The Tell

by Linda I. Meyers

  “We’ve told you three times,” someone says, “you’re in New York Presbyterian Hospital. You fell.”

  Ah, of course, a place I know well. East Sixty-eighth between York and the river. Valet parking. Chemo lab. Hello, George. How are you doing? Stupid question to ask someone with cancer. So many stupid questions.

  I am back in 2006—a warm day for the end of March. We are driving up to our country house. Happy. Young friends are coming to join us. George waits in the car while I run in to Citarella’s to pick up steaks for the barbecue. When I come out, George is on the phone; he hands it to me. The doctor is at first unwilling to discuss the results over the phone, but I insist. “Pancreatic cancer,” she says. Not good, I think, but I don’t yet know just how bad “not good” is going to be. All I know is that the bottom has just fallen out. We continue to drive, stunned, as if we’ve just seen a terrible accident on the side of the road.

  My grown sons, David and Robbie, are standing at the foot of the bed. Paul is standing there too. For a moment I remember it is Paul, not George, who holds my heart. George has been gone now for too many years. Paul and David and Robbie look like three dwarfs. What is the name of the dwarf that looks frightened? Was there a dwarf that looked frightened? I try to ask them but no sound comes out. Robbie is holding his cell phone, taking my picture. I try to smile, but my face won’t do what I tell it.

  “I want to see the picture,” I manage to mutter.

  “No, you don’t,” says Robert.

  “Yes, I do.” Why is he arguing? Was there a dwarf who argued?

  David, knowing that I won’t be put off, tells Rob to just show me the picture.

  It is a picture of a woman. Her face is swollen. Distorted. Rivulets of blood run down her face like red roads on a blue map. Her eye is swollen shut. A tube comes out of her nose. There is a gash across her eyebrow and a brace on her neck. I cannot connect this picture to myself. I’m sorry, I say, without speaking, but I cannot visit with you anymore. I float away.

  I am in the kitchen of our Princeton house, staring at the dishes, trying not to listen to the hollow sound of George’s feet falling off each step. He is seventy-nine. It is one year since the day of his diagnosis. The cancer has eaten the inside of his body the way parasites bore into a weakened tree. How humiliating for him to be held up by his sons—one under each arm. They are bringing him down for the last time, but I don’t realize yet that it’s the last. I should have realized. If I’d known that last night was the last we would sleep together in the same bed, would I have held him tighter? Would I have stayed awake all night just to feel him there? We put the hospital bed in the center of the garden room. If he opens his eyes, he can see the sky or the plantings around the patio. He can watch the tiny buds appear on the trees, harkening a spring he will never see.

  “Are you comfortable, George? Would you like another pillow? It’s all right. Sleep. I’ll be right here.” I rest my head on his chest. Using all his strength, he manages to put his arm around my shoulders. I hear myself whimpering. He sleeps.

  My head is in a machine.

  “Pictures of your brain,” someone says.

  My brain, I think. I think with my brain. This can’t be good.

  I am in a smaller room. David sits in a chair, his head resting in his hands. Paul is leaning over the bed, holding my hand. I don’t see the third dwarf.

  “Where am I?” I manage to ask.

  “New York Presbyterian Hospital,” David says again.

  “Yes, but where am I?”

  “You answer her, Paul.” He passes me off. Grumpy dwarf.

  “You are in the ICU.”

  “Oh, that’s not so good. What happened?” I ask.

  “You fell, Ma. You broke the bones in your face—around your eye. Your brain is bleeding. We are waiting to see if it stops bleeding so they can operate on your face,” he says and looks at Paul.

  Why are you telling me all this? Who are you talking about?

  “I’m tired,” I whisper.

  “Then go back to sleep. We’re here. You can go back to sleep.”

  “George, the sun is coming up. Wake up sweetheart. Open your eyes. Oh, that’s good. And a smile. Would you like some water? No. Just a little. All right. Okay. The boys are coming today. They will all be here soon.”

