by Alix Ohlin
“It wasn’t, but okay.”
“Did you ask me if I was a spy?” he said. “I vaguely remember that.”
“You were talking about a life spent in far-flung locations. It seemed like a logical question at three in the morning. I’m not sure I was thinking clearly.” In the ensuing silence she could imagine him wearily rubbing his eyes.
“I was employed for a time by an international NGO working to provide basic supplies for refugees in famine areas,” he said. “I handled logistics. I organized the importation of rice. Coordinated food drops and set up camps.”
“Okay,” she said.
“And now I coordinate paper supplies. As you can see, it was a logical step.”
“What happened to you?”
“I had enough. It happens to a lot of people. Anyway, I felt I owed you an explanation. Sorry about calling in the middle of the night. It won’t happen again.”
“Hold on,” she said, but he was gone.
In spite of his confession, she felt that they’d taken a step backward. He’d offered her bits of his past, yes, but mostly to keep her at a distance. There is a difference between the facts of a person and the truth of him, and Tug knew it. Grace wasn’t so far gone that she didn’t notice how little he asked about her, and she wanted to be acknowledged as someone with whom he might develop a connection. It would be a way of feeling her own weight in the world. She wondered if in all their time together she’d made any impression on him at all.
Then a couple days later she stepped out of the office and there he was in the parking lot, leaning against her car on a freezing afternoon. His cheeks were red, his hands stuffed into the pockets of a navy-blue pea coat. She wondered how long he’d been waiting. “You look cold,” she said, and smiled.
He didn’t smile back, his expression so serious that he almost seemed angry. “I don’t really know why I’m here.”
“I’m glad to see you,” she said.
“Oh,” he said. “Good.” For the first time, he seemed unsure of what to do next.
Grace said, “Seriously, you really do look cold.”
“Do you think—” he said, then stopped. “Look, can we go somewhere?”
Grace nodded, unlocked the car, and, not knowing what else to do, drove them to her apartment. Once inside, Tug took off his coat, accepted a drink, and sat on the couch. He didn’t look around the place or make any small talk. She sat down next to him, acutely conscious of his closeness. He was wearing a collared shirt and a V-neck sweater, and she could see that his throat had completely healed.
“So, how are you?” she said.
“I’m better.” Looking at her, he took a sip of his wine.
“Your whole situation—it’s a little confusing to me, Tug.”
At the sound of his name, he smiled. “Do you wish you’d never stopped when you saw me there on the mountain?”
“No.”
He nodded slowly. “You really don’t care, do you? About what I did. What I almost did.”
“Of course I care,” she said. “It just doesn’t discourage me.”
His lips were dark pink, almost red, and she wondered if they were chapped or raw from cold. But they weren’t. They were soft, and he was kissing her. Barely able to make any sense of it, she put her hand on his arm and felt the knit of his sweater, telling herself, This is real. I’m touching him. His other arm went around her waist, and her leg was on top of his. She stopped kissing him, almost sick to her stomach with an excess of wanting.
“Are you all right?” he said, his mouth against her ear.
“I need to stop.”
“Okay.” He sat back and watched her.
She took a breath, trying to calm down. Her nerves were singing, plucked like too-tight strings. It had been a long time since she’d been with anyone.
“Should I leave?” he said. “You can tell me to.”
“No.”
“No, you can’t tell me, or no, I shouldn’t leave?”
“You know which,” Grace said. She went to the kitchen, drank some water, then came back to this person she hardly knew, this dark and difficult person, and kissed him. Some things were too intense to do slowly.
Afterward, they got dressed. It had happened very fast, the two of them panting and desperate and not especially well coordinated, and when it was over they still felt like strangers. Tug lounged on the couch, looking a little drowsy. Grace still felt off-kilter, feverish, her cheeks burning from his unshaven face. She poured them each more wine and wondered what she had gotten herself into. If she were her own patient, she’d tell herself to put an end to this situation as quickly as possible. Instead, she pulled her legs up beneath her and watched him. She didn’t want him to go.
“So,” she said, “how’ve you been?”
This made him laugh and he set down his glass, giving her the first real sense of accomplishment she’d felt in quite some time.
“Grace,” he said, “do we have to talk?”
She couldn’t imagine what else, in fact, to do.
Sensing her confusion, Tug patted the couch next to him. She felt summoned and, obscurely, condescended to. But she moved over and laid her head on his shoulder, waiting for him to say something. Then she heard a faint whistling sound. He was snoring.
With his head resting on the back of the couch, he had fallen asleep and left her just sitting there. She tried to curl gently into him, and his arm pulled her closer. She was uncomfortable but didn’t want to move—he always looked so tired, so beaten down—though after ten minutes, her right leg was tingling and she desperately wanted to scratch her nose. Tug’s snoring was light and sibilant, like a faraway train. Slowly, hoping not to wake him up, she straightened out her leg. In response Tug shifted, suddenly jerking his head forward, and, with the hand wrapped around her shoulder, slapped her in the face. “Jesus!” she said. “What the hell?”
“What happened? Did I hit you?” He was still half asleep and confused. “Are you okay? My God, I’m sorry.” He touched her cheek gently. “It’s all red.”
