Four of a Kind

by Valerie Frankel

  “When you look at me like you feel sorry for me,” Robin said to the group, “it only makes me madder.”

  7

  Bess

  “What, no stirrups?” asked Bess. She was naked under the paper gown, sliding toward the end of the exam table.

  Dr. Able (comforting name for the man holding the speculum), said, “I got new tables two years ago. No stirrups, just the slide out platform for your feet. Women tell me they prefer it.”

  “I guess it has been a while since I last saw you,” she said guiltily. Like most mothers, Bess never missed her kids’ annual checkups, and took them to the pediatrician at the slightest sign of trouble. But she’d been hard-pressed to make time for or keep her own annual appointments. Carla insisted Bess get some blood drawn, though, since she’d been sick for so long. She was here, might as well get the royal treatment. Smear, blood, urine. A full body-fluids check.

  Scooting to the edge of the table, Bess rested her feet on the slide-out platform, and spread her knees wide, the paper gown stretching and crinkling with each movement. “Oh, yes, this is much more dignified,” she said.

  Dr. Able said, “Okay, my hands are on your thighs. I’m parting the vaginal lips. I’m inserting the speculum …”

  She knew the play-by-play was meant to prepare her for his latex touch, but she could have done without it. After four kids, she was practically a gynecologist herself, and had long ago lost any modesty about her vagina. It’d been splayed before dozens of people, had seen a lot of action. It was practically public property.

  She felt the cervical scrape, and then the hasty removal of the plastic tool. Dr. Able said, “Most women hold their breath when I do that, followed by the dramatic exhale when it’s over.”

  “I’ve been telling you for years, Doctor. I’m not like other women,” she said.

  He prepared the sample for transport, changed his gloves, and then moved to the side of the table. “Slip your arms out of the gown and lower it, please.”

  Breast exam time. “I should mention that I’ve had a nagging cold forever,” said Bess, lowering the gown. “I made excuses for it, but then I read an article about a woman who ignored chronic headaches, put off going to the doctor, until she dropped dead from a massive brain tumor.”

  “You suspect a brain tumor?” he asked.

  “Sinus infection,” she said. “That could creep into my brain and kill me.”

  Dr. Able laughed. “I can give you antibiotics to treat a sinus infection. I’ll take a look. But if you haven’t keeled over yet, I’d say you probably just have a persistent cold. Arms over your head, please.”

  She complied. The doctor reached for her left breast. While he pressed into it, Bess closed her eyes, and relaxed. She tried to remember the last time she’d had a massage. Five years ago? An anniversary gift from Borden that took six months to find its way into her schedule. It’d been a relaxing hour at a spa in the city, but then she’d come home to chaos, the part-time babysitter overwhelmed by the boys’ running around, the kitchen a disaster, Amy furious at her for who knows what reason.

  Bess tried to remember the last time Amy hadn’t been angry or annoyed with her. When she was ten? Eleven? Back then, Amy had been madly in love with Bess. They’d walked down the street holding hands, smiling into each other’s faces, going on girls-only shopping trips to the city, and then dinners of French fries and hot chocolate at a diner. Time was, Amy came to Bess to hash over every social squabble (“and then, she was like …” “and then, I was like …”). They’d pore over nuance of tone, especially when a boy called Amy (“about homework, yeah, right,” said the cynical sixth-grader). Bess believed she could feel any emotion Amy experienced. She felt Amy’s joy and pain, had total maternal empathy.

  And now? Gone. Bess had no idea what Amy felt or thought about. She tried to understand her daughter, but Amy’s black curtain of disdain was impenetrable. Bess longed for the old days, giggling in a booth over milk shakes or hot chocolate. Maybe Amy would agree to a dinner at Teresa’s, just the two of them. No pressure, no demands or confrontation. Just some face time. Some eye contact. Exchange of simple words. Hello. How are you? When Amy was home, she holed up in her room. Usually, the teen was out with friends, whoever they were. Bess couldn’t help notice—with mixed emotions—that Amy wasn’t wearing her Stella McCartney outfits anymore, the ones Simone bought for her in London. A rejection of Simone-style? More likely because, as Bess also couldn’t help but notice, Amy had put on some weight lately. At least ten pounds.

