Blackberry Winter

by Maryanne Fischler

  He didn’t answer. He was too busy looking at her. She was equally busy looking at him.

  “Hello, Emily.”

  “Hello, Brian.” She scanned him up and down the way a country girl would scan a skyscraper. “How tall are you anyway?”

  “About six two. Don’t tell me you don’t like tall men,” he said, grinning.

  “I don’t think I know any tall men. Of course, the truth is I don’t know many men at all. I certainly don’t know any like you.”

  “Are you ready to get out of here and back to the real world?” he asked.

  “You know, the real world is looking better to me all the time.”

  The first actual date Emily and Brian had was an evening of chamber music. Emily had mentioned that she liked classical music, and Brian heard about a local group giving a recital. He knew little about the genre, but was willing, as he put it, to broaden his horizons.

  It was Emily’s first night out since the accident, and she was at a loss as to what to wear. In fact, Emily very rarely went out at night at all. She decided to go with what she thought of as a Sunday dress. Solid navy, white collar, gold pendant necklace, a very modest, safe choice. She also decided that she ought to get some new clothes. “Everything in my closet just screams ‘old maid librarian,’” she thought.

  Brian arrived right on time and they had an amusing conversation on the way to the performance about all the things that Emily had not missed seeing during her temporary blindness. There was the nasty little dog that lived in the apartment above hers and had a face that looked like it had gotten stuck in a closing elevator door. There was the wreck of her car which she had gone to inspect at the garage to which it had been towed. “But mostly,” she said smiling, “I’m glad to see everything else.”

  As they entered the hall in which the concert was to take place, the first thing that struck Emily was that there were quite a lot of empty seats. A few bars into the group’s first number found Emily wishing that there were two more. The ensemble was unbalanced, the tempo was off, the selections were not well suited to the group. She could only think of how classical music had been her suggestion and that Brian was going to think she had dreadful taste. After a very long forty minutes, there was an intermission, and he suggested that they step outside for some of the unseasonably mild night air.

  They strolled along in front of the building, neither of them in a hurry to say anything. Brian noted that Emily kept pace with his limp, and appreciated that she didn’t seem uncomfortable walking slowly. Emily was torn about what to say. To come right out and say that the concert wasn’t very good might suggest that she wasn’t enjoying being with him, and besides, a concert had been her idea. On the other hand, to go back in and listen to another eternity of poor playing was hardly a palatable option. It was Brian who eventually broke the silence.

  “I don’t know much about such things; how would you say this ranks in terms of chamber music in general?”

  In a voice drenched with relief she answered, “This ranks right around the bottom. It’s awful. We don’t have to go back, do we?”

  “Not if you don’t want to,” he said laughing. “What would you like to do?”

  “Oh, no. I suggested music, and look what that got us. I’m not going to say. What would you like to do? What is your favorite way to spend an evening?”

  Without thinking, he answered more truthfully than he meant to, “With you.” He was surprised at his own answer—not only that he had used a line on a woman, but that it was such a good line. Even more surprising, he really meant it.

  She seemed somewhat disconcerted by his answer. After a moment, she replied, “You shouldn’t be nice to me after I got you stuck in that dreadful concert. Let’s do something you would enjoy.”

  In the end they spent the evening listening to chamber music at Emily’s apartment. They talked well into the night about music, and libraries, and pathology, and other subjects that Emily regarded as safe. Once again, Brian noted her propensity to steer the talk away from herself or anything too personal.

  The pattern continued for their next several dates. They would go out to a restaurant or a museum, and then spend the rest of the evening talking and listening to music. Always at the end of the evening, there was the kiss at the door. Eventually, there was a kiss upon first greeting, and then an occasional kiss in between. Emily seemed comfortable with this, but if Brian held her a little too long, or made even the slightest indication that he was interested in any other form of physical contact, she would give a friendly squirm. He assumed at first that this was maidenly modesty and was happy to be patient. In his college days in the eighties, things had been quite different. Brian had pledged a fairly raucous fraternity, and partied with the best of them. Sex had seemed terribly important then, an end unto itself in the context of relationships. Brian had to admit that Emily’s way had a certain romance to it, but he began to suspect that her primness was more that just an old-fashioned standard or a straight-laced mindset. It was something he thought about often and with some unease. There seemed nothing for it, however, but to wait and see what time might bring.

