The Ryer Avenue Story: A Novel

by Dorothy Uhnak

  Quietly, Megan asked, “Do you like this room? Find it comfortable and flat-out a mess?”

  Patsy looked around, flopped into an easy chair, hugged a huge pillow against her body. “Ummm. It’s comfortable. So … safe. Informal. My God. My house is decorator perfect. Even the kids’ rooms. Enough storage that everything can be scooped up at the end of the day, and there’s no sign left of anyone actually living there.” As though talking to herself, she added, “Even the kids’ rooms. All in order.”

  “That’s an interesting word to use—safe.”

  “Hey, c’mon, Megan, don’t start playing shrink with me, okay?”

  “I am a shrink. I don’t play at it. Okay, you’re right. I have to remember when to turn it off.” Casually, she reached over and handed Patsy one of Mike’s latest books. “Do you recognize this?”

  She smiled suddenly, a relaxed, warm smile. “Yes, of course. Mike Kelly. His books are wonderful. They’re fun, so human. My kids were raised on Seuss and Kelly. Do you know him?” She hunched forward. “Is he a patient of yours?”

  Megan grinned. “He’s my husband. He has his studio on the top floor, and I have my office right here. This room. We live in the rest of the house.”

  Patsy looked astonished, as though Megan were talking about another world. “You’re married? But … I found you listed in the telephone book as Dr. Megan Magee.”

  “I kept my professional name. After all, I had been building a practice before I got married. Professionally, I use Magee. Otherwise, I’m Mrs. Kelly. We have a son, Jordan. He’s nearly ten.” Without knowing she was going to do it, Megan reached down, patted her braced leg. “You didn’t think old Pegleg Megan would ever get anyone to marry her?”

  “Oh, Megan, God. I never called you anything like that. No. It’s just—how can you use your maiden name? Doesn’t he—Mike, your husband—object? You have your own separate life? I mean, my God, you’re famous. You write all those articles and give lectures and things. How did you get so lucky?”

  Megan watched her closely, picking up clues. “Mike doesn’t let me. It isn’t for him to give me permission. We’re two adults. He’s my husband, not my keeper.”

  “But who takes care of things? The house, your kid, the cleaning and cooking, the planning, the entertaining, all of that?”

  “We have a cleaning woman once a week.” She glanced around. “She’s no dynamo, but she is reliable. We take turns getting Jordan back and forth to wherever he’s supposed to be. We work it out. As for cooking, I gotta tell you. I can’t wait for Jordan to take his turn. He’s pretty good at salads and some basics, and Mike is a much better cook than I am. And, my God, there are enough restaurants within walking distance, we could eat out every night for a month and never eat the same food twice. Not that they’re all wonderful—God, every kook with an apron and a pot seems to try things out down here. That’s the Village. Very laid back. What’s wrong? You look confused.”

  “This is very different from my life. Oh, we all read what’s-her-name, Betty Friedan—The Feminine Mystique. Frankly, I can’t buy into most of it. But some of your articles about women—I’ve read them in the supermarket magazines—they’re really interesting. Make you stop and think.”

  Megan had begun recently to write for popular magazines rather than just the professional medical journals. She wanted to reach a wider audience, not just the stuffy, critical, threatened world of her male colleagues. She went for the most readily accessible outlet—the largest-circulation women’s magazines—to tell women that times were changing, that they were growing up to be adults. They had a right to be full partners, a right to a piece of the world.

  “But I don’t know anyone who actually lives the way you write about. Women going back to college, planning for regular careers when their kids are grown. Thinking … about themselves. Not in Lloyd’s Neck, anyway.”

  “Well, I guess suburbia has its own pace and its own rules. God, looking at you, I bet you play tennis three times a week and beat everybody you play.”

  Patsy smiled bitterly. “I ran out of women opponents a long time ago, and I don’t play men anymore—they can’t take it, being beaten by a woman. It’s just not the ‘done thing.’ I guess we have our rules, even if nobody calls them that. My normal weight is about a hundred and ten, for instance. I never go over that, at least when I’m not pregnant. We’re all slim, all well groomed, wear the latest clothes, entertain to the hilt. Our kids are cookie-cutter kids, all good at everything. We get them to swimming lessons and tennis and Little League, the girls to Brownies, the boys to Scouts. There are dance classes and art classes … well, I don’t imagine it’s all that much different in the city. You must do pretty much the same for your son.”

