by Paloma Meir
“My top? Really? We have time but we need to get you open about this. Talking about it will give you the power. The power that the “Patriarchy” as you like to put it, took away from you.”
“Cool.”
She ignored my brush off.
“Have you talked about your experience or your drinking in any of the meeting? Or with Keith?”
“No I like the meetings though. I love the stories. They’re more exciting than most of the books I’ve read. I don’t have anything to top them.”
“It’s not about “topping”. It’s about sharing your experiences, supporting each other. How about this? You speak in one of the meetings today and I won’t pressure you talk about the rape for a few days. Is that fair?”
“I hate that word.”
“What word?”
“Rape, please stop saying it.” I covered my ears and took a deep breath. “I don’t even remember it. Ask Carolina. She’ll tell you, she knows what happened.”
“From what I understand Carolina was not there until the end and feels guilty. I want to hear it from you.” She covered my hands with her own.
“Please fix Carolina.” I ran to sink and threw up.
“It’s going to be okay." She came to me and patted my head, "We won’t call it that until you feel comfortable saying it. Let me help you to your room.” She walked me to my room. I lay down on my bed and stared at the ceiling singing my favorite song in my head.
I stayed in my room for the rest of the day only coming out for dinner. Keith had a seat waiting for me with my tray already set up.
…
“Are you okay? Rita told me to leave you alone for the day.”
“I’m fine. Let’s hurry up and eat. Danny should be here soon.”
“Good I can’t wait to see the bluest eyes and the broadest shoulders.” I poked him in the arm.
“Blah, do I talk about him too much?”
“Nah it’s cute.”
“Isn’t Lana coming tonight? All I know about her is that she’s “hot”?"
“You got that right. Hurry and finish you cordon bleu style meal so we can get a good table in the visitor’s room.”
I stuffed my mouth and gestured with my head we should go while trying to chew much more than my mouth could hold.
“I’m going to slap your cheeks so that it all shoots out.” He came at me with hands. I ran down the hall with him chasing me, laughing so hard that the food came through my nose. Arriving at the room we took a moment to calm ourselves.
We waited. Nobody came to visit us. We walked back to the TV room saying to each other that at least we would get control of the television. The TV shows were boring, but we watched anyway.
“Let me braid your hair.”
“Are you trying to turn me into one of your girlfriends?”
“No I’m just bored.”
“I bet you’ll be happy to get back to your fancy school, with your fancy friends. Braid away.”
“Probably,” I shrugged and thought of Theodora and Veronica, missing them.
“Well how do you like it?” We stood in front of the mirror in the TV room. It had been a mistake to get up. Two of the patients took our seats on the sofa and control of the remote.
“It gives us something to do tomorrow. You get to take out the braids.”
“Only if you’ll braid mine.”
“You are turning me into a girl. What’s your friend’s name? Carolina. You’re trying to turn me into Carolina.”
“No, I’ve never had a friend who was a boy before. We’re good. I’ll let you stay a boy for Lana’s sake.” I probably shouldn’t have mentioned the one of the ones who rejected us.
“Good night Zelda.”
“Good night Keith.”
We walked to our separate rooms and went to sleep.
...
At breakfast the next morning I broached the subject of us talking in the next meeting.
“Rita said she would leave me alone about some things if I spoke at one of the meetings, which means that you have to do it too.”
“Fine I don’t have a problem with that. I haven’t talked because I like to listen. I thought that’s what you did too.”
“Well that’s part of it. I don’t know. I’m not seeing myself as an alcoholic. I say it at the beginning of the meetings because everyone else does...”
“We’re good. I’ll start. We could talk about those things...”
“As you said we’re good.”
“Come on Zelda that’s what we’re here for.”
“I’m fine. I’m sorry I don’t mean that, for the past four or five months everyone who spoke to me tried to make the “meaningful conversation”. I like that we talk about normal things. I feel like I’m on vacation. We can talk if you want.”
