by June Ahern
“Here we go.” Dr. Weissman’s voice startled her.
Embarrassed he’d see her teary eyes, she spoke to him over her shoulder. “This view is so very beautiful.”
After a few moments, she turned to find a silver tray sitting on the oval coffee table. It held a white teapot decorated with pale pink roses and two matching cups.
“Tea?” he asked.
“Please,” she said eyeing the platter of assorted cookies and feeling hunger pangs. She nodded “yes” to some cream and settled into a chair, eager to enjoy a cup of hot tea.
Dr. Weissman first poured a thick cream into a cup and then added the steaming black tea, blending the liquids into a perfect light brown.
Picking up silver tongs, he asked, “Sugar?”
Cathy enjoyed the familiar ritual. “Two, please,” she said, relaxing her tightly crossed ankles and hands.
He delicately dropped the lumps of sugar into the teacup. Cathy gratefully accepted the tea and nestled comfortably into the chair. She slipped out of the tight heels (an unusual thing for her to do in public) and dug her toes into the thick carpet.
“When we lived in Ireland, we learned to appreciate a good cup of tea,” said the doctor, holding out the plate of cookies. She chose a butter cream. He poured himself a cup, settled back on a long couch and faced her.
“Shouldn’t I be on the couch?” Cathy joked.
“Freud would agree with you,” the doctor said in good humor.
“Was your wife Irish?” she asked.
“Yes, but born in America. In the ‘50s we moved to Ireland so she could find her roots, as she put it. A most adventurous, spirited woman!” Dr. Weissman exclaimed. His eyes drifted over to an end table full of framed photographs.
Cathy focused on a black-and-white photo of a woman with dark wavy hair, smoldering eyes and full lips in a pouting half smile. It was hard not to notice the photo. The woman looked like the sultry movie star, Rita Hayward.
“That’s Peggy, my wife. It was my charm, not my looks, that got her,” he chuckled.
Silently, Cathy agreed. “How long were you married?”
“Forty-four years before cancer took her life,” the doctor answered.
“I’m sorry,” Cathy said.
“Actually, our many happy years are what we focused on during her illness. She made me promise to always think of her in that way,” Dr. Weissman explained.
“At least you have happy memories. Losing love is awfully tragic,” Cathy said pensively.
“Love is never lost though, not if your love is true. Isn’t that so?” He smiled nostalgically.
She looked at him, uncertain of where to start her story and skittish about admitting there was truth in June’s vision about the redheaded angel and hilltop with daisies. Would he think she was also delusional as Dr. Schmidt thought of June?
“Do you have children, doctor?” she inquired.
“Two,” he said.
Cocking her head at a photo of two young men with their arms around each other’s shoulders, she asked, “Are those them?”
He pointed to the wavy dark-haired man. “Sam is, and Mike’s his boyfriend.”
Cathy’s mouth fell open at his calm candor that his son was a homosexual. She wasn’t naive about people of the same sex having relationships. There had been gossip up and down Castro Street for years that Sadie and Bernice were lesbians. It hadn’t influenced her friendship with them, but it wasn’t a subject discussed openly. She now knew that Jacob Weissman was not a man to follow the mainstream of society. Perhaps he would accept June’s independent thinking.
“Most parents would be mortified if a son or daughter admitted that,” he said. “All I know is my son is happily in love and that’s good enough for me. In my field I’ve seen and heard a lot. One of the most damaging things I hear is how hurtful it can be to deny one’s true self and live a life of lies just to appease others.”
Is he that good that he can read me so well? Cathy wondered guiltily. She shifted in her seat. Watching the old man sipping tea in the sunny living room as calmly as the sleeping cat, she pondered, who am I to judge another person’s children when one of my own is locked up for thinking she’s a witch? And another is having an illegitimate baby with a colored boy. Then there’s Annie, my most practical daughter, rushing to marry at City Hall and not marry in the Church. I suspect she’s pregnant, too. At least Mary isn’t a problem.