  Megan shook her head. “He’s a city kid. We manage. He seems happy. He’s a good student and a good athlete. He goes to a good private school, but they don’t emphasize competitive sports very much.”

  “Ah, that’s the word, kiddo—competitive. God, we compete about anything in my little world. If you come up with a recipe, you’d kill before you’d share it with your best friend. One woman found out her kid’s IQ was one-sixty. You can’t imagine how often the subject of intelligence tests pops up in her conversation.

  “Mostly, we try to be subtle. Sort of casually mention our husband’s new promotion, our new car, how much money the damn new cleaning woman wants.

  “And I’ll tell you the dirtiest secret. No matter how great your newest success is—it’s only perfect if your best friend just failed at something. Nice, huh? Aren’t we great? Jesus!”

  “Which is a way of saying life’s too short not to live it, at least in some respects, the way you want to. Right?”

  Patsy hugged the pillow against her again. Megan studied her old childhood friend. She looked for the nearly forgotten face, remembered the high-spirited, tough, determined young girl, who took any dare, any challenge. What she saw was a desperate and defeated woman.

  “Patsy, you’ve got a lot of things on your mind. I think you could use some help. We all do from time to time. I get the feeling you’re about to explode. Have you had any therapy? It’s not as hard as you think, once you get started.”

  “Therapy? Yeah, I had therapy. I went to this old guy, with his picture of Freud staring straight down at me from the wall. This was after my third kid was born, in less than four years. I felt tired all the time. I felt like a prisoner. Know what this sonofabitch asked me? He asked me what I wanted out of life. He told me I had everything any woman in the world would envy. A husband who worked hard to give me a beautiful home; pretty, healthy kids; nice friends. What more could a woman want? I told him I didn’t know. I thought maybe I was missing out on something. Maybe I should think about going back to school, just take some night courses—you’re for that, right? So, someday, when the kids were older, I could get a job. Start a little business of my own. You know what he asked me? Did I want to wear the pants in the family? Maybe my husband should stay home, wear a skirt, be a housewife? He told me to stop putting myself first, and think more about my husband and children. That was a woman’s greatest role, most fulfilling place in life. He told me to put things into perspective; to count my blessings, weigh them against my discontent. Then he suggested that if I really needed time away from the household—everyone did from time to time—I should buy myself a gorgeous nightgown, get my hair done, buy some new perfume and makeup, and have my husband take me away, just the two of us, to a wonderful hotel suite in the city, or a lodge upstate, where I could be a wonderful lover to him. Maybe try something new. After all, husbands work hard, they get tired and bored. It was up to the woman; otherwise, their men might stray into other fields, look toward other women. And if I needed some time away from my daily responsibilities during the day, I should hire a baby-sitter once a week or so and do volunteer work in a hospital. Period. End of therapy.”

  Megan cursed softly, in words that seemed to shock Patsy. “Fucking sonofabitch. You didn’t
have ‘therapy,’ you had male-dominated brainwashing. I know some good women therapists, Patsy. One in particular who’d be just right for you—”

  “Forget it. That’s not what I need. That’s not what I’m here for.”

  Finally, Patsy was getting to it. In a quiet, neutral tone, Megan asked, “Okay, Patsy, why are you here? What do you need?”

  “I want an abortion.”

  “An abortion? Patsy, I couldn’t help you out there. I’m not … I’m a psychiatrist. And anyway—”

  “You’re a doctor. You know doctors who—”

  “For God’s sake, Patsy. Abortion is illegal. Surely you know about birth control. You’ve had five kids already, why the hell didn’t you—”

  “I did. Try. But he—Randy—I know he can’t rape me. He’s my husband. But that’s what he did. He raped me. He got mad about something and it carried over to the bedroom. He threw my diaphragm down the toilet, and we had a terrible fight. A physical fight. Randy is a big guy, and I’m not so tough anymore. I’m worn down. He forced me. It was like a stranger, doing that to me. If he was anyone else, you’d say he raped me, but he’s my husband. He’s done it before. So here I am. Nothing I can do about it. He was entitled. That’s what he said. He was entitled, anytime he wants.”