“No pressures.” He poked me in my side, “No judgments okay? I don’t want you to run off scared.”
“We’re good.” We tapped our knuckles together. He liked to that a lot. All the boys I knew did, especially Danny and Serge.
“Zelda phone call.” One of the nurses whose name I could never remember called out to me.
I looked at Keith in surprise.
“We get the phones all weekend. I thought you memorized the rule book.”
“It didn’t mention that. I must have an outdated copy. I’ll talk to Rita about that.”
“Yeah, you talk to Rita about that.” I poked him the ribs and got up to go to the phones desperate to finally speak with Danny. I sat down on the chair and wiped the mouthpiece with the sleeve of his sweatshirt.
“Danny. I miss you.”
“Sorry it’s me” Carolina said.
“Even better. I’ve missed you even more.” My heart felt tight. Where was he? Why wasn’t he calling me?
“That’s sweet but untrue. How are you? I miss you too. Your mom told me about your last day. I can't believe you did that...” She laughed and sounded relieved I was safe.
“It was pretty good in retrospect.” I caught her up on my days at the rehab and listened to her updates about John. Ever since her mom went away she had been on a streak of happy times, well other than me.
“When are you going to come visit me?” I forced myself not to ask about Danny.
“I’ve been trying to. I can’t get a ride. My dad and Serge visit my mom everyday in Malibu and..." She was quiet for a moment, "John is going to borrow his mom’s car next weekend and we’ll come visit you. I’ll try to visit before then though.”
“I give up. Tell me about Danny. He hasn’t been to visit me or call or anything. I don’t get it. If it weren’t for Keith I would a puddle of goo.”
“I’ve seen him around but he seems to be avoiding me. I didn’t want to bother him. You know that was a lot for him.” Her words cut through my chest. I struggled to catch my breath.
“You think... never mind.” I managed to sputter out.
“I’ll find him Monday... Maybe you should call him? I could ask Serge.”
“No, no, no… Please don’t ask Serge,” Thoughts of Serge filled me with such confusion, best to leave him out of my troubles, “I'm not going to call Danny. He has to come to me… I thought he would always be my friend at the very least… Maybe I’ve lost him…”
Panic took over my body and my thoughts. Carolina spoke rapidly, cooing into the phone calming me.
Keith plopped down on the floor in front of me. He made a silly face, an exaggerated expression as if he had waiting days for me to get off the phone.
“I have to go now Carolina… Bye.” I laughed at Keith as I hung up the phone.
“Braids out now. I look like I’m on Death Row.”
“Isn’t the meeting starting now? Which one is it? The touchy feely 70’s style or AA?
“AA.”
“Oh good, I like those better. Let’s go.” We raced down the hallway because we were young and had too much energy to be locked away in a stagnant aired building. We jumped up landing in a big cozy old uphols
tered chair. We fit in snuggly.
I unbraided his hair as the old people hobbled in and took their seats. Other than Keith’s roommate Ernie I hadn’t spoken to any of them. I didn’t have a roommate. I suspected my father had something to do with that.
The meeting began. We went around the room saying our names and identifying as alcoholics. It was hard not to roll my eyes with the proclamation. The last man in the circle Albert said his name and spoke.
“I’m paying 50,000 to be here for the month and I’ve had enough. Those two,” he pointed to Keith and me “are on my last nerve running around the hallway, screaming night and day. Look at them. Why is she sitting in his lap?” I wasn’t sitting in Keith’s lap. My mouth dropped open in shock.
“Isn’t there a rule about physical contact?” I opened my mouth to recite the rule regarding physical contact, a rule we had not broken, but he continued on. “Little slut...”
My hands trembled as I looked down at my outfit. I wore jeans and Danny’s sweatshirt. My clothes were shapeless. I knew I wasn’t provocative. I didn’t want to be dirty anymore. I didn’t know what to do. I hated that a man could look at me and think his ugly thoughts. I stood up and screamed at the top of my lungs until I held no more breath.
