by Joy Fielding
“Excuse me, but you can’t go on the ice without skates.”
Jane’s gaze dropped to her feet, then back to the ruddy-cheeked young man before her. “But I’m only going to lead my daughter around the rink.”
“You have to be wearing skates. I’m sorry, but it’s the rule.”
Jane felt her hackles rise. “Look, I don’t want to argue with you. Can’t we work something out? There’s no one else on the ice, and I don’t see what harm it would do. …”
“You can’t go on the ice without skates, lady. It’s that simple.”
Jane felt every muscle in her body tense at the word lady.
“Come on,” Jane urged the young man, hiding her clenched fist inside the pocket of her warm jacket. “You don’t want to disappoint my little girl. She’s been looking forward to this all week.”
The young man shrugged indifference. “Look, lady, rules are rules. Take it or leave it.” He turned on his heel and started to walk away.
“Asshole,” Jane muttered, not quite under her breath.
“What did you say?”
Everything after that happened very quickly: the young man spinning around, marching back, his hand grabbing hold of the front of her collar, lifting her into the air, spewing invective at her; Emily screaming at her side, people rushing to the scene; the young man hurriedly letting her go, her feet returning gratefully to the ground; “I’m sorry, I lost my cool"; “I understand, rules are rules"; retreating to a nearby bench, her legs shaking; Emily making her way onto the ice alone, managing quite well by herself; Michael trying to reason with her later that night, “God, Jane, why do you do these things? One day some guy’s liable to kill you!” “I’m sorry, Michael, he just made me so mad!”
“Are you okay?”
“What?”
Jane fought her way through the fog of her memories toward Michael’s face. “I was just going over what happened at the skating rink again.”
“Did you remember anything else?”
She shook her head, wondering briefly what day it was, how many days had passed since the incident at the skating rink had come back to her.
“I have to go to the hospital now. Paula’s downstairs if you need her.”
“What time is it?”
“Almost eight o’clock.”
“In the morning?”
He kissed her forehead. “In the morning.”
“I wish you didn’t have to go,” she said, contemptuous of the whine in her voice. “I feel so alone when you’re not here. I get so scared.”
“There’s nothing to be scared of, Jane. You’re home now. And you’re remembering more things. That’s good news, not something to be scared of.”
“But I feel so panicky inside. I feel so disoriented, so weak….”
“Maybe you should try to get out today,” Michael offered, pulling away from her, looking down at her from the side of the bed. “Why don’t you get Paula to take you for a walk this morning?”
“I don’t think I’d get very far.”
“A drive, then. The fresh air will do you some good.”
“I just don’t understand why I’m so tired all the time.”
“I really have to go, honey. I see my first patient in less than an hour.”
“Maybe I should see Dr. Meloff again. Maybe there is something wrong with my brain.”
“Why don’t we talk about it when I get home? All right?” He kissed her again, then walked toward their bedroom door. “I’ll have Paula bring up some breakfast.”
“I’m not very hungry.”
“You have to eat something, Jane. You want to get better, don’t you?”
Don’t you? Don’t you? Don’t you? Don’t you? The words followed her like an echo as she stumbled out of bed toward the bathroom. She needed all her concentration just to put one foot in front of the other, and once in the bathroom, she couldn’t remember what it was she had wanted to do. “What’s wrong with me?” she asked her reflection in the mirror above the sink, noting the presence of drool dribbling from the side of her mouth, and angrily wiping it away. And was it her imagination or had her features acquired an eerie, almost masklike cast?
She tried to straighten up, feeling the muscles in her back go into one of their increasingly frequent spasms. Was it possible she had suffered some kind of a stroke? Certainly that would explain her loss of memory, the lethargy that had become her constant companion, the variety of physical ailments that plagued her. And yet, surely evidence of a stroke would have surfaced in at least one of the tests she had been administered at the Boston City Hospital. Unless she’d suffered the stroke since she’d come home! Was it possible to have a stroke and not be aware of it?
“Something is very definitely wrong with you,” she informed her passive reflection. “You’re a very sick girl.”
Jane splashed some cold water on her face, not bothering to dry it, then returned to her bed, crawling inside and hugging her pillow to her wet cheek, smelling Michael though she knew he was gone.
She pictured him lying beside her in bed, his arms snaked around hers, their bodies fitting together like spoons, the calm of his breathing steadying hers. They slept in the same bed now, though they hadn’t made love since that first time together, how long ago now? A few days? A week? She was always so tired. She hadn’t the strength. He made no demands, simply snuggling in peacefully beside her, seemingly content with whatever scraps she threw his way. Could a week really have passed?
Jane flipped onto her back, calling forth fresh spasms. She took deep breaths, trying to will the spasms away, understanding that their will was stronger than hers. She tried to concentrate on other things: the sound of Michael’s voice as he whispered words of love; the soft wetness of his tongue as it danced along the slender curves of her flesh; the way the muscles of his arms tightened when he pushed into her; the grateful way he collapsed beside her when their lovemaking was done.
She looked up, half expecting to find his nude body looming above hers, saw instead Paula’s earnest face staring down at her. Jane gasped, immediately feeling the muscles in her lower back knot in protest. Her gasp turned into a cry of pain.
