The Waiting Room

by Emily Bleeker

  Veronica juggled the groceries so she could pat her front pocket for her keys. The front door was always locked—always. Two women and a baby alone all the time—it made Veronica’s already heightened anxiety reflex vibrate. Doors double locked. Windows firmly shut and bolted. Curtains drawn. Top-of-the-line security system installed. But sometimes the triple line of security backfired and she couldn’t get into her own house. Her pocket was empty, keys probably still hanging in the ignition of the car. Damn it.

  With a quick flip of her elbow, Veronica rang the doorbell of her two-story bungalow. There was an immediate shuffling behind the door, and after a few metallic clicks and the loud beep of the security system, the broad white door swung open and her mother stood behind it, eyes bleary and the imprint of a textile against her cheek. Ever since Veronica could remember, Barb had worn her hair the same way: short, bleached blond, and spiked slightly at the top. Now it was slanting slightly to one side, like the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Veronica tilted her head to add some balance. The cry was louder with the door open, and Barb’s arms were empty.

  “You take a little nap, Mom?” Veronica held out one of her numbed arms with a silent request for help. Barb rubbed at the side of her face and straightened the remnants of her lip liner from her complicated morning makeup routine. She always said, You never know when the man with the big paycheck might end up on your doorstep, so you should always look your best. She had a similar saying about cute paramedics after a heart attack and clean underwear in a car accident. How could her father ever have left such a sage?

  “Yeah, just dropped off for a little snooze while you were gone. How’d it go?” Barb answered, taking the lighter bags with the crushables in it and shuffling toward the kitchen as if she didn’t even hear the screaming in the background. It was true that when you had a baby with colic, you had to just get used to some level of crying, but the way her mother could tune it out drove Veronica insane.

  “Fine, I guess, but how long has Sophie been screaming like that? Please tell me you didn’t sleep through it, Ma. If you want me to go to therapy, you have to promise me that you’ll take care of Sophie while I’m gone.”

  Half-awake, Barb rolled her eyes, annoyed.

  “I dozed off for a bit, but she’s in her swing now.” Barb stood at the entrance of the kitchen, watching Veronica struggle with the bags, rubbing her hands together as if she were dying to snag a handle. “Here, let me help.”

  “I got it,” Veronica said and shooed her off, not interested in having her mother so close to her while she was still annoyed. Barb took a step back and used her nervous hands to rub at the corners of her eyes, keeping her heavy mascara untouched, a little too groggy for a proper caregiver.

  Veronica unloaded the heavy bags, her hands tingling as the blood flooded back in and painful pins and needles filled her extremities. Without a further thought to the groceries, she yanked open the refrigerator and assessed the bottles of expressed milk in the fridge. The four o’clock feeding was still sitting untouched on the shelf. “Damn it, Ma! No wonder she’s screaming. Were you texting with Val again and got distracted?”

  Her mom’s longtime best friend had a daughter, Sommer, who was the same age as Veronica. Both Val and Barb initially hoped that the two girls could find a similar bond as the one their mothers shared, but personality, situation, and biology seemed to have different ideas. Sommer (with an O, she’d always tell substitute teachers and boys who asked for her phone number) was perfect and always had been. In high school she’d been tall, gorgeous, witty, a math wiz, and a cheerleader who could get any guy she wanted. As an adult, even a cursory glance at her Facebook page could tell you all you needed to know about Sommer’s continued perfection with her handsome, adoring husband and three perfectly groomed children, two girls and one boy. Veronica would never live up to Sommer’s or Val’s equally high parenting standard.

  “Val is a nurse and gives me parenting tips, so you should like that I text her. And I didn’t forget anything, Ronnie,” Barb shot back, a bit of real hurt in her clear blue eyes. “It’s only”—she glanced at her wristwatch—“ten till four. You’re early. I’m only halfway through the routine: music, diaper change, then turn on the swing while I get the bottle. I did it like you wanted.”

