Tuesday Night Miracles

by Kris Radish

  “You have had a hard life. I can tell. Don’t worry, honey. It’s all going to be okay.”

  The bus lurches to yet another stop, and before Leah can utter a word or move to help her, the woman hoists herself up and disappears.

  Leah’s heart is pounding. She feels as if she has just received an unexpected gift. And she has one thing she can now write in her assignment book.

  When she turns her head to look out the window, tears are streaming down her face and it looks as if it’s snowing on the front porch of the house the bus is passing. Either that or a wild-looking woman in a lovely, thick flamingo-pink bathrobe is throwing tiny pieces of newspaper into the air while she stands on her front porch step and screams.

  16

  Writing It Down at Dinner

  Buffy Vandeis lives in one of those gorgeous, restored, terribly expensive town houses close to downtown Chicago that were once tenement homes for the Polish and German immigrants who made Chicago the multicultural city it remains to this day. Olivia can’t believe she has such a dear friend who lives in such a remarkable place. She also can’t believe she has a friend named Buffy.

  Phyllis, of course, adores Buffy. Buffy always cooks something that smells terrific when they come over for dinner and when Phyllis sidles up to her after they eat when Livie and Buffy sit on the couch, Buffy picks her up and puts her next to her.

  On the couch!

  Phyllis is on the couch right now, looking across at Livie, who shakes her head every time Phyllis winks at her. And Phyllis is totally winking at her. I’m on the couch. I’m on the couch. And Buffy loves me more than you do!

  The couch is a lovely shade of pale green, and smooth, but all Phyllis cares about is how her hips and shoulders feel when she leans against Buffy and then dips her head onto the edge of the cushion. She could spend forever right here.

  Livie feels pretty much the same way. Buffy married up, divorced much higher than up, and she’s been Livie’s closest friend for more than twenty years. Buffy is the woman Livie thinks about when she counsels someone who doesn’t have a friend and needs one very badly. Buffy is her emotional anchor, a retired psychologist, one of only two people in the entire world who know her better than she knows herself, and she’s a hell of a lot of fun.

  Buffy has been trying to get Livie to spring loose from her job for years. She wants to take her to Paris and rafting, but Olivia wouldn’t go camping if the end of the world were near, and foreign travel is not on her dream list.

  “You, my sweet darling, look exhausted,” Buffy says, stroking Phyllis.

  “You would be exhausted, too, if you had these four women facing you tomorrow night. And, besides that, I have no idea what I’m doing. At least that’s what it feels like.”

  Buffy moves her right hand across her body as if she’s shooing a fly off her own face. “This wouldn’t happen if you would have quit while you were ahead.”

  “Up yours, honey,” Livie jokes, laughing lightly.

  “Talk to me. Where are you?” Buffy leans forward and puts her elbows on her knees.

  “I’ve done everything I’ve always wanted to do. Focusing not on the anger but on what should be coming next. Instead of the anger logs I usually make people keep, I’m making them write down what makes them happy.”

  “Ah, the write-it-down therapy. I can see them now, sitting around their tables making up lies.” Buffy relaxes and sits up.

  “It eventually works,” Livie explains, pointing a finger at her friend. “You know that. These women have dipped away from honesty for so long it’s going to take a while. These are special clients. Not your run-of-the-mill badasses, anyway.”

  “Be careful now, dear. I can almost imagine who they are and what they look like.”

  Admittedly, Olivia sometimes crosses the line when she talks to Buffy about her clients. But Buffy, with her silk suits, glorious peeled face, and Ph.D. mind, has never betrayed her.

  She has seen Livie through the beginning and end of so many groups like this that she could step in and run them herself. Well, maybe not this one. Still, she has seen her friend through things that were much more savage. But Buffy knows what Livie has on the line.

  “Still confident, sweetie?”

  “I’ve seen some progress and I’m bringing them back in again tomorrow,” she tells Buffy. “But who knows? This is all my bright idea and I’m not about to back up now.”