“Your back bothering you again?”
Paula was obviously used to her spasms, Jane thought, nodding affirmation, barely able to lift her head off the pillow.
“Turn over on your side,” Paula instructed. “I’ll massage it for you.”
Jane obeyed without hesitation. How many times during the past week had this ritual been repeated? She felt Paula’s hands at the small of her back, applying gentle pressure.
“Here?” Paula asked, her fingers drawing invisible circles on the surface of the white cotton nightdress.
“A little higher. Yes, there. Thank you.”
“Try to direct your breathing into the area,” Jane heard Paula say, and wondered what the hell she meant. How could she direct her breathing anywhere? “Concentrate,” Paula said, and Jane tried to do what she was told, failing miserably. How could she concentrate her breathing when she could barely concentrate at all?
What was happening to her? When had she crossed the line from hysteric to invalid?
“How’s that now?” Paula asked, her hands withdrawing.
“Better, thank you.”
“You should try to get up, do a little exercise.”
The thought of exercise made Jane want to throw up. “I don’t think that would be a very good idea.”
“Dr. Whittaker thinks we should get out of the house today. He said I should take you for a walk.”
“Or a ride in the car,” Jane said, remembering the second, much preferable, alternative.
“He said you didn’t feel like breakfast.”
“I don’t think I could keep anything down.” Jane’s eyes flashed hopefully to Paula’s. “Do you think I have the flu or something?” she asked, wondering if her amnesia might have confused everyone into ignoring other obvious physical reasons for her present condition. Supp
ose one thing had absolutely nothing to do with the other. Suppose she just happened to be sick.
Paula’s hand was immediately on Jane’s forehead. “You do feel a little warm,” she admitted, “but then so would anyone who stayed in bed all day.” The words carried traces of reproach. Jane felt as if she were a little girl being reprimanded by her nanny.
“I’ll try to get up.”
“You better take these first.” Two small white pills materialized in the palm of Paula’s hand, followed by a glass of water.
She must moonlight as a magician, Jane thought, slowly transferring the pills into her own hand, and staring at them with an intensity that suggested she expected them to speak.
“Take them,” Paula instructed as the phone rang in the other room, Michael having removed the phone from their bedroom sometime earlier in the week. “I’ll be right back.” Paula put the glass of water on the night table and walked briskly from the room.
“If it’s for me, I’d really like to talk to whoever it is,” Jane called after her, receiving no acknowledgment that her words had been heard. “Fat chance,” she said to her reflection in the mirrors across from her bed, pushing her hair away from her face and trying to force the muscles at her mouth into a smile. Her mouth refused to move. “I’ll force you to smile,” she announced, bringing her fingers to her lips, trying to manipulate the sides of her mouth upward, as if her skin were clay. The white pills fell from her hand onto the mint-green carpet at her feet. “Oh, God, I forgot all about you guys.” Jane collapsed onto her hands and knees, retrieving the pills and then lifting her head, staring at herself in the wall of mirrors. Woman as Dog, she thought with amazement, wondering what had reduced her to this state.
Concentrate, she heard Paula repeat silently. Concentrate. You were feeling fine when you were wandering the streets of downtown Boston, you were feeling okay at the Lennox Hotel. You were all right at the police station and the hospital, and when Michael first brought you home. It’s only after you started taking these stupid little white pills that are supposed to be so helpful and mild that it became an effort to get out of bed, that you developed this disgusting drool, that you lost your appetite. “It doesn’t make any sense,” she said out loud. “Even when I lost my memory, I never lost my appetite!”
She studied the two small, round, uncoated, bi-concave white pills with the beveled edges for several seconds before pulling open her closet door and thrusting them into the toes of a pair of black shoes, briefly wondering whether other people’s shoes were as interesting as hers were rapidly becoming. Then she forced herself to her feet and over to her night table, where she quickly swallowed the glass of water just as Paula reentered the room.
“That was my mother,” Paula announced without prompting.
“Is everything all right?”
“Christine got it into her head that she wanted to wear a certain outfit and my mother couldn’t find it. She wanted to know if I knew where it was.”
“And did you?” Jane was reluctant to let go of the conversation, grateful as she was to anything that made her feel even vaguely human.
Paula shrugged. “Christine outgrew that dress years ago. I don’t know where she gets these things in her head.” She frowned. “She’s got a million crazy ideas these days. I guess it’s part of being five years old.”
Jane nodded, trying to recall Emily at five years of age, immediately conjuring up the image of a little girl in a pink snowsuit clinging tightly to her hand at the edge of a small, oval-shaped skating rink. Michael said that incident had happened about a year and a half ago, so Emily would have been five. What million crazy ideas had been going on in her five-year-old head? What crazy ideas must be going on in her head right now?
Does she think about me? Jane wondered. Does she wonder why a few days with her grandparents has stretched into a few weeks? Why I don’t phone her to say hello? Does she think that I’ve abandoned her? By the time I remember who she is, will she still remember me?
“I’d like to call my daughter,” Jane announced suddenly.