  It is time to call hospice. I am relieved that this time has come. I am embarrassed that I am relieved. See, he nodded yes. He knows. We talked about hospice. Right, honey? See, he nodded again. Where’s the number? I can’t find the number. No, it’s here. It’s under the papers. It’s here. I know I put it here. David and Paul have left. I am in a different room. I am told that my brain has stopped bleeding.

  “Are you sure you weren’t playing hockey?” The doctor laughs. “The last time I saw an injury like this, the guy got a puck in the face.” He laughs again.

  Ha! Ha!

  “We are going to operate to fix the bones in your face. Don’t worry you’ll be fine. Just don’t laugh.”

  Ha! Ha!

  Why is the hospice nurse sleeping? She is supposed to be awake. Wake up! Do your job! “What is that gesture, sweetheart? Your finger to your lip—is that a kiss? I love you too, darling. I’m going to go upstairs and sleep.” I glare at the nurse. “The nurse is going to stay with you.”

  What if he wasn’t saying I love you? What if he was touching his mouth because he was hungry? Oh my God, what if he was hungry? I run downstairs. “Are you hungry? Do you want some applesauce? I’ll get you some applesauce. Here. Here. Take a bite.” No. No. Okay, then maybe it was meant to be a kiss.

  So many rooms—this one, recovery, I think. I open my eyes and see Paul. No, it’s not Paul. Yes, it is Paul, but he’s flat and pink like a strawberry Gumby.

  “What time is it?” I ask. I hear my voice coming from a distant place. I am on a blue moon.

  “Three o’clock in the morning.”

  “Why are you here at three o’clock in the morning? Why are you pink?

  Why are you pink, Paul?” Ha! Ha!

  He laughs. Easy for him to laugh.

  “You are hallucinating,” he tells me.

  “It’s not my fault you’re pink,” I say.

  He tells me to go to sleep and when I wake up and see him tomorrow, he won’t be pink.

  I am draped over my darling George. Sleeping on his chest. Listening for every breath. The sun is coming up, reflecting off the patio and brightening the day. There’s the promise of spring in the air. The birds have begun to sing. I lift my head. He is still breathing. Thank you, God. Another morning. “George, it’s morning. See, the sun is rising. Wake up, sweetheart. See the sun. Here, I’ll open the sliders, so you can feel the air.” I’ve gone ahead and planted some of the pots early with pansies, and aromatic herbs. So when we open the door, he can smell the rosemary.

  Paul leaves, and I wonder if I have hallucinated all of it. Maybe I didn’t fall? Maybe I just dreamt I fell. Maybe I fell and I’m dead. Is this smooth and purple floating place where we go when we die? This blue moon? I reach up and feel the bandages on my face. The nurse comes in.

  “Don’t touch your face,” she says. “Don’t smile and try not to sneeze.”

  Sneezy? No, this one is not a dwarf. This is not a dream and not death.

  How not to sneeze? I’ve no control over that. I start to cry but I can’t make a crying face. It is hard to have a straight-faced cry.

  “George! George! George!” I’m screaming as I feel him moving farther away.

  “No!” he shouts. “No!” The last word he says.

  And I know with that no, he wants to leave, and he needs me to let him go. His head drops to his shoulder. He looks like a fallen eagle. I put my hand on his foot and follow the heat as it travels up his body. I fist my hand into his armpit—the last warm place. As the energy leaves his body, his face relaxes, and, as if a magician had lifted a veil, a young handsome man appears.

  “I am sorry to hear about your husband,” a neighbor s
ays. “How are you doing?” Stupid questions but I know people mean well.

  “All right,” I say politely. “Thank you for asking.”

  When I leave the hospital, my face is black and blue and swollen. My left eye droops like a basset hound’s. The red, lower lid hangs down. I look grotesque—a female Quasimodo. I wear dark glasses even in the house, afraid of my own reflection.

  Dr. Elahi has a reputation as a miracle worker, an ocular plastic surgeon. I’ve never heard of this—two sub-specialties blended into one. I think that such a specialty must have been devised only for me and for hockey players.

  Dr. Elahi reassures me that I will look fine when he’s done. He operates once and then again. My lower lid is back up near my eye. I look in the mirror. It is almost me again.