  “You’ve sure as hell talked about doing a group like this long enough,” Buffy says, closing her eyes and trying hard to remember exactly how long they have been talking about new ways to treat angry people. “I’m actually a little jealous.”

  “Seriously?” Olivia opens her eyes as wide as they can go and stares at her friend.

  “Honest,” Buffy admits. “I doubt if there’s a therapist alive who hasn’t thought he or she could do things better. Think about it. Half the books we use were written in the Dark Ages.”

  “No kidding!” Olivia laughs. “Thank God I threw all my damn books away!”

  “If anyone can change the world and the way people think it’s you, Livie,” Buffy says with admiration and affection in her voice. “You’ve always been remarkable at what you do.”

  Phyllis’s eyes are beginning to droop. The three of them—meaning Buffy, Livie, and Phyllis—had a hearty beef stew for dinner. It’s a miracle that Phyllis didn’t get to sit at the table and drink her own glass of wine. The scent of the stew still lingers in the house, and these are the moments that keep Phyllis and Livie young. The soft hand, the cushion, Olivia sitting with her feet up—and that smell!

  “Tell me,” Buffy says as Phyllis begins to fall asleep. “Do you think you can pull this off?”

  Olivia hesitates for a moment. She knows that in the quiet of the night the human heart wrings itself out and stands in front of a mirror to examine possibilities, potential, and, yes, failings. The power of the self, the ability to try something, give it your all, then accept what does or doesn’t happen has been the center of most of her life. She has always had to try.

  “In a way I feel as if these broads, and I use that term loosely right now, are a gift to me, Buffy. It’s one hell of a challenge. The answer to your question is yes. I think I can change the system, or, at the very least, show that there is more than one way to handle group sessions.”

  “That’s my girl!”

  Phyllis shifts and wakes up when Buffy uncrosses her legs. Please don’t stop talking! Please let us stay a while longer!

  It’s still early evening and Olivia feels the same way Phyllis does. She loves the view of the city from the kitchen, the graceful calm Buffy brings to her life, and she loves that Buffy won’t let her get away with a thing.

  “One more drink?” Buffy asks, knowing she’s having one no matter what Livie says.

  “I took a taxi. And you know what?”

  “What, darling?”

  “I’m starting to get sick of moderation.”

  “Thank Jesus. This has only taken, what? Twenty years?”

  Phyllis hears the ice go into the glass after Buffy gets up and she lifts her head, turns it just a little bit, and, swear to God, winks at Olivia as if to say, “Thanks! I love this fabulous couch.”

  17

  Touching the Edge of Dreams

  In the pouring rain the Franklin Building, with its dark brick façade, dim exterior lights, and side-street location, is a better fit for a Halloween house of horrors than for an anger-management class.

  Kit is holding her jacket above her head, as if it is a makeshift umbrella, and running down the sidewalk as fast as she can. There was rain in the morning forecast, but she’s been living for years with the ridiculous notion that if you ignore the weather it will just go away. She suddenly wonders how many other things she has ignored that she probably shouldn’t have.

  She shakes herself off like a wet dog before she enters the building. There are wads of paper in the entryway hall, an overflowing garbage can, and a collectio
n of used coffee cups sitting on every visible ledge.

  “Budget cuts and slobs coming to court-mandated meetings,” she grumbles as she decides to try her luck with the old elevator while she kicks a discarded brown paper bag with her left foot.

  Something besides the way the building looks makes Kit uneasy. She’s not thrilled to be coming back to another meeting with her fake happy-face log tucked into her purse. Even though she has nothing to do but apply for graphic-arts jobs she knows she probably won’t get, Kit would rather be anywhere but standing in front of an antique elevator that will take her to a meeting that will probably embarrass her. Who knows what they will do tonight? Carve old pumpkins?

  “Crap,” she says, putting her ear to the door to see if the elevator is coming, going, or has fallen halfway to hell.

