Private Practices

by Linda Wolfe

  Naomi pulled away from him and sat up, her curls shaking. “Sidney, Sidney, Sidney,” she fumed.

  “I thought you just said you wanted to go out to dinner.”

  “Yes. Yes, I do. But not just when Sidney gives you permission to take me.”

  “It’s not a matter of permission from Sidney. It’s a matter of my deciding he can be left alone.”

  “It amounts to the same thing.”

  He couldn’t get her to see his side of the situation. After a while he gave up trying and made love to her distractedly.

  On Saturday night he knew as soon as he entered the restaurant she had picked that the food would be bad. It was a little Italian place in the Village he had never heard of before and although there was a handful of men drinking at the bar, none of the tables in the dining area was filled. Still, he tried to look forward to the meal. Naomi was wearing her backless yellow sundress and it made him think nostalgically of the Caribbean. He ordered a rum and tonic. She asked for a martini.

  “What’ll we eat?” he questioned her. “What are they famous for here?”

  Naomi sipped her martini and kept ominously quiet.

  “What made you pick this place?” he persisted. “What’s their specialty?”

  Naomi tilted her martini glass to her lips and drank so hurriedly that he realized even before she answered him that trouble was brewing. “I have something to tell you,” she whispered as soon as her drink was half-consumed. “That’s why I picked this place. I knew it would be quiet.”

  “Oh?” He waited while the waiter handed them food-specked menus.

  “I’ve been having second thoughts about us,” she said as soon as the waiter was gone. “I wanted to discuss them in some neutral sort of place.”

  He closed his menu and shoved it against the wall. “I’ve had them too,” he said quietly. “But I wasn’t planning to act on them.”

  “That’s the difference between you and me,” Naomi said, finishing the rest of her martini and warming to the subject. “That’s what’s causing the trouble. You’re so passive.”

  He looked away, hurt. He had never insulted her by naming her deficiencies. She said quickly, “Oh, I don’t mean sexually. That’s fine now. I mean about Sidney. The way you let him dictate to you. Run your life. Run me out of your life.” She brushed a hand across her forehead, pushing back her hair. “You do everything for him and nothing for yourself.”

  He didn’t think it was true. “He’s not running my life. In a way, I’m running his.”

  “You’re not,” Naomi insisted. “Take us. You were happy with me. You wanted me and Petey to move in with you. But just because Sidney barges in and takes over your place, you let him destroy your relationship with me.”

  “Destroy? I don’t see that at all. We’ll be living together soon. You just have to be patient for a while.”

  Naomi shook her head stubbornly, the gin making her at once courageous and flushed. “But that’s just it. He is destroying things. He’s destroying my feelings for you. I can’t feel the same pride I felt about you when I feel you have no pride. That you’re his lackey.”

  He looked away from her again, his thoughts in turmoil, and this time caught the waiter’s eye and signaled him to bring Naomi a refill. He didn’t believe he was Sidney’s lackey anymore; he was looking after him, but he was no longer in thrall to him. He acted like a servant, but he didn’t feel like one. Ironically, Naomi herself had been a factor in helping him achieve this new emotional freedom from Sidney. He was in her debt. He’d always be grateful to her. But watching her gulp down her second martini, seeing how the gin made her dark skin flush and her curls slip rakishly out of place, he knew that although he could live with her and make love with her, he could never love her.

  “Look, Ben,” she was saying. Her voice had grown huskier with emotion. “I didn’t decide this overnight. I’ve been thinking about it hard. You’ve got to get Sidney to move out.”

  He acted distressed. He shook his head in despair. Then he said very sadly, “I can’t do it, Naomi. I would if I could. But I can’t do it. Sidney needs me.”

  It infuriated her, as he had known it would.

  “He doesn’t need you. He doesn’t need anyone. He’s incapable of need. He’s just using you.”

  He shook his head again. “I love Sidney. He’s my brother. I’ve got to rescue him.”

