Obsession

Same thing Rick had said.

“Not that it stopped her from double-shifting or cooking or keeping up the house, but her appetite dropped and she started losing weight. When I pointed it out, she said don’t complain, maybe she’d finally be skinny. But that was the point. Mommy could never lose weight, no matter how hard she tried. I’m premed, knew enough bio to wonder about diabetes. One night, when she’d barely touched her dinner, I pointed out what was happening. She said it was just menopause, no big deal. But she’d started going into menopause two years ago and women typically gain, they don’t lose. I pointed that out but she brushed me off. Finally, a week later, she was forced to check it out.”

“Forced by what?”

“Dr. Silverman noticed the yellow in her eyes and insisted. But even with that, before she agreed to see a doc, she had blood drawn in the E.R. When the results came back, Dr. Silverman ordered an emergency CAT scan. The tumor was sitting right in the middle of the pancreas and there were metastases in her liver and her stomach and her intestines. She went downhill fast. Sometimes I wonder if the shock of knowing took all the fight out of her. Or maybe it was just the natural course of the disease.”

She sat straight-backed, dry-eyed. Petted Blanche slowly. Someone who didn’t know her might judge her detached.

I said, “How long was she ill?”

“From the day of diagnosis, twenty-five days. Most of that was spent in the hospital; she became too weak to live at home. In the beginning, she did her best to be ornery-complaining her tray wasn’t taken away promptly, griping that float nurses weren’t like regular nurses, there was no continuity of care. Every shift, she insisted on reading her chart, double-checked that her vitals had been recorded accurately. I guess it made her feel in control. Mommy was always big on control. Did she ever tell you about her childhood?”

“A bit.”

“Enough for you to know what happened to her in New Mexico?”

I nodded.

Small hands clenched. “It’s a miracle she turned out so wonderful.”

“She was a terrific person,” I said.

“She was an incredible person.” She studied an etching on the left wall. “That first week in the hospital, she was an absolute despot. Then she got too sick to fight, mostly slept and read fan rags- that’s what she called celebrity magazines. That’s when I knew it was really bad.”

She turned her lips inward. “Us, People, Star, OK! Stuff she’d always made fun of when I brought it home for weekend reading. I’m no star-chaser but I do work-study at the U. library fifteen hours a week and between that and premed, why not enjoy a little guilty pleasure? Mommy loved to kid me. Her fun reading consisted of investment books, the financial pages, and nursing journals. At heart she was an intellectual. People tended to underestimate her.”

“Serious error in judgment,” I said.

She petted Blanche. “True, but the country-girl image could also work against her. She told me before she met Dr. Silverman she never got what she deserved from her bosses. He appreciated her, made sure she received her promotions…anyway, I think you can see that I’m working through the grief. I don’t repress. Just the opposite, I force myself to remember everything I can. Like when you have a splinter and dig deep.”

I nodded.

“Sometimes,” she said, “I freak out, cry it out, get too tired to feel anything. Nights are the worst. I have nonstop dreams. That’s normal, right?”

“Dreams in which she appears?”

“It’s more than that. She’s there. Talks to me. I see her lips move, hear sound but can’t make out the words, it’s frustrating…sometimes I can smell her-the way she always smelled at night, toothpaste and talcum powder, it’s so vivid. Then I wake up and she’s not there and there’s a huge feeling of deflation. But I know that’s typical. I read several books on grief.”

She recited half a dozen titles. I knew four. Two were good.

“I found them on the Web, chose the ones with the best feedback.” Wincing. “I’ll just have to go through this. What I do need help with-and please forgive me but I’m not even sure you’re the right person to talk to about it…” Her cheeks colored. “I thought of talking to Dr. Silverman…I turned to you because Mommy respected you. So do I, of course. You helped me…” She compressed her lips again. Plinked one thumbnail with the other.

Smiling at me. “You’re not allowed to be angry, right?”

“What would I be angry about?”

“If I wasn’t totally up front-okay, let me just get it out. The real reason I’m here is that you work with that detective-Dr. Silverman’s significant other. I would’ve gone straight to Dr. Silverman but I really don’t know him that well and you were my therapist so I can tell you anything.” Deep breath. “Right?”

“You want me to put you in contact with Detective Sturgis.”

“If you think he can help.”

“With…?”

“Investigating,” she said. “Finding out exactly what happened.”

“The ‘terrible thing’ your mother confessed.”

“It wasn’t a confession, more like…there was drive there, Dr. Delaware. Drive and determination. Exactly the way Mommy got when a problem needed to be solved. You’re thinking I’m being ridiculous, she was sick, her brain was impaired. But as sick as she was, she clearly wanted me to focus.”

“On the terrible thing.”

She blinked. “My eyes itch. May I have a tissue, please?”

Swiping her lids, she exhaled.

Blanche’s flews billowed.

Tanya looked down at her. “Did she just imitate me?”

“Think of it as empathy.”

“Whoa. She’s the perfect psychologist’s dog.” Sudden smile. “When does she get her own Ph.D.?”

“You talk to her,” I said. “She wants to be an attorney.”

When she stopped laughing, she said, “What was that? Comic relief?”

“Think of it as a pause for air.”

“Yes…so may I tell you exactly what happened?”

That’s what they pay me for.

I said, “I’m listening.”

CHAPTER 4

“The second week was all about pain,” she said. “That was everyone’s focus except Mommy’s.”

“Hers was…”

“Getting stuff done. What she called putting her ducks in a row. At first, it upset me. I wanted to take care of her, tell her how much I loved her, but when I started to do that she’d cut me off. ‘Let’s talk about your future.’ Saying it slowly, gasping, struggling, and I’m thinking it’s a future without her.”

“Maybe that distracted her from the pain.”

The muscles around her eyes shivered. “Dr. Michelle-the anesthesiologist-had her hooked up to a morphine drip. The idea was to give her a constant flow, so she’d experience as little discomfort as possible. Most of the time she turned it off. I overheard Dr. Michelle tell a nurse she had to be suffering but there was nothing he could do. Do you remember how totally obstinate she could be?”

“She had definite opinions.”

“Ducks in a row,” she said. “She lectured and I had to take notes, there were so many details. It was like being