Turn of Mind

A woman here earlier this week. Did she ask about Amanda’s enemies? Whether there was anyone that wished her harm?

Oh, lots of people did, I would imagine. How could they not? She is difficult. Like you just said, an avenging angel. That is her genius— spotting the carcass before it has begun to rot. She out-vultures the vultures.

A nice way to talk about your best friend.

She’d be the first to admit it. She senses weakness and goes in for the kill.

Whereas when you saw weakness you chose to heal.

I wouldn’t say that’s why I chose surgery. Not exactly.

Did you and she ever fight?

Once or twice. Almost breached our friendship. We would declare a truce almost immediately. The alternative was too horrifying to contemplate.

What would that horror have been, if a breach had occurred?

For me, loneliness. For her I can’t guess.

It sounds like an alliance rather than a friendship. Like the treaties between heads of state, each with powerful armies.

Yes, it was a bit like that. Too bad she doesn’t have children. We could have arranged marriages between our two houses.

Created a dynasty.

Exactly.

I have some other questions, but you look tired.

Perhaps. I had a long day of surgeries. One particularly difficult one. Not technically difficult. But it was a child with meningococcemia. We had to take off both his hands at the wrist.

I never did understand how you could do what you did.

The father was distraught. He kept asking, But what about the kitten? He loves the kitten. It turns out he wasn’t worried about eating, writing, or playing the piano, but about the child losing the soft feel of fur against a certain part of the body. Trying to reassure him that other areas of the epidermis were equally sensitive to the feel of fur didn’t do any good. We had to medicate him almost as much as his son.

Sometimes that’s how you grieve. In the small ways. Sometimes those are the only ways open to you.

I wouldn’t know.

Oh?

My losses have been minimal. Containable. Small enough that they don’t need to be broken down any further to be processed. Except when I lost my parents, of course. My dear father. My exasperating mother. There I managed to compartmentalize, to shut off the particular horrors that way.

You’re lucky, then.

I forgot your name.

Mark.

You look familiar.

Lots of people tell me that. I have that kind of face.

I think I am tired.

I’ll go now, then.

Yes. Shut my door behind you, please.

The good-looking stranger nods, leans down to kiss me on the cheek, and leaves. Just a stranger. Then why do I miss him so much?

Wait! Get back here! I call. I command.

But no one comes.

When I have a clear day, when the walls of my world expand so that I can see a little ahead and a little behind me, I plot. I am not good at it. When watching the heist movies that James loves, I am impressed by the trickery the writers think up. My plots are simple: Walk to the door. Wait until no one is looking. Open the door. Leave. Go home. Bar the front entrance against all comers.

Today I look at the photo I picked out. Labeled clearly: Amanda, May 5, 2003. My handwriting?

In the photo, Amanda is dressed simply but severely in a black blazer and pants. Her thick white hair is pulled back in a businesslike bun. She has just come from a meeting, something official. The expression on her face is a mixture of triumph and bemusement. The memory tickles, then slowly returns.

I had heard a story about her, told to me by one of my colleagues at the hospital whose son attended a school in Amanda’s district. One of many such stories that had been whispered over the years in the neighborhood.