Getting Back
Page 3
But there wasn’t time. The door opposite her opened and out came a stunning, long-legged blonde. Dressed in black slacks and a periwinkle silk blouse, she looked directly at Elizabeth, a closed-mouth smile on her face.
“Margaret Halperin?”
Elizabeth stared back for a second and then remembered she had given Margaret’s name to the receptionist when she set up the appointment. She didn’t want the fact that she was seeing a therapist to be circulating throughout New York City. Besides, Margaret deserved a little bit of payback for putting her in this position in the first place. “Oh,” she said as she stood. “Dr. Patterson?”
“Yes.” There was a questioning tone in her response and her eyes narrowed in confusion. She glanced down at a yellow legal pad she’d been holding and looked back at Elizabeth. “Please come in.”
The room they entered was larger than the waiting room. A light wood desk was positioned out of the way. There was a trio of small framed photos on the surface with the pictures facing away from her. She wondered if Dr. Patterson had a husband and children.
The rest of the area was furnished in the style of a living room with a small burgundy couch and two upholstered armchairs in more neutral sand-colored tones. A taller wood-framed chair covered in what looked like brown leather was opposite one of the armchairs, a small light wood table next to it. A large area rug with stripes that picked up the burgundy, brown, and sand accents completed the decor.
As Dr. Patterson took her place in the leather chair and crossed her legs, she gestured for Elizabeth to sit in one of the armchairs. Once she was seated, Elizabeth looked past Dr. Patterson and saw a framed print of a beach scene hanging on the wall. Designed to soothe tormented souls, she supposed.
“This is a lovely office,” she said. “So spacious.”
“Thank you. Yes, I run a number of groups here.” Dr. Patterson leaned back in her chair and raised the pen she was holding. “You’re not Margaret Halperin, are you?”
She hadn’t expected the direct question right off the bat. But what good would it do to delay? She closed her eyes and shook her head. Then she rose and offered her hand.
“Elizabeth Morrison. My apologies for the bit of subterfuge, but I’m in a position where I need to exercise some discretion in these matters.” She smiled weakly.
Dr. Patterson breathed out and touched Elizabeth’s hand in greeting. “I thought so.”
Elizabeth detected a slight Southern accent.
“Ms. Morrison, do you know who I am?” she asked with a tilt of her head, that same puzzled look from before on her face.
“You’re a psychotherapist. I’m told you’re quite good or else I wouldn’t have bothered calling you.”
“Well, thank you, but…” She paused and opened her mouth, appearing as if she was trying to figure out how to say something. “I thought you’d know that I’m Robin Greene’s partner, and you of course are her publisher.”
Elizabeth stared at Dr. Patterson. How could this be?
“Ms. Morrison, I can’t see you for therapy. We have a conflict based on my personal life and your professional one.”
Surely this wasn’t possible. It seemed preposterous that she would have decided to pursue therapy, in spite of all her misgivings, only to be faced with the partner of one of her authors. This was not the sort of thing that normally happened to her in business. She always anticipated these kinds of complications.
She rose from her seat and went over toward the desk, walking around to the other side to peek at the three standing picture frames.
Dr. Patterson followed her. “Ms. Morrison? What are you doing?”
Robin Greene’s face stared back at her from a publicity still the company had taken after the Pulitzer announcement. A second picture was of Robin with Dr. Patterson, both of them younger, gazing at one another. And a third photo showed them with a dark-haired shorter woman, their arms all around each other. The woman looked vaguely familiar.
Elizabeth looked up at Dr. Patterson, her mouth open, an apology forming.
“Reese didn’t mention any of this, I assure you.”
“Reese Stanley referred you? She knows me. She’s had us over to dinner.”
“I don’t know what to say. It’s not like Reese to be so careless.”
“You understand my position, Ms. Morrison, don’t you?”
Elizabeth’s mind went blank and she felt the room move, making her dizzy and queasy. It had taken so much energy just to get here and now, she was thoroughly embarrassed and thwarted. She stood at the side of the desk, balancing on the smooth wooden surface for support. Dr. Patterson approached her.
“Let’s both sit back down,” she said softly. She gently guided Elizabeth over to the armchair.
“Now, I can refer you to some really good therapists, top-notch people, I promise.”
The words sailed right past Elizabeth as if they were inconsequential background noise. She leaned forward in the chair and pressed the tips of her fingers into her closed eyes.
How could Reese do this to her? And why had she herself been so sloppy? Normally she would have looked into Dr. Patterson’s background on her own, verifying where’d she trained and who knew her. But because her mind was dulled by lack of sleep, she had not thought to pursue her usual vetting. Instead, she’d been distracted and unnerved by the incessant ticking of the clock in her head counting down to the day when she’d have to face Ruth.
“I haven’t been myself lately. I should have known this,” she said, her voice shaking. She lowered her hands and looked directly at Dr. Patterson, whose face registered concern. “Have we met before?” she asked.
Dr. Patterson leaned forward in her chair. “Only once and it was a brief introduction at the PEN Literary Gala. I was also at the Pulitzer luncheon with Robin. I don’t recall if you were there.”
