"You all right. Doctor?"
"Fine. Miles. Let's go," I said and he moved quickly.
What a mess I felt I was in now. Willow. I was worried about explaining myself to Ralston, of course, but as we drove to the clinic, I was also very much concerned and worried about Grace. What would be the effect on her of what we had done the night before? Was Ralston looking for me because of her behavior today? Had I caused some terrible regression or exacerbated her problems? Her mother, your grandmother, had brought her to me to help her, to make her well enough to return to their world. Had my selfish acts made that all be impossible now?
Saying I was tense doesn't do justice to how I felt when I entered the clinic. Ralston was in a session with Palmer, so I had some breathing room there. Nadine Gordon was attending to some other patients, but she was the first to inquire as to my health.
"I'm fine," I told her.
"You do work too hard. Doctor," she said, surprising me with the softness in her voice. "I might not show it, but I worry about you."
"Thank you for your concern. Ms. Gordon. I'm all right."
"You try too hard with some of our patients. Doctor. No one should expect miracles of you."
I nodded.
"Any particular problems this morning?" I asked.
She stared at me a long moment. Did she know that I was really inquiring only about Grace?
"No," she said. "Your Miss Montgomery..."
"Yes?" I said, trying not to appear overly interested.
"Is very chipper and energetic today. In fact, she's in the arts and crafts roam helping Miss Richards with the other patients. One would think she was one of our attendants. She practically begged me not to make her take her medication this morning, claiming she had no need of it.
"I told her when she graduated medical school. I would take orders from her,' she added dryly.
"Interesting." I said.
"Yes, isn't it?" she pursued, her eyes a bit smaller. "Maybe it will give you the opportunity to spend more time with your other patients now," she suggested with a cold, calculating smile that went right to my heart.
"Maybe," I said. nodding, "I'll look into it."
She held her eves on me and then she tamed and left the office.
Later. when Grace appeared for her session with me. I saw Nadine Gordon in the hallway. She didn't look away when I looked at her. Grace walked in and I stood there in the doorway exchanging this inquisitive glance with my head nurse. She gave me a small nod and left. I closed the door and turned to Grace.
"How are you?" I asked her.
She answered by rising on the balls of her feet to kiss me softly on the lips.
And then she smiled and said. "I wanted to be sure it wasn't all a dream."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes," she said.
"How?"
"From the look on your face." she replied, and I laughed and reached out to embrace her.
We held on to each other like two castaways who had found a welcoming shore and knew we would never be alone again.
Later that day my receptionist Edith Hamilton buzzed me in my office to tell me Alberta absolutely insisted I pick up the phone. It mattered not whether I was in a session with a patient or not I could tell Alberta had flustered Edith because she kept apologizing for interrupting me. I told Edith it was fine and had her pass Alberta's call through.
"What's wrong?" I asked immediately.
"Wrong? Why don't you ask what's right for a change? Must all you psychiatrists always look to the dark side of things?"
"I'm sorry, Alberta. My receptionist said--"
"That woman was rude to me, When I call your precious clinic, they should be told it's important and I'm not to hear any 'Can I have him call you back?' Or 'He's with a patient."'
"Sometimes it is very important not to be interrupted. Alberta," I said calmly. "Okay. Why are you calling with such urgency?"
"It's not urgency, Claude. It's elation, something you're not accustomed to seeing over there in your inner sanctum and halls of misery."
"Elation?"
"I was elected," she declared. "You're speaking to the new president of the Woman's Club."
"Oh. Congratulations. Alberta, That's very nice," I said.
"Nice? Nice? Why is it you always have the perfect words for your mentally disturbed patients and their families, but not for me? Nice? It's more than just nice. Claude."
"I didn't mean it was just nice, Alberta. I meant it was nice that they appreciate you and your great efforts to make the organization a success." I said.
She was satisfied with that. "Well?" she added.
"Well, what?"
"How do you intend to celebrate this with me?"
"Oh. Well, why don't we go to the Hideaway?" I said. It was the restaurant we had gone to on three previous wedding anniversaries.
"Yes, that would be appropriate." she replied. "I'm surprised you came up with it. Very good. Claude. You might make the husband of a president yet." she added with a light laugh attached. "Go back to your depressing activities and save all your buoyancy and joy for me." she commanded.
If she only knew, I thought, where I had invested all my so-called buoyancy and joy.
8
Wings of Wax
.
Perhaps nothing fills your heart with optimism
and blinds you to reality as much as falling in love does. Willow. When your mother and I were together, none of the problems I had to face outside the clinic seemed to matter to me. I've already told you that it wasn't that long after our marriage that Alberta began accusing me of indifference toward things that mattered very much to her. I didn't agonize at all over the decisions she made for our home. and I never gave much importance to the social problems she had. In her eves it wasn't possible for me to be any more neglectful or unconcerned than I already was, so I understand why she didn't take any more notice of my indifference toward anything but the clinic and Grace.