“That’s not from your hand. It’s from your face.”
“My face?”
“Your beard. I mean, your stubble.”
“Oh, Grace,” he said, and kissed her sore, mottled cheek. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s all right,” she said. “I’m glad you slept.”
“I didn’t know how tired I was.” He kissed her again, this time on the lips, and soon they were together again, more slowly, in the bedroom, without any awkwardness or rush, more like she’d wanted. And when they finished, she was the one who fell asleep.
Over the next two weeks, he’d show up at her apartment or invite her to his, usually late at night. They rarely went out to dinner; they just drank wine and talked before heading to bed. Mornings, over coffee, were silent. She might have considered herself tangential to his life, except that in the middle of the night she’d wake to find him twined around her, his leg over her hip, his arm over her shoulder, the heat of his chest pressed against her back; or, as they lay side by side, he’d clutch her hand in his sleep; or he’d pull her to him, her head against his chest, and as she nestled there, he’d sigh.
Grace moved through these days in a fog, shrouded in secret emotion. With her patients she was kind and warm, trying to make up for her wandering attention, and if anything they seemed grateful when she dived back into the conversation sympathetically, probing the intricacies of their situations with inexhaustible thought and care. The only one who seemed to notice a change was Annie. Since the night she’d shown up at the apartment, she’d treated Grace with a familiarity that implied both trust and condescension. It was the ease of someone used to having hired help, the scornful confidence of a girl in her housekeeper. More open and less respectful, she knew now that she could get away with things, and it bothered Grace.
When she tried to get her to talk about how she was feeling about the decision she’d made, Annie asked her, “Are you pregnant
?”
“Me? No,” Grace said, too surprised to say anything else. “Why do you ask that?”
“You look different,” Annie said, sprawled across a chair—she even sat differently now—with her legs flung over the side. “It’s like you gained weight, but in a good way.”
“And the first thing you associate with that is pregnancy,” Grace said, “rather than just plain good health. Why do you think that is?”
“God,” Annie said. “Take a compliment.”
“I wasn’t sure it was a compliment, at first.”
“Or maybe you’re in love.” She said this snidely, like a twelve-year-old boy.
“That’s beneath you, Annie,” Grace said.
This seemed to get her attention. She swiveled in her chair, sat up straight, and said, “I’m sorry.”
“You don’t have to apologize.”
“Right. Therapy means never having to say you’re sorry.”
“You might have to, actually, maybe even a lot. But mostly you have to figure out why you did whatever you’re sorry about.”
“I know,” Annie said. “It makes me tired.”
Grace’s evenings with Tug continued steadily, and soon they were going out for dinner or to see a movie. They bought him new skis and went skiing, and on lazy Sunday afternoons they would lie together in bed and read the newspaper. She forgot they had ever had a strange beginning or that there were uneasy questions hovering over them that might occasion an ending to their relationship. They were caught up in the middle, and it felt like it was going to go on forever.
One morning there was a sharp knock on the office door, and a couple walked in before Grace could respond. She couldn’t place them, though she knew they had met, and as she stared at them blankly without rising from her seat, she saw them go from mad to madder.
“We need to talk to you,” the man said.
“Please, sit down,” Grace said, her mind coursing through unlikely scenarios before she realized they were Annie’s parents.
They sat together on the couch but as far away from each other as possible. Annie’s mother wore a dark-blue suit and her hair in a blond bun, her stiletto-heeled boots tapping with rage. Her husband’s suit was the same color. They were a matched pair, expensive and well maintained.
“What can I do for you?” Grace said. She still couldn’t remember their first names.
“What can you do? What have you done?” Annie’s mother said. She wasn’t crying, but her eyes instantly reddened, and Grace’s heart turned over.
“I assume this is about Annie,” she prompted.
“This is about the end of your career,” the man said.
She could tell he was accustomed to making threats, and she remembered something Annie had told her: “They always get what they want, so they don’t understand why I can’t too.”
“We know what you did for Annie,” he said. “Taking her to the hospital. Encouraging her to get an abortion.”
“What?” Grace said. “That did not happen.”
“We heard all about it from Annie,” his wife said. “You said that telling us would just complicate things. You’re a monster. This was our daughter.”
“Your daughter is very troubled,” Grace said. “Perhaps more troubled than any of us realize.”
“You shouldn’t be allowed to muck around in people’s lives,” the man said.
“I just want to be clear about this,” Grace said. “Is your objection to the procedure itself, or that Annie kept it a secret from you?”
“So you know all about it,” the father said. “I can’t believe this. I’m going to have your license revoked. I’m going to ruin you.”
“You could do that,” Grace said calmly, “or instead we could actually talk about your daughter.”
He glared at her and stood up, livid, but his wife, Grace could tell, wanted to stay. She stroked his arm and smiled up at him pleadingly. He sat down and said, “Tell me what you know.”
Grace looked at him for a long moment, choosing her words carefully. “When Annie first came to me,” she said, “I believed she was on a path of self-destruction that came out of her putting too much pressure on herself. And I still think that’s true.” She paused.
