Burning Time

Hi, it’s Charles. I’ve been thinking about our talk on Sunday. Give me a call when you have a minute.

The answering machine went click.

Jason sat at his desk with one of his favorite skeleton clocks in front of him. The glass case was off, and he was watching the brass sunburst at the bottom of its pendulum swing back and forth as the pallet at the top of the pendulum moved back and forth over the escape wheel.

Tuesday, ten fifty-six A.M. Click, burble, doodle, doodle-oo.

Dr. Frank, I have to cancel my Tuesday appointment. My throat really hurts. Oh, and I think I left my appointment book there. If you find it, hold on to it for me, will you. I’m, like, dead without it. By the way, it’s Jeff.

Something deeply satisfying about clocks. Nothing but a series of spur gears, powered by falling weights, or unwinding springs, turn the two hands.

That’s right, retreat to bed, Jeff, when the going gets tough; Jason shook his head. He hated being canceled at the last minute, even when he desperately needed the time. Jeff was due in five minutes.

Jason had been tempted to leave the well-thumbed book on the floor where Jeff dumped it when he last came in. Jason had wanted to let it sit there forever, or at least until Jeff cooled down enough to come back and start looking for it. But that sort of thing always distressed the other patients. Daisy wouldn’t be able to think about anything else for months. Even Harold would be disturbed. They all wanted to be only children. Jason knew that Jeff used his hypochondria to manipulate and worry him. He would never let on, but secretly he did worry over every sore throat and cold.

Tuesday, eleven-forty A.M. Click, burble, doodle, doodle-oo.

That was irritating, too. Jeff called when he knew Jason had another patient. Five minutes later, and Jason would have taken the call. He focused on the clock to calm his annoyance. Some people put pets on their laps and stroked them, or talked to them, to get their heartbeats down. Jason watched the insides of his clocks, moving the way they should. As he watched the gears engaging, he wondered what aspect of Jeff’s regression he should worry about. Shit, if he might have done something to cause it? No, he decided: Jeff just didn’t want to face getting well and having a future. Safer to leave the appointment book that represented his future behind on the floor.

That is your last message.

Jason sighed and pushed Erase.

I will erase your messages.

He waited a few seconds while the machine rewound the tape and then he dialed Charles’s number. Charles had almost the identical message on his machine. Jason sat there while the soothing voice regretted not being with him and promised to return the call as soon as he could.

Please start speaking after the tone.

Tone.

Hi, it’s Jason. I have a cancellation. I’ll be taking calls for an hour. It is—He looked at the face of the clock. Now that he had made a minor adjustment, it seemed to be running perfectly.

—Eleven forty-five. He hung up and put the clock and its case back on the shelf between two stacks of journals.

He sat there watching the pendulum go back and forth. At eleven fifty-five, the phone rang.

“This is Dr. Frank.”

“Hi, it’s Charles. I’ve been thinking about what you said the other day.”

Pause. Jason didn’t help out.

“About Emma,” Charles prompted. “Look, I don’t know what I can do. But I can’t just sit here and ignore what you’re going through.”

Still Jason was silent.

“I want you to know I’m here for you. I want to help. Do you want to meet and talk about it?”

One part of Jason wanted to put Charles off, send him back to his secure little niche. Another part was impressed that Charles was willing to take the time to bother.

Finally he relented and said, “Thanks, I appreciate it.”

“I break for gym now. When is your next appointment?”

Jason usually jogged after Jeff, so he was free until one-thirty. Amazing. Charles was offering to give up his maintainance, and today, no less.

“I usually break at twelve-thirty on Tuesdays. I’m free from now until one-thirty,” Jason replied, surprising himself.

“Great. Why don’t you come here? … And why don’t you bring those letters you mentioned?”

“You want to look at the letters?” Jason said.

“Yes, any objection?”

“Ah, no, but why?”

“The letters are what you’re really worried about, aren’t they?”

“Yes,” Jason said, surprised that that was the case and that Charles knew it. It was the letters he was worried about. He checked the clock again. He could be there in ten minutes.

23

Twelve minutes later, the two men were shaking hands in Charles’s waiting room.

“I brought the letters,” Jason said.

“Sit down for a minute. There’s a lot to this. A whole lot,” Charles replied, leading the way into his office.

There was a desk, chairs, the analyst couch, the usual things. At the far end of the room was a new leather sofa. A burnished antique coffee table was positioned in front of it.

Charles headed for the sofa and sat heavily. “Would you like a drink?” he asked.

Jason raised his eyebrows. Drinking in the middle of the day now, were they? “Yes, I would,” he said. “But I better not.”

Charles shrugged. “Listen, I can’t get a handle on this.”

Jason blew some air out of his nose. He didn’t have a handle on it either.

“You know I don’t want to dig into places you don’t want me to go. But it’s a puzzle. I don’t have the pieces.” He shrugged apologetically. He was a big shrugger. “You know I’m here for you. I’ll do anything I can, but without the pieces—” He raised his shoulders again.

“What do you want to know?” Jason smiled wanly.

Charles took a breath. “Well, I saw the film.”

“I thought you would. What did you think?”

“I was very surprised,” Charles said carefully. “I wasn’t shocked. I mean, most films these days have some pretty graphic sex in them, but,” he paused, “the content is disturbing. There’s no question about that. It takes a dim view of therapists. But there’s a lot of that going around. That’s not an issue in itself.… You said Emma didn’t tell you about this, is that right?”

Jason nodded, and then shook his head. “Well, a film doesn’t just arrive out of nowhere,” he admitted after a slight hesitation that he knew Charles noted.

“The script was around for a—long time.” Jason could still visualize it sitting there on the table for many months. “I just didn’t read it.”

He hesitated again, then went on. “The guy who wrote it is a friend of Emma’s. I admit I never liked him— grubby, insinuating, supercilious sort of asshole. Defensive. But he had been a friend of hers since college. Emma was in several of his plays,” he added.

He smiled, thinking of the plays.

“Good plays?” Charles asked.

“She was good, but the plays were—nothing. Not daring, not involving. Just kind of dull.” Jason