  Bess’s consciousness returned to her boob. Dr. Able seemed riveted by a particular area.

  “What?” she asked.

  “How long has this been here?” he asked, taking her hand and placing her index finger on the spot.

  “I don’t feel … oh,” she said, finding what felt like a coffee bean about a half an inch deep under the skin.

  Dr. Able felt around her armpit, and her neck, then he said, “Let me check the other breast.”

  She put her other arm over her head. Finding nothing on the right side, he removed his gloves and asked her to sit up. Taking a seat at the desk, he started typing into his computer.

  Bess said, “Well?”

  “Five millimeter mass in the upper left quadrant of the left breast,” he said. “It’s always the left. Someone should do a study.”

  Bess nodded. Her boob felt tender where they’d been worrying the coffee bean. “Mass, meaning what exactly?” she asked.

  He said, “Could be anything. I’m writing a referral to the imaging center on Joralemon Street. Go there now. I’ll have Belinda call to tell them you’re coming.”

  “I have a Parents Association meeting at the kids’ school,” she said. “I’m chairwoman of the winter fund-raiser. It’s a major planning meeting. I have to go.”

  Dr. Able frowned. “How long is the meeting?”

  “All afternoon,” she said, a spark of fear starting to prickle along her spine. But faint. A twinge, sure to worsen by the minute. For a strange illogical moment, Bess felt a wave of fear about how afraid she was going to be in an hour, in two hours, if the bean turned out to be … don’t go there yet, she admonished herself.

  “Bess?” he asked. “Are you okay?”

  “I can miss the start of the meeting,” she said.

  “I’m sure they can get along without you,” he said.

  I’m sure they can get along without you, thought Bess as she walked to get the mammogram.

  I’m sure they can get along without you, she thought as the technician pancaked each of her breasts (both, just to be sure) between the glass plates from multiple angles. The technicians took the pictures, but they wouldn’t give her their assessment. Bess would have to wait to hear from Dr. Able, who would be notified as soon as their staff doctor had a chance to examine the film.

  Fortunately, the imaging office was in the basement of the medical arts building on Joralemon Street, only a block from the Brownstone Institute. Bess rushed to school, the urgent gathering she’d organized, to plan the all-important winter party/fund-raiser. The Parents Association (aka PA) sponsored a dozen events over the course of the school year, but the winter party was Bess’s baby. Even though all decisions were made by the committee, Bess had final say. She’d fought for her smidgeon of power, and aimed to hang on to it, despite some pushing back.

  Now her control issues about the party seemed to be the concerns from another dimension. From her parallel universe, Bess could still dredge up the agenda she’d planned, the purpose of this meeting. It was strange, she thought, as she entered the PA’s basement office at Brownstone spouting apologies to the gathered moms, that she could be aware of her own denial, and yet continue to enjoy its effects.

  The dozen women seated around a rectangular table smiled and welcomed her. She’d known some of them since Amy was in preschool—thirteen years ago; it seemed impossible. Bess was well entrenched in the school’s social strata, and this group of women represente
d the upper echelons. They were uniformly rich, attractive, yoga-hard homemakers. If they’d had careers before kids, their professional ambitions were distant memories. Miraculously, there wasn’t a divorcée in the group, although Bess had been propositioned by nearly all of their husbands, in a playfully safe manner, e.g., putting his hand on her ass, and then saying something lame like, “Oops, how did that get there? My bad.”

  Among Brownstone fathers, the masters of the universe types (severely downgraded these days, of course) seemed committed to the juvenile sexuality of their frat boy pasts. Except Borden. He was a well-mannered grown man. She fleetingly wondered if Borden’s hand had ever found its way to any of these women’s behinds at a drunken party over the years. No way. Not possible. He loved only her. Her body. But would he feel the same way if she was minus one boob? The left boob. “It’s always the left,” Dr. Able had said.

  “So glad you could make it,” said Anita Turnbull, a “my life is my kids” flag-waver—exactly the kind of woman Bess’s feminist mother saved her greatest contempt for. “We’ve made great progress.”

