Walking on Broken Glass (12 page)

Was I supposed to speak? She didn’t seem quite as threatening, but then I noticed she hadn’t yet applied her war paint. And she definitely did not have mental telepathy or she surely would have swatted the blazes out of me by now.

“Okay.” I glared back.

“So, you finished or what ’cuz I got some business to do in here, you know?” She pulled a pink plastic case out of the front pocket of her jeans and wiggled it as if I was capable of seeing only moving objects. “This ain’t no pencil case.” She waved the tampon container toward the door. “I’ll let you know when I’m done.”

Lucky for her, the universal rule of menstrual cycle sisterhood worked in her favor here. “Sure.” I shrugged my shoulders and eased past her. I hoped the fumes of whatever perfume she wore wouldn’t settle on me in the seconds I needed to escape.

I headed to the rec room to wait to be herded to breakfast. After last night's feast of peanut butter and jelly, I woke up ready to chew on the pillow.

The women were the only ones moving around. Annie was back in her corner with her ever-present magazine. I tossed a feeble “hello” in the direction of
Good Housekeeping
. It nodded back. Maybe I could dash across the room, yank the magazine out of her hands, and … and what, genius? Run away. Yep. That's probably what I’d do. A few seconds of brain-numbing ridiculous behavior followed by the awful recognition of my own stupidity. And then flight. Hmmm. Why does this feel so familiar?

“Hey, the bathroom's yours if you want it now. I even sprayed it all up for you.” Theresa's burp punctuated her arrival in the rec room and her announcement. “Whoa! Watch out now.” She laughed, slammed her fist into her chest, and then
umpfed
on the sofa next to me.

“Thanks, but I’m all done for now,” I said, grateful to bypass the aromatic aftermath of Hurricane Theresa. Any other year, I’d be combating the aftermath of a weekend at the lake house. Morning Bloody Marys, margaritas for lunch on the pier, late afternoon sunset martinis, and wine with dinner. My 24-hour prescription for surviving the toxic dose of Carl's mother during the day and Carl at night.

“So, what's with book chick over there?” Theresa said, and nodded her happy curls in Annie's direction.

I pretended to be intrigued by the viewing guide scrolling on the television. She leaned closer and whispered, “She stuck-up or something?”

I glanced at Annie, who still hadn’t moved. She had to have heard Theresa's question. I’m sure half the wing heard her. A Theresa whisper is on the level of ordinary conversation.

“I don’t really know. Maybe you should ask her.”

Theresa leaned back into the mushy sofa cushion, folded her arms behind her head, and eyed Annie like she was up for auction. Her feet alternately tapped the floor; the movements rippled up her body and jiggled her stomach to the beat. Even deep thinking was a physical activity for Theresa.

“Nah,” she said, “I don’t think I’m gonna need someone else to talk to. I got you, right?”

At that moment I wanted to bash Annie and her magazine-addicted self over the head.

O
n the way down to breakfast, Cathryn announced the day would start with a group session with Dr. Sanders.

“That ain’t no good after breakfast,” Benny grumbled.

“Yeah, so what meal is it good after, huh, kid?” We could always count on Doug for our reality check.

“Me, I don’t care when it starts as long as I got time to go the bathroom,” Theresa said.

I shifted to let Theresa out of the elevator and caught Annie either twitching or actually winking at me. The corners of her mouth seemed suspiciously turned skyward for a nanosecond. Her usual slather of green eye shadow had been replaced by an iridescent violet, meant, I think, to coordinate with the tie-dyed pink and purple blouse shoved into waist-cinching khaki shorts. Annie's clothes had not yet surrendered themselves to what must have been a new body shape.

“So, how are you and Theresa working out?” Annie didn’t lift her eyes from the gray cafeteria tray she pulled from the stack. I looked over my shoulder, not even sure she was talking to me. We were the last two in line, so she really was breaking her vow of silence.

“I can tolerate anything for twenty-three more days,” I said. “Even these scrambled eggs with bits of what I’m praying are bacon or some sort of meat substance.”

Annie stopped to survey the bread options. “Yeah, but now you’re doing it sober.” She picked up two lumpy biscuits, stacked them onto her plate next to her mini-tower of sausage patties, picked up her tray, and walked toward an empty table at the far edge of the cafeteria.

So much for the beginning of that friendship.

How could Annie not like me? Most people at least liked me. Well, if I didn’t count my mother-in-law, and I didn’t. The thud of absolute loneliness that crashed into my gut echoed through the dining hall. How ridiculous! I’m a professional. I have a college degree. Plus graduate hours. I have friends. I have a husband. A house in the right zip code. I drive a Lexus. And not one person in this motley assortment of human beings talked to me.

I ate at a table for two near a window. At least I had a view if not a human companion. I swirled the syrup on my disorganized stack of pancakes. Not at all like Carl's. What was he thinking as he ate breakfast this morning? Probably not about dreading group therapy.

Dr. Frank Sanders already sat in the group room when we arrived. He stationed himself in a chair closest to the door. Was that to expedite his getaway or to prevent ours?

A circle of submarine gray folding chairs waited. The only seats not occupied were on either side of the doctor. Naturally. But my teacher-self realized the advantage of not being in eye-lock view of the man in charge. Peripheral vision tended to eliminate the possibility I’d have to be subjected to one of his squirm-inducing stares.

Everyone was quiet. Sanctuary quiet. Like any moment a priest or minister or rabbi or Dali Lama would start services quiet. Even Theresa was mute. She held her pudgy hands hostage under her thighs, which seemed to ooze off the seat, and stared at her kneecaps. Doug's long legs acted as ballasts as he teetered on the back chair legs, his neck barely holding up his head. His splotched hands, threaded together on his bloated stomach, were the shade of pancakes I barely ate for breakfast. The boy teens’ U2 fire-red shirts were the only bolts of color in the otherwise naked room. The overhead lights were so white and punishing they could have been used for police interrogations. The unforgiven in an unforgiving room.

