Breed

by Chase Novak

  Leslie squints at Yost. He is the second doctor she has seen at Turtle Bay Obstetrics and Wellness. The first, a woman named Dr. Eva Kosloff, an unusually tiny woman with mad blue eyes, was clear from the beginning that the eight doctors who shared this practice also shared the patients and that Dr. Kosloff herself might not be present at the delivery. Glancing down at her clipboard, she’d added, “So you come to us from the great Dr. Kis.” And after saying his name, she seemed to have difficulty making eye contact with Leslie. “Did Dr. K. mention to you that some of the women he works with deliver a bit ahead of schedule?”

  “He mentioned nothing of the sort,” Leslie said. “But the sooner the better. Look. I need to do something about this.” She lifted her arm, showed her. “Can you take care of this for me?”

  “Not really my field,” Kosloff said, quickly turning to take her leave.

  Leslie, usually so good at coming up with solutions to life’s difficulties, is simply paralyzed with self-revulsion, and even finding a dermatologist who might help her is made difficult by her doing it in secret. She trolled the Internet and found a doctor down in Greenwich Village whose office she now sits in, taking her place in the waiting room with two wealthy-looking Indian women in gorgeous saris, both of them chatting amiably while their unibrows expressively rise and fall. Also there is a glum teenager, slim and tall, who could have been a model were it not for a noticeable mustache, and a demure woman in a pantsuit who sits with her knees pressed together and her purse in her lap and who has the sideburns of an Elvis impersonator.

  Her cell phone chimes in her purse and she reads the message from her assistant Robert. Are you in the bldg? Jacket proofs are up and they look horrible!!

  No, I am not in the building, Leslie thinks. My disgusting self is in the office of a hair-removal specialist, thank you very much.

  At last, it is Leslie’s turn to see the doctor, Carole Ann Ryan, a lantern-jawed young woman with a pageboy haircut and oversize glasses with red frames that match her hair. She glances at her clipboard and asks, “So what seems to be the trouble?” though even with most of Leslie’s body covered it is obvious she is struggling with extreme hirsutism.

  Leslie’s eyes blaze as she fixes the doctor with a long stare until finally she pulls the tails of her blouse out of her skirt and exposes a torso that is darker and thicker with hair than it was even the day before. Dr. Ryan, despite her extensive acquaintance with scars, boils, eczema, psoriasis, rashes, oozing acne, and cancerous growths, has never seen anything that comes this close to turning her professionally strong stomach. Leslie notes the quiver of the doctor’s throat as she swallows her shock, and her light brown eyes widen behind her thick tinted lenses. She reaches for a chair and drags it toward her and sits, heavily, releasing a sigh.

  “Are you being treated for endometriosis?”

  “No. Why do you ask?”

  “Oh, sometimes the treatment can lead to a certain amount of unwanted hair. How about weight loss? Have you lost a great deal of weight lately?”

  “Are you even looking at me? I’m pregnant. I’m gaining weight.”

  “Okay. I’m just ruling out the normal causes.”

  “Normal? Does any of this look normal?”

  “So… you’re pregnant,” Dr. Ryan says, glancing down at Leslie’s new-patient questionnaire on her clipboard. “That’s very exciting. You do know that a certain amount of hair growth often accompanies pregnancies.”

  “This is not a certain amount,” Leslie says. She tells herself to calm down, but rage boils within her.

  “The important thing is to try and enjoy your pregnancy,” the doctor says. “It’s a very special time in a woman’s life.”

  “I can’t live like this. I have a job, I’m in public. This is not doable.”

  “If your insurance covers laser hair removal, we can do that for you right here. And if not, we can direct you to a couple of reliable places where it can be done nonmedically.”

  Something catches Dr. Ryan’s attention—the light has touched the hair above Leslie’s upper lip in such a way that it makes it seem thicker than before. Curious in some horrible, childish manner, Ryan steps closer to Leslie and then, her brow furrowed, her lips pursed, looking like a kid about to turn over a rock to see what vile squiggly things might be beneath it, she pokes at Leslie’s mustache with one finger.