“No. I had to be in Seattle for a meeting with executives from Amazon.”
She felt as if she were in one of her dreams where the surroundings seemed familiar, but all of the action was greatly distorted. She gazed down at her lap and shook her head slowly.
“Ms. Morrison, can you look back up at me?”
Dr. Patterson’s request sounded more like a command than a question. Elizabeth raised her head.
“Sit all the way back in the chair, please. Can you do that?”
Elizabeth complied.
“Good, now relax your arms on either side of you and keep looking at me.” The voice was softer now, helping to shift Elizabeth’s dream-like state from one of agitation to comfort.
As she grasped the armrests of the chair and felt the soft brushed cotton under her palms, she noticed that Dr. Patterson’s eyes were a beautiful sea green, the same color as the water off Sanibel Island.
“What was the last vacation you took where you really felt like you’d gotten away, even if it was for only a few days?”
How strange she would ask this question just as the thought of Sanibel Island had come into her head. Three days with friends and a shared commitment that cell phones and computers would remain off from sunup to ten p.m. It had been glorious.
“Late December last year, I was away with friends for a few days at a place on the beach.” Still feeling as if she were in a dream, her voice had a faraway quality to it that even she could detect.
“Did you feel or smell or taste anything that made you happy or relaxed?”
She felt her mouth form a slight smile at the memory. “Yes. I had grouper, grilled with a sweet garnish. Moist and full of flavor.”
Dr. Patterson nodded. “Sounds wonderful. And was the ocean warm at the beach?”
“Yes. I sat at the water’s edge and let the tide come up around me. It was like a soothing bath that ebbed and flowed.”
“Hmmm. Close your eyes now and remember t
hat moment when the water rolled up onto you. How it felt against your skin, how the sounds behind you on the beach faded and you were shielded from everything and everyone for a short while. Can you still feel it?”
“Yes, and it was exactly like that. As if I was cordoned off.”
“Good. Stay right there for another minute. Stay there.”
Elizabeth found that she was able to. The quiet din behind her, the water warming her thighs, the sun on her hair, her fingers smoothing the wet sand.
“Now, slowly open your eyes and look at me again.”
The beach melted from her vision and there was Dr. Patterson.
“Okay, turn your head slightly to each side and notice your surroundings. You’re back in my office now.”
Elizabeth fixed on the burgundy couch first and then the desk with the framed photos. She stared straight ahead and saw hanging on the wall what now felt like a poor substitute for the beach of a few minutes ago.
“How do you feel?”
She looked at Dr. Patterson as she contemplated her answer.
“Better, calmer, like I’m waking from a relaxing nap. No, not a nap, more like a massage.”
“Good. I’m glad it was helpful for you. Remember, you can get back to that place at the beach any time you need to go there.”
She stood up and smiled. “So now let me give you some names of other therapists.”
Elizabeth felt confused.
“I don’t understand. Weren’t you just, I don’t know, being my therapist?”
She shook her head. “No, I was just trying to get you back to yourself after the way you reacted to being surprised. I didn’t think it would be right for me to let you leave my office in that state. I also thought it would be good to give you a strategy that you could use on your own when you felt agitated. But I still can’t see you for therapy.”
This just wouldn’t do. Tracy Patterson had been the first person who’d actually been capable of improving her state of mind. She was as talented as Reese said she was. Elizabeth didn’t have the time to go on an extended hunt for somebody else. There had to be another way, one that could sidestep these bothersome conflict-of-interest rules.
But then she remembered that Reese had said, “If she’s not right for you for whatever reason, I’m sure she can refer you to someone else.” Had she known all along that this might happen?
“Dr. Patterson, I’d like to ask you to reconsider. At my level in the company, I have very little interaction with individual authors. I don’t work with Robin Greene at all.”
“I understand that, Ms. Morrison. But you are the president of a company that has a business relationship with my partner. If that relationship changed, it would become an impediment to the work we could do here.”
“That’s ridiculous. Robin Greene is one of our top authors. We treat her with the utmost respect and generosity.”
“I’m sorry, but I have to abide by the code of ethics of my profession. These rules were put in place to protect clients. I’d be doing you a disservice if I ignored them.”
Elizabeth stood and threw back her shoulders. “It’s not in my nature to take no for an answer.”
Dr. Patterson smiled and gave a quick shrug. “Well, in this case it’ll have to be. But I do hope you’ll contact someone else.”
As Elizabeth was shown out of the office, Dr. Patterson handed her a folded piece of paper with three names and phone numbers. Waiting for the elevator, she wondered if she’d truly be able to again conjure up the peaceful scene from Sanibel Island after waking from one of her more troubling dreams.
Once outside, she looked up and down the street to see if Max had arrived to pick her up. As she reached for her phone to call him, the realization hit that Elizabeth Morrison, the head of one of the most successful publishing companies in the country and anointed by Curve magazine as one of the top ten most eligible lesbians, had been summarily dismissed by a beautiful young woman. Her stomach clenched with the realization that it had only happened one other time, and the woman had been Ruth.
