Braided Gold

by Glen Roylance

  Paul chose to be unmoved by Cathy’s tears or perhaps to defend himself against them. “And so this specialist examined you and said he wanted to hospitalize you for some tests?”

  Cathy continued haltingly. “He says he can’t be sure about anything without the tests. … If there’s a tumor he says I could have had it even before I got pregnant.”

  Paul reeled emotionally with the impact of what he perceived as an indictment. There were memories of his repeated humiliation of Cathy as she complained of physical discomfort. He remembered the night he had sarcastically educated her on the fine points of psychosomatic illness: “You know, Cathy, I’ve reviewed literature that describes these kinds of problems as having a psychological origin. In fact, you might be surprised to know that nearly seventy-five percent of all ailments are psychological in nature. It’s unresolved stress or personal conflicts that make most people sick.”

  There was also the time Cathy had spoken to him about her fainting spell at work and the bank manager’s alarm, which Paul had interpreted as nothing more than concern for the bank’s public image. He remembered Cathy’s explanation that she had been placed on work leave until after the baby was born and his own angry response. The prospect of his having to take on additional employment and slow down his graduate program had been unpalatable. His belittling words had been brutal: “Cathy, you’re just not emotionally equipped to handle the challenges you’re facing here in Michigan. I’ll tell you what you have done; you’ve created a ‘make believe’ world for yourself. You continually picture yourself as a mother taking care of little children because that would be psychologically safer than the life you’re being asked to live. You feel so inadequate that you’re trying to carve out a fantasy life where you could be more successful.”

  In a flash these and other painful memories flooded over Paul that morning as he looked at Cathy’s pitiful form on the living room sofa. They were as an indictment standing against him. But an impulse from the core of his being fought against these ugly accusations, leaving him incapable of opening himself to the associated guilt and feelings of accountability. They were like dangerous sea water to a foundering ship. If allowed inside, the consequences could be disastrous. Thus, his response had been surprisingly cold and unfeeling, even to himself.

  “I just have one question about all of this,” said Paul. “What do you want from me? You and Lucy have managed quite well without me. Why not just go ahead and do what you have to do? Oh, but there is the matter of money, isn’t there? Someone has to pick up the tab now that the two of you have convinced the good doctors that all these dark symptoms have credibility. ‘And here come the tests, Paul – just thought we’d let you know!’”

  Cathy was openly sobbing. “Don’t make it so hard for me, please!”

  “Maybe you should call the good doctor and explain that your husband doesn’t have the money for medical tests. That might change his mind as to how urgent your symptoms are.” Allowing the sting of his words to fully register, Paul walked to the bedroom closet and put on his jacket. A few moments later he paused at the front door, brief case in hand. “If I had known that being married to you would become such a liability, I would have let you stay on as the family nursemaid in San Diego. Isn’t that where you’d rather be? And now, Cathy, I have an exam to take this morning.”

  The scene was pathetic, one that would haunt Paul throughout years to come. Cathy was trembling, almost hysterical. “Oh Paul, don’t leave me. … I need you. … Don’t you care what happens to me?”

  Paul opened the door and without looking back, put the finishing touches on his icy rejection of Cathy in this hour of great need. “If it’s so critical that you get to the hospital, have Lucy take you. This is her production!” The door slammed and he was gone.

  Angry, impulsive actions are hard to accurately understand. Even now, as he stood alone rehearsing that scene over and over again in his mind, it was difficult to make sense of what he had done. Something about the circumstances had ignited an emotional explosion within him, giving vent to accumulated frustrations and resentments that not only involved his marriage but earlier distressing chapters of his life. His actions had resembled a train running down a track with momentum that was hard to curb. For weeks he had felt the need to discipline Cathy, to set right those things that had gotten out of hand in his estimation. He rationalized that he was simply hurting her because she had hurt him – yes, she had hurt him! His golden hopes for the future, which had cast Cathy in an important supporting role, were now twisted and complicated. Instead of the buoyant, positive support he had expected from her during a critical part of his career, he perceived her needs and demands to have become inordinate, so much so that he had begun to regard the relationship as burdensome. But these efforts at justification could not satisfy his own troubled conscience!

  Neither anger nor its attendant self-justification can persist in people without there being a counterbalancing impulse from somewhere within them. This inner requirement that one judge his conduct by a true standard of justice can be deadened temporarily, but sooner or later it reemerges, making its demands for reparation – particularly when there has been a violation of love’s obligation. These inner dynamics of personality began to plague Paul the moment he walked away from Cathy that morning. They had continued to rise and fall like an ocean tide ever since. Though he set his will against feelings of self-accusation, he was unsuccessful at eliminating the agitation that engulfed him. It was a dreaded moment of truth.

  Paul’s examination that morning was in a behavioral statistics course. It was a class most graduate students in his field would have avoided, had it not been required. As he summoned his faculties to demonstrate competence with formulas and methods used in evaluating behavioral data against standards of statistical probability, he could not free himself of painful preoccupations that were ever present just beneath his conscious thoughts. Immediately after his exam he headed for a public telephone. When no one answered at home, he thumbed through the phone book until he located Lucy Bartlett’s number. A sitter, who sounded like an older woman, answered and explained that Lucy was at the University Hospital.