  When the door suddenly springs open and she sees Jane and Grace standing inside, looking as if they have just seen a ghost, Kit is paralyzed.

  “Are you getting in or what?” Jane snaps, totally avoiding eye contact. “We were almost to the damn third floor when you must have pushed the button.”

  Grace gives Jane a look, then sticks out her hand so the door won’t close.

  “Come on in, Kit. We should probably all take the stairs, because this thing sounds like an old tank,” Grace warns.

  Kit steps in and says, “Maybe we’ll get stuck in here and won’t have to go to the damn meeting.”

  “That would be an unbelievable dream come true,” Jane agrees, laughing as she steps back to make room for Kit.

  It takes so long for the door to close after Grace pushes the button again that all three of them wonder if it indeed might have been better to attack the stairs.

  The elevator lurches, and the sound of a chain dragging against metal makes them all raise their eyes.

  “Is this a good idea?” Kit wants to know as she braces herself against the side of the elevator.

  “It did this before, too,” Grace says, trying to reassure herself and Kit. “The inspection notice here on the wall is current. I thought using the dark stairs would be just as dangerous as getting on this thing.”

  “Well, this is just great for me,” Jane whines. “Being scared doesn’t make me happy. This is not a good sign for tonight’s meeting.”

  The elevator is moving so slowly that Kit is now certain they will all be late.

  She takes comfort in their shared misery. “Did you two do the happy-log thing for tonight?”

  Jane snorts. “What a crock that was. I couldn’t believe it when I got the email. I mean, really!”

  “But did you do it?” Grace asks as the chain continues to bump and grind.

  “I wrote a few things down. That’s all she’s getting from me. Did either of you keep a log?”

  Grace and Kit look at each other and do not say a word.

  Jane, who appears to get irritated by simply breathing, asks again.

  “Sort of,” Grace finally replies. “It’s not something I really think about, or have time for, but I get her point. It’s just one more thing to have to do and worry about, and I have enough of that.”

  Jane and Grace look at Kit.

  “I wrote in mine, but not like she wanted me to,” Kit admits. “Grace is right. It’s not the worst idea—it’s just, well, hard in a way, and I for one do not care if I have to lie about it.”

  “Good girl,” Jane says, smiling.

  “Do you think Leah kept a log?” Grace has thought about Leah more than a few times this week. Kit has wondered about her once or twice also, and Jane has done everything possible not to think about her.

  “I couldn’t believe it when she walked into the room,” Jane says.

  “Why?” Kit wants to know, although she realizes she could easily guess at Jane’s answer.

  “She lives in a shelter, for God’s sake,” Jane responds with more than a hint of disgust in her voice. “She’s well, hell, you know—she’s not like us. My mother would say she’s from the other side of the tracks.”

  The word mother causes Kit’s heart to skip a beat. Her mother would have slapped Jane openhanded on the cheek three times by now, because Jane obviously thinks she’s better than Leah, and maybe Grace and Kit, too. Her mother, who raised a house full of boys and lived with a man who thought he was king, put up with a lot, ignored a lot, swept a lot under the table, but she would have paid someone to go after Leah’s husband with a shotgun, two knives, and her Mafia in-laws. Her mother would also never, ever, in a million years, believe that her only daughter, her Agnes, would be standing in an ancient elevator with two other women who got caught with their weapons drawn.

  Ellington County Anger-Management Class. Sweet Mother of God. How did this happen to me?

  Kit looks at Jane and says, “So?”

  Grace is praying that the elevator makes it to the third floor. She has already decided that she’s going to get a small folding knife for her purse and take the stairs to class next week. Maybe she’ll get some Mace, or brass knuckles, or hire a bodyguard—and it won’t be just for the dark stairway. It will be to protect her from her fellow classmates.

  “I know what you mean, Jane,” she agrees, raising her hands in a peacekeeping gesture. “But I’m guessing Kit doesn’t think it’s fair to judge Leah. We really don’t know much about her. You never know a person’s whole story until they tell it. Don’t you think we all have secrets, too?”