  “How did you fall?” my neighbor asks.

  “I slipped on a slick, wet step,” I say, finally remembering.

  Now, on the year anniversary of my plummet down those stairs, I look out the window and keep checking the temperature. It is not warm enough yet for the ice to have melted. I am still afraid to go out, but I’m also determined. I have to buy yogurt and coffee. I have to make lunch dates with friends. I have to live.

  I put on the high boots with the combat heels—the best boots for snow and ice. The boots that shouldn’t have slipped off the step, but they did. They are still the best boots I own. I put on the gray down coat that kept me from breaking all the bones in my body. I’ve cleaned the blood off the coat. I zip the zipper and snap the snaps. Was it zipped when I fell? It must have been zipped. Did they take it off before they put me in the ambulance or when I got to the emergency room? Why does it matter? Just put on the damn coat and get out of the house.

  In the pocket is only one glove. Where’s the other glove? It’s too cold to go out without the glove. They are fleece-lined, black, suede, warm gloves. Was I wearing them when I fell? When did I last wear the gloves? I can’t remember.

  I’m getting increasingly frantic. If I find the glove, I won’t fall again. The gloves, two, one for each hand, will protect me. I go through the drawers. I look in the closet. I can’t find the damn glove. I call the nurse who took care of me when I came home from the hospital.

  “Nadine, my glove?” I ask her.

  “No gloves,” she says, “I didn’t see any gloves.”

  There were no gloves!

  I’m on my own. Right, baby? You’re gone. Somewhere in the stratosphere, somewhere on a blue planet, somewhere near the sun. Are you omniscient now? Can you help me find the glove? It is an empty prayer, yet in the hospital, he felt so close.

  I try to reassure myself, glove or no glove, George or no George, my life has gone on. There is Paul, after all, but I’m convinced that only those gloves will protect me. I give up looking, and decide to replace them. I bought them at Harry’s on Broadway and 84th Street, thirteen blocks away. Thirteen is a very unlucky number. My father told me to be particularly careful on Friday 13. What day is today? The month is February 2015. The calendar tells me that it’s not Friday, nor is it the thirteenth. I’m relieved.

  Bundled up, I take to the streets. I watch my steps with the vigilance of an inspector looking for clues after an accident. I try to walk in the wake of the man in front of me—his step, my step. If he doesn’t fall, I won’t fall. I’m terrified of black ice. It masquerades as wet sidewalk worse than glass. It fools you and lands you flat on your ass. I am so intent on looking down that I forget to notice red lights. A cab honks. A car rushes by and splatters me with slush. Harry’s is still one block ahead.

  The window is full of winter boots on sale. The shelves inside are lined with spring and summer shoes. Sandals with wraparound ties. Canvas shoes in candy stripes, strawberry and orange, lime green and yellow. Purple-and-lavender flipflops. Are they crazy? Why don’t they look outside?

  They do not have the gloves. “Sold out,” they tell me. I begin to panic.

  “Please check in the back.”

  “No gloves. I’m sorry,” she says. “Everything we are stocking now is for spring.”

  Before I venture back out, to distract myself, I walk up and down the rows with the spring line of footwear. I pick out several pair to try on. Retail therapy. It will be risky carrying packages while trying to stay upright—like the dog walkers with their poop bags and inside-out umbrellas—but I can manage it. It’s then that I realize I’ve just walked thirteen blocks in New York winter without falling, and with only one glove. Clearly, I’m able to stand on my own two feet.

  “Can I see this pair in an eight?” I say.

  acknowledgments

  This book is dedicated with love to my husband, George Wolfgang, who died March 27, 2007.

  It could have not been written without Melanie Bishop. Her intelligence, creativity, and unwavering support helped me to get up each morning and face the terror of the blank page.

  I would also like to thank Mindy Lewis and the members of our writing workshop for the multiple reads of the same material until, with their help, I finally got it right. And thanks are due to Philip Lopate, the members of the NYWI summer writing retreat, and to Mindy Greenstein who also attended the workshop and has since become a friend and reader of my work. Her feedback is always spot on.