  Emily returned to work shortly after her discharge from the hospital, and her regular routines simply adjusted themselves to fit in the new element of a gentleman friend, as she referred to him when her co-workers asked who that man was picking her up for lunch. They all told her how much they had missed her in the time when she was recuperating from her accident, and she was touched by their sincerity. Gradually, without of her being aware of any change, Emily began to acquire a more positive outlook toward people.

  Sundays were the one day when she didn’t generally see much of Brian. He had mentioned while she was still in the hospital that he generally spent Sunday afternoons with his closest friend, Paul Lawrence. They had been friends for many years, both were bachelors, both were doctors, and they had made something of a ritual of creating a big meal together on Sundays. Brian had invited Emily to join them, but she had said that she didn’t want to intrude on their time together. Brian had told Emily that Paul was a psychiatrist and he suspected that her reluctance to join them on Sundays stemmed from her discomfort with the idea of spending time in the company of a doctor in that particular specialty.

  Paul Lawrence was the closest friend Brian had ever had, the only person with whom Brian ever completely relaxed. They met soon after Brian was injured in the Gulf. Paul had been Brian’s psychiatrist for a brief time during his recovery. Brian had been overjoyed when some two years later Paul had come on to the staff at the hospital where he was doing his residency in pathology. Paul was about five years older than Brian, but didn’t look it. He was five feet ten inches tall, and his frame reflected the muscular build of the serious jogger. He exuded confidence and charm with a warm smile that indicated accurately the presence of an active sense of humor. He had written a well-received book on post-traumatic stress syndrome. Often honored by leaders of the black community for his volunteer work with troubled youth, he was seen as a role model of a successful black physician.

  On a Sunday two weeks after the chamber music incident, Paul and Brian got together at Brian’s house for their weekly meal, this particular feast to be lobster.

  “So, tell me all about Emily,” Paul asked. Although a native of Tennessee, he spoke with no trace of an accent. “How was the chamber music?”

  “The concert was pretty grim, so we went to her place instead.” After a thoughtful pause, he said all at once, “It seems strange after having known her for such a short time, but the truth is I think I’m falling for her. She’s very easy to be with. She has wonderful taste; she thinks I’m fascinating.”

  “It’s nice that somebody does.” His dark face broke into a playful grin. “I wish I could meet her.”

  “Actually, I invited her to come today, but she said she didn’t want to intrude on our time.”

  Paul concentrated on the lettuce he was tearing, but still took note of the cadence of B
rian’s speech. “You seemed to stress the word ‘said’ in that statement. Do you think there’s some other reason she didn’t want to come?”

  “Sometimes I think you know me too well. I wondered if she might be uncomfortable with the idea that you’re a psychiatrist.”

  “Why should that be a problem?”

  “I’m not sure. Maybe she’s one of those people who think that psychiatrists see neuroses in everybody and she’s afraid that if you looked, you’d find out about hers.”

  “Do you think she’s neurotic?”

  Brian wondered, as he had so many times before, whether the psychiatrist ever really went off-duty. “I don’t know. She’s very shy, very old-fashioned. She won’t talk about her family or her childhood. I get the impression that she hasn’t dated much, and that she’s sort of cocooned herself into a very private life. I suppose she is a little unusual in that respect.” Brian’s voice had a suggestion of defensiveness which Paul was quick to pick up on.

  “Don’t worry,” he said smiling, “some of my best friends are neurotic. I’m curious about what you mean when you say that she’s easy to be with.”