  And with lightning speed, like a beast in the wild and with no more premeditation than an apple falling from a tree, Leslie sinks her teeth into the doctor’s finger. The doctor screams in pain and terror, grabs her right pointer with her left hand.

  Leslie is standing now, unperturbed by the doctor’s howls of pain. She feints a move toward Ryan, causing the doctor to cower in fear. She places her hands on Ryan’s shoulders and shoves the doctor so hard against the wall that the glass cabinet attached to it comes loose and crashes to the floor.

  Dr. Ryan is temporarily out of commission, but Leslie hears the sound of rushing footsteps, and she bolts down the gray-carpeted corridor, into the waiting room, and bursts through the doors leading to the common hallway on the fifth floor. No time to wait for the elevator; she takes the stairway. She hasn’t had any real exercise in years but she finds it surprisingly easy and even pleasant to be running. There’s a spring in her step, but what is stranger than that, and more disturbing, is there is a quietly humming joy in her heart. It’s the first moment of real happiness she has had since taking Alex’s hand on the plane back from Slovenia. Her thought back then was I’m pregnant; now what fills her heart with wild music is another thought: Get out of my way!

  Shortly after Leslie returns home, the police arrive to place her under arrest. On the ride to the station, she contacts Alex and calls their lawyer, Arthur Glassman, and because of Glassman’s efficiency and Leslie’s lack of prior arrests, he is able to quickly post a minimal bail and get her out of there.

  They get back home about seven. Glassman is full of bluster and pride about having gotten Leslie released so quickly. Leslie pours drinks for the men and sparkling water for herself and they sit in the front parlor listening to the rattling-beads sound of rain against the window and the whoosh of traffic below.

  After finishing half her drink, Leslie excuses herself and says she must take a hot shower to get the stinky putrid smell of the lockup off.

  “Oh God, yes, by all means,” Arthur says, rising from his seat. He is a well-turned-out man in his early sixties, in an English suit and expensive shoes, with a full head of kinky white hair and merry blue eyes. He takes Leslie’s hand and gazes at her in his fatherly manner, though he is also inspecting her, wondering if he might discern some visible sign of madness that would cause Leslie to take a serious nip out of a doctor’s hand.

  When Leslie is out of the room, Arthur sinks back into his seat. “This is not going to be easy, you know,” he says. “I mean, she actually did bite that woman.”

  “Is that a question?” Alex asks.

  “No, it’s not a question. The woman was bitten, and she has Leslie’s teeth marks on her. Teeth marks are more identifiable than fingerprints.”

  “I’m sure they are.”

  “Alex. What is going on?”

  “I don’t know. Pregnancy? It changes women, everybody knows that.”

  “Yes, that’s true. But Leslie is the first pregnant woman I’ve known to bite a dermatologist. Look, the pregnancy thing is a card we can play, and I’m sure I can get this settled with probation and community service. There’s no way they are going to lock up a woman of Leslie’s stature, pregnant or not. But we’re going to have to cop a plea. You understand? We’re going to have to hammer out some sort of agreement, and I promise you this doctor is already using her good hand to dial some bottom-feeding personal injury lawyer and she is going to hit us up in a civil suit.”

  “You just do what needs to be done, Arthur,” Alex says.

  “You still haven’t answered my question, Alex.”

  “There are things that hap
pen, Arthur. In people’s lives, their bodies, their marriages; private things. But whatever it is, I’m sure it will pass.”

  “What does her doctor say? And who is your obstetrician, by the way?”

  “Oh, this Dr. Blah-Blah, who the fuck knows? It’s a practice with eight doctors and we see someone different each time. It’s strictly a moneymaking outfit, but we’re fine where we are. The last thing we want is some helicopter obstetrician hovering over us. Listen, Arthur, we’ve waited a long time for this and now the only thing that’s important is to keep her safe and comfortable and for us to have this child.”

  “I realize that. But this Dr. Blah-Blah or any of his colleagues, they haven’t noticed anything… untoward in Leslie? Nothing out of the usual?”

  “What are you implying?”

  “I’m not implying anything, old buddy. I’m just asking.”

  “Do you see something out of the ordinary in Leslie?”

