“Jane?” Old Doctor says.
I hear him, but I want to move on. He wants to discuss my father. What I remember of him during the holidays. I’ve been barfing out my usual responses for more than twenty minutes: I was only eleven, and he died on Christmas Eve. Of course, “died” isn’t right. It is like me saying “incident” about my incident, I suppose, but I’d never tell Old Doctor that. Died is what you say about people who go, gently or not, into that good night propelled by some external force: cancerous cells or a speeding car. My father called his own shot. He hit his own switch, as the patients here at Life House are fond of saying. My father killed himself. (That’s how Old Doctor would want me to say it, with honesty and frankness.)
“I remember very little about his death,” I say, which is both true and untrue, but to say anything else now, after all my half memories told and untold over the past year, would raise too many questions. And I know why he is asking. It’s because I’m going home and it’s Christmas and inevitably things will be stirred up. That’s what the holidays are for me: a big stir-up-shit festival. People don’t get this, but memories are just like the future. You can’t plan for when they show up, and you’ve got no control over them when they do. Worst of all, the older you get, the sadder they are. At least, that’s been my experience.
And by the way, nobody stirs the shit like my mother. That’s what Old Doctor is probably biting his nails about late at night. He’s met my mother, so he knows. She’s bonkersville with all the photographs in every fucking room, like having a picture in your room will keep your dead husband alive in your heart. It certainly keeps the depression alive and kicking in mine. Leaving the house, of course, isn’t an option either. For instance, if you go shopping at the Stop and Shop, a banal act by any sane person’s account, every aisle is the location of a forgotten memory. “Oh, your father loved Honey Nut Cheerios,” or, “Coffee, your father just loved the aroma of a freshly brewed cup.” Really, Mom? Did he like the soft feel of Charmin toilet paper too? It’s enough to make you want to scream, “If he loved so much, why the fuck did he kill himself!”
I hear Old Doc clear gravel from his throat.
“Sorry. What did you ask?” I say, looking to buy time.
Old Doctor sits in his big leather chair and waits for me to continue. His arms are thin and knotted with bones that threaten to poke right out of his saggy, chapped skin.
“You haven’t been home in a year,” he says, switching gears on me. “How does it make you feel?”
“I’m ready,” I say, but offer nothing else.
“Ready?” he finally asks, after waiting a few moments.
I worry for a second that the combination of my reluctance to speak and my short, unproductive answers will lead to his questioning my readiness. I look down at my shoes, pretending to ponder his question deeply. I can’t die in these shoes. They’re old lady shoes my mom bought for me in case Life House had a prom or something. Think about that for a second, and you have a little window into what I’m dealing with. My mom figured there might be some nice boys I could dance with here at this fine mental institution.
I should be clear: I don’t blame my mom for anything that happened. My dad was a suicide seeker, like his mom was and I’d bet her mom or dad was too. I’m sure there are studies that show this better than I can state it, but if somebody in your family has killed themselves, you are way more likely to try it yourself. I do blame her for not letting go and letting his ugly decision fester like an open sore on my life: left untreated, it can become a problem, as doctors like to say. And I guess I’ve become the problem. Sure, she took me to doctors galore, but she could never fucking move on, so that’s why we’re stuck in the same place since the Offing on that Christmas five years ago.
“You keep looking at your shoes. Why?”
“My mother gave them to me in case there was an event here. A dance or something. God, it sounds so pathetic to say it out loud. She’s bonkers, right?”
He nods again, more acknowledgement than agreement. But I say nothing. Finally, he relents.
“Is your trip home an event?”
I feel it. Those old bony hands have taken hold of something inside of me. But did he know what he had his hands on?
“Sadly, a bus trip to a podunk town, followed by another bus to a sad little airport in a hick city is a big event in my life these days.” I crack a nervous smile. I don’t like where this is going.
He looks at me, waiting. He wants me to barf my secret plan onto the table.
I sit stone-faced.
He leans in, focusing on my eyes, trying to tighten his grip on the unknown inside of me. I bet the use of the word event has pricked his antennae and he’s searching for his prize. Show no emotion, Jane.
“Jane,” he says softly.
I notice for the first time that I’m shaking. He must see a little opening because his eyes twinkle. I have to say something to break his spell.