  Paul was scheduled to attend a seminar on learning theory later in the day but he knew that the scheduled discussion might as well be in a foreign language, for his mind, now fully charged with belated concern for Cathy, demanded that he immediately go to the hospital. There were some unavoidable delays on campus, but soon he was working his way through a maze of hallways as he approached the appropriate nurse’s station. A large woman wearing an ill-fitting uniform was very much in charge as he asked where he might find Cathy Kirkham.

  “This is not a good time for a visit. She is heavily sedated.”

  “I’d still like to see her. I’m her husband.”

  The battleship of a woman remained undaunted. “It won’t do either of you any good. She’s out like a light. Besides, the doctor has asked that she not be disturbed.”

  The nurse had been preparing a tray of medications for patients in that wing and went on with her work, seemingly unwilling to acknowledge Paul. Not to be put off so unceremoniously, Paul stepped nearer to the counter enclosure and spoke with obvious impatience.

  “I have some questions about my wife’s condition. Who would be best qualified to give me some answers?”

  The nurse put down her papers and gave Paul a stony look. “What is it you want to know?”

  “She was scheduled for some tests. Have they been completed?”

  “They have.”

  “And the results? Who do I talk to about the results?”

  “No one today. Didn’t Dr. Gordon talk to you about the time it takes to process these kinds of tests? He’ll probably want to meet with you tomorrow.”

  Paul’s impatience increased. “I have not spoken with him and I don’t know anything about your procedures here. I just want to know how my wife is doing; do you understand?”

  The nurse now looked direc
tly at Paul and her eyes searched his face with curiosity. She knew just enough about Cathy’s agitated state at the time of her admission to the hospital and of her husband’s detached role in the crisis to form a fairly accurate appraisal of the circumstances. Surmising more than she had been told, she was unwilling to relieve Paul of the awkwardness he was feeling. “Mr. Kirkham, I have been given no information about your wife’s condition, with the exception that her emotional state is sufficiently fragile that Dr. Gordon found it necessary to sedate her. He has given explicit instructions that she is to receive no visitors. I do not know how soon the results of today’s tests will be available, but when they are, the doctor will want to review his findings with you personally.”

  That was it! End of conversation! The woman now turned her attention to a stack of papers in front of her, and Paul, furious at having been treated like a “schoolboy,” turned and walked back down the hall. After searching in vain for Lucy Bartlett in the waiting areas, he returned to the University campus. But it was no good. At the height of his personal frustrations he drove back to Ypsilanti and his row house with its cardboard walls. He would need to speak with Lucy – his first item of business. But even as Paul was settling his mind upon an appropriate way to approach Lucy, she knocked at his door. He made a conscious decision to be gracious with her — to try to lift the pall left by the way he had spoken to Cathy that morning.

  “Come in, Lucy. I was just about to come over, myself.”

  At Paul’s invitation she seated herself, perching on the edge of a living room chair with obvious formality. Lucy’s manner was dutifully respectful, yet determined. It was apparent that she regarded her errand to be of great importance.

  “Cathy is in the University Hospital,” she announced solemnly. “I arranged for a sitter and …”

  Paul interrupted her before she could continue. “Yes, I was at the hospital earlier today but was not able to see her.”

  Lucy registered surprise. “Oh you were! Then you’re aware of what has happened?”

  “Not entirely. The nursing staff didn’t provide a lot of details. What can you tell me?”

  Somewhat puzzled at Paul’s graciousness, she commenced her rendition of the details. “It was a hard day for her. In fact, it was a nightmare. She needed you, not me. Cathy called me early this morning and was so distraught I could hardly make sense of what she was saying. You nearly pushed her over the edge, Paul.” She tried, but Lucy could not entirely hide her disdain for Paul.

  “It was an unfortunate misunderstanding. Cathy was in a despondent mood and must have read things into my words that were never intended. I called later in the morning to tell her I would be by to pick her up, but the two of you must have already left for the hospital.”

  This simple and seemingly sincere explanation softened Lucy’s demeanor as she continued. “Yes, after Cathy called, Carl and I arranged for a sitter and the three of us drove into Ann Arbor. I left Carl at school and stayed with Cathy all day. It took forever to get her admitted into the hospital, but as we got all of that behind us we received word that Dr. Gordon had been detained. At that point they assigned her a temporary bed in an outpatient area. I stayed until Dr. Gordon arrived, but there wasn’t much I could do for her. She sobbed like her heart was going to break. Maybe it did,” she added for Paul’s benefit.

  “When the doctor finally came, she was shaking like a leaf in the wind. It was impossible to make any sense of what she was trying to say. The doctor had to give her something to settle her nerves before he could even start with the tests he had scheduled.” Lucy paused, expecting a response from Paul, but when he said nothing she continued. “It took three hours to complete the tests, and then they moved her to a regular room. I had been waiting in a nearby lounge when the doctor called for me. He said they were going to keep her at the hospital until the test results were available. He didn’t think it would be good for her to return home in her emotional state. The doctor also asked that you call him. He would like to see you tomorrow.”

