How to Cook Your Daughter

by Jessica Hendra

  I brought my habits with me to Sonora. I’d been given housing by a supporter of the theater, a seventy-something widower who settled me comfortably in his guest room before heading east to visit his grandchildren. Before he set out, he told me to help myself to anything in his house. I investigated the “bad” foods in Bob’s kitchen and swore not to touch the cookie dough ice cream or Twinkies. Instead, I continued to slice my breakfast apple into tiny pieces, each to be eaten with a fork. For lunch it was salad. For dinner, a plain bagel that I cut it into four equal parts—one section to be eaten before the show, one to be nibbled during intermission, and the remaining two for after the curtain fell. The cast must have noticed the way I parceled out my lone bagel, but, of course, I found my behavior unremarkable. I continued to run six miles a day, and came home exhausted, my head spinning from lack of fuel.

  I called Dr. Shaffer each week, telling him the same things I had told him in his office: how scared I was to gain weight, to break all the food rules I had set for myself. I told him how I wanted to be someone with no needs at all—for food, for love, for anyone or anything. I told him how I thought my need for my father’s love had made me complicit in his molestation of me, that if I had been a “stronger person” it never would have happened. I told him I still felt weak, that, even at age twenty-nine, I hated myself for my neediness. And I told him how I simply wanted to be invisible, to take up no space in the world, to become a tiny, emotionless thing. During the calls, I worried out loud that if I began to eat more, I would simply binge and become bulimic again. Dr. Shaffer suggested I try Prozac, but it only made me feel nervous and even more anxious than usual. I had two car accidents in a week. And when Kurt told him that I hadn’t gained a pound, Dr. Shaffer decided to make a “house call” to northern California.

  We sat in a small cafe in town, and Dr. Shaffer told me that I had come to the proverbial fork in the road. The path I chose was up to me. I couldn’t get better for him or for Kurt, for my mom, or my friends. I had to do it for myself. I had to take a chance on breaking my life-threatening food rules, to be brave enough to believe in myself. And if I couldn’t…there wasn’t much that he or anyone else could do for me. I knew he was right. I had to stop punishing myself for what had happened with my father.

  That night I returned to the house and lay on the floral bedspread in the guest room, thinking about what Dr. Shaffer had said. In Kurt, I had been given a huge gift: someone who loved me despite the dirty secrets of my past. Now, here I was, squandering that gift, taking Kurt’s love for granted. I thought about how I had told my secrets, and how both Kurt and Dr. Shaffer had supported me. Then I began to wonder: What would it feel like not to be dizzy all the time? Or sick? It has to be better than this! I got up from the bed and headed to the kitchen. I felt as though I were moving in slow motion, watching myself, just as I had that evening at Celia’s, when I threw up in her bathroom. When I finally got there, I reached into the cupboard and pulled out a bowl. Then I opened the freezer door and took out the cookie dough ice cream. I put two scoops in the bowl, and sat down at the kitchen table. But I was too nervous to eat. I knew I needed to talk to the one person in my life who would understand what it meant for me to eat a bowl of ice cream. I called Kurt.

  I told him what Dr. Shaffer had said, how I felt it was time to break my rules, and that I needed him to talk to me while I ate.

  “What do you want me to talk about, Jess?”

  “Anything…what you did today, how work was, anything to take my mind off what I’m about to do.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with eating some ice cream,” he reassured me. “Nothing is going to happen to you if you do. It’s just a first little step, a little step that might be the beginning of you getting better.”

  “I know, but I’m scared.”

  “Just eat,” he said, “and let me talk.”

  And so Kurt chatted on about this and that, told me a funny story, then an ironic anecdote. I laughed a little, ate deliberately, and felt that each spoonful that went into my mouth was part of a long journey toward the bottom of the bowl. I wished I could just be a normal woman and enjoy my dessert.

  Finally, I finished.

  “How do you feel?” Kurt asked.

  I thought for a moment. “Okay,” I told him. “I actually feel okay.”

  “I’m very proud of you, Jessica. I know how hard that was.”