“I hate these shoes. My mother likes to buy shoes. I hate her fucking shoes. My father made fun of her shoes. I remember that.” Stop talking, Jane. No more.
I look down at my shoes, and surprisingly a tear hits them. I wish I could say that the waterworks are an act, part of my small revelation, but they are beyond my control. This old bastard has a way with the questions, and with the timing of them, I suppose. I’ve been so busy blocking knowledge of the Plan from Old Doctor, my other secrets have become less defended. Or maybe I’m nervous about today. It feels like something inside of me is breaking open.
“Why did he make fun of her?”
“I have no idea. He’s been dead for so long. He used to say she had ‘more shoes than a princess.’ He liked ties. My mother and I always bought him two ties every Christmas. We’d open a pile of gifts: toys for me, shoe boxes for Mom, and Daddy would always open two thin tie boxes.”
I stop talking for a moment and visualize my father in my mind’s eye. I always see the same picture when I try to remember what he looked like: what he was actually like day to day. He’s sitting in his studio, leaning back in his chair staring out the window. I’d walk in very quietly, thinking that he had no idea I was sneaking into his studio-but he always knew. I was a tiny little girl then, maybe five or six. He’d say, “Hey pumpkin, can I have a pumpkin seed?” and I’d always say, “For what purpose, sir!”-it was a line he’d taught me. “I’d like to roast and toast it and eat it all up.” And I’d shake my head no with a little impish grin. He’d fake being offended and plead and plead for a pumpkin seed until I laughed. Then he’d scoop me up and kiss my head and tell me he loved me over and over.
It’s funny because the day before he died, he walked up to me in the TV room where I was sitting and watching an old movie called The House Without a Christmas Tree. He leaned over and kissed the top of my head, like he did when I was five. But now I was eleven, and I turned around and shouted at him, “Don’t do that! It’s weird. Don’t kiss the top of my head or touch my hair.” He kind of stood there frozen for a second and then smiled. He said, “Sorry, pumpkin, I didn’t mean to bother you.”
“You’re not bothering me-just don’t kiss the top of my head anymore.”
He nodded okay and said, “I’m sorry, pumpkin,” and left. The next morning he was dead. I never got to say sorry or anything or explain it. I didn’t hate it-just my eleven-year-old self hated it. That’s what eleven-year-olds do. I hate thinking about that and that’s why I hate thinking about him too much as well. But everybody always wants to talk about it.
“My mother saved his ties. I won’t look at them or her stupid pictures of him. His studio is like a creepy shrine or mausoleum. It makes me sick. She makes me sick. I love her, but she makes me sick. All she wants to do is keep everything exactly the way it was, except it isn’t. He’s dead. And I’m crazy now too, just like he was.” This was exhausting me. Not the way I wanted to spend this last session.
“You’ll see your mother tomorrow. Perhaps we can have her fly back with you and we can have a family discussion about the photos and ties, and about your father’s office, if it is upsetting to you. Each of you listening to the other might be helpful.”
There’s a long pause again and he patiently waits for me to respond. But I sit stone-faced. He gazes at me for a few minutes, which makes me really uncomfortable, until finally I blurt out the first thing that comes to mind.
“I’ve never spent Christmas without her. It made me feel lonely to think about that. I’m flying home. I’m glad about that. It’ll be like old times. We can talk then; there’s no need for her to come here.”
He nods, hoping to keep me talking.
“I want to go shopping with her. It’s a happy memory for me.”
Then there’s a long pause where I say nothing and he sits there like a statue in a park waiting for the nut job on the bench to talk.
“You will; I’m sure.”
He grabs a box of tissues.
I take one. I cry.
He looks at his clock, then says, “You have a bus to catch.”
I sniffle and smile.
“Have a wonderful trip, Jane. Remember this: No matter how dark your time at home gets, you are not alone. There might be a moment or even a day or two that feels that way, where you are thinking, ‘no one in the world can see or hear me,’ but it isn’t true. We are always with you. We believe in you. And you can reach out and check in with us by phone at any time.”
I wonder if that’s his subconscious at work. If he’s worried that something bad might happen. I wonder if that notion will blossom in his head and if he’ll try to come and save me as I’m getting on the plane. Magical thinking, I chide myself.
“Merry Christmas, Jane.”