“You’ll have to discuss that with Dr. Whittaker when he gets home.”
“I don’t need my husband’s permission to call my daughter.”
“I don’t think it would be wise, in your present condition, to do anything that might upset both you and your daughter.”
“How would talking to her own mother upset her?”
Paula hesitated. “Well, you’re not exactly the mother she remembers, are you?”
Jane felt her resolve crumble. There was no denying the validity of Paula’s last utterance. Besides, she couldn’t very well insist on calling her daughter when she didn’t know exactly where the child was or the phone number where she could be reached.
“Paula,” she said abruptly, as Paula was bending over to make her bed. She watched Paula’s shoulders tense, her arms coming to rest at her sides. “Where did you put my telephone-address book?”
Paula glanced at her from over her shoulder, her position unchanged. “I didn’t put it anywhere.”
“It was in my night table and now it’s gone.”
“I’ve never seen it,” Paula informed her, “let alone touched it.”
“It was in the night table and now it’s gone,” Jane repeated, stubbornly.
“You’ll have to ask Dr. Whittaker about it when he gets home,” Paula said again, just as stubbornly.
“I should make a list of all the things I have to ask him.” Jane didn’t bother trying to disguise the sarcasm in her voice.
“Feeling a little feisty this morning, aren’t we?” Paula remarked. “Maybe that’s a good sign.” She finished making the bed. “Why don’t you get dressed and we’ll go for that drive.”
It was more demand than request and Jane decided not to argue. Paula could be very obstinate. Besides, Jane really wanted to get out of the house. Hadn’t she been begging Michael and Paula for just that opportunity? When had she stopped wanting to get out more? And why? What had stopped her?
She peered inside her closet, pretending to be concerned with what clothes to select for her outing, but in reality, her eyes were directed to the floor, focused on the toes of a pair of black patent leather shoes.
“Come on, damn you. Don’t give me a hard time.”
Jane held her breath and waited for Paula’s anger to subside. It was the second such outburst in the course of their ten-minute-old excursion.
“Damnit!” Paula’s hand slapped against the steering wheel, accidentally triggering the horn. The car behind them immediately honked back. Paula waved her apologies into the rearview mirror, then returned her attention to the problem at hand. “Damnit, don’t die on me now!”
“Maybe if you turn the engine off for half a second,” Jane suggested.
“No, that won’t work. It’s been stalling like this for about a month now. I know its pattern. It won’t start again until it’s good and ready.”
“You need to take it in.”
“I need a new car is what I need.”
Jane said nothing. What was there to add? Paula’s car was indeed old, had probably been old when she bought it. It was definitely on its last legs, a fact Jane found strangely appropriate in that it made her feel less alone. I shouldn’t be the only one on her last legs around here, she thought, deciding against sharing such thoughts with her companion.
Paula made another attempt to get the car moving, but the old Buick only sputtered momentarily before wheezing into unconsciousness. Paula looked suspiciously at Jane, and, for an instant, Jane felt Paula might be holding her responsible. “Was it Dr. Whittaker who told you to turn off the engine?”
“I don’t remember,” Jane said, thinking it an odd question. “I guess so.”
That was good enough for Paula. She immediately turned off the ignition.
The car behind them honked his indignation. “Just what would you like us to do?” Jane called out. “Pick up the damn thing and carry it?” She gave the man an i
ndignant finger.
“Jane, for God’s sake, what are you doing?”
Jane guiltily brought her hands back into her lap. “Sorry. Force of habit, I guess.”
“So I understand.”
“What do you mean?”
Paula ignored the question, focusing her concentration on the car’s ignition. With fresh determination, she reached over and turned the key. The car hiccuped, coughed, then belched into action. “Thank God,” Paula whispered, waving to the driver behind them and continuing northwest along Woodward Street.
“What did you mean, ‘So I understand’?”
“Dr. Whittaker’s told me about your famous temper.” Paula stared resolutely at the road ahead, so that Jane was unable to draw any further inferences from Paula’s expression.
“What exactly has he told you?” Jane heard the testiness in her voice that she recognized as a precursor to anger, and wondered what she was feeling so angry about. Had she not expected Michael to discuss her with the woman who was being paid to look after her?
“Just that you have a temper.”
There was more, but Jane understood from the stiffness in Paula’s shoulders that that was all she was going to tell her. “He told me that I used to honk the horn of his car when he was driving,” she volunteered, hoping that Paula might be tempted by this tidbit to offer further revelations of her own.
“Try that with me and you’ll lose an arm.”
Jane found herself hugging her arms to her sides. She decided against further attempts at conversation, and instead directed her attention to the rows of fine old Victorian homes that lined the streets. She was feeling slightly perkier than she had when she first woke up. Did the fact that she hadn’t taken her morning medication account for her clearer head, or was it simply a question of mind over matter? Wasn’t her whole life these days a question of mind over matter? And did it matter at all? Never mind.
She found herself chuckling.
“Something funny?” For the first time since they had crawled into the messy front seat of Paula’s gray Buick, Paula looked directly into Jane’s eyes.
It was Jane’s turn to look the other way. “I was just thinking about how ridiculous this whole thing is.”