene.
Later, the police would try to piece together what had caused the tragedy. The two witnesses from nearby cars weren’t much help. One said that the SUV veered across the lane, taking the curve too quickly. The other said that John’s car didn’t adjust to the position of the SUV coming around the curve. The police determined that the driver of the SUV had a blood-alcohol level above the legal limit, and he was put in jail. Manslaughter. But John didn’t feel absolved. He knew that at the very moment the SUV had rounded the curve, he’d looked away for a millisecond—or he possibly had, though he thought his eyes had stayed on the road as he felt for the phone with his hand. Margo didn’t see the SUV coming either. She was looking out the passenger window, toward the ocean, fuming at John while refusing to check his phone.
Gracie couldn’t remember a thing, and the only person who saw what was about to happen seemed to be Gabe. The last time John heard his son’s voice, it was a piercing scream with one long word: “Daddyyyyyyy!”
The phone call, by the way, was a wrong number.
As I listen, I’m overwhelmed with heartbreak—not just for John but for his entire family. I’m holding back tears, but John, on the couch, has turned to face me now, and I see that his eyes are dry. He seems removed, distant, just as he had when he told me about his mother’s death.
“Oh, John,” I say, “that’s—”
“Yeah, yeah,” he interrupts, his tone a taunt, “it’s so sad. I know. It’s so fucking sad. That’s all everyone said when it happened. My mom dies. It’s so sad. My kid dies. It’s so sad. Obviously. But that doesn’t change anything. They’re still dead. Which is why I don’t tell people. And why I didn’t tell you. I don’t need to hear how fucking sad it is. I don’t need to see people’s faces get that sad, stupid look of pity. The only reason I’m telling you is that I had a dream the other night—you shrinks like dreams, right? And I haven’t been able to get it out of my head and I thought—”
John stops, sits up.
“Margo heard me scream last night. I woke up screaming at four in the fucking morning. And I can’t be doing shit like that.”
I want to say that what John sees in me isn’t pity at all—that it’s compassion and empathy and even a kind of love. But John doesn’t let anyone touch or be touched by him, which leaves him alone in already isolating circumstances. Losing somebody you love is such a profoundly lonely experience, something only you endure in your own particular way. I think about how gutted and alone John must have felt as a six-year-old when his mom died and then again as a dad when his own six-year-old died. But I don’t say that right now. I can tell that John’s feeling what therapists call flooded, meaning that his nervous system is in overdrive, and when people feel flooded, it’s best to wait a beat. We do this with couples when one person is so overwhelmed by anger or hurt that all he can do is lash out or shut down. The person needs a few minutes for his nervous system to