“Your other child?” she asked politely, hoping not to appear too shocked at the doctor’s information.
“My daughter is as adventurous as her mother. She lives in Brazil,” he said.
“What’s she doing there?” Cathy asked, very curious about this most unusual family.
“She’s an anthropologist, studying the indigenous people’s witch doctors and their power to heal.”
“Witch doctor? Do you believe that kind of person really exists?” she asked cautiously.
Chuckling, he answered, “Not by that name, but yes. Brazilian Indians have a xamã, a man of great knowledge of healing herbs and plants. He’s also a sorcerer who can use spells involving the forces of nature to create a magical energy to heal. For instance, to heal a sickness, the xamã passes incense over the body while praying to rid the person of the evil spirits causing the illness. People believe, thus a healing usually occurs.”
“Do you believe in magic, Dr. Weissman?” Cathy asked, cautiously.
“I think our minds have a greater influence over our health and life conditions than we admit. If that is seen as magic, then yes, I do believe in it. And you, Mrs. MacDonald?”
Cathy shrugged her shoulders. “I’m not sure I have faith in anything anymore. But if it’s magic that will bring my daughter home, then tell me the spell to cast.”
“Tell me about June,” Dr. Weissman said sitting back with his hands folded on his rounded belly.
From what the doctor had told her, Cathy trusted he would understand the difficulties of being a parent to a child that was a social outcast. She told him her problem had started when she gave June her name, a name her husband adamantly objected to. Going against her husband had caused much trouble for the family. Jimmy blamed her when June started telling stories about her conversations with an angel, and when she started seeing dead people, and also when June got in trouble with her tarot cards. Cathy thought maybe it was her fault. She recited all her failings as a mother and admitted feeling sick over her guilt of not being a good enough mother. She told the doctor she would go to bed hoping to sleep away her problems, which left many of the household responsibilities to her children. She wiped away a tear as she confessed that Jimmy’s temper frightened her, which was why she didn’t defend her daughters when he disciplined them harshly. Her unhappy marriage felt like a thankless job.
“You didn’t marry the man you loved?” Dr. Weissman asked quietly.
To Cathy it sounded more as a statement and she was stunned by his observation. She was unable to answer immediately. “No, I didn’t, Doctor,” she finally admitted.
Cathy wondered if it would help if Dr. Weissman knew about her role in June’s difficulties. The entire family had suffered because of the secrets she had insisted on keeping. Freely, she told the story from the beginning.
It started with the lover she had before her marriage to Jimmy.
“It was 1940. The German bombs were devastating England, especially London. I wanted to help. So, off I went to London to fight the war. I was a young, naive girl who believed I knew everything. I was just like June, only a bit older at nineteen.”
“Your parents agreed to you leaving?” he asked.
“My father forbade it. It wasn’t like nowadays where young people leave home without their parents’ permission. And certainly no decent woman my age would move out alone, unless she was to be married. My father told me, ‘You’re just a lassie and you’re no going off alone.’ “ Cathy spoke her father’s words with a Glaswegian accent.
Her Scottish burr grew mo
re distinct as she continued the story. “He was overly protective of me since the death of my brother, Francis. Besides, I was his wee darling, being the youngest and the only girl with five brothers.”
“And your mother?” the doctor asked.
“She and I were very close and had always got along, as thick as thieves when it came to getting my father to agree to our plans. She talked my father into letting me go. She told him Stevie, my oldest brother who was in the war office in London, would take care of me. I remember the day I left Glasgow. It was an unusually clear, dry day for March. My mother came with me to the train station,” Cathy said staring into the past.
* * *
Glasgow’s central train station was bustling with the early morning activity of passengers arriving and departing from the many train platforms. Dropping a sturdy brown suitcase in the station’s café, Cathy’s mother scurried off to buy two cups of tea.