  Megan said, “He raped you. You better believe it.”

  “I won’t have this kid. I want an abortion. I can’t go through this all over again. Not the way this happened. I don’t know what else to do. I will not have this baby.”

  “Don’t you have a doctor you trust, who you can talk to?”

  “My regular doctor is one of my girlfriends’ husbands. You know what a pal he is? He gives us all amphetamines a few months after we give birth, and the baby is on the bottle, so we can ‘get our energy and our figures back.’ We’re all a bunch of speeders, Megan; sometimes I don’t know if I’m coming or going. So that’s my life. That’s it. I’m waiting and I don’t know what for. Nothing will ever change. My life is what it has been and will be, and it’s worth nothing at all.”

  Megan went to her desk, fingered her Rolodex, then looked at Patsy thoughtfully. “Patsy, tell me something. It’s always bothered me. When we were fourteen, when I got back from the rehab, why did you just abandon me? It was when I needed a friend most of all in my life. I needed you, and you just dumped me.”

  Patsy shrugged. “Megan, c’mon. I was fifteen. I got into a group of girls and the word was, ‘Hey, what boys are going to come around if they see … a crippled girl hanging around with us?’ I guess all kids are cruel at that age.” She covered her face with the pillow for a moment, then emerged. “Don’t you think I’ve realized by now I threw away the best friendship I ever had? We were always so honest with each other. No bullshit—for better or worse, we never had to pretend with each other. I’ve never had that kind of relationship with anyone again. Megan, I’ve thrown my life away. It’s nothing. You, look what you’ve done. Me, I’m a ghost. Nothing.”

  And then, suddenly, Patsy smiled. Her grin was warm and familiar and she laughed and tossed the pillow at Megan, stood up, and spread out her arms as though imitating an airplane, the way a kid would do.

  “God, Megan. I almost forgot. The one thing I did do. The one dream I did fulfill.”

  Megan held her finger on a card in the Rolodex surprised to see the change in Patsy.

  “What? My God, Patsy, what?”

  Patsy flopped back onto the couch and put her feet up on the heavy, cluttered coffee table.

  “I took flying lessons. I used to sneak out, God, after my fourth kid was born. He, Randy, thought I was learning Chinese cooking, for God’s sake. Only one of my friends knew. She’d go to cooking class, then give me the recipes, and we’d prepare a joint dinner. To fool Randy. Megan, I actually soloed.”

  “What was it like?”

  Patsy’s face glowed; her expression was that of an ecstatic twelve-year-old. “It was like liberation. To get into that plane and look straight ahead, to be in complete control, complete charge, to rise up off the ground, to go into the air. On my own, so … so alone, but not lonely. To look down, to be above it all, to … Oh, God, Megan, it was like being a kid again, only a competent kid, a grownup kid. It was dream time.”

  “What happened? Did you get your pilot’s license?”

  “Randy found out. He went nuts. Told me how crazy I had been. What if … you know, all the what-ifs. I put my life in jeopardy; what would have happened to my children, to him, to our home, to our life? How could I be so irresponsible, so selfish, so unthinking?” She shrugged. “Never did get my pilot’s license. I came close, though.”

  Megan latched on to this. “How close? How many more … solos, lessons, would it take?”

  “Oh, it would all come back. I’ve never forgotten one single thing about it. I could get into a plane now, right now, and take off. And fly. God, the feeling.”

  Megan said, “Then hold on to that. Keep that for yourself. Get back to it. Let that be yours, Patsy. It is yours. Wow, Peerless Patsy takes to the sky.”

  Patsy smiled. “Oh, boy. Remember that? ‘Peerless Patsy’ and ‘Magnificent Megan.’ Well, you are magnificent, Megan. Your whole life is. You are.”

  “Oh, I have my very less-than-magnificent moments, believe me. We all do.” She jotted down the name of a doctor, said, “Okay, look. I’ll give this guy a call tonight, you call him tomorrow morning. Oh, how many weeks pregnant are you?”