For a while then. I lived in almost as much illusion as some of my patients. To think that now that I had found Grace I would never feel alone again was foolish, especially for a man who had the education and experience I had. Oh, the self-analysis I ended up doing. Willow, the hours and hours I spent reviewing it all, questioning my own thoughts and feelings. It was truly enough to drive anyone mad. I'm surprised I didn't walk into walls. I was that distracted at times, especially at home. where I paced and spent my time trying to come up with more reasons and more ways to spend even more time at the clinic without attracting too much attention.
To my own credit. I will say that I never once denied the fact that this was a forbidden love affair. Willow. Of course. I tried to conceive of ways to make that not so, but in the end I realized that no one would see it as anything else but a serious violation of my medical ethics. My career, my value to other patients, my whole purpose for being was in great jeopardy, and I had put it there.
Every time your grandmother called that fact was driven home, and the two times she visited the clinic to see Grace made it even more emphatic. The first time was only a little more than a month after Grace and I had become lovers. As strange as it may sound to you. Willow, the worst fear I had was not that somehow Jackie Lee Montgomery would come to realize something was going on between your mother and me. No, the worst fear I had was she would see the changes in your mother that were improvements and insist she be released. Don't forget it was embarrassing to her that your mother was here in the first place.
From the tone and context of phone
conversations I had with Jackie Lee. I could also tell that she was becoming unhappy with the ruse of her being Linden's mother. He was getting older and more demanding. Raising a child again was a big
responsibility and, without any help, a great burden on her time and her energy. From what she was telling me. I understood that she wanted the freedom to become an eligible widow again, a woman without any baggage so she could sink her teeth into a new hus
band, preferably someone with goad standing in the Palm Beach community and of course, someone wealthy enough to return her to her previous lifestyle. She had lost so much with Kyle Scott: the plane, the boat, the big house, the seemingly unlimited allowance for designer clothing, vacation expenses, everything that was once very important to her and had became so again. Her complaints about her present life seemed to multiply as fast as rabbits and become an endless tail to her inquiries about Grace,
"That man," she would say, "didn't only damage my daughter. He ruined my life and made it so much more difficult. You have to be seen in fine places to meet fine people, especially decent men."
On and on she would go, perhaps thinking I would somehow provide a solution or, at minimum, be sympathetic.
And then. as I said, she began to complain more specifically about her motherhood responsibilities and the toll that was taking on her physically and mentally.
"My daughter should realize she has an obligation to the child," she told me. "Can't you get that through to her, drum that into her head?"
"We don't exactly force these things on our patients. Jackie Lee. Your daughter has to arrive at the conclusions by herself or they won't be lasting, and that's what we both want, isn't it?"
I wanted to ask her whatever happened to her worry that Grace wouldn't be able to handle motherhood, her concern that once someone had a mental problem, it was always there, never corrected.
"I've been through all this sort of responsibility already," she wailed. "I need my freedom. too. A grandmother should be a visitor." she told me. "She should be able to shut her doors, say goodbye, drive away. None of the grandmothers I know are anything like I am today. I feel like I'm being punished for my daughter's sins and not vice versa.
"And vou were right the first time." she continued. "it's not good for the child. He'll be so terribly confused. He'll end up in your clinic, too!"
I tried my best to commiserate with her, but I couldn't get up enough sincerity to make myself sound convincing, especially to myself. First. I didn't appreciate Jackie Lee's real motives for wanting Grace to be released, and second. I dreaded the day she would leave the clinic.
In any case Jackie Lee arrived at the clinic, or more like charged at it. For someone complaining about how hard and stressful her life had become, she looked absolutely glamorous. As stylish and elegant as the first time I had met her, she entered my office with great expectation. Grace and she had spoken a number of times on the telephone, and from the last two conversations she had with her. Jackie Lee was convinced that Grace was as close to being normal as she could ever be.
"She asked about Linden. She sounded very homesick, and she didn't mention any ghosts or her father or Kyle. You've done a wonderful job," she declared with a definite sense of finality. I had the sense she would jump up at any moment and start packing Grace's bags,
"Thank you. Jackie Lee. but I'm afraid we'd be moving things a little too quickly if we sent her home right now."
"Why? What else is there to do?" she wailed, her face filled with disappointment and frustration,
"She's still dependent on medication and--"
"Oh, if that's all. I can certainly give her pills, make sure she takes them on time and everything."
"No, it's not just the dispensing of the medicines, it's the monitoring and regulation of them that's important, and there are still a number of troubling issues to work out through therapy. Remember I asked you to be patient. Now, you wouldn't want to cause a relapse here. It's often more difficult to return to this stage of improvement once something like that occurs," I warned her. "It could be worse, in fact."
Part of it was true, but part of it was my selfish conniving to keep her from taking Grace away from me.
She lowered her shoulders like a flag of defeat. This is so hard, so hard." she muttered.
"I know." I said "I appreciate what you are going through. Believe me, we want only the best for the both of you, for all of you."
"Well, let's see how she is." she told me. and I brought her to visit with Grace, who was sitting on a bench in the garden and reading.