Keith jumped up beside me and rubbed my shoulders. A group of the nameless old woman circled, speaking all at once. I know they were trying to soothe me, but their voices spurred on my nerves. I felt as if my head would explode.
A much older gray haired woman took control of the chaos by putting her arm around me and leading me out of the room. She didn’t speak as we walked down the hallway towards the rec room. It was as if she knew I needed a moment of silence.
“It’s going to be okay…” She sat me down next to her on the sofa.
“Everybody always tells me it’s going to be okay… But it’s never been okay. Always, always, always assaults on my sexuality… Even when I was little… These girls… They were awful…” My mind entered into a dream and the words flowed out of my mouth instead of the song that hummed through my head when events overwhelmed me. I wanted to quiet myself but found I couldn’t.
“They would tell me… They didn’t tell me, they yelled at me, all the time, saying I was gay. I didn’t really even understand what they meant. And they said it as if it were a bad thing. But so many friends of my parents were gay… I didn’t understand it, and they scared me so much.”
“The bullies… trying to bring you down. It never changes.” She shook her head and looked a little lost in her own memories.
“I don’t know what they were trying to do. Did they succeed?” I asked but I knew I would never know the answer.
“Oh sweetheart…”
“I’m not a sweetheart, or a princess,” My throat closed for a moment and I feared it would never open again. I forced myself to cough, to loosen my strangled muscles, “Please don’t infantilize me. The man on the beach… I can’t talk about that… ever.”
“Believe me I understand –“
“You don’t understand,” I snapped at her, my dream state shifting into a world of tense rage, “l cut my hair off, I'm wear shapeless grey-toned clothing, I don’t wear make-up. What the am I suppose to do? I hated not showering. Do I have to be filthy and drunk to keep men away from me?"
“Don’t you do a thing, wear your make-up, your bright colors. The bloom of youth disappears in a blink of an eye. Enjoy it. Don’t hide yourself for anyone.” She placed her finger under my chin and guided my face in her direction, forcing eye contact.
“I’ve been watching you. I had an idea by the way you carried yourself about what you went through. Whatever happened wasn’t your fault and you couldn’t have prevented it. Do you understand?” The seriousness of her expression frightened me.
“But…“ I shook her hand away.
“No, you’re just a girl, a beautiful girl, who unfortunately will be dealing with the male gaze for years to come. But listen to me now Zelda. You will not let them dictate your behavior. If you do, they will have won.”
“You mean the patriarchy?” I had been babbling about the concept for months, but I hadn’t really understood it. Believe me, I didn’t quite get it in that moment either but a starting point was in view.
“Yes, the patriarchy,“ She laughed, but not at me, “I grew up in Israel – “
“L’Chaim.” I nodded my head very seriously.
“Ummm… Yes L’Chaim Zelda… As I was saying… When I was girl, around your age… There was a series of rapes, and as you can imagine the government wanted to catch the man, but more importantly protect the women. Many solutions were proposed. The most popular one was to place a curfew on the women.”
“That would make sense…” I shifted around on the sofa. I wished she would talk about anything else.
“No, you’re wrong Zelda…” She sighed and shook her head in a slightly patronizing way, but I didn’t mind, “The leader of our country, a woman by the way, was appalled by the suggestion. Do you want to know what she said?”
“Yes” I said, not really, I thought.
“She said it is a man attacking the woman. If there is to be curfew, let the men stay home.”
“Really?” I didn't quite believe her.
“Yes. You’re very sweet Zelda… Not in an infantile way.”
“Thank you…” I felt uncomfortable by her attention, so I purposefully changed the subject, “ My boyfriend Danny is Jewish, and I’m thinking of converting… Maybe I’ll live in Israel one day.” I shrugged as if my future destination was an inevitability, “I don’t know your name --“
Her reply was drowned out by a swarm of the older patients coming through the rec room door, surrounding me. All of them speaking at once, telling me to scream as much as I like, run around the hallways until my legs gave out. Truly, it was one of the sweetest moments of my life.