  Glad you could make it? This was Bess’s meeting. “Wonderful,” she said, part relieved that she hadn’t been asked to explain where she’d been, part resentful that her absence hadn’t been a problem. “Bring me up to speed.”

  “Do you mind if we keep moving forward?” asked Anita. “Hate to break our momentum.”

  “Just a quick recap,” said Bess, settling into her chair. “Did you vote on casino night or an auction? I prefer an auction, myself. The donations are always so cool. Last year, remember that one family donated a weekend in Tuscany? And that father who’s a producer on The View got a backstage pass …”

  “We picked casino night,” interrupted Anita. “With the recession, we thought an auction wouldn’t be as lucrative as in years past. We’re up to item eight on the agenda.”

  The agenda that Bess had spent hours preparing. “Great,” she said, feigning enthusiasm. “Casino night, it is. Did you vote on a theme? ‘Caribbean’ is a nice idea for the middle of the winter …”

  “We picked ‘The Seventies,’ ” said Anita with a tight grin. “Sorry, I hate to sound impatient. But you were late. We’re on a roll. And I’ve got a two o’clock.”

  “A two o’clock what? Shrink session? What could possibly be so important?” asked Bess, a snide edge in her voice.

  The women around the table suddenly perked up, smelling blood. Bess and Anita stared at each other, not bothering to pretend-smile.

  Why would Bess feel threatened? It was embarrassing. The PA had elected Bess to be their president. She was the well-liked event chair. Anita, on the other hand, was a self-important Martha Stewart wannabe who spent hours hand-crafting her kids’ party invites, baked mountains of brownies, and shlepped her kids to fencing and gymnastics thrice a week. She was a Robo-Mom, a helicopter parent, a manic speck. The woman was already boasting about her ten-year-old’s legacy at Harvard. Anita poured every ounce of her hopes and dreams into the flesh buckets of her children. Without them, she didn’t exist.

  Bess’s chest rose and fell, her sudden flare of antipathy shortening her breath. It was not like her to judge so meanly. The coffee bean, poked aggressively by Dr. Able and the mammogram technician, started to throb. Bess tried to get control of herself. Instead, she suffered a rip in her consciousness, an opening of self-awareness that asked, What makes you better than Anita? How dare she look down her nose at this woman who showed more creativity and energy as a mother than Bess did? Sure, Bess went through the motions. She baked. She made Valentine’s Day cards. Her kids were well dressed and exercised. She packed healthy lunches. She was active in the PA. As the event chair, she should care if the winter fund-raiser was a casino or an auction, Caribbean or Seventies. She should care if her kids went to Harvard.

  The opening in her consciousness widened, and Bess realized with a gasp that she didn’t care—about organizing the fund-raiser, or getting her kids into Harvard, packing healthy lunches, making cutesy party invites. Yes, of course, she loved her children and husband. But did she love doing for them? Did she love her day-to-day existence of making other people’s lives run smoothly? She was stuck in a loop of 24/7/365 service, errands, and chores. It would be insane for anyone to suggest this was a satisfying, fulfilling existence. And yet, this was the life she chose.

  Did Anita truly, deeply, personally love this life? Apparently so. Bess’s contempt for her happy homemaker “friend” shifted to jealousy. Anita was happy; Bess was sick of her life. Quite possibly, she was sick from it, too.

  If she’d ever wondered what it would take to turn a critical eye on herself, Bess now knew. A five-millimeter mass had done the trick. It was a testament to how crazy-busy Bess had been, that she hadn’t had a moment to think about her own dissatisfaction and emptiness. A mystery mass makes time, she thought. It stops time. But only for an instant. Then the specter of cancer—finally, she used the word in her head—sped everything up.

  With the dozen pairs of eyes locked on her face, Bess tried to come up with a single thing she truly, deeply, personally loved doing.

  “I love playing cards,” she said to herself out loud. “I love it and I’m good at it.”

  Anita repeated, “Cards.”

  Bess turned toward the voice and nodded. “Poker. With my friends.”