  “Other than her practically eviscerating her dermatologist?”

  “Not funny, Arthur.”

  “Not meant to be. But something’s going on. If you don’t want to get into it, we can just drop the subject. But if there’s anything you want to let me know, this is the time to do it. Right now. You’re on the clock anyhow.”

  “Actually,” Alex says, clearing his throat, “it looks as if it might be more than one. We might be looking at twins. And there’s an outside chance of triplets.”

  “Oh my God.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “I don’t know. It just came out.”

  “You don’t think we’ll be good parents?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “But you said ‘Oh my God,’ as if some catastrophe were on the way.”

  “It popped out of my mouth, Alex. No offense intended.” He finishes his vodka, places it on the end table with some finality, and stands up to leave.

  Alex thinks how amusing it might be to pounce on Arthur, to shove him on the chest and bring him to the floor—not to hurt him, just to remind him who is boss, who is on top and who is on the bottom. Who is paying the bills. Who is paying the cost to be boss. Yeah!

  And here Arthur comes, his arms open for a comradely embrace, his stout belly pushing at the middle button of his suit jacket, his cuff links winking in the overhead light. He puts his arms around Alex, pats him manfully on the back, and says, “Be well, old friend. We’ll talk in the morning. And please make my apologies to Leslie—but I have to get home. Rhonda and I have tickets to Phantom of the Opera tonight. I have zero interest, but Rhonda is young and she wants to see it. She actually thinks it’s an opera.”

  “Okay then,” Alex says, suddenly ravenous. He has a vivid vision of steak tartare as he walks his old friend to the door.

  Between the arrest, the pending civil suit, and the tone of Leslie’s e-mails and telephone calls, Cynthia feels compelled to leave her life in San Francisco and come to New York to look in on her younger sister. Cynthia is not the worrying kind, but there is no ignoring the tone of her communication with Leslie. After being installed in her own suite of rooms and putting her clothes away in the George III mahogany serpentine front chest, Cynthia wants to take care of Leslie’s increasingly vexing grooming issues.

  There is reason to believe that word about Leslie has circulated throughout the dermatologist community in New York, but Cynthia is quite certain that within the vast network of skin-care specialists in the city—Hungarians, Russians, Koreans, licensed and unlicensed—someone will be able to give Leslie at least temporary relief through electrolysis. Leslie’s experience in Slovenia has made her reluctant to see an Eastern European, and as luck would have it, Leslie finds on the Internet a woman named Lu Park who has a skin-care business in a walk-up building four blocks east of Leslie’s house. This time, hoping to avoid a repeat of Leslie’s experience at Dr. Ryan’s—Leslie blamed it on her own embarrassment about her condition, a somewhat flimsy excuse that Cynthia decides not to prod—Cynthia gives Leslie a double dose of Xanax, rendering her rubbery and practically speechless. The hair removal, which takes a full five hours and which Leslie basically sleeps through, proceeds without incident.

  It is left to Cynthia to pay Lu Park, a woman in her forties with girlish barrettes in her dark hair and hands that feel as hard as wood. Lu Park asks Cynthia, “She your sister, right?” And when Cynthia says yes, she is, Lu Park shakes her head and says, “Two other women, big pregnant, same problem. Both come here.” She counts the money angrily as she speaks, as if there is not quite enough there to compensate her for her troubles.

  The next day, Leslie is still exceptionally groggy from the sedative. Her skin looks red and feels burned and it is an easy decision to give work a miss and stay home with her sister. Over a late breakfast of French coffee and croissants, Leslie, her voice low, her words slurred, finally confides to Cynthia about her visit to Dr. Kis.

  “I’ve never been so scared in my whole life,” Leslie says.

  “How could you go to such a quack?” Cynthia says while at the same time admiring the pattern on the Spode coffee cup.

  “Not such a quack, was he?” Leslie says, patting her distended middle. “We tried everything and everyone, and Dr. Kis is the one who succeeded.”

  “Dr. Kis? Honestly his name?”

  “We really didn’t even know that much about him, to tell you the truth. But I thank God for him now.” She pats the great hump of her stomach again.