  “It isn’t love when you want to rescue someone. It’s self-aggrandizement.”

  “Call it what you want. But in any case, I can’t abandon him. Sidney’s part of me.”

  “Then I’m not going to see you anymore,” she announced impulsively. “I can’t stand the feeling of being in love with a man who lets someone else push him around, dictate to him all the time. Make Sidney move out and I’ll come back.”

  “I can’t.”

  Her eyes filled with tears but she had gone too far to retreat. “You poor bastard,” she said.

  He felt sorry for her, but he took refuge in the fact that she, not he, was causing their breakup. It was her doing. He had done nothing. “I still want you,” he said. “It’s not that I don’t want you. I’m horny all the time.” Reaching out for one of her hands, he kidnapped it below the table to press it against his unruly penis.

  His expression of desire for her at so emotional a moment simply offended her further. “I don’t care,” she said, snatching her hand away. She looked at him as if she no longer recognized him, her eyes distant, and then she slid out of her chair in a sudden swirl of movement. She dropped her pocketbook, bent for it, scooped it up, dropped her sunglasses, bent for and retrieved them and was gone from the table a moment later, scurrying through the bar, blurring.

  Just as she neared the door he had a moment’s change of heart and thought of running after her, taking her arm, turning her around and talking her into one last farewell-time in bed. But what was the point? He would just have to part from her sooner or later, and this way he had allowed her the dignity of feeling it was her own decision. Of course, it might have been more amusing to have demolished her dignity … deliberately. The thought surprised him. He had never allowed himself to think a thing like that, much less do anything so frankly cruel. He was interested. And, a moment later, horrified. He called the waiter, asked for another rum and tonic, and ordered roast veal. But by the time the food arrived he had no appetite. Pushing the plate aside, he told the waiter to wrap the meat up in tinfoil for him and, leaving, took it home, where he offered to share it with Sidney.

  He was with Sidney constantly after his parting from Naomi, with him in the office, in the hospital, at home. Most of the time they were alone. He had always, before Naomi, been an isolate and Sidney had had not friends but admirers, colleagues and sycophantic junior staff members who put up with his brusqueness because of his reputation. But as he continued to deteriorate, many people began to ignore him. He had always been arrogant, self-absorbed and mocking. But he had had power and prestige. Now that he was losing these, his personal traits, which had once impressed people as interesting, struck them as irritating.

  One morning Ben was walking into the hospital with Sidney when he saw James Herron coming toward them. Herron had for years been trying to woo Sidney to his house for one of his cocktail parties, but Sidney had always claimed to be too busy to attend. Now Herron turned on his heel as soon as he saw the two brothers approaching and headed in the direction from which he had come.

  A few of the junior men, slower to recognize a fall from authority, still tried, occasionally, to stay in touch. Diehl left several messages for Sidney, inviting him to come to his apartment to toast his fiancee, and one ambitious young intern stopped him on his way out of the OR several afternoons in a row and proposed they have a drink together. But Sidney wasn’t drinking. In his only effort to reduce the ever-present danger of his overdosing and falling into a brain-destroying coma, he had asked Ben to clear out his liquor cabinet. He rejected the offers of companionship that the young men ma
de by telling them gruffly that he no longer drank.

  Ultimately Ben and Sidney saw no one socially but each other.

  Toward the end of July, Miss Viviani quit. She lumbered into Ben’s office, her obese body moving more swiftly than he had believed possible, and told him in a voice simmering with indignation that Sidney had just thrown a bottle of alcohol at her. “I can’t stay here,” she sputtered. “Not a day longer. Not with him.”

  Ben had been sitting at his desk, a set of X rays balanced on his lap, another propped up in front of him against his books. He slid from his chair, the X rays on his lap slipping onto the floor, and hurried to Miss Viviani, putting his arm around her shoulders. The front of her uniform was soaked. “Please. I need you. I’m sure you realize that my brother is not always fully aware of what he’s doing. He’s not well.”

