“We’ll find out.” Dr. Rosen shrugged—not an inspiring gesture as I headed toward inevitable devastation.
“Max, help,” I said.
Ever since our showdown, I sensed that I could trust Max more than anyone else in the circle. When you scream into someone’s face, you learn something about how solid they are. Max was a goddamn redwood whose roots ran deeper and wider than anyone else’s in the circle. If he told me to run from Reed, I’d consider lacing up my shoes.
“I think you have to play this out.” Though the serious look on Max’s face scared me, I also heard his blessing for my folly.
But Dr. Rosen was the authority figure, the doctor, the Harvard alum. He should make a decree or recommendation. “Isn’t it malpractice for you to bless this affair?”
“You think driving this underground and making it more secretive would be helpful for you? Come on.”
30
When my group mates considered Reed’s potential as a mate for me, they stopped at the solid-gold band on his left ring finger. I wasn’t ignoring that detail—even when he hinted that I’d be a great stepmother and that he could move into my new condo. Instead, I focused on how much better he was than the other men I’d dated. He told me he loved me every time I talked to him, so he was the anti-Alex. He didn’t care about religion, so he was the anti-intern. He answered my e-mails within thirty seconds and asked me to lunch every other day, so he was the anti-Jeremy. I rationalized that it was good practice to bask in Reed’s love and attention. Eventually, I would transfer my attention to a man who was just like him, except without that gold band.
As soon as Reed sat down in group on Tuesdays, he would extend his hand toward me. I’d held a lot of hands in group: Patrice, Marty, Nan, Emily, Mary, Marnie, Max, Grandma Maggie, Lorne, and Dr. Rosen. Sometimes those hands supported me, and sometimes my palm served as someone else’s ballast. But this was different. Holding Reed’s hand didn’t feel like a gesture of therapeutic support. It felt like foreplay.
The first time we held hands in group, Rory and Marty both gasped. Patrice sighed in frustration. Carlos whispered, “Girl, please.” Dr. Rosen made a show of seeing our hands together, fingers like a lattice to each other’s body, but said nothing. When I caught Dr. Rosen’s eye, the seed of fear and frustration would blossom into protest.
“What’s your plan, Dr. Rosen?” I held up my hand still knitted to Reed’s.
“Plan? I’m not God.”
“What about Reed’s wife? Don’t you care about her?”
“She’s not my patient. You are.”
He asked me what I was feeling. My answer was always the same: shame and hunger. Dr. Rosen asked me what I wanted. “Reed. I want Reed. Are you helping me? I came here for help with relationships—”
“I am helping you.”
“The sum total of your therapeutic advice for me is come here, feel feelings, and disclose everything?” As I confronted Dr. Rosen, Reed held my hand, his thumb tracing a circle across my palm.
“Yes.”
Did Dr. Rosen think that Reed and I should be together? Together together? I stared hard at Dr. Rosen—his unblinking eyes and straight neck, the slight hunch of his shoulders, his shoes planted on the floor. When he peered into the future, what did he see for me? A life with Reed and his girls? A life with someone like Reed, but whom I could have all to myself?
Patrice and Grandma Maggie begged me to cut it off. Lorne trotted out Renee’s history with Reed as a cautionary tale. Max continued to say I had to play this out and that the mysterious alchemy of the advanced group would somehow immunize me from total destruction. Rory, Marty, Carlos, and the Colonel looked to Dr. Rosen, who smiled inscrutably and held his palms open. In the elevator one Tuesday morning, Rory, in a quiet voice, said, “I don’t know what Dr. Rosen is doing with you.” Her eyes darted from my gaze in fear.
In late February, Steven threw a party for Clare’s birthday and invited all of our law school friends. When I stepped into the dark restaurant, I spotted Clare decked out in a silk top and skinny jeans. I felt like I’d just returned from a long trip to a faraway country. My relationship with Reed had so consumed me that I’d forgotten there was a big wide world beyond my three-inch BlackBerry screen, where I read and reread Reed’s messages while waiting for him to break from his family and call me.
All through dinner, my BlackBerry buzzed. Each time it vibrated, I pretended to search my purse for lip gloss or gum or a pen so I could read the message from Reed: I miss you. Two minutes later: When are you going to be home? Ten minutes later: I have a second to talk. Can you pick up? Where are you? Five minutes after that: We are driving home soon. I won’t be online for about an hour.
“Tater, what on earth are you expecting on that BlackBerry?” Clare cornered me in the line to the bathroom.
I told her I was involved with someone, and she wanted to know why he wasn’t with me. My mouth froze in a smile as I realized with perfect clarity: Clare would never meet Reed. I was a secret, a mistress. Having to look Clare in the eye and tell her I was with a man who was currently at his niece’s ballet recital with his wife of nineteen years was a sickening jolt of reality. I mentioned that he was “sort of attached,” and she understood instantly.
“Are you in love with each other?”
I pulled out the Valentine’s Day card Reed gave me that I kept in my purse. She opened it and read aloud. “ ‘I love you, Reed.’ ”
“How’d you meet him?” Clare knew all about group therapy, but the