Grace knew her mother was coming, of course. She and I had discussed it. I had not dared tell her my fears, but she knew from speaking with her mother that Jackie Lee anticipated taking her home, if not now, very soon. When Grace told me about the conversations. .I said nothing more than a "We'll see." I was afraid of what I would say if I added any more. Apparently, she understood.
"You look wonderful." Jackie Lee declared the moment Grace lifted her eves from the pages of the book she was reading. "What a difference between the girl I brought here and the girl I'm now looking at, wouldn't you agree. Dr. De Beers?" she asked.
Grace and I looked at each other.
"There's been some marked improvement, yes." I said. Stressing the word some,
"Um," Jackie Lee grunted.
"I'll leave you two for a while," I said, backing away, "I have to attend to some matters."
"Go on. Doctor. Thank you." Jackie Lee said, smiling at Grace. "I can see we don't need you hovering over us."
She sat beside Grace, who looked at me with some desperation in her eyes. I nodded, smiled at her, and left them, my heart pounding with anxiety. My feelings were mixed, of course. and I was at myself again, chastising myself for being so selfish as to want to keep a patient longer than she might need to be kept. I made up my mind that I would have Ralston treat her for a while so he could make an evaluation.
I am writing all this as if it is only my story. In the beginning of all this. I did not fully consider Grace's feelings, Willow. She was just as troubled by mixed emotions and desires as I was. On the one hand. I was sure she very much wanted to be considered well enough to go home. She certainly wanted either me or Dr. Price to confirm that she was capable of raising her child.
On the other hand, she was truly in love with me, and she never felt safer than she did with me at the clinic. In our own little world, no demon could enter and spoil anything. The curse she had come to believe was on her and followed her through most of her young life was stopped outside the door. I was too powerful for it. It dared not show its dark face.
"I can love you and not be afraid for you or far myself." she told me once.
There was that contradiction in me again. Willow. The doctor part of me insisted that was not valid. She would be just as safe anywhere and I had no special powers, certainly no powers to overcome some curse, and if there was one thing I didn't want to do as a psychotherapist, it was to provide her with another crutch. However. I would be lying if I didn't confess that the other part of me, the man. the lover, wanted to encourage such thoughts because I knew they would keep her close to me.
What would end such a grand struggle for my and her destinies? Apparently, at the end of that first visit, I knew it wasn't going to be Jackie Lee, Grace either pretended or really believed she was not quite ready to be released and return. She convinced her mother that she was still too fragile. I believed that, too. but I needed to have it validated, and so I told her I was going to have her see Dr. Price for the next few weeks. There was a danger in that, of course. Ralston was a talented man, a very perceptive man. He might very well discover the true relationship between Grace and me. and I wasn't ready for him to know that, nor was she.
The fact is she fell into a bad depression when she began her sessions with him. Not only didn't she make any new progress, she began to regress and to the point where he confronted me.
"Why did you want me to take this patient new. Claude?" he asked me. "You were doing so well with her. Now she's practically the way she was the day she arrived."
I referred to my original intention, talking about Jackie Lee and how she was pressuring me to release Grace. I wanted to be sure I was doing the right thing by resisting. He was too clever to buy into that completely. I could see it in the way he tilted his head and gave me his famous. "Umm."
"Well, I'm afraid I'm not doing well with h
er. Claude. She has a better rapport with you. I would advise you to continue her therapy. She's built a trust with you, a bridge that I'm only blocking.
"As for the mother, you're handling her correctly," he concluded, and Grace returned to me.
After that I spent more and more time at the clinic, taking advantage of Alberta's new and heavier involvement in her social activities since being elected president of her favorite club. She was out planning fundraisers, socials, networking with other women and other organizations, especially charities. She was almost weekly in the social pages of our newspapers and featured twice on our local television stations.
One afternoon Grace and I took one of our now famous walks, only we didn't stop at the crest nor did we stop at the river's edge. We continued on until we found a beautiful area shaded by trees. I knew we had gone too far from the clinic, and it would take us too long to return, but it was a magnificent, beautiful day with the sort of sky artists envision, the blue deep and rich, the few clouds puffy and milk white.
We sat on a soft patch of grass and watched a flock of birds do amazing gymnastic-like turns and circles. It was as though they were performing for us.
"When we first moved to our estate on the beach," Grace said, "I used to go out at night and lay on the sand and look up at the starry sky. Soon I would feel like I was falling into it, like I was above the stars."
She lay back and put her hands behind her head and looked up at the clouds.
"Try it," she told me. and I lay beside her.
"Yes," I said. laughing. It works."
We were both very still, hardly breathing for fear of shattering the moment.
"What will become of us. Claude?" she finally asked me. "You will get stronger and you will return to your boy." I said.
"That's me. What about us, Claude?"
"I don't know," I said. "I know what I wish and want. but I don't know. Grace. It's very complicated with your being my patient and all."
"You're so honest with me." she said, turning and bracing herself on her elbow, "You could easily make up a fantasy, tell me a story, give me some false hope, but you won't."
Hidden Leaves Page 9