Hunger Point

by Jillian Medoff

  “No,” she says slowly. “Daniel hasn’t said anything.”

  “Well,” I race. “I wouldn’t talk to him just yet. I think it’s still being planned. Maybe they won’t even have it at all.”

  “I’m sure he would have said something to me. I have a catering business.”

  “Oh. I did not know that. Wow. Huh. How ’bout that. Well, just goes to show you. Life is really funny. Well, I’m sure Daniel will bring it up when the time is right. Well, thanks. And, well, bye,” I say.

  “Goodbye, Frannie,” she says. “Have your father call me, okay?”

  The phone clicks, and I am left holding the receiver. I slowly hang up, my body pulsing. I lean forward and bang my head against the phone, once, twice, and then a third time until I feel it throbbing. The throbbing doesn’t bother me. In fact, the only thing I feel is a sense of justice; that if anything, I have earned the pain, or rather, deserve it.

  On the street I walk backwards and crane my neck. With all the bars, the hospital looks horrifying. Fuck it. I walk back inside.

  “This is Dr. Thompson. If you’d like to leave a message…” I hang up. He’s not home. Then a thought strikes. “Dr. Bryan Thompson, please,” I tell the hospital operator. She tells me she has to page him.

  I wait a few minutes and then hear, “Yeah, Thompson, here.”

  “Oh…uh…hi. How are you?” I clear my throat, suddenly unable to breathe.

  “Hello, Dr. Thompson here. I can’t hear you. There’s people talking behind me.”

  “HI, BRYAN!” I yelp. “IT’S FRANNIE HUNGER…I MEAN HUNTER.”

  “Oh. Hello.” He doesn’t remember me. Fuck.

  “I’M SHELLY’S SISTER. SHELLY FROM THE E.D. UNIT ON THREE.”

  “Oh, Frannie. Hi. How is everything?” He tells whoever’s talking to move away.

  “Well, I’m fine. It’s Shelly who isn’t doing so well. I…I…was like wondering if we could get together and talk. I thought maybe you could help me figure all this out.”

  “To be honest, I haven’t been on that ward for a very long time.”

  “Oh well, then, okay.” We sit in silence for a few seconds. Then he tells me he can meet me for coffee.

  “I’m in the lobby,” I blurt out. “How about now?” He says that now’s not so good, and he’s out of town the following week, but how about Monday the fifteenth? At the diner on the corner at noon?

  “That’s fine,” I tell him. “I really appreciate it.”

  “Good,” he says. “Frannie, don’t worry. Sometimes patients slip, but she’ll be back in med school in no time. Take care.” And he’s gone.

  Med school? Who said anything about medical school? It’s law school! And I’m Frannie, the girl with the incredible mouth. How could you forget me? You said you wanted to kiss me!

  When I get home, Aunt Lillian calls from Arizona. “Mommy’s working late,” I tell her.

  “I called to talk to you.”

  Wrapped in the phone cord, I lean into the refrigerator. “’Bout what?” I take out turkey, bread, tomatoes, mustard, Swiss cheese, and onions and build myself a Dagwood. Every time I lean into the refrigerator, I think about Shelly. I search for mayonnaise. Shit, my father didn’t buy any mayonnaise. What is wrong with him? Mayonnaise is an essential household condiment. How could he forget mayonnaise?

  “Are you there? Frannie, put down what you’re doing. I need you to listen.”

  “I am listening.”

  “You’re eating.”

  “No, I’m not,” I say, swallowing. She launches into how she wants to sell Grandpa’s condo and move him up to New York. Tilly can’t take care of him anymore, and having both him and Beth in Tempe is too much for her to handle. “Grandpa needs us right now, Frannie,” she says. “We owe it to him. I’ll hire a nurse for the days you’re working.”

  “Look, Aunt Lillian. Shelly’s not doing so well. We have a lot going on, too.” I bite into my sandwich and chew hard. With every bite, I make Shelly’s face go away.

  “But this is Grandpa. Don’t you think we should get him the best care possible?”