Keith stood behind them, leaning against the doorway. He looked as if he wanted to say something, but was at a loss for words. We nodded our heads and understanding passed between. We wouldn’t need to talk about it.
…
We didn’t bother with the visiting room that night. Instead we took over the TV room with blankets and a bag of candy we brought from his drawer. We watched a scary movie, screaming loudly. The older people yelled with us. Their grizzled old faces were growing on me.
Sunday morning came, my one-week anniversary of being in rehab. I opened the old grey curtains in my room to find the day was bright and blue. An old Beatles song filled my mind, and I sang along as I made my bed, and dressed for the day.
The counselors agreed the day was beautiful and took us for walk down by the beach. I averted my eyes from the shore, afraid that it would trigger uncomfortable feelings. I was so tired of being afraid, or angry.
They let Keith and I run ahead to stretch our bodies, shake our out youthful energy. We stopped on the corner a block ahead of the group and simultaneously stood, heads held up high and let the sun’s rays wash over us.
The counselors lost track of time and we were late for a meeting. It was one of the emotional touchy feely ones. I sat between Erica (Keith had told me her name) and Keith. I felt shy speaking to her after my outburst, but I liked to be near her. She didn’t seem to mind.
It was my turn to speak I took a big breath and spoke, inadvertently taking Erica’s hand in mine and squeezing it.
“I’ve been lying about my drinking. I didn’t have only one drink a day. I would wake up and have one after breakfast, pack one in my lunchbox and sometimes one before bed. That’s it though, and I never got drunk. I only did it for a couple of months. That’s it.”
“Why do you think you did that Zelda?” asked the Doctor
“I don’t know.” I squeezed Erica’s hand harder “I was nervous. It calmed me down.”
“It was like medicine for you?”
“Yes.”
“Why were you so nervous?”
“I don’t know. School, stuff like th
at. I had broken up with my boyfriend.” I lied
“Those sound like normal pressures. You said you only did it for a few months. May I ask if there was a key event that triggered your stress?”
“Nothing in particular. Could you please let Rita know I spoke in this meeting?”
“I could do that. One more question Zelda. How are you going to cope with the stress when you get leave the center?”
“Yoga I guess. I heard that helps.” Yoga? Never.
“Yoga? That could help. I think we should get to the bottom of where this came from, but for now does anyone have any suggestions for how Zelda might cope with her stress?”
The meeting passed slowly after that. I wished that I hadn’t brought up yoga. The old people talked about how crystals had helped them. Crazy things like aromatherapy and past life regressions. What was wrong with them? No wonder they had such problems. Carolina would have been appalled by their flakiness. We had always been reality based. One of the more mentally stable ones suggested massage, even a broken clock is right twice a day I thought.
Keith and I waited until we got back to his room before breaking into a fit laughter. We lay on his floor, rolling around until we were out of breath. Somehow we pulled ourselves together and managed to open the candy drawer. We had gone through half of it.
“How do we get more candy? You’re running low. We’ll be out in a week.” I asked as I stuffed a Reese’s peanut butter cup into my mouth. I was almost back to my normal weight.
“Were you telling the truth about your drinking in the meeting? Or was that for your “checklist”?
“I wouldn’t lie for the checklist. Don’t make fun of it. I’m certain they have one and I just earned a big gold check on it. Jealous?” I poked at him and laughed.
“It’s a thirty day program either way but go on with your bad self and collect your good marks.” He threw a Twizzler at me. I gnawed on it though I preferred Red Vines.
“Dinner let’s go.” I picked at my chicken and pasta for appearances sake, but devoured the brownie. Keith ate slowly, savoring every bite.
I grew impatient waiting for him, wishing mealtime were over. Visiting hours were longer on the weekend and I desperately wanted us to take our favored seats by the window.