  Veronica shot daggers at her mother with her eyes and turned the kitchen faucet all the way up to its hottest setting. She plunged the bottle under the rushing waterfall of steaming tap water and sighed. Barb stood in a tense reverie, as if she were waiting for an explosion but at the same time didn’t know how to manage when it came. Veronica hated feeling so unreasonable. This was her child; she should be able to have expectations for her care.

  At moments like these, Veronica wished more than anything she could go into her daughter’s room and scoop her up in her arms, lift her shirt, unlatch the hook on the top of her nursing bra, and just feed her child. It was infuriating that she had to depend on a third party. Part of her felt guilty about being so mad at her mom. She did a lot, way more than most grandmothers had to do, but it wasn’t like Veronica didn’t pay her what she’d pay a nanny or au pair. Not to mention Veronica gave her a place to live and free food and . . . Shit . . . Sometimes she took a step back from her life and really saw how messed up it was.

  “I like Val and I love having a nurse on call, but, Ma, she’s still crying.” Veronica turned off the tap and then swirled the bottle, turning it upside down to test the temperature. Barb yanked it from her hand, her cheeks flushed a deep red like they used to when Veronica was a teen and got the car back an hour later than curfew.

  “Today you say change the routine. Last week you said to never deviate. I don’t know what you want, Ronnie. If you want things ‘just right,’ then maybe you should go into that nursery and give it a shot yourself.” Small but feisty, Barb shot out her proclamation and then stumbled backward over a filled bag of groceries, sending a can of formula rolling across the floor. Barb froze, the bottle slowly dripping after its time in the water. “You bought formula?” she asked, calming slowly.

  Veronica cringed, wishing she’d hidden the formula till she was ready, or at least been able to put it away in the cupboard until she could figure out how to manage the transition. She knew her mother tried to keep her opinions to herself, but it rarely, if ever, happened. She crouched down to retrieve the yellow can.

  “Yeah, Lisa suggested it. She said that Sophie might be crying from hunger because I’m getting less milk lately.” She placed the full container on the counter and looked at her mother, defiant. “I’m not giving up breastfeeding, though. Just supplementing until she eats more solids.”

  “So you like her? Lisa, I mean,” Barb asked, taking a step toward Veronica, who continued putting away groceries so she didn’t have to look at her mother and see the hope in her eyes.

  “Yeah, I like her. She’s . . . helpful. I don’t know.” Veronica shut the cabinet door under the sink a little harder than necessary, making the bottles of cooking wine jingle against each other.

  “Maybe . . .” Barb blinked a few times as though she had something in her eye and then took another step toward Veronica. “Maybe I can meet her soon. It might help if I knew what your treatment looked like, and maybe she’d have some questions for me.” Barb placed the bottle on the counter, painted coral fingernails clacking against the countertop.

  Veronica stared ahead of her, surprised by the question and that she didn’t say no instinctually like she usually did when her mom tried too hard to manage her life. She didn’t really want to let her mother into her therapy bubble just yet. The only reason she picked up the phone to call Lisa was because Barb had finally stepped back and let her daughter go through the list of grief counselors provided by Central Carolina Hospital on her own. She didn’t like the feeling of her mom breathing down her neck, but then again, the potential was there. If anyone could help Barb and Veronica resolve the long-standing push and pull of their mother-daughter relationship, Lisa could.

>   “I don’t know, Ma.” Veronica shrugged. “Maybe.” Sophie’s crying slowed in the background, only a small whine and then a little whimper as Barb reached out and touched Veronica’s arm. When her mother touched her, Veronica always felt a little closer to Sophie. The hands that did what hers could not yet. But hopefully soon . . . soon.

  With cautious movements, Barb slid her arm around her daughter’s shoulders and then, when she didn’t pull away, added another. It always surprised Veronica when she realized how small her mother was. Memories of her mother’s arms were usually of her as the protective giant and Veronica as the frightened child. But today her mother felt like the fragile one, and though her knee-jerk reaction was irritation at her mother’s over-the-top response, when Barb’s shoulders shook and she pressed her face into Veronica’s neck, her hot tears and breath touching Veronica’s skin reminded her that her mother had the same love for Veronica as Veronica had for Sophie.