  “Of course I do. Jesus. Why would you even ask that?” It’s my brain, she said. It’s eating me alive. I crunch a pickle. The sound of myself chewing fills my ears. Is that possible? Can your brain eat away your sanity? Does it have that kind of power? “I don’t know how much help I can be. Mommy and I don’t always see eye to eye. And she’s really worried about Shelly. Really worried.”

  “I am, too. Believe me. But maybe with Grandpa there, it will take her mind off things. We need to do this for him…And for Grandma,” she adds solemnly. “They took care of us our whole lives, now it’s our time to take care of them. Please talk to Mommy for me.”

  “Okay,” I say, you manipulative fucking bitch. “I’ll talk to her.” Suddenly ravenous, I devour my sandwich, make another one, and eat that, too. And then I rip into a box of Oreos.

  “A surprise party!! Frannie, what the hell is wrong with you?” My mother snaps on the light.

  In bed, I rub my eyes to appear disoriented. “Huh?”

  “Why did you call Adele Reynolds?” She stands over my bed. Her mouth is tight, and she looks like she’s about to hit me. “Frannie, look at me. What are you doing?” She leans over me and gets right into my face.

  “I wasn’t doing anything.” I grope for words. “I was just trying to help out. Shelly’s not doing so well, Mom. I mean, she’s doing really bad. I’m scared…”

  She cuts me off. “I know that, Frannie. I spoke to the hospital today. They’re adjusting her medication. But that’s not what we’re talking about, and you know it. I told you that there is nothing going on between Daniel and me. And even if there was, what right do you have to call his wife and make up some bullshit story?” She leans on my dresser, her hand in a fist. “Look at me, Frannie! I said LOOK AT ME!”

  I quickly look up, then away. “I’m just worried about Shelly, Mom. Do we have to go into this right now? Do you think that just changing her medication will be enough? I think Shelly’s getting worse in that hospital. Does Marilyn think that, too?”

  “Goddammit, Frannie. Stop it. This is my house, I’m letting you live here as a favor. It is a PRIVILEGE, not a right. Do you understand?” I nod. “DO YOU?”

  “I said yes, Mom. You don’t have to yell. Maybe this would work a little better if we tried to have more respect for each other.”

  “And you’ve been showing respect? Making accusations? Calling the wives of my business associates? You’re a grown woman living in my house and I tiptoe around on eggshells.”

  “Do you really think I like living here?” I ask. “That I want to live like this?” We both look around. Stockings and tights hang out of open drawers, sweaters are piled on the floor. I feel like I’m eleven years old and she’s telling me how fat I am, fat and stupid, fat and lazy, fat and in the way. She acts like she hates me. Maybe she does. Maybe she hates the very sight of me, fat and smelly, living in my little room.

  “I don’t know what to do, Frannie. Tell me what to do. I have a daughter wasting away in a mental institution. Did it ever occur to you that I NEED you? I spoke to Aunt Lillian. I’ve decided to bring Grandpa up here, then move him into a nursing home after the first of the year. So if you’re going to be around, you’re going to help out. Otherwise, you can leave now. Then, when Grandpa moves out, you will, too. January first, I want you in your own apartment.” She stares at me, but I don’t say anything. “Do you hear me?”

  I nod. Not knowing what else to say, I tell her that Aunt Lillian called me, too.

  “Why did she call you?” My mother’s still pissed, but she’s calmed down a bit.

  “She asked me to talk you into having Grandpa move up here.”

  “Jesus, that’s so like her. Well, it’s done. He’s coming.”

  “I promise I’ll help, Mom,” I say, my eyes glistening. “You can depend on me.”

  “Fine. And are we clear on the January evacuation
date?”

  I mumble a yes. She stands in the doorway. “I know you make good money at Rascals and you haven’t been paying rent since July, so please don’t insult me by crying poor.”

  “Well, Mom, something’s come up.” I draw out the words. “I’m not employed at Rascals anymore.” I look up. “But it was a mutual thing.”

  “What will you do for money? Forget it.” She turns away. “I don’t want to know.”

  That’s good, I mutter, because I don’t have the first fucking clue.

  “Paulie?” I whisper. “Paulie, I need my job back.”

  “I can’t, honey,” he says. “Not yet. You pissed off someone important.”

  “What am I going to do?” I start to cry again. He tells me I have to go out and talk to people. His voice is stern.