  Gratitude to Nancy McWilliams and Ghislaine Boulanger for their kindness and caring. It is their expertise that helped me navigate the road between trauma and trust, grief and acceptance. They have given me the courage to accept myself—a prerequisite for writing this memoir.

  Thanks to family and friends, some of them readers, but all of them supporters of my efforts to complete this book: Lucy James, Renee and Jack Crary, Robert Yeager, Joan Odes, Joan Morgan, Caitlin Thomas, David Clark, Roni Natov, Amy Lerner, Richard Skolnik, Vickie and Steve Morris, Susan Held, Darcy Tromanhauser, and Gus Hinojosa.

  With much love and gratitude to my cousin Louise who, no matter what, has always been there for me.

  A special thanks to Paul Bloom who not only read every chapter but also sat patiently while I read each word aloud. His critique definitely made this a better book.

  A special thanks to my daughter-in-law Kim Johnson for her belief in my writing and her willingness to share my work with her friends.

  To my son Jonathan Munk, a poet and an editor, who many times helped me find the right word, restructure the wrong sentence, and remove the misplaced comma.

  To my assistant Jonathan Young, who has patiently helped me navigate the new world of social media.

  To the team at She Writes Press for supporting me through this project and for their dedication to closing the gender gap in publishing.

  To Angelle Barbazon and the team at JKS for helping me spread the word.

  And thanks to all of the following:

  To Thomas and Randall at Vagabond’s House, for always finding me the right chair.

  To the editors at Alligator Juniper and Post Road, for publishing two chapters of this book, helping me to believe that it deserved to be in print.

  “The Flowers” first appeared in Alligator Juniper, 2016

  “The Spring Line” first appeared in Post Road, 2016

  about the author

  Linda I. Meyers is a psychologist and psychoanalyst in New York City and Princeton, NJ. She has been published in professional journals and academic books. In 2016, she published two chapters from her memoir, The Tell: “The Flowers,” a top five finalist in Alligator Juniper’s annual contest in creative nonfiction, and “The Spring Line” in Post Road. She lives in New York City.

  Author photo © Dylan/Patric Photographer

  selected titles from she writes press

  She Writes Press is an independent publishing company founded to serve women writers everywhere. Visit us at www.shewritespress.com.

  The Butterfly Groove: A Mother’s Mystery, A Daughter’s Journey by Jessica Barraco. $16.95, 978-1-63152-800-2. In an attempt to solve the mystery of her deceased mother’s life, Jessica Barraco retraces the older woman
’s steps nearly forty years earlier—and finds herself along the way.

  A Different Kind of Same: A Memoir by Kelley Clink. $16.95, 978-1-63152-999-3. Several years before Kelley Clink’s brother hanged himself, she attempted suicide by overdose. In the aftermath of his death, she traces the evolution of both their illnesses, and wonders: If he couldn’t make it, what hope is there for her?

  The Beauty of What Remains: Family Lost, Family Found by Susan Johnson Hadler. $16.95, 978-1-63152-007-5. Susan Johnson Hadler goes on a quest to find out who the missing people in her family were—and what happened to them—and succeeds in reuniting a family shattered for four generations.

  All the Ghosts Dance Free: A Memoir by Terry Cameron Baldwin. $16.95, 978-1-63152-822-4. A poetic memoir that explores the legacy of alcoholism and teen suicide in one woman’s life—and her efforts to create an authentic existence in the face of that legacy.

  Scattering Ashes: A Memoir of Letting Go by Joan Rough. $16.95, 978-1-63152-095-2. A daughter’s chronicle of what happens when she invites her alcoholic and emotionally abusive mother to move in with her in hopes of helping her through the final stages of life—and her dream of mending their tattered relationship fails miserably.

  Times They Were A-Changing: Women Remember the ’60s & ’70s edited by Kate Farrell, Amber Lea Starfire, and Linda Joy Myers. $16.95, 978-1-938314-04-9. Forty-eight powerful stories and poems detailing the breakthrough moments experienced by women during the ’60s and ’70s.