  Kurt said good night, and he told me that he loved me. And I went to bed feeling hopeful. I vowed that in the morning, I would not skip breakfast to make up for being “bad.” That I would finally add the PowerBar Dr. Shaffer had been urging me to eat. That I would take baby step after baby step. That I would recover. In the morning, I kept my promise, and in the weeks that followed, I started to gain weight.

  The bulimia hadn’t returned, and I began to see my body differently. Now, I wanted some flesh. I wanted to take up space. The scale still scared me, but I felt as though I had turned a critical corner—that, maybe, I had begun to free myself.

  My neuroses resurfaced whenever I’d hear Dad’s voice or see his face, but I tried my best to set them aside. We even traveled to France to visit his new family. Kurt lurked in the bushes whenever Dad took our girls out to play. I hated myself for seeing him, for pretending to be okay when I wasn’t. But what choice did I have?

  Then, Father Joe, a book that I couldn’t help but see as an attempt to bury our secret once and for all. If I didn’t speak now, if I didn’t correct my father’s “record” of our family history, then I would never be able to live with myself. He had chosen to let the world believe he had bared his soul to save it. He even had the gall to dedicate the book to his first family. I simply couldn’t let it stand. Here I was, telling the New York Times details of something I never wanted to make public. But Daddy only had himself to blame—for what he had done and for what he had written.

  It was the end of the week, and Rudy told Shipley that I was coming to New York on Monday. Shipley would call me Tuesday, he told Rudy, after he met with the other editors and figured out the best person to cover the story. That Sunday, a girlfriend in New York called asking me if I had seen the Times.

  “I live in Los Angeles, now, remember!” I told her. I was a little tense. So she e-mailed me the letter. It was written by Michael McKean, perhaps best known for cowriting the movie This Is Spinal Tap.

  To the Editor,

  In his review of Tony Hendra’s Father Joe (May 30), Andrew Sullivan refers to the author as “an architect of the peerless parody rock documentary This Is Spinal Tap. I wonder where Sullivan picked up that phrase.

  McKean wrote that my father “stands apart” as the only actor to have tried to claim credit for the movie, even though he had neither written it nor conceived of it. McKean ended his letter this way: “I think Tony Hendra is at least one confession away from salvation.”

  I could feel the frustration and anger in each word that McKean had written. Even today, having authored “one of the best spiritual memoirs ever,” my father was still trying to pull a fast one. And one that Michael, Chris, and the other writers of This Is Spinal Tap had called him out on before. They must have been shaking their heads, just as I was, thinking Tony hasn’t changed. He might have said on the cover of his book that his soul is saved, but the guy hasn’t changed one bit.

  I think Tony Hendra is at least one confession away from salvation. Yes, I thought. At least one.

  My mom, the girls, and I flew to New York on Monday. Kurt stayed behind to work. Mom had sold the loft and moved to California shortly before my youngest daughter had been born. She wanted to be close to her grandchildren. Her new husband, my stepfather, watched their house in Topanga—and their gigantic dog-child, Dave.

  I went through my usual anxiety about getting on the plane. But I had important reasons to get to New York. First, to take Julia and Charlotte to the American Girl Store on Fifth Avenue, and second, to tell my story to the New York Times.

  My mother kep
t a studio apartment on East Thirty-fifth Street, and we arrived there late. The girls were thrilled to be back in the city. All of us crowded into the studio, Charlotte and I sleeping on an air mattress on the floor, my mom and Julia in the bed.

  I didn’t hear from David Shipley on Tuesday, and I began to wonder if perhaps they had second thoughts about pursuing the story. The notion left me disappointed—and relieved. When I checked my voicemail on Wednesday, I had three messages. Two were from my father, asking me again if we could meet privately and talk. The third was from Shipley. He wanted me to call.

  When Shipley and I finally connected, I was on my way up Thirty-fourth Street with my mom and the girls, looking for a bagel place. I stopped on a “quiet” corner and, pressing my cell phone to my ear, strained to hear him. He told me how much my piece had affected him and how he thought it was important to handle it correctly. He wanted my permission to pass it on to the Metro editor, and if I agreed, they would assign someone to the story the next day. I didn’t think twice and gave my permission. Shipley said someone would be in touch with me soon. I told my mother the gist of the conversation. She felt as I did—gratified and scared shitless.