  “You said it,” she barked. “He shouldn’t be allowed to practice.”

  He patted her arm. “That isn’t up to you or me. There are department chiefs and administrators who decide these things.” He stroked the cloth on her sleeve. “Please stay. I need you.”

  “It isn’t you,” she said. “You’re a dream to work for. But I can’t stay here. Not with him the way he is.”

  “Please,” he pleaded, humbling himself. “The patients need you.” He couldn’t face the trauma of hiring yet another new receptionist. “Please just stay on for a month or two. You can do that, can’t you?”

  She softened a little, leaning heavily into his arm. “Well, okay. I’ll stay a little longer. Maybe they’ll take away his license next Tuesday anyway.”

  His arm dropped to his side. “What do you mean? What are you talking about?”

  “The Department of Professional Conduct,” Miss Viviani said. “They’ve been writing him letters. About his not signing health insurance forms. And the last one said that if he didn’t come to a hearing they’re holding next Tuesday, they’d start an action to take away his license.”

  For a moment, he almost laughed. Here he had been guarding his brother against disaster at the hospital and yet disaster was looming from a direction he hadn’t even thought to consider. Miss Viviani’s information struck him as stunningly incongruous. But a second later he realized the seriousness of the situation and said tersely, “Let me see the letters.”

  Miss Viviani padded out and returned with a slim manila file. He told her to delay sending in his next patient and quickly perused the file. It was filled with letters requesting Sidney’s appearance, then demanding it, then hinting at legal action if he didn’t comply. The letters reminded him of the progressively threatening form letters relied upon by bill collectors. The last one stated assertively that Sidney would be subpoenaed to explain himself unless he voluntarily came down to a hearing on Tuesday.

  Grabbing the file, he charged down the corridor and across the waiting room and burst into Sidney’s office. He didn’t knock, even though Sidney had a patient with him.

  “I’ve got to speak with you at once,” Ben said, ignoring the curious glance of the patient.

  “I’m busy,” Sidney intoned coldly.

  “Busy or not.” Turning to Sidney’s patient, he added, “Excuse me, but you’ll have to leave for a moment.”

  The woman obediently stood up.

  Sidney raised a hand as if to signal her to sit down again. “What the hell’s going on?” he said. But Ben had already eased the woman through the door and shut it behind her.

  “That’s what I want to know,” Ben fumed as soon as the door was closed. “That’s what I want you to tell me!” He slammed the file down on Sidney’s desk. “What are you doing about this?”

  Sidney’s voice was expressionless. “Oh. Those jokers.” He swept the file to a corner of his desk with an impatient gesture.

  “You’ve got to go down there on Tuesday,” Ben said, lowering his voice in case Sidney’s patient was waiting just outside the door.

  Sidney swiveled his desk chair so that his back was turned. “I’m not going. You know how I feel about those fucking forms.”

  “Sid, be reasonable. They’ll drive you out of practice if you don’t show up.”

  “I’m a surgeon, not a computer,” Sidney roared, and swung his chair noisily around so that he was facing Ben. His face looked so gaunt and his eyes so huge that for a moment Ben didn’t recognize him. He seemed almost as emaciated as the concentration camp victims from whose photographs he had always turned away his eyes. Looking at him, he couldn’t proceed with his argument. At last he focused his eyes downward, concentrating on his brother’s refusal and not his appearance, and was able to say, “You won’t have to sign the forms. You just have to put in an appearance. Just make up some bullshit story about why you haven’t signed them in the past, say you’re sorry, and promise that from now on you will. It’ll be months before they get after you again.”

  “I’m not going,” Sidney declared suddenly, his will not in the least diminished. “I didn’t become a doctor in order to do paperwork. I don’t have to explain myself to anyone.”

  “You’ve got to go,” Ben expostulated, his eyes still cast down. “It’s either that or plan on shutting down your practice. They’re going to subpoena you.”