  It wasn’t easy. In fact, it was nearly as hard as putting that formula in the cart and then letting the checker put it in a bag so she could take it home, but Veronica put her arms around her mother, the woman who seemed to find fault in her every time she turned around.

  At first Veronica’s arms floated there, hovering around the crying woman who had raised her nearly singlehandedly. But then, as though they were responding to some instinct from far in her past, they tightened, and her fingers rested in the soft side she used to put her face into when she was embarrassed and clutched the loose material limply hanging there.

  “I said maybe,” Veronica reiterated, detaching herself from her mother’s embrace, forcing the moment to a swift conclusion. Letting in any emotion made it hard to hold all the other ones at bay. Distance was better. “And the formula isn’t that big a deal.”

  Barb wiped at her eyes and stepped back to the end of the counter.

  “I’m proud of you for trying, sweetheart.”

  Instantly the irritation was back. Veronica stopped herself from rolling her eyes and then sighed. She was trying. Every day she woke up and went through the motions of life, she was trying harder than she’d ever tried. Anyway, she knew the only reason Barb was so excited about formula was because she wanted her daughter drugged up, and the excuse of nursing was the only thing holding her mother’s passive-aggressive nature from rearing its nasty head.

  She wanted to snap at her mother and tell her she could see what she was doing, but today she paused before the bitter words on her tongue burst out when she had a thought. How would she want Sophie to talk to her when she was grown? She cleared her throat and opened the cabinet above the sink before responding.

  “Thanks, Ma,” she said calmly, wondering why it felt like she was lying to her mother about her gratitude.

  Barb held her gaze for a moment longer and then grabbed the bottle again. “I’ll take this in to the nursery, then.”

  “Yeah. I mean, if she fell asleep in the swing, don’t worry about waking her. Just point the camera at the swing so I can watch her.” Veronica resumed unloading the groceries, this time starting to clear out the brown cloth grocery bag.

  Barb took one last look at her daughter that Veronica pretended not to notice. But then, when her mom turned to leave, Veronica paused, the jar of artichoke hearts in her hand halfway to the cupboard in front of her.

  “Please,” Veronica added, carefully placing the jar in its spot on the shelf, avoiding any glances at her mother. “I meant to say please.”

  “I know you did, dear.” Veronica could hear the smile in her mother’s voice, and as Barb went off to the nursery, Veronica allowed the corners of her mouth to turn up a little as well. Maybe therapy was worth it. Today she had bought formula, told a stranger about losing Nick, not run away when the baby was crying, and hugged her mom and felt empathy for her. So it wasn’t a magic pill, but maybe there was something to getting help after all. One day it wouldn’t be strangers and formula—it would be holding her daughter in her arms.

  CHAPTER 5

  “So you told the man from the waiting room about Nick? The whole story?”

  Veronica nodded and picked at the fraying seam in the armrest of the overstuffed chair. There were two chairs side by side and then one across the narrow room. The first time she’d walked into Lisa’s office, Lisa had offered her any chair. After Veronica had settled into the one closest to the back wall, Lisa had sat and said, “Congratulations—that will most likely be your chair for every visit we have together.” She had explained that people were creatures of habit. Once they picked a chair, it usually was theirs for life.

  “I mean, we were at the grocery store, and I told him I was a widow, which seemed to make him feel bad for me or something at first—and that made me mad because I should know better by now, you know?” Lisa nodded at her as though she did know. “It kinda made me want to show him I was okay and that I didn’t need his sympathy. So I blurted it all out. I told him how I went to sleep early because Nick was supposed to take the night shift with Sophie. I told him about searching the house for them and then the weird texts. I told him about the phone call and going to the morgue. God, I even told him about Sophie’s surgery and how I wasn’t allowed to pick her up for a month and that by the time it was okay, I couldn’t bring myself to do it.”