  “Not weeks, kiddo. Months. Almost … more than five months. I’ve always been irregular, so at first I wasn’t sure. But I do know. For sure. I never even show until the sixth month. But it’s been that long.”

  Megan crumpled the piece of paper in her hand. “For God’s sake, Patsy, it’s too late. Why the hell didn’t you come earlier? There’s no way, now, at this late date—”

  “There has to be a way.”

  “Patsy, there’s a real, live, well-formed baby there. An abortion now … no doctor I know would—”

  Patsy stood up, the toughness seemed to come back over her. “Thanks, Megan. For nothing. Oh, well, what the hell.”

  “Patsy, your life doesn’t have to be the way it is now. After you’ve had the baby, call me. I promise—you can get help, honestly. My God, you’re barely forty years old, you’ve got the whole future to get on with. You can have a better life, I promise.”

  Patsy looked around the room, then back at Megan. “You were the tough one, kiddo. You really took charge of your life. Well’, we can’t all be Megan Magee. Bum leg and all, you really did it.” Abruptly, she reached out and hugged Megan. “I did love you, Megan. I loved us. All those dreams we had, we were so innocent. But we were girls. Wrong plumbing, that’s what they used to say. ‘Those tomboys got everything but the right plumbing.’ Well, it was good to see you, Megan.”

  Patsy pulled back and stared at Megan, as though memorizing her face. Megan felt a cold, helpless fear, which Patsy caught.

  She grinned. “Listen. I always have an easy birth. This one will be quick and easy—not to worry. And then, after a while, God, I will get back to flying. I’ll make you a promise, Megan. I’ll get my license and take you up there with me. Just the two of us. We’ll be twelve years old again, how about it?”

  For a split second she saw the young Patsy; the two of them together, funny, brave, silly, crazy with their own sense of life and determination.

  “That is one promise I’m gonna make sure you keep, kiddo.”

  After Patsy left, promising to call, to keep in touch, Megan gathered her notes for her evening lecture at NYU. Maybe it was because she had had polio, and was out of the race didn’t have to get on with the same prescribed life as all the other girls she grew up with. Maybe her braced leg had given her the freedom to make special demands on herself. Maybe the steel brace and the limp had kept her from becoming Patsy.

  Megan shook her head. She couldn’t go back to being twelve years old, not for more than a few reminiscing moments at a time. But she
wished she could, she and Patsy, even for just a minute—just long enough to make life plans.

  Megan would not have changed anything at all about her own life. She wondered how many people would be able to say the same.

  A little after six o’clock, between the classes she taught at NYU, Megan stopped off at her small office for some coffee. There was a message on her spike to call her father. Jesus, did she forget her mother’s birthday? Again?

  Her father’s voice was low and calm. “They called me because someone recognized your name on the note and remembered you were my daughter.”

  Patsy Wagner Fenton had left Megan’s brownstone in Greenwich Village, taken a cab to the Empire State Building, got on an elevator to the seventy-fourth floor. She’d tucked a note, addressed to Dr. Megan Magee, into one of her carefully placed shoes, next to her neatly folded jacket and coat and her pocketbook.

  Then she’d opened the window at the end of the hall and jumped. She’d hit the side of the building on the sixty-eighth floor, bounced hard against a window, then ricocheted out into space. She’d landed on Thirty-fourth Street, a few feet from Fifth Avenue, where she’d nearly hit two tourists from Iowa who were deciding whether to visit the Empire State Building now, or first thing in the morning.

  The note, addressed to Megan said, “Peerless Patsy decided to solo without you. Hello, Amelia. Goodbye, Magnificent Megan.”

  Mike held his wife in his arms and let her talk.

  “God, I shouldn’t have just let her walk out. I wanted to believe that she’d make it. That she’d come back and ask for a therapist, after the baby was born. It wasn’t realistic of me. It was just the easy way out.”

  “Megan, you can’t blame yourself for Patsy’s whole adult life.”

  “But she reached out to me and—”

  “For an instant fix. A miracle that only she could accomplish, and with a hell of a lot of hard work. I shouldn’t have to tell you this; you’re the doctor.”

  “But it hurts so much.”