just knew that she didn’t want to be there.
As the sessions went on, Martha began to appreciate Dr. Baer’s firm voice. She looked forward to the weekly appointment, picking out her outfit to go to the office downtown, walking down Walnut Street, looking in the windows of the clothing shops. Martha always felt important when she walked down the street to the office, like she had somewhere special to be. Dr. Baer’s office was on the second floor of a building that was squished in between a Rite Aid and a Lacoste store. Sometimes when she entered the door from the street, she felt like she was entering a secret passageway. There were no markings on the door, just a small mailbox card that said MD BAER. If you didn’t know what you were looking for, you’d walk right by.
Martha wasn’t embarrassed about seeing a shrink (although Dr. Baer hated that word. “I’m a therapist, Martha,” she would say whenever Martha called her that). She was very honest about her appointments with everyone at J.Crew. “I can’t work Tuesday afternoons,” she would say. “That’s my shrink appointment.”
When Dr. Baer took her vacation in July, Martha felt a hole in her life. The hour appointment was easily the best part of her week. Martha began to think of Dr. Baer more as a friend than as a doctor; a confidante she could talk to. That is, until today.
Outside the office, Martha watched as Duncan walked inside to see Dr. Baer. Duncan had had the appointment right after Martha’s for almost two years now, and they often ran into each other in the waiting room or right outside on the street. They always gave each other knowing nods as they passed. Today, Martha wanted to grab Duncan’s arm and warn him. Watch out, she would say. Dr. Baer is in a mood. They would look knowingly at each other, Duncan understanding just what Martha meant. But Duncan walked quickly past her before she could say anything.
Martha pulled a dusty Kleenex out of her pocket and blew her nose. Then she decided to walk to the coffee shop a couple of blocks away to get something to drink. She needed to sit and make sense of her last hour.
She hadn’t even gotten a chance to tell Dr. Baer about the dream that she’d had last night, where she’d seen a giant orange ant and grabbed a shoe to kill it. When she smacked it with her shoe, the ant turned to look at her with big eyes. Then the back half of the ant kept moving and Martha had to chase it around and hit it again. She’d been excited to talk about the dream, since she never had dreams that vivid. It must have meant something—she was sure of it. She’d told her mom about it that morning, but her mom had just sort of stared at her in a fuzzy way over her coffee. Dr. Baer would have had to listen as she described the body of the ant, how strange it made her feel. But she hadn’t gotten to talk about it. And now she would never know what the ant was supposed to be.
The coffee shop was more crowded than Martha expected. There were several people banging away on laptops with a sense of purpose, a couple of people reading the paper, and one pair of girls with their heads bent close together, whispering seriously. Martha found a small table in the middle back of the shop, and edged her way through the other customers to get there. A few of them looked up as she passed and she wondered if she looked distressed to them. She tried to catch the eye of one scraggly-looking guy who had his hands resting on his laptop and was staring off into space, but he looked back at the screen as soon as he saw her looking at him.
Martha sighed and flopped her bag onto the table. It made a satisfying thump, and a couple of people jumped. Then she sighed again and sat down, pushing her chair back so that it screeched on the floor. No one looked up. She wanted just one of these people to acknowledge her and give her a sad smile. I just had a fight with my shrink, she would say. Although that wasn’t really true. Maybe she’d say, My shrink just told me I’m worthless. That would get their attention. But that wasn’t true either.