Annie’s mother tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, and despite her tailored clothing she looked very much like Annie: pretty, blond, vulnerable. The father was sitting stoically upright, allowing her to hold his hand, waiting grimly.
“I think Annie’s in so far over her head,” Grace said, “that she doesn’t even know it. She thinks she can manipulate all the adults around her in order to get what she wants, which is to continue inflicting pain on herself and prove to everyone—and herself—just how worthless she is. Needless to say, it’s a very dangerous place to be.”
Annie’s father’s face was flushed, but he didn’t say a word. Grace let the silence invade the room, waiting for the explosion she sensed was coming. Finally, Annie’s mother let out a sob.
“I came home and Annie was in bed,” she said. “She said she had the flu. I didn’t suspect a thing. She didn’t even miss any school, did you know that? She took her algebra test and then went to the hospital for a four o’clock appointment. She’s that responsible. That organized. She arranged it all so we wouldn’t know anything.”
Grace said nothing and waited.
“We would never have known,” the mother said, crying openly now.
“So how did you find out?” Grace said.
“It was after yesterday’s appointment with you,” the father said.
“We didn’t have an appointment yesterday.”
“Of course you did. Like always, the twice-a-week schedule you recommended six months ago.”
Grace sighed. “And what did she say?”
“She was very upset last night and couldn’t stop crying. She said she didn’t want to come see you anymore. When we asked why, the whole story came out. About what you’d helped her do, and how she had doubts about it.”
“She was a little girl again,” the mother said, “with a boo-boo on her knee. Crying in my arms.”
Grace thought, Boo-boo? “I don’t know what she’s been doing on Thursday afternoons,” she said, “but she hasn’t been coming to see me. Your statements from my office would reflect one weekly session.”
“We never even have time to look at them, as Annie well knows,” the father said. “Where the hell has she been?”
The mother was almost hysterical now. She couldn’t speak for sobbing, just shook her head apologetically. Her husband handed her a tissue from Grace’s box but made no move to comfort her.
“We called the hospital,” he said, “and they won’t give us any information. We can’t get a straight answer from anybody. You have to tell us what you know.”
Grace again said nothing for a moment, calculating how little trust these people had in her. “What Annie and I discuss is confidential,” she finally said.
His eyes were glowing with rage as he leaned forward, his expensive white shirt puffing out from his chest. “Who’s the father?”
“I don’t know.”
“Is it that Oliver kid? I’m going to kill him.”
“I honestly don’t know,” Grace told him. “But I do know that Annie needs all of our help to get through this.”
“Like helping her get an abortion without her parents’ knowledge?”
“I didn’t do that.”
“I don’t know why we should believe you.” He stood up again. “You and Annie—you’re both liars. No wonder you get along so well. That’s why she talks to you instead of us. You just build on each other’s lies.”
“Please, wait. Sit down and let’s talk this through.”
But to sit down would be to concede defeat. “This is your fault,” he said, biting off each word. “You were supposed to help her. That was your job, and you’re accountable.” He spoke slowly and precisely. He had located a target for his anger and was, however subconsciously,
pleased. “We will hold you accountable. You’ll lose your position. Along with the right to inflict damage on other families.”
Grace stood up and faced him. “I understand how awful this is,” she said. “I really do.”
“I don’t care what you understand.”
“I care about Annie,” Grace said. “I’d like to keep helping her.”
“When I’m done with you,” the father said, “you’ll be the one who needs help. Starting with a good lawyer.”
He opened the door and strode from her office. And without hesitating his wife followed him, her face full of gratitude that he’d found a place to lay the blame.
FIVE
New York, 2002
THE CHILD EXISTED for the three of them in many ways—as a bone of contention, a zone of negotiation, a locus of arguments, a reminder of sex, a sore spot, a tender spot, a sweet spot—before it existed in the world.
Hilary’s body encased both the baby and herself in flesh and placidity; she could not be touched. At times, Anne couldn’t stop looking at her. What was it like to grow so massive, to be a container so uncontained? Huge and getting huger, she put on pounds every day, eating gallons of ice cream and boxes of saltine crackers and even T-bone steaks that Anne, who in all her time in New York had never even noticed a butcher shop, brought home for her.
Meanwhile her boyfriend, too, bulked up. He spent several hours a day doing pushups and weights—he’d found a set of barbells on the street—in a corner of the living room he claimed as his own, a masculine realm marked by fitness magazines, the barbells, a pair of stinky running shoes. He was working as a framer on some construction site in Queens, and between that work and the lifting his skinny body was broadening; there was a rope of muscle along his neck and shoulders, also nascent biceps and thicker forearms. It was as if he thought that when it came to fatherhood, muscles were what would be required.
At least he was working, and Anne hoped he was putting money away. She had no idea what would become of them once the baby came and they moved out of her apartment. Or she assumed they would move out. When she tried to talk to Hilary about all this, her mask of placidity would break and she’d start to cry, her pale, milky face blotchy and streaked. “We’re going to figure it out,” she’d say weepily, which sounded less like a promise than a pallid, inadequate reassurance to herself and her unborn child. Feeling guilty, Anne would drop the subject. Nobody likes to make a pregnant woman cry.