Dr. Sanders looked around, taking emotional temperatures as his eyes flicked from one of us to the other. He smelled fresh, like pine trees, like my brother. If I closed my eyes for just a moment, I could pretend Peter sat next to me, and we were in the movies waiting for the lights to fade into black. Only there's no black, no fading, no Peter.

“First day, first group. Let's start with an introduction. First names only and how you came to be here. I’ll start.” Dr. Frank, a psychiatrist, was in recovery from an addiction to Demerol and Dilaudid and other pain medications outside the realm of pronunciation.

I prayed we’d do the clockwise round because my tongue felt paralytic, and a Civil Defense air-raid siren drilled into my eardrums. I heard Vince's post-adolescent voice and stopped holding my breath.

“Hey. I’m Vince and, like, my mom, she told me I had to be here or else she’d, like, figure out a way for me to be in jail, ya know. She got all whacked when she found out I was skipping school. Well, I guess I’m addicted to pot, X, whatever gets me flying. I ain’t old enough to buy alcohol.” He shrugged his shoulders.

“Dude, that's funny.” Benny gave him a fake punch in his arm. “You not being able to buy drinks or go to bars and you still ended up here.”

No one else laughed, not even a stifled giggle. I wanted to award him bonus points for catching the irony of it all.

“Me? I’m Benny. My old lady, she liked that guy Elton John. Guess he's a guy. Anyway, she liked the song he wrote about Benny and his jets. So, I’m nineteen. I started using, but I told my old lady when I get here she the reason I’m here. I mean, look where she got my name.”

I knew I should listen to Benny's story—there's probably a test later. But no matter how often I swallowed, the knot in my throat wouldn’t dissolve. I had that first day of school shivering anticipation, only then I knew what I was going to say. I wished I had a script. If my contacts didn’t make me want to rip my eyes out I wouldn’t be forced to wear glasses, which at this moment slipped down my oily nose. At least the sweats camouflaged my lumpy legs, which had been acting as silos for the ice cream that had become one of my daily food groups.

“Leah?”

My child voice escaped before I had time to add years to it, “Oh, I’m sorry. I’m next?”

Dr. Sanders didn’t answer. He just nodded and gripped his pen. An extra fine point. My favorite. I lusted after pens. I probably shouldn’t share that today. Someone coughed. I focused on the outer rim of Theresa's hair.

“Well, my name is Leah. I’m married. My husband's name is Carl.” Each word sounded like a stone carefully placed. I paused, knowing I’m supposed to share how I became a willing inmate.
I’m here, if you really want to know the truth, which if we did, none of us would be here, but the truth was I have to be
drunk to have sex with my husband. So now I’m here, and I’m not only not drinking, I’m not having sex.

“Umm. Well, I’m here because my friend Molly took me to lunch and said I needed to stop drinking. Not that I was drinking all that much. But, you know, I’m just mid-stage, and, well, I just mostly drink beer.”

Doug snorted. “Girl, I’ve spilled more beer on my tie than you drank in your whole little life. I don’t even know why you’re here.”

“Doug, shut it down. You don’t need to be all over new chick, giving her a hard time and all.” Wow. Theresa to the rescue?

“Seems to me like she got lost on her way to the country club or somethin’.” Doug slapped his hands on his knees and leaned forward. I wasn’t sure if he was going to throw up or stand up.

“Leah?” Once again, Mr. Doctor's voice. “Why are you smiling?”

“Why am I smiling?” I echoed, rotated my wedding band, and stared at the floor. This wasn’t a question I was prepared to answer. I didn’t read about a smiling probation period in the papers Ms. Wattingly had given me. Why did it matter? A test? Lady or the tiger? Sobriety behind one door. Insanity behind the other. Still the band spun around my finger. So much friction, my fingers would explode into flames. My hand on fire would put a stop to that smiling.

“I … I just smile. I don’t think about it, really. I always smile. I mean not always, but mostly.” I was a stammering adult, apologizing for a smile. This was why people drank. This and the fact that I now held a conversation with the floor.

“Uh-huh.” Mr. Doctor's pen tap-danced on his clipboard.

I knew that response. I practiced it often in teaching, mostly at parent conferences or in discussions with school board personnel. Loosely translated, it meant, “I don’t believe one syllable of what you’re telling me, and I don’t think you do, either, but we’re just not going to go there now.”

Finally, I suspended my psychic transference with the floor. When I lifted my head, the first face I saw was Annie's. Her eyes were dull, like unpolished silver. An invisible screen separated us. She focused on a movie playing itself out, one only she could see. I stopped smiling.

The pause allowed time for random body shifting. Even my well-padded posterior felt numb. It didn’t help that the room could have doubled as a meat locker. The near-freezing temperature must have some effect on addictions. In that space of quiet, I allowed myself my first deep breath since the mini-interrogation.

Everyone else seemed comfortable with the stillness. Me? I waited for the other shoe to fall. Why?

Exactly.

Why did I have to gird myself for impending doom? If the bad thing hadn’t already happened, it's sure enough going to happen, and it's just a matter of time, probably even closer than you think if something good's happened, so buck up, baby. Hold on. The breath out of everyone's mouth was a gale force wind.

A few coughs broke the stillness. Theresa sneezed and wiped her hands on her jeans. One of the U2 kids belched. They both laughed. Annie surfaced from her meditative state. Doug snored. Amazing. Minus the gravel he seemed to be processing through his nostrils, he could be mistaken for someone deeply prayerful.