  Jane looks appalled. Did these women fall on their heads when they were babies? Did they not see how Leah was dressed and what her face looked like? And secrets? She would never dare to open up her heart to these women, to tell them how lonely and alone she feels, how she lies on the couch and makes believe she’s sitting on her mother’s lap, how sometimes she imagines she’s just like them.

  Before Jane can say anything, Kit speaks up. “You know, we really don’t know each other at all.”

  She wants to say more. She wants to say that Jane looks like a high-class hooker and someone else that she can’t quite identify, and that Grace could be dropped into any suburban neighborhood in America and blend in like an additional stop sign. A part of her wants to agree with Jane and say yes, Leah is white trash and probably got beat up when she was living in the last legal trailer park in Illinois. She wants to hit the stop button and freeze them between floors two and three so that they don’t have to go into the meeting. Maybe she really does want happy and not all this damn angst.

  But Kit also can’t stop thinking about her mother and how even though she’s now dead Kit has totally let her down. And she has let herself down, too. All this anger and loss and yearning have sent her backward instead of forward and she feels as if there is nothing to hold her in place.

  “We at least look like normal women,” Jane fires back as the elevator lumbers toward the third floor. “And, before you say anything else, I know that looks aren’t everything and we aren’t supposed to judge a book by its cover and whatever else happens when we are prejudging others. But really. Think about it.”

  What Grace and Kit think about is that they’re all prejudging one another. It’s fairly obvious that the tension between them is razor-sharp. And you don’t have to have a degree in psychology to figure out why. How easy is it to transfer your own angst, hurt, and fear to someone else? It takes the heat off you and holds the spotlight over someone else’s head. They should all be looking into a mirror instead of into one another’s eyes.

  But they remain silent until Grace can’t stand it any longer. She has to talk and she’d rather talk about anyone but herself, and she feels bad that poor Leah isn’t trapped in the elevator with them to defend herself.

  “Hey, doesn’t Dr. Bayer remind you of an old hippie who probably protested the Vietnam War braless while smoking marijuana without her shoes on?”

  Imagining Dr. Bayer walking through the mud at Woodstock with hairy legs makes them all start laughing as the elevator lurches and then begins to drop into place. The movement of the door against the ancien
t steel glider it sits on sounds like the door of a dungeon creaking open.

  “I think, especially on Tuesday nights like this, we’re not just riding in a dungeon but living in one, too,” Kit suggests, laughing as the elevator door screeches open.

  Finally, here is one thing they can agree on and their combined laughter rolls down the hall a few seconds before they do, and when the three of them walk into the room they’re startled to see that Leah is already there and she’s apparently having an intimate conversation with Dr. Bayer.

  Dr. Bayer looks up and smiles. “Well, it sounds as if you’re all in a good mood tonight.”

  Leah is already here? She’s having a private conversation with Dr. Bayer? Is Dr. Bayer playing favorites?

  Grace, Kit, and Jane walk in wordlessly, half nod to Leah, who silently waves with her left hand, and Dr. Bayer groans internally, straightens up, and prepares to do battle. Apparently the girls weren’t happy about being happy.

  Battle is not what a therapist usually thinks about as a tactical maneuver at the start of an experimental group session. Occasionally some group members will be inappropriate. There will be flirting, or someone will constantly be late. Sometimes she will notice lewd gestures or smirking that intimidates other group members. Several times Dr. Bayer has had to bring along a fellow therapist, usually a burly weightlifting psychologist who can scare even the hardest criminals. He enters the room, Dr. Bayer introduces him, and then he stands at the door in a short-sleeved shirt with his arms crossed, constantly flexing his biceps.

  When Dr. Bayer interned following her postgraduate work, she chose to focus on women in prison. She designed a remarkable program for female inmates who were mothers and who wanted to maintain that role even though they were incarcerated. She worked with murderers, career felons, women so accustomed to the hard edges of life that at first glance it would seem impossible to discover even a hint of emotion.