  “I’m talking to you,” I whimper. I can hear the clatter of plates in the background and I sob, really let it go. I blow my nose in my sleeve.

  “Frannie,” he says, “call me in a month, okay? Things will have blown over by then. In the meantime, keep your chin up. This could end up being very positive for you.”

  “Yeah, right. I should step in front of a bus. That would be positive.”

  “Don’t tempt yourself.”

  “It’s too late.”

  I busy myself cleaning up my room. Screw it, if she wants me to move out, I’ll leave now. She’s totally overreacting, and I know it’s because I found out about her sleazy affair. She doesn’t have any respect for me. Calling Daniel fucking Reynolds in the middle of the night. Then I think about Shelly and start to cry, hating myself. I do make things worse. I deserve to die.

  With no one else to call, I dial Chubby, but all I get is her service so I leave a message that it’s an emergency. I sit on the edge of my bed and stare into space, wishing I had somewhere to go.

  A half-hour later, the phone rings. “Frannie?” Chubby asks. “You called?”

  “Well…I’m not sure…I don’t know…I guess I wanted to talk about Shelly.” I sniffle. “I saw her today and she was totally out of it. She did this freaky thing where she picked up radio words as if they were her own thoughts. She like spliced them into her conversation.”

  “It was a mild psychotic episode, Frannie. It’s scary, I know, but it’s not dangerous. It’s a symptom of someone who is detached from their feelings. Shelly’s dealing with pain that she’s buried for a long time. It’s a way of checking out from feelings of sadness or loneliness. Recovery takes a long time. But she is doing better. I can’t say much more. It may not seem like she’s recovering, but she is.”

  “She seems worse than before she went into that place. Her insurance runs out soon. What will she do then?”

  “Everything’s okay, Frannie. She’s where she’s supposed to be. But how are you? That’s what I’m interested in.”

  “I’m fine,” I say, crying. “Just fine, thanks for asking. I’m just worried. You know, people worry.”

  “You don’t sound fine.” I can’t stop crying. I know I’m making a fool of myself, but I can’t help it. Then, in the kindest voice I’ve ever heard, Chubby asks me to come see her. “Sometimes it helps to talk things out.” Her voice is like a pool of warm water and I feel as though I’m wading in it, my skin absorbing the water as if feeding on it. I tell her I don’t know. “It may help, Frannie.”

  “Okay,” I say, gaining strength. “I’ll think about it.”

  “I’ll be here,” she tells me. As I listen, her warm voice fills my ear, flows through my body, soothes me all the way down, and holds me close, as if I’m a child.

  9

  I’d like pizza for lunch,” Shelly tells me as I sign her out. “The nutritionist and I planned it.”

  “Are you sure?” I wrap a scarf around my neck. She doesn’t say anything as we walk to the elevator. “What’s wrong?” I ask. “Are you upset?”

  She shakes her head and chews on the string of her hood. We ride for a few floors in silence. For the past few weeks, she’s been much better. She responded well when her doctors adjusted her medication, and they’ve stopped talking about giving her the tubes or moving her upstairs. In fact, they reinstated her privileges and now she’s allowed to leave the hospital for outings. “So everything’s okay then?” I had asked when she invited me to lunch. “I was really scared. I didn’t know what to do.”

  “I was scared myself,” she reassured me, “but I’m okay now. That was my last dip. A lot of patients have a dramatic mood shift before they start getting healthy. They call it the storm before the calm.”

  I look at her as the elevator dings. “Why aren’t you talking to me?”

  “I’m thinking.”

  “Fine,” I say brightly. “Think.” The elevator creeps down. It dings again and two patients and a nurse get on. The nurse turns forward as the doors close, but the patients stop short, facing me. I smile sympathetically and pretend nothing unusual is happening. Shelly doesn’t notice, not even when the taller patient sticks his hand inside his bathrobe and starts massaging his chest.

  “I planned pizza,” Shelly says finally. “I’d like to stick with my plan.”

  “I planned pizza.” The short patient mimics her, licking his finger. “Pizza pizza.”

  I change the subject. “What will you do when your insurance runs out?”