  Another mother, Cheryl Baker, said, “I’ve never played poker with you. Who do you play with?” Over the years, Cheryl had been at Bess’s house for dinner parties scores of times. They’d gone on shopping expeditions to Woodbury Commons, their kids had regular playdates. They’d consumed a bathtub of coffee after hundreds of drop-offs. Cheryl had every right to be confused. Wasn’t she Bess’s friend? A close friend? Each of these women had been her “friend” for years. They were all wondering the same thing, so loud Bess could hear their thoughts: Who are Bess’s card-playing friends, and why hasn’t she invited me to play with them?

  It was like junior high redux. Bess, the Ruling Class Queen, breaking popular girl rules by affiliating with the lowly fringe dwellers. Would the other popular girls cast Bess out for socializing below her status? She could admit that she had a card klatch with a trio of undesirables (as these women would see them). Instead, Bess said to Cheryl, and the others, “Old friends. No one you know.”

  “Should we have poker tables at casino night?” asked Anita, mercifully getting the conversation back on track.

  “Yes,” said Bess, gratefully. “That’s exactly my point. We’ll hire dealers, keep the booze flowing, and rake in the bucks. Can you see it? A mirrored ball hanging from the gym ceiling? Disco music? ‘Funky Town’?”

  A few of the women liked the sound of it. The rest joined in, and the talk resumed a purposeful tone. The women were clearly relieved that Bess had returned to normal. The meeting continued for another hour, the mood light. At two o’clock, they ended it so Anita could rush off to her appointment, which turned out to be a haircut.

  No one dared asked Bess about her one-minute mental lapse, although she was sure they’d gossip about it later (“What was that about?”). Bess took it upon herself to apologize to Anita for snapping. After all, Anita meant well. She was harmless. Bess was ashamed of herself for thinking critically of her.

  When she stepped outside the school, she waited for the others to go their separate ways (in pairs and trios). Then she called Dr. Able’s office. The receptionist asked her to hold, and then came back on the line saying Dr. Able was talking to the radiologist right now, and he’d call her back in a few minutes. Not wanting to take that call alone in her empty house, and with an hour to kill before pick-up, Bess went across the street to Traviata, an Italian restaurant. She sat down at the bar, ordered a vodka tonic. Taking her first sip, she thought, I needed that.

  Dr. Able hadn’t called back by the end of the first, or second, cocktail. It was close to 3:00 p.m., pick-up time. Bess got off her chair, felt woozy from the vodka, and put a twenty on the bar.
She drew herself up, remembering that she was a lady, and walked as soberly as possible across the street to collect Charlie and Tom, her two younger sons. Amy and eighth-grader Eric had keys and were allowed to find their own way home. It was Eric’s first year with key privilege, and he’d been responsible with it, often beating Bess, Charlie, and Tom back to Clinton Street. Amy, however, seemed to enjoy pushing Bess’s anxiety to the limit, not showing up at their townhouse until after six o’clock, the dinner hour, and then refusing to say where she’d been, what she was doing, and with whom.

  Bess’s cell phone vibrated in her pants pocket. She answered it just as she found Charlie and Tom in the lobby at Brownstone. “Hold on, one second,” she said in the phone, and pointed the boys in the direction of home. Charlie tried to say something to her, but she silenced him, saying, “I’m on the phone.” The boys shut up, and they walked the three blocks home quietly.

  Bess was quiet, too, listening to Dr. Able explain the mammogram findings. In a nutshell (or a coffee bean), the lump in Bess’s left breast appeared to be self-contained (good) and dense (also good). But, at this point, it was impossible to tell from imaging alone whether the mass was benign or malignant. The lump would have to come out to be tested.

  Bess’s mother, Simone Gertrude, had been presented with exactly the same recommendation twenty years ago. Simone’s lumpectomy had turned into a radical mastectomy, and another bestseller, Report from the Front. The book politicized Simone’s cancer experience, criticizing the medical establishment for their love of cutting up women’s bodies, the pressure she felt from her male doctors to have a breast reconstructed, and their utter bafflement when she decided not to. She challenged the notions that a woman wasn’t complete without cleavage. “Breasts made me a mammal, but not a woman,” Simone famously wrote. Her controversial ideas started an antireconstruction movement, short-lived as it was. Simone herself eventually had a reconstruction.