Upon returning, she immediately repeated her orders to Cathy, “Now, hen, when Stevie meets you at the train station, you telegraph me right away.”
“I know, Mammy. What about Daddy?” she asked.
“Don’t you worry about him. Now listen to me, lassie. There’s lots of men roaming around in London. You be careful. Your Daddy’s hoping you and Jimmy MacDonald will get married when you get back.”
“For God’s sake, Mammy! I can’t stand him with those beady eyes an’ all. Besides, he’s ancient!” Cathy wailed.
“Och lassie! He’s only thirty-one. The same age as Stevie,” Granny reasoned with her daughter.
“Mammy, I’m no even twenty yet.”
“Don’t remind me we’ll no be together next month for your birthday. The first time ever. I wished you waited until afterwards, don’t you?”
Cathy pursed her lips and scowled, ignoring her mother and watching a middle-aged gypsy woman in a long colored skirt make her way around the crowd. She stopped to talk to a very tall red-haired man. He laughed heartily and handed the woman his teacup. Cathy was keen on the handsome muscular young man in the naval uniform. As though sensing her scrutiny, he looked straight over at her. Her stomach lurched and her face reddened at being caught spying.
“Maybe I’ll fall in love in London,” she said dreamily.
“Don’t you dare bring home a Sassenach,” her mother said strongly, referring to the name the Scots called the English.
“Maybe an American, like Clark Gable,” Cathy said jokingly.
“You’d no leave your Mammy for Hollywood, would you?” her mother chided.
They sipped their tea and talked about handsome movie stars until her mother announced that she better be getting home.
“Don’t go yet. Wait ‘til my train comes,” Cathy said realizing they were truly parting for the first time in her life.
“Sorry, pet, your Daddy will be wanting his supper. Cheerio, my wee darling. May the Blessed Mother protect you.” She cupped her daughter’s face in her gloved hands. “Come home to me, you hear?”
“I promise.” Cathy moved closer to her mother. An awkward silence hung between them. After a quick kiss on Cathy’s cheek, her mother hurried away.
“Mammy!” Cathy called after her, raising a hand to wave. But her mother was already lost in the crowd.
Nervously, she chewed her lips as she peered toward the trains. A sudden chill went through her and she pulled her red coat snuggly around her. Feeling a hand on her arm, she spun around to look into the dark face of the gypsy.
“I can see your future. Love beckons to you,” the woman said, motioning to Cathy’s empty teacup. The gypsy lifted the cup close to her face and circled it around from the left to the right. Her dark eyes peered at the leaves clinging inside it. The loud sounds of people and trains caused them to huddle close. Cathy heard her say something about crossing a gold bridge and love.
After a moment of listening, she gave the gypsy a few coins and sent her on her way. She then hoisted her heavily packed handbag on her shoulder and bent down to pick up the suitcase. A hand reached it before she did.
“Let me help you with that,” the red-haired man in the Navy uniform said in the soft voice of a Scot from the Highlands.
“Oh! Thank you,” Cathy said, pleased at his attention.
“I’m Malcolm Macleod. And you are?” he asked.
The loud noise of trains pulling into the station drowned out her answer.
* * *
Cathy smiled sadly as she continued her story to Dr. Weissman. “Malcolm Macleod was the name of my handsome lover from the Isle of Skye. That’s in the Highlands of Scotland. We took the train together to London. He was returning back to duty. I was on my way to my new job to help children find safe homes in the countryside, outside of London and away from the bombing.”
“My brother Stevie met me at the train station when I arrived there. He was pleasant to Malcolm, seeing he was also in the military. Stevie had secured me a room in a boarding house for young women. That way my morals wouldn’t be in question. Before I left the station, I snuck Malcolm the address. On my second night in London, he was waiting for me in front of the boarding house. We went for fish and chips, but before we could even eat our meal, the sirens sounded. Oh, doctor, if you’ve ever heard those loud sirens screaming, you know how your heart stops. And you don’t even think of death. You can only think of getting away from the noise. We dropped our food and ran.”
