American Wife

as you see fit, but I’d advise against saying anything to your parents. I just can’t imagine what purpose it would serve.”

I felt an impulse then to express incomprehension, except that I did comprehend. At night, when I listened to “Lonesome Town,” I knew. She was right.

“Isn’t it—” I hesitated. “Isn’t it illegal?”

“Certainly, and it happens all the time. You can’t legislate human nature.”

“You don’t think that I should have it?”

Quietly, she said, “I think it would kill you. If circumstances were different, I would say, ‘Go live at a girls’ home in Minnesota, go to California.’ But you don’t have the strength. You’ll be strong again, but you’re not strong now.”

As she spoke, I could feel my lips curling out, the tears welling in my eyes. I whispered, “I’m sorry for disappointing you.”

“Come sit by me,” she said, and when I did, she rubbed my back, the palm of her hand sweeping over the white cotton of my nightgown. After a moment, she said, “We have to make mistakes. It’s how we learn compassion for others.” She paused. “You don’t need to tell me whose it is. That doesn’t matter.”

WE TOOK THE bus rather than the train. At my grandmother’s instruction, I had gone to school as if it were a normal day, but before the end of first period, I’d been summoned to the principal’s office, where my grandmother awaited me. We walked quickly to the bus station, rode the bus to Chicago—“I’m sure there’s someone who does it in Riley, too,” my grandmother said, “but I’d have to ask around, and I don’t want people talking”—and from the bus station on Broad Street, we took a taxi to the hospital. As directed by my grandmother, I had not eaten or drunk since the night before, and in the taxi, my stomach turned, filled with nothing but anxiety. “I’ve given your name as Alice Warren,” my grandmother said. “Just as a precaution.” Warren was her own maiden name.

“You don’t think I’ll get arrested, do you?”

“You won’t get arrested,” my grandmother said.

“And the doctor won’t use dirty tools?”

My grandmother looked at me strangely. “I thought you understood that Gladys is performing the procedure. That’s why we’ve come here.”

My grandmother was not permitted in the operating room. I wore a blue hospital gown, and when I lay on the table, the nurse had me set my feet in metal stirrups. “The doctor wants to talk to you before we put you under anesthesia,” the nurse said, and ten or twelve minutes had passed before Dr. Wycomb appeared in a white coat. She squeezed my hand, and the warmth of her grip made me realize how cold I was.

“I know this is difficult, Alice,” she said. “It will be over before you know it, though, and you’ll recover quickly. The way a D and C works is that I’ll expand the entrance of your uterus, and I’ll use a very thin instrument for the curettage. You might experience cramps and spotting for several days—you’ll want to use sanitary napkins—but you’ll be able to walk out of here.”

I nodded, feeling faint. I did not even know then what curettage meant, but back in Riley, I looked it up; the dictionary definition was scraping.

“If any problems arise in the next days or weeks, it’s important that you call me,” Dr. Wycomb said. “Your grandmother has my telephone number.” She was not distant—she still held my hand—but she was crisp and professional in a way that made me understand she was probably very good at her job.

“One more thing: I’ll leave these items with Emilie, and I want you to get them from her when you’re home. You need not discuss them with her.” Dr. Wycomb reached into a small brown paper bag I hadn’t noticed and extracted an object I didn’t recognize, a white rubber dome that she handed to me along with a capped tube, also white. “Fill the diaphragm with spermicide before you insert it,” she said. “Then push the diaphragm deep into your vagina so it walls off your cervix. Make sure to practice a few times before you’re in a situation where you need it and remember that spermicide alone isn’t effective—if your friends suggest otherwise, they’re wrong.”

Once, it would have been unthinkable, unendurable, to listen to my grandmother’s friend use the words spermicide and vagina. But by then so much had happened that was unthinkable and unendurable, and furthermore, the words themselves were overshadowed by the larger implication of her comments.

“It won’t happen again,” I said. “I’m not—” I wanted to say, I really am the girl I seemed to be last winter, but surely, the necessity of making such an assertion would undermine it.

“This is a conversation about health, not morality,” Dr. Wycomb said. “Once a person engages in sexual intercourse, the likelihood of remaining sexually active is high.” She patted my forearm. “I’m very sorry about the automobile accident,” she said, and then she called for the nurse.

WHEN I EMERGED from the fog of anesthesia, I was in a different room—I opened my eyes, closed them, opened them again—and my grandmother was sitting beside me reading. I blinked several times, my mind blurry. “Should I write Dr. Wycomb a thank-you note?” I asked.

“I don’t think that’s necessary.” My grandmother set a bookmark between two pages and closed the book. “She’s coming by to check on you, though, if you’d like to thank her in person. How are you feeling?”

“What time is it?”

“It’s after two. You’ve been sleeping for nearly an hour.”

“Isn’t my mother—Won’t she expect me home?”

“I told her I was meeting you after school to take you shopping. Alice, if you’d like to tell them, that’s your decision.”

“I’ll never tell them,” I said, which proved to be true.

When Dr. Wycomb came into the recovery room, I still was loopy. I said, “I hope you don’t go to prison because of me.”

Dr. Wycomb and my grandmother exchanged glances, and Dr. Wycomb said, “This is a very common procedure, Alice. You were my third this week.”