  While they talked, the preparations for the meal continued. It made conversation easier for Brian when he didn’t have to maintain eye contact, and he suspected that over the years of their friendship, the preparations for all these meals had enhanced the quality of their conversations.

  “I just feel relaxed with her. We got to know one another before she had ever actually seen me. You know, I’ve gotten the feeling over the past twenty years that women are uncomfortable around me. But there was something in the way she reacted in the hospital when I told her about my situation that put me completely at ease with her. I figured she’d make some fumbling remark about how it didn’t matter in the slightest, that she was sure I was just a wonderful person anyway. But I could tell that it really didn’t make any difference to her. The smile on her face when she first saw me was so warm, so real, I didn’t get the feeling that she was disappointed in the way I look.”

  Paul grinned as he looked at his friend. “Are you sure her eyes were working well enough so that she could really see your face?”

  There was an early spring that year. The heavy rain and snow of winter broke a cycle of drought that had hung over the area for some years, and the daffodils were more beautiful than anyone could remember as they burst onto the scene in late February. Winter can be pleasant with the lovely contours of drifted snow and the dramatic outlines of bare trees against a brittle, cold sky, but it is nonetheless a season to be survived, a time when the environment and human needs are most at odds. When spring comes, color returns. Spring is to be enjoyed rather than conquered.

  Brian had accompanied Emily to buy her new car with the insurance money from the accident, and so had surreptitiously found out her when her birthday was by looking over her shoulder as she filled out the forms. On March 6, three days hence, she would be thirty-two. He wasn’t sure whether to surprise her with a gift, or simply ask her what she would like to do to celebrate. It struck him that such an orderly person might not deal well with surprises, so he resolved to take the safe route. Little did he know.

  That evening, they had dinner at her apartment. It was a tiny one-bedroom cell in a hive, over-priced because it was in a safe, suburban section of town. Overly neat, kept with a fastidiousness that would have suggested compulsiveness to many people, it made Brian feel boxed in, though he also admired the femininity of the decor. The dining area was only large enough for four, but since she rarely had company that wasn’t a problem. Over somewhat overdone lasagna, he decided to ask about the upcoming event.

  “So, Emily, the big day is this weekend. What shall we do to celebrate?”

  She looked at him rather suspiciously, “And just what big day is that?”

  “Your birthday, of course.”

  She spoke as sharply as he had ever heard her, “I don’t celebrate birthdays.”

  He had certainly not intended to make this the issue upon which to make any sort of stand, but he was perturbed by her getting annoyed about it. Being a private person is one thing, he thought, but this is too much. “I see. So I can’t talk about your birthday, and I can’t ask about your family, and you don’t want to talk about your childhood or your home. We’ve been spending every free minute together for six weeks, and for all I know you were hatched at the age of thirty from some alien space egg. Don’t you think I could know just a little something personal about you, or are you really not interested in getting that close?”

  The look on her face told him as much as the words that followed. She was obviously torn somehow between the pleasures of the present and the harsh lessons of the past. “It’s not that. I’ve just never been much of one for celebrating. I didn’t mean to imply that I don’t want to get personal with you. I’ve already gotten more personal with you than with anybody I’ve ever known...This is all so unlike me.” There was obviously more that she wanted to say, but the tears gathering in her eyes made her distrust her voice.

  He took her hand in his, and looked her directly in the eye. He spoke slowly and gently. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you. I think that somewhere along the way, somebody’s been unkind to you. They hurt you and made you unhappy. I’ve been hurt and unhappy too, so I know. It really does feel better if you talk about it.”

  She pulled her hand away, and walked to the window, looking out into the night, seeing nothing. Her voice was slow and deliberate. “There’s really not that much to talk about. I had an unhappy childhood. My father had a terrible temper, I guess he was mentally unbalanced, certainly he was very cruel. We seemed always to have money troubles. There was never enough of anything, except fear. It was a horrible environment to try to grow up in. Maybe that’s why in some ways I still haven’t grown up completely.”

