to self: put new, easy-to-remember passwords on everything.
“Jen! You can’t do things like that. There are barriers.” But it didn’t come out like that. I heard the lisp in my voice… barrierrzz. I had meant to say “boundaries,” but boundaries and barriers were all rolled into one confusing mix. My excitement caused me to slip violently backwards in the sheeny bathwater, submerging me as I slithered around and spluttered up the oily, orange-blossomed water. When I came up for air I saw my toes and fingertips were shriveled little prunes. How had this happened? How had I allowed Jen—practically a teenager—to hang out with me in my bathroom smoking weed, while I was naked in the bathtub, and boozing? Black and white had been blurred into a hazy gray. It was shameful.
Get a grip!
“You call him right back, and you tell Mr. Donner that I will be there at three o’clock sharp. I cannot believe you did this!”
“I’m sorry, but I didn’t like seeing you so stressed out, so sad. Thought you needed a break. Anyway, he seemed relieved. Happy to have the day off. Said he’d go to Pebble Beach and play golf.”
“That’s my income you’re meddling with! I have a reputation to think of. That’s my job, which I happen to take extremely seriously!”
Jen pouted. “Don’t be mad at me. I felt like hanging out, is all. Wanted to put a smile on your face.”
I had no answer. Should I be flattered? Furious? This job was my lifeline. No kids, husband dead. At least my job gave me a sense of self-worth. But then, how would Jen, at her age and with her limited life experience, know how I felt? How my career and doing well academically had been the one thing I could rely on, the one thing that had never let me down?
Jen took another drag of her fat, badly rolled joint. Sitting at the dressing table, she dabbed some of my expensive French perfume behind her ears, and in the crook of her slender wrists, all with the joint still in her hand, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. I suspected this was more than just a “now and then” vice and bet the others smoked too. She languidly stretched herself up like a yawning lioness, and I sighed, but she had no intention of leaving. No, she simply sprawled herself on the chaise longue and picked up December’s Vogue.
“I tried modeling once,” she said dreamily, tapping her finger on a glossy Gucci ad. “But I didn’t like it. It’s shitty work, you know. They make you schlep around with your book, all over the city. Which is really dumb, because they don’t even care what you look like in the flesh. I suffered New York for one long, hot summer. It was so boring. And humiliating, actually. I didn’t have the look they were after anyway.”
“You, humiliated? I can’t imagine.”
“Yeah, there were girls taller and prettier than me, it made me feel small. Haven’t you ever felt that way? Like everyone else is more special than you?”
“Of course.”
“When?”
“Well, I had a terrible time at school.”
“Really? Why?”
I hesitated then slurred, “I was born with a birth defect that affected me horribly.”
“No way! Like one of those strawberry birthmarks?”
“Six fingers.” Oops, I didn’t mean to share that with anyone. Too late.
Jen’s jaw dropped. “No way!”
“It’s more common than you might think. It’s called ‘finger hexadactyly.’ They also call it radial or preaxial polydactyly.” I heard my tongue try and roll around the words “preaxial” and “polydactyly.” Was I really so drunk?
“Sounds like a dinosaur or something.”
“That’s just how I felt as a child, like a freaking dinosaur. ‘Freaky Fingers.’ ‘Edward Scissorhands,’” I lisped.
Jen laughed and threw her head back. She looked like her mom in that photo they showed me. “I don’t know, it’s kind of cool to have six fingers. You could have, like, played guitar extra fast or something. Or done card tricks.”
“True, but I didn’t have that kind of bravado.”
“So how come your parents didn’t take you to a surgeon to get finger number six removed?”
“They did, but not till I was thirteen. As it was well formed and healthy the doctors advised them that there was no reason I should have it removed, unless for psychological or aesthetic reasons. They warned my parents I might get teased at school. Ha! That was the understatement of the year. Spiteful children don’t have much empathy for disabilities, do they?”