  Sidney leaned back in his chair and shoved his feet up on the desk in his favorite posture of resistance. Why did he so often assume this position? Spasmodic trembling often afflicted street addicts. Did his legs tremble less when he propped them against some firm surface? But he didn’t have time to pursue his thoughts. Sidney was saying, “You go for me. You go down and say you’re me.”

  Startled, he had to look at Sidney’s face again. It was unshaven and the hair on his cheeks was growing in grey and wiry. Beneath the stubble, his skin was pimply and rashed. As Ben stared at it, Sidney seemed to become conscious of a tickling sensation, and he began to scratch himself. “I don’t know any of these jokers,” he said, and dug his nails into the stubble. “And they don’t know me. They don’t know what the hell I look like. You go. Say you’re me. Tell them anything you want. Just get them off my back for a while.”

  It was true, Ben thought, that the men at the hearing didn’t know Sidney or what he looked like. And it was just as well that they didn’t, although in a way he wished that they could see him as he looked right now, his nails digging compulsively at his sparse beard. But if the men from the Department of Professional Conduct did see Sidney, he realized, just the sight of him might make them keen to penalize him. It was best, for both their sakes, to avoid that. He decided he would agree to Sidney’s request.

  The hearing was in a building on lower Park Avenue, a cold-looking modern building made all the less appealing for being set down on a block still lined with ornate turn-of-the-century mansions. The building was an imposition on old ways of doing things, Ben thought as he approached it, just as the very fact of a Department of Professional Conduct was an imposition on doctors’ old ways of doing things. Entering the lobby, his resolve to impersonate Sidney weakened. He shouldn’t be doing this for Sidney. He should have found a way of forcing Sidney to come himself. For all he knew, if he got caught impersonating his brother, the department could start an action to revoke his own license too.

  Inside the revolving doors, he peered at his reflection in a mirrored wall. His face was furrowed, nervous. His shoulders were hunched. He ought, he thought, to smile and stand straight, to stop stooping and emulate the self-confident stance that Sidney had always had, at least in the days before his addiction. Thrusting back his shoulders and relaxing his face, he tried to assume the air of an eminent researcher. But although he was wearing his best suit and had borrowed Sidney’s gold snake and staff cufflinks and one of his monogrammed handkerchiefs, when he entered the elevator he still felt insecure about his appearance.

  The hearing room had windows on three sides and bright sunlight flooded Ben’s eyes as he walked in, so that at first he couldn’t see who else was present. Then he made out a large, T-shaped conference table and fi
ve men, four seated together at the top, like judges, and one sitting solitary across from the door, along the table’s length. The solitary man had a stack of documents at his elbow.

  “Over here, Dr. Zauber,” one of the four men at the top of the table said, gesturing him to a chair opposite the man who sat alone. “I’m Dr. Martin,” the man who had spoken went on, “And this is Dr. O’Connor, Dr. Kaplan, and Dr. Ferlinghetti.” He waved a plump hand at his companions. “And this is Mr. Stoner, our counsel,” he added, pointing at the solitary man.

  Ben slipped tremulously into the chair Martin had proposed, and knew he should introduce himself, but when he opened his lips, no sound came out. Crossing his arms, he laid them heavily on the table for support and at last was able to say, “I’m Dr. Zauber. Sidney Zauber.”

  “You didn’t bring counsel?” the lawyer asked. He had a piercing voice and looked at Ben aggressively.

  “N-No,” Ben stammered. “I thought this was an informal hearing.” The sound of words coming out of his mouth, like the sound of a scream after a moment of paralyzed terror, reassured him, and he managed to add, “I thought I only needed a lawyer if you decided to proceed against me.”

  “True enough,” Dr. Martin said. “Although it’s customary to bring a lawyer.” He had a flat, upstate New York accent and Ben had to concentrate at first to understand his emphases. “Well, no matter,” Martin went on. “We can manage well enough on our own.”

  Ben looked at him closely. His face was round, with gold-rimmed glasses that shielded his small eyes, and he was wearing a yellow and green plaid sports jacket.