  Paul’s response was warm, but as he spoke, Lucy suspected that she was being patronized. “Lucy, we’re both indebted to you. Thanks for being such a good friend to Cathy. This is a rough turn in the road for us, but I’m grateful she’s in the hands of a good physician. Again, we have you to thank for that. I’m sorry all this responsibility fell to you and Carl today.” His composure had been unflappable.

  “I have the baby with me at home. Cathy thought it would be best if I kept him for a while.”

  “Yes, that would be very helpful. I’m sorry for the imposition. Hopefully this whole thing will resolve itself in a few days.”

  Lucy was unwilling to be dissuaded by Paul’s efforts at cordiality. She would speak her mind! “There’s a likelihood that Cathy has a brain tumor, Paul. That’s my doctor’s opinion. He says it could have been there for months. Those horrible morning sickness problems were probably something else all along. She was afraid to tell you how she really felt, but she told me. I was the only person she could talk to. She didn’t even tell her obstetrician about the headaches or dizziness. You made her feel guilty about all of that. Did you know that she has had numbness on the left side of her body for months?”

  Paul made no response.

  “No you didn’t know that because she was afraid to tell you. She was afraid to acknowledge it to herself because you told her she was sick emotionally. I know you won’t like it when I tell you this, but it has to be said. If you hadn’t made her feel so guilty about her symptoms she would have tried to get medical help much earlier. My doctor says that brain tumor symptoms are like a ticking time bomb – people just can’t afford to ignore them.

  “There are other things she was afraid to tell you, Paul. During the past three weeks she has begun to have blackout spells. One of them came while she was walking the floor with the baby in the middle of the night. She knows how you dislike the baby’s crying at night and while she was trying to get him to go back to sleep she lost consciousness. When she opened her eyes she was on the floor. The baby was next to her screaming with fright. When she told me what had happened, I decided to take matters into my own hands. I told her that if she wouldn’t call her doctor, I would. Then she worried about having to explain why she had kept all these symptoms to herself for such a long time. But I think she was even more concerned about the doctor’s bill. She was afraid for you to see it! So I scheduled her with my doctor and insisted that she keep the appointment. I told her I would pay the bill for his examination.”

  Lucy paused, waiting for some response to her indictment. But there was none. Paul was an enigma to her. “What is wrong with you?” she thought to herself; “Is it impossible for you to break inside? Don’t you know how to say to say, ‘I’m sorry?’ Are you completely incapable of making things right when you’ve been so terribly wrong? Do you really love Cathy? Are you capable of loving anybody but yourself?”

  Though these questions raced through her mind, she left them unspoken, deciding to leave well enough alone. Looking at her watch she broke the awkward silence, “I’d better get back home,” she said. Then searching for some indication as to the impact of her frankness, she added, “I’m sure the things I’ve said are offensive to you, … but I …”

  “There’s no need for concern. I understand your being upset and I accept what you’ve said, even though there are many details you don’t really understand.”

  They walked to the door where Lucy paused briefly and then added a final postscript to their conversation. “About Dr. Gordon – he’s a member of the faculty at the University Hospital. I’ve been told that he is one of the best neurosurgeons in the country.”

  “I’ll call him first thing in the morning,” said Paul.

  Although the exchange between Lucy and Paul had been diffused of its explosive potential, Lucy’s resentment remained. Perhaps she would have felt more satisfaction in an outright verbal scrap with Paul. As she returned home, her perceptions crystallize
d: Cathy was a casualty of Paul’s poisonous words – of his self-serving nature. He had stifled her great capacity to love and robbed her of her independence. He had forced his selfish perspective of things upon her, leaving Cathy bereft of personal identity and seriously damaging her sense of worth. All of this had made it possible for a foreboding pathology to be ignored, to remain undetected – to open the door to something that now threatened her very life.

  Though he had not openly acknowledged it, Lucy’s condemnation had, nevertheless, registered with Paul, and as the evening wore on he continued to grapple with her dark accusations.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Robert Gordon was a respected senior member of the University medical faculty, a man in his late fifties with a round, good-natured face and graying hair that had not yet begun to recede or show the effects of thinning. Not only was he highly skilled, but he was also gracious and kindly disposed towards the many patients who sought him out on the basis of his reputation. Over the years he had become a shrewd observer of people as they faced medical challenges. As Paul was shown into his office Dr. Gordon studied him with interest. He was confident that this young man was in the midst of a marital crisis, owing to the troubled emotional condition of his wife at the time of her admission to the hospital.

  The conspicuous role of Cathy’s friend, Lucy Bartlett, had also been somewhat perplexing. Her “in charge” manner and apparent sense of responsibility for Cathy’s welfare further underscored the detachment of the patient’s husband. But now, as Paul sat in Dr. Gordon’s presence, he projected a high level of interest and concern regarding his wife’s condition. Surprisingly, Paul had immediately seized the initiative in the conversation without a hint of deference.