  On Thursday morning, I heard from John Kifner, the reporter who had been assigned the story. My mother remembered him as an old friend of my stepfather’s (my stepfather had been a well-respected photographer and had worked with a lot of reporters). She wondered if we should remind Kifner of this or whether he might remember himself. I suspect he remembered because, a few hours later, he called me again and cited “a family emergency” that would prevent him from being able to follow the story. He said someone else would be calling me within a few hours.

  We had planned to take the girls to the Metropolitan Museum of Art that afternoon. I thought it was unfair for them to sit at home waiting for a phone call. So we made our way to the number 6 train and headed to Eighty-sixth Street. Just as we crossed Fifth Avenue and walked toward the main entrance of the museum, my cell phone rang. The number came up as 1111111111. Could it be my father?

  “Hello?” I answered reluctantly. The voice on the other end said his name was Sonny Kleinfield and that he was from the Times. He sounded so unassuming that I feared I’d been passed on to someone junior. I had no idea that he was one of the Times’ best, most experienced investigative reporters, and that he would turn out to be, as one of his colleagues later noted, “the instrument of providence.”

  “When could we talk, Jessica? I can meet you somewhere, or you can come here. Whatever you prefer.”

  “What about tomorrow morning? That would be the best time for me.”

  “I was hoping we could meet today.”

  “It’s just that I am on my way to the museum with my daughters….”

  I saw my mother making gestures at me.

  “I’m sorry. Can you hold on one second?”

  “Sure,” Sonny said.

  I put my hand over the phone and turned toward my mother. “What?”

  “Jessica, I’ll take the girls to the Met. Go and meet this guy if he wants to meet now. You need to get this over with.”

  “But look what I’m wearing!” I had on shorts and a tank top.

  “Just say you will meet him. No one in New York dresses in the summer.”

  “But I don’t have my notes or anything.” I had been trying to anticipate the interview by writing down some thoughts.

  “You don’t need notes.”

  “But I’m not prepared!”

  “Jessica….” My mother looked straight into my eyes. “You have been preparing for this your whole life. Just tell the guy the truth.”

  I took my hand off the phone.

  “I’m so sorry to have kept you waiting. I can come now. My mother is going to take my girls.”

  “Okay. Where would you like to meet?”

  For a second I had an image from some 1940s movie. “Thank you for meeting me, Mr. Kleinfield,” I would say in a deep, raspy voice. The reality was I had no idea where to meet. At that moment I felt incapable of remembering a single diner or coffee shop in the entire city.

  “I’ll come to the Times building. It’s easier.”

  “Great. Call from downstairs when you get here. I’ll come and get you.”

  We hung up, and I turned to my mom. “I’m going to meet him at his office.”

  “Good,” she said.

  “I just worry that I look like a complete flake coming to the New York Times building in shorts!” I looked myself over. “And a tank top! Mom, what if he thinks I’m not credible?”

  My mother took off the Ann Taylor cardigan she had slung over her shoulder, drew my arms into it, and buttoned the sweater over my tank top. It was like she was dressing me for the first day of school.

  “Here. Now go.”

  I was nervous as I kissed her and the girls good-bye and took the steps into the subway.

  As I emerged twenty minutes later on Forty-second Street, I imagined meeting my father coming out of the news buildings around Times Square, having just given an interview about Father Joe. Or perhaps he would be coming from a leisurely lunch with his agent during which they discussed the size of the checks they would both be receiving if Father Joe stayed on the bestseller lists. I felt like a traitor to him.

  I walked in the lobby of the Times building, and the security guard, large and gruff with a big mustache, greeted me. I called up to Sonny in the newsroom. He said he’d be right down to get me.

  I paced in the lobby and tugged at the legs of my shorts, trying to make them seem longer. I wished I was wearing a nice pants suit (I didn’t even own one, but never mind). Finally, a fair, slight man came out of the elevator wearing jeans and discreetly holding a notepad and pen.