“The whole of London went into darkness as we ran along the streets trying to find a bomb shelter. Buildings were exploding. People were screaming and yelling. It was bedlam. We clung to each other and waited out the bombing in the corridor of a building. That was our first date,” Cathy said with a weak laugh.
“Later on, after he and I knew we were truly in love, we decided to hurry and marry because he was shipping out. In my weekly letter home, I arranged a day and time to telephone my parents from my boarding house. Our parish priest was good about letting people use the telephone in the rectory for important business. In those days most people in Glasgow couldn’t afford to have phones in their homes. I was very nervous, but full of hope my love for Malcolm would win over my parents about us marrying.”
“I called the rectory where my parents were waiting for my call. When I told my mother I wanted to marry Malcolm, she handed the phone to my father. He asked if he was Catholic, which many Highlanders are. Malcolm was not. My father threatened I could be excommunicated from the Catholic Church if I married him. As you probably know, Catholics were not expected to marry outside of their religion without grave consequences, such as being ostracized from their family and religion.”
“Were you excommunicated?”
“No. That would have been up to our parish monsignor and with Glasgow also being heavily bombed, I don’t think he was too interested in my sins. I knew it was just my father’s way of trying to get me to do what he thought was best.”
Dr. Weissman shook the pot of tea and then refreshed her cup. “At least he wasn’t a Sassenach. Your mother must have been glad for that.”
“She didn’t want me to marry a man from such a faraway place. I think she was afraid I’d leave her. But my father said I’d no longer be welcome at home if I went through with it. I was as stubborn as him and said I’d do what I wanted, with or without his permission,” Cathy explained.
“How did you feel about that?” he asked.
“Devastated,” she said bitterly and then, sadly, “So horribly alone, separated from my family for the first time in my life. That was my first mortal sin. I loved a man without the sanction of the Holy Church.”
She told him about the gripping heartache of saying good-bye to her lover, who departed for the war only a couple of weeks after the phone conversation. Alone and angry with her father and saddened by her job of separating children from their parents, she went to live in Skye with Malcolm’s mother, who welcomed her. When Malcolm died fighting in the war, her parents came to bring her home to Glasgow. She hung her head and began to cry.
“Oh, yes. He was part of my mother’s scheme to redeem me and make an honest woman of me. I went back to Glasgow and married him, and life went on,” she said reflectively.
“But the past shadowed your life, has it not, Mrs. MacDonald?”
Dabbing her eyes dry, Cathy said, “Enough of me. What about June?”
“Does she know about Malcolm?”
“Strangely, I think she does. It seems to be part of her visions ever since she was a little girl. One time she showed me a picture in a magazine of a tall man kissing a woman at a train station. It frightened me so much to think my children might know about my secret past that I, well, I hate to admit, I yelled at her to stop with her story. I buried any memories I had of Malcolm and my life in Skye a long time ago. How can she know?”
“Somehow, you are sharing your past memories with her through your thoughts. It can be called thought transference or telepathy. We can explore that with June,” he said.
“I’d like to know more about it because June has said some uncanny things ever since she was just a wee thing. Like seeing an angel in the sky watching us. I used to pray to an angel to watch over Malcolm when he was at sea. And the yellow daisies June always loved. They’re like the kind I used to pick on the Isle to make daisy chains. It’s almost as though June’s been in Skye.”
“Or that Skye is in June,” the doctor said.
Cathy’s spirit had lifted with the confession of her secret past. But still, most important to her, she wanted to know when the doctor thought June could come home.
“Before I can talk to you about releasing your daughter, I’ll first meet with June and get to know her. I’ll also have to run tests and find out what medication she is taking. This is the only way I can truly evaluate the situation fairly.”
“I think I should warn you Dr. Schmidt is a very controlling person, who doesn’t like her power challenged,” Cathy said, while slipping into her high heels.