Chapter 3
April 2008
No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t get herself back on that beach. It must have been Tracy Patterson’s sea-green eyes or her soothing Southern accent that was missing. Unable to make any progress, Elizabeth left her bed on a particularly fretful night and tried sitting in the armchair in her living room with her eyes closed and the memory of moist grouper in her mouth. But that was as far as she could get.
The calm remove of Sanibel Island had been beyond her reach. When she pictured herself sitting on the sand, instead of the quiet roll of small waves rising up to meet her, she heard the laughter of her friends and then felt a hand tap her on the shoulder. “Elizabeth, we need you to settle a dispute. Did we read Kate Chopin’s The Awakening in American Lit or Intro to Women’s Studies?” She turned and saw Margaret and their friend Celeste seated on a beach blanket.
She blinked and was immediately back in her apartment. “Women’s Studies,” she said aloud to nobody. She shook her head and closed her eyes, but no amount of concentration could help her return to that moment of peace she’d experienced in the therapist’s office.
Maybe there was another way. One thing that always helped her think when she felt overwhelmed was cooking. The more complex the recipe, the better. Could she close her eyes and imagine herself baking something French? While in Paris the year after graduating from college, she’d taken courses at Le Cordon Bleu, toying with the idea of abandoning her plan to work in publishing and instead becoming a chef. She’d quickly learned that a life among books suited her better than a life in a kitchen, but she held on to cooking as a hobby. Now, perhaps, it could also keep her sane.
She sat back, closed her eyes and pictured the steps involved in making a Napoleon. First, preparing the vanilla beans for the pastry cream, then stirring the mixture over medium heat on the stove. Next came the custard. She added in the egg yolks and made sure to stir constantly until the ingredients thickened to the desired consistency. Butter was then included, using a whisk, one teaspoon at a time. Finally came the mixing and rolling thin of the pastry dough, which first needed to be refrigerated before it was time to assemble everything and apply the icing.
She found that this cooking meditation helped a bit. It momentarily took her mind off her problems, but instead of relaxing her so she could sleep, she felt energized and awake. Leaping out of the armchair and practically running to the kitchen, she surveyed the contents of her refrigerator and pantry. There was enough of what she’d need to make a lemon soufflé. By sunrise, she had a lovely dessert to bring to the office and another night where sleep had eluded her.
A week later, still unable to get a good night’s rest, she decided to try one of the therapists listed on Dr. Patterson’s sheet of paper. She was a woman close to Elizabeth’s age who’d written a mediocre book on healing from a broken heart, of all things. Published by an imprint of Penguin Group, the book had all the markings of a rush job thrown into the market for a pre-Valentine’s Day release. Elizabeth had leafed through it in a bookstore. It was full of trite, quasi-feminist affirmations (“you will only be able to truly love another once you love yourself,” “women always undervalue their self-worth,” and so on). She’d go mad if she had to listen to that kind of drivel for fifty minutes each week. But after a few more sleepless nights, when she finally put aside these misgivings and met with this woman, it was clear very quickly that her session was in actuality a pitch for the therapist’s second book.
“Did you happen to check out my recent publication, Clearing the Love Deck?”
The full title was Clearing the Love Deck: How to Move Out, Move On, and Move into You. Elizabeth had actually shuddered when she’d first seen the dust jacket.
“Yes. I found it, uh, very informative.”
Elizabeth did her best not to take the bait and to redirect the conversation to the woman’s psychotherapeutic methods. But at that point there wasn’t much this therapist could say to redeem herself. Elizabeth would have much rather taken her chances with Tracy Patterson’s so-called conflict of interest than with this blatant attempt to secure a book contract from Morrison Publishing. She dealt with that kind of thing on a daily basis. She didn’t need to pay someone for the pleasure of receiving more of it.
There was no point in contacting the other two names she’d received. It was clear to her that she was bound to find something objectionable about both of them. She’d known all along that this idea of Reese’s was not going to work. She should have just dismissed it immediately instead of wasting her time. So with therapy now off the table and her attempts at revisiting the calm of Sanibel Island a failure, Elizabeth gave in to her last resort—sleeping pills. An Ambien before bedtime seemed to do the trick. She was finally able to get eight hours of rest undisturbed by visions of prison camps and misguided weddings. She could now get through the workday looking and acting more like herself.
With the difficulties of the last month behind her, she leapt into the intensity of the social season with less focus than she could usually muster, but enough to prevent her from embarrassing herself or the company. She was hopeful that she was the only one who could figure out that she was still off her game.
One of the commitments on her calendar was a fundraising dinner that Morrison Publishing had signed on to as a lead sponsor. She’d agreed to this as a favor to Joe Donovan, one of the company’s best-selling authors. Joe and his wife, Maureen, were active in a school-based creative writing program called Voices from Our Future. They were co-chairing galas up and down the East Coast, from Boston to Miami. Elizabeth had personally taken charge of the New York event. Held at a hip new hotel near the Flatiron Building, it had sold out a month ago, with six hundred and fifty people paying five hundred dollars each to attend.