  “I remember when we were kids,” Cynthia says. “I was the one who wanted babies and you were always the one who said you would never let that happen. Now look—I’ve got two cocker spaniels and an apartment full of antiques, and the way it looks now, I am never ever going to be a mother. And you! You’re bursting at the seams.”

  “When you’re married to someone, you want to please them.”

  “He’s married to someone, he’s married to you, and I don’t see him pleasing you.”

  “Go fuck yourself,” Leslie says. The words ring out like gunfire, and in the miserable silence that follows, Cynthia’s face colors and Leslie feels waves of shame and astonishment. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I don’t know where that came from. That was nuts.” But even as she says this, the sisters both have a pretty good idea where it came from—the same place Leslie’s sideburns came from, and the same place that launched the attack on ruddy Dr. Ryan. Leslie is in catastrophic hormonal imbalance.

  “God, Leslie, I’m the one having her period and you’re the one acting crazy. And by the way, I don’t suppose you have any supplies on hand. I didn’t come fully equipped.”

  As if to silence herself and prevent any new outbursts, Leslie fills her mouth with what remains of her croissant. It feels very unfoodlike in her mouth, as if she has taken a bite out of a pillow. To moisten the wad of unsweetened pastry, Leslie takes a large swallow of coffee, and the introduction of the hot liquid causes her to choke. Holding on to the edge of the table, she coughs without restraint, as if she were alone, or not entirely human. She sticks her tongue out and expels food from her mouth—Cynthia is shrinking back now, shielding herself with her pale rose damask napkin—but even ridding herself of the croissant and coffee cannot quell Leslie’s coughing, and before long she has made herself sick, and she vomits up the early bites of her breakfast as well as remains of last night’s dinner, little chunks of chicken floating in a broth of bright yellow bile.

  “Leslie!” Cynthia says, as much in admonishment as concern.

  Leslie’s eyes are glassy. Her mouth hangs open. She brushes her fingertips across the little mound of sick that quivers on her lovely Spode breakfast plate. And then she places her fingers in her mouth, sucks them dry.

  “Leslie, stop! What are you doing?”

  Leslie looks as if she is about to answer. Her mouth opens, but no words come out. Just a low moan, an ahhhh that rattles in her throat like a pebbles in an empty can. She pushes back from the table, starts to get up, and tumbles hard from her chai
r onto the floor, where she writhes, moaning, drooling, her eyes wide, frightened, and unseeing.

  “Leslie!” Cynthia cries. She kneels beside her sister and tries to soothe her by patting her shoulder, stroking her hair.

  Blanca, the housekeeper who works there three mornings a week, comes into the room with a large bowl of fruit and, seeing Leslie on the floor, her legs thrashing, her shoulders hunched, lets out a cry of sympathy and distress. After placing the bowl on the table, Blanca hurries into the kitchen and calls Alex’s office, and after a few delays and misunderstandings, she is at last connected to him.

  “Mrs. Leslie is sick,” Blanca says to Alex.

  “I’ll be home in minutes,” he says to her. The offices are not far away; most often Alex doesn’t bother with the firm’s car service, and this time he runs the ten blocks between his office and his house. Normally the little jaunt takes ten minutes; today he makes it in three—he cannot recall ever moving so quickly, so effortlessly, not even in the full flush of vibrant youth. He feels as if he is propelled forward by a turbine engine. Other pedestrians step out of his way and turn to watch in astonishment as he speeds past them.

  “Where is she?” Alex asks Cynthia as soon as he walks in.

  “She’s in bed,” Cynthia says. As Alex goes past her on his way to the bedroom, Cynthia tries to stop him by placing her hand on his arm. “She’s sleeping.”

  Alex pauses, looks at Cynthia’s hand on his arm. His nostrils dilate as he detects the faint aroma of her menstruation. The smell; the unexpected, alluring delicacy of her fingers and her painted fingernails; the sound of her breathing; the scent of her scalp; the out-of-balance nervousness of her posture; her eyes—all of it come together to create a sudden and overpowering rush of desire. Never, even as a teenager drunk to the point of lunacy on his own hormones, has Alex felt so helplessly swept into the vortex of lust.