  Once the spring thaw began, the water slowly started its flow. She told him things that she had never told another living soul. Little embarrassments that hadn’t seemed so little at the time. Humiliating experiences in front of friends that eventually caused her to stop trying to have friends. She told him about things she hadn’t consciously remembered before now. All the while, he held her. He spoke very little, his low voice murmuring in her ear, “It’s all right, Emily. Everything’s all right now.”

  At one point she related what happened on her tenth birthday. Her father had come home from work and gotten angry because her mother had prepared Emily’s favorite dish for dinner. It was a dish her father wasn’t particularly fond of. He had thrown the food against a wall. Emily remembered how scared she was that her mother would tell him the reason why she had prepared that particular dish on that particular day. Emily didn’t want her father to remember it was her birthday. “It was always better not to be conspicuous, not to draw his attention. I decided then that I’d just as soon not have a birthday anymore.”

  At that point, Emily saw a tear in Brian’s eye and stared. “What’s the matter?”

  “There’s this picture in my mind. I see a little girl, helpless and frightened with no one to turn to, trying to find reason in the totally unreasonable, trying to please the most important man in your life, and crushed when he wouldn’t ever let you.”

  “I’ve never talked to anyone about this before because I thought no one would understand. But you do.”

  “Yes, I think I do,” he answered and then, in his gentlest voice added, “You don’t have to be frightened any more. You’re not alone.”

  Women in new relationships amuse themselves when they’re lying in bed at night wondering, “When will he say it? Will I be ready to say it back? Will it really be true for him? Is it true for me?” Emily had done that, and had always pictured the moment as one just like this. She was right, and she was ready with an answer.

  Brian said, “I love you, Emily.”

  “I love you, too, Brian.”

  Emily spent a long, sleepless night. When memories long frozen begin to thaw, th
ere often comes a flood. Emily frantically strove to fortify her defenses, to re-build the dam that would hold the flood in. There were so many painful images stored away in her mind, so many things she had struggled to freeze into numbness. Five years old, a skinny little girl whose only good feature is her long, curly hair. But when it gets washed, the tangles are a mess. Mother combs it so roughly, and the child complains. So the father swears about her whining and cuts most of the hair off. And suddenly, it is true, what he always says, she is ugly.

  He’s such a big man, a big hard man. His hands are rough and hard as rocks. His voice is hard, too, always so loud that it seemed the whole world must hear him swearing, must hear his pronouncements about the child’s worthlessness. He is a dark man, his hair black and his chin always studded with coarse black shadows. Emily realizes now that her father was in fact five feet nine inches tall, much shorter than Brian, but he seemed like a giant then.

  The child is nine and has acquired a fear of the dark. She follows along behind her brothers as they go off into the woods. She sees them crouching near a tree and recognizes in the stealth of their movements that they must be doing something forbidden. Then from her hiding place behind a huge oak she sees the puffs of smoke and knows they have stolen some cigarettes and are smoking. Even her hiding place is too close to trouble for comfort, and she turns to run back to the relative safety of the yard, but of course they see her and think she is running to tattle. They chase her and are shouting threats. She promises not to tell, but she knows the giant will find out anyway, he always does. And when the darkness of night comes, so it is. The giant is missing cigarettes, and justice must be served. There is no place to hide from the all-seeing giant. Even the darkness is no longer her friend. As the child cries, she knows that there is no one as alone as she is.

  When something has been broken so many times, it seems foolish to keep it. It can be of no use. “And so,” she thought to herself, alone in the darkness of a spring night, “I threw my heart away beyond the reach of hope, beyond the reach of caring. Now I’ve somehow found it again, but I’m not at all sure of how it’s supposed to work. And so I go on losing, go on missing things, wasting time and wondering if it will be better when I grow up. I don’t want to live like this.”