  She sucks on the string. “I expect to be out of here by then. Why? What do you think I should do?”

  “Why are you asking me?”

  “You’re my big sister.” She smiles, and I’m flooded with warmth. I miss the days when she asked my advice. When she was heavy in high school, she told me that I was her only true friend. Back then, I was a good friend to have, I guess. Once when she was a junior and I was already in college, she called me, crying. “I don’t have a date for the prom,” she said between hiccups. “And it’s because I’m FAT. I don’t blame people for not wanting to be seen with me.”

  We spent hours talking. I don’t remember what I said, but it must have been nice because she stopped crying. I remember feeling good that she called me. In fact, I felt so important, I blew off a final and drove home to take her out for dinner and a show, just so she wouldn’t have to be alone on prom night while everyone else got laid and threw up. It ended up being a nightmare because I ate some bad seafood and spent the entire show on my knees in the ladies’ room, but at least I’d captured the spirit of the evening. Sometimes, when I remember times like that, I wish we were young again.

  She’s quiet as she waits for my answer. “It’s a big decision, Shelly. You’ve been in what, five months? Give it another week. See how this medication does. Then if you feel good, maybe it is time to leave.”

  When we reach the ground floor, Shelly turns to me. “Guess who’s getting out?” She stops to button her coat all the way to her neck. “Cynthia Balducci.”

  “No shit. God, she’s the last person I thought they’d spring.” I chuckle until I realize that Shelly’s not laughing. “What? What did I say?”

  “Would it kill you to have some compassion? Cynthia is a survivor.”

  “Of what?” She was in combat?

  “Of incest.” In her newfound mental health, Shelly can be very self-righteous and I’m never sure what is acceptable psychoparlance. I try be sympathetic, but the hospital has become her whole world. Once we spent fifteen minutes debating if she should ask Pia to turn down her radio because Shelly didn’t want to invade Pia’s personal space. I hate myself when I lose my patience, but I thought therapy was supposed to move you away from your problems, not deeper into them.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize.” You were the one, I recall, who said Cynthia fried her brain. “You can still keep in touch, can’t you?”

  “I’m in a hospital, Frannie. Not a prison.” We stop to collect ourselves before we tackle lunch in the real world. “Maybe it is time to leave,” Shelly says wistfully. As we move through the lobby, her eyes dart around. She’s looking for people she knows, I think sadly. Appar
ently the coast is clear because she puts her gloved hand on the glass double-door. She stops for a second, as if mulling something important.

  “What?” I ask. “You’ve decided? You’re going to check out?”

  She turns to me. “I’m not going to have pizza,” she says firmly. “I’m having a chef salad.” Then she pushes the door open and moves into the winter afternoon, the string of her hood still wet where she was sucking it.

  When the waitress walks toward us with our food, Shelly starts babbling. She tells me about the party they are planning for Cynthia, and how Keisha lost eleven pounds and is going to sue her old company for discrimination. She tenses up as the waitress places the salad in front of her and doesn’t move until she leaves. “It’s the anticipation,” she explains, catching my eye. “I just can’t stand the anticipation.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” I lean back in my seat. “So what are you going to be for Halloween?”

  “Anorexic. You?”

  “Unemployed.”

  “Good, so we won’t have to spend money on costumes.” She smiles. “Mommy told me you told her about getting fired from Rascals.”

  “God, does she tell you everything?” I attack my French onion soup. The thick cheese won’t budge when I try to cut it, so I pull it apart with my fingers. I eat all the cheese and push the bowl away. Shelly is eating her salad very slowly, one item at a time. She chews each bite carefully, covering her mouth with her hand. I rummage in the empty bread basket and signal the waitress for another one.

  She looks at my empty soup bowl. “Aren’t you going to eat anything else?” she asks.

  “I’m stuffed.”

  “Do you mind ordering something else? I don’t like to eat alone.”

  “I had a whole bowl of soup and two baskets of bread.”

  “That’s hardly anything, Frannie.” She perks up. “Have a sandwich.” She scans the menu. “A turkey club.” She signals for the waitress and orders a turkey club with Russian dressing and fries. The girl moves away. “Oh, miss?” she asks. “Could you add onion? We love onion.”