  Tears welled up in her eyes, and Veronica grabbed for a tissue from the box on a little carved table to her left. She was always surprised at how pretty the office was and at the whirring sound machine in the hallway that almost sounded like waves. At first it made her chuckle in her wry, sarcastic way, like the counselors were trying too hard. But now she found it comforting, like she was visiting an oasis from life each week when she walked in the door.

  “Wow, Veronica, I love that you felt like you could open up, but you do know that you don’t have to tell anyone your story that you don’t want to, right? It is your story to tell, and no one has the right to know it.”

  “I know, but at first I thought he was looking at me like he didn’t believe me, like I’d lie about my husband dying just to get rid of a guy hitting on me.” The outrage swelled inside her again, but it wasn’t his questioning look. It was how that look changed when tears filled her eyes. Then he’d looked at her, really looked at her after she’d said she was a widow, as though he could read her sorrow in the lines around her eyes or the fall of her hair. It was unnerving.

  “Maybe what upset you wasn’t that you perceived that he didn’t believe you, but more that he showed interest in you. He did give you his business card, right? What do you think about that?”

  Veronica remembered the card; she’d put it in the small wallet attached to her phone case. She kept a couple of random bills there and an emergency credit card in case she ever lost her wallet. Now she had his card, safe and hidden from her mother’s prying eyes and safe from her guilty conscience. She ran her thumb over the diamond ring she still kept on her left-hand ring finger. It felt so right there, so comforting. Between a diaper bag for a purse, a ring, and a less-than-cheerful attitude, she had a nearly impenetrable fortress when it came to men. It felt good. It felt safe.

  “I’m just not ready to date yet. I can’t even think about it. I should have a husband and a baby. We should be commiserating about how hard it is to get going in the morning after being up all night. I should be taking a video of Sophie crawling across the floor and texting it to Nick. I should have his unending love and support and be able to give it back in return. But I don’t. And when that desire to love and support bubbles up inside me—I can’t imagine giving that to anyone else but him.”

  Veronica stared at her ring. It glittered just as brilliantly as the day Nick had gone down on one knee in the middle of the Guggenheim and yelled, “Will you marry me!” garnering them more than one dirty look. How could a ring last longer than a human being? How did it go from being a symbol of their future to a symbol of their love to a symbol of all she had lost? “I know he’s gone, but . . . I can’t seem to refocus that love
onto anyone else. Not my mom, not Sophie, and definitely not the random man at the supermarket.”

  “This is the time in our session that I remind you there are medications that could help you, Veronica. Zoloft is completely compatible with breastfeeding and prescribed all the time for PPD. I have a psychiatrist that I refer my patients to regularly. I promise you’ll like him.” She flipped through her organizer and fished out a crisp, off-white business card. “Dr. Larkin. He’s great.”

  Lisa held the card out toward Veronica, crossing the divide that usually acted as an invisible barrier between them. Veronica stared at it, sure that if she touched it, she’d break out in hives like when she ran through the patch of poison ivy in the third grade.

  “No, thanks,” she said, putting up her hands, not even willing to look at the card much less hold it in her hands. It wasn’t that she had anything against medication; she’d seen it help her college roommate when she was overcome with the crushing anxiety that came with OCD and perfectionism and a full freshman course load. And at one point a few months after Nick died, her editor confided that she’d taken antidepressants after her son was born and that after therapy and time, she tapered off the meds and was doing well now. Medication was fine, good, lifesaving even, but Veronica wasn’t ready for that just yet.

  “I’m going to ask you every week, you know that, right?” Lisa said, as she had every week for almost two months.

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “One of these days, you are going to take that card,” Lisa said as she tucked the card back into its slot and closed her zippered binder.

  A bubble of stubbornness inflated inside Veronica at Lisa’s confident tone. It was the same feeling she got when her mother told her she needed to start dating or that she put the toilet paper on the wrong way. If she was going to take medication or stop nursing or go to a psychiatrist, then it would be her decision. Not her mother’s and not even Lisa’s.