  “I’m Sonny Kleinfield,” he said, extending his hand.

  “I’m Jessica Hendra,” I said, shaking it.

  “Do you want to go and talk in the cafeteria here or out somewhere?”

  “I don’t know,” I said somewhat sheepishly. I mean, what was the best spot for denouncing your father?

  “Let’s just go to the cafeteria.”

  “Fine.”

  Sonny signed me in, and I followed him to the elevators.

  “I’m sorry I’m so casually dressed. I was expecting to be taking two small children around the hot city today.” I sounded a bit shaky.

  “Don’t worry about that,” he said. “No one in New York dresses in the summer.” Mom was right.

  Sonny and I took the elevator to the cafeteria and chitchatted about the security in the building since September 11. When we got there, I excused myself and went into the ladies room to splash some cold water on my face and pull myself together. Sonny waited patiently, and when we walked into the cafeteria together, we stopped for coffee.

  Do I pay or does he pay? I felt I should offer, but strangely, I didn’t want him to think I was buying him off. Sonny paid. Then he asked me where I wanted to sit. I chose a table at the very back of the cafeteria. Even though I was about to tell more than a million readers of the New York Times what my father had done, on that day I didn’t want anyone but Sonny to hear my story. It was as though I had blocked out the reality of what I was doing and still treasured the illusion of privacy. I took one sip of the coffee, gagged slightly, and left the rest to get cold on the table.

  I wish I could remember all the questions Sonny asked me or even how he began his interview. I only recall how nervous I felt and how skillfully Sonny drew the story out of me. He didn’t push me into saying anything, and he was considerate of the difficult details of my past. I don’t even remember when I realized he was taking furious notes. I just remember telling him my story, as clearly as I could. And objectively, even. Despite all that had happened, I felt I needed to be fair-minded. The truth, after all, was on my side.

  “I have the piece you sent to the Op-Ed page,” he told me. “You talk about what happened with your dad in great detail in it. I’m not going to ask you to recount all that aga
in right now. But is it okay for me to just quote from what you have already written?”

  “Yes. That would be much easier for me.” I felt relieved. “Thank you.”

  We talked for more than three hours, and Sonny sympathetically scrutinized everything I said. It seemed as though he believed me but needed to be sure. And who could blame him for being skeptical? I had come to the paper on my own volition. I had initiated this. And I was increasingly aware that I was taking a huge risk. Sonny might believe me. Or he might not.

  He asked if he could talk to Kurt, my friends, and two therapists—Dr. Shaffer and the woman I was currently seeing in Los Angeles, Dr. Tracy Studdard. And also to my mother. I promised to call him with a list of numbers from my phone book after I got back to Mom’s apartment. I also said I’d ask my mother if she would consent to an interview. But I cautioned him that Kathy “wasn’t going to want to get involved.”

  Sonny also wanted to see the e-mails my father and I had exchanged after Father Joe came out. And as I had over and over again since that day, he bemoaned the fact that I had destroyed the letters my father had sent me ten years ago, when I was in therapy for my anorexia.

  “Does your dad know you’re talking to me?” I knew Sonny would ask. I felt awkward about my dad not knowing and answered, simply, “No.”

  “You know that I will have to contact your father later in the process.” Sonny seemed so matter-of-fact about it, so clinical.

  “Of course you will,” I said. “You should. You have to.” I’m sure he didn’t need to be reminded. “I understand that.”

  “What do you think he will say?”

  I had asked myself that very question since I thought about doing this. “I don’t know,” and I didn’t. “I can’t imagine he could deny it….” Not exactly true; I could imagine it. Vividly. “But I guess he will.”

  “Yes,” Sonny answered, “I guess he will.”

  We exchanged e-mails and phone numbers and agreed to talk soon.

  I walked from the Times building and onto Forty-third Street. The late afternoon sun still blazed but with a tad less intensity. I even felt a very slight breeze. I called my mother on my cell phone. She had arranged for us to have dinner at a friend’s apartment that evening. I didn’t ask what excuse she had given our hostess for me being so late.