“Last weekend, on Saturday night. A week ago.”
“How did you do it?”
“I was frolicking,” she said. Weirdly, she giggled. “I was frolicking in the bushes, and I fell, and a twig or something caught on my nipple ring, you know?”
A shocked pause stopped all activity for a few seconds. The resident, who probably had seen it all and heard it all, paused in his scribbling. Even he seemed rattled. Gretchen held herself utterly still. Craig's mouth hung open, stalled at the start of a sentence.
“I never frolic,” said the doctor, and the relief in his voice-if such was the result of frolicking, then by God, he was glad to put in thirty-six-hour shifts for the rest of his natural life-shook the other people in the room, on both sides of the curtain out of their momentary arrest.
“Too busy to frolic,” the mother said. “You must work very hard.”
“Yes,” he murmured. “Um, you'll need to remove your jewelry for surgery, Ms. Heller.”
“All of it? Some of them won't go back in. They're permanent.”
“Okay,” the resident said. “Fine.”
“They made me remove my wedding ring,” Gretchen whispered to Craig. “Said you can't have anything metal in the operating room.”
“They don't want to tangle with her,” Craig said. “Don't want to get stuck with something sharp. Holy Christ, what's the matter with those parents? She looks completely savage. Her parents ought to be teaching her more about what it means to be human.”
“You're how old?” the resident asked Katie.
“Twenty-one.”
“Smoke?”
“Yep.”
“For how long?”
“Since I was ten. That's… uh…”
“Eleven years,” her mother offered helpfully.
“Right. Eleven years.”
“Drink?” the resident, from here on out unflappable, said.
“Yeah, to excess, regularly.”
Craig, listening across the curtain, ruffled his hair again, clearly quite upset.
And despite the obvious heat of the story bubbling behind Katie's words, the resident ignored the implications and moved right along. “Anything today?”
“No.”
“Street drugs?”
“No.”
Craig snorted. Gretchen put a hand to his lips to shush him. “Yeah,” he whispered, “she was running naked through the bushes and she doesn't take drugs. Right.”
“I imagine the staff know instantly what lies are being told. Like when they asked how much I weighed…” Gretchen said. “They can probably tell by looking.”
“Oh, you. You don't lie very well. Every crazy thing you do, you eventually confess.”
“You didn't know I knew about your girlfriend.”
He shrugged. “Maybe I didn't want to know. Maybe I wasn't ready until now.”
“Prescriptions?” the resident continued with the girl.
The father stood up. “I've got the list,” he said. “Already gave it to the nurse.”
The resident's head stayed bent over his clipboard. “Read 'em off.”
Katie's father listed at least a dozen medications in a clear English accent. The first ones, familiar names like Xanax, came out brightly, as though he were reciting a list of breakfast cereals. Several others he had trouble pronouncing, but he struggled until he had conveyed the information, and put the paper back into his pocket, satisfied.
“Okay, I was wrong,” Craig said. “She didn't need street drugs when she could get high legally ten different ways every day.”
“Diagnosis?” asked the resident through the curtain, a paragon of dispassion.
“Bipolar,” Katie said, sounding almost happy at being truly pegged. “And…”
At this point, Craig bumped into Gretchen's table and upset the water pitcher, so they didn't hear the rest of the diagnosis. But the next question from the doctor regained their attention. “Are you sexually active?”
“Not anymore,” Katie said, again filling her words with portent.
“One of those drugs that's supposed to make her sane must inhibit her libido,” Craig said, keeping his voice quiet, obviously fascinated.
“Where can I get some?” asked Gretchen. “Stop you from wanting to screw your newest blonde and any other willing women in your future. Nip your desire in the bud. Make you act your age.”
“Don't be bitter, Gretchen. That's ugly.”
“I'm not pretty but you used to think I was. I guess now all your blind loving goes her way. Now you think she's pretty. Now you see me in front of you, faded. I thought you had more character, Craig. You could have resisted.”
“I couldn't. You think you can control everything.”
“I do have control, Craig.”
“Nobody controls life.”
“I make a dozen decisions every day to regulate my behavior, to keep to the path I've picked. I don't grab for the man making eye contact in the elevator, even if he's handsome, and I'm lonely and ignored. I don't steal at the store even if it's something I want and nobody's looking. I won't sell my soul for a nickel!”
“Here you go again, hysterical. Souls at stake, instead of a failed relationship.”
“Out-of-control is so easy. You didn't make a conscious choice when you looked too closely at a woman and started noticing her perfume, and then took it further and talked to her. Touched her.”
“Gretchen, it isn't as if you don't do crazy things. You know you do when you drink.”
“I'm not proud of that. It's not who I really am.”
“You had to know eventually. I'm glad it's out.”
“I didn't want you to tell me. I wanted it to burn out. Now, you've told me, it's real.”
“She's just a place to go for now. It isn't what you think.”
“Should that make me feel better? That you didn't even fall in love with someone else? You left me for nothing?”
“I didn't say that…”
“Romance is fantasy, you know. You think there's a special woman out there for you when it really all amounts to the same thing, a woman, a sexual attraction, connection. Doesn't matter what woman. It might as well be me as her.”
“I need something different in my life.”
“Question,” Gretchen said. “If you don't love me, how do I feel about you?” She started crying, but really it was her leg killing her now. The dull pain sharpened and struck, and the long bone that had broken burned inside her leg like a molten sword. She took her other half pill with a piece of leftover bread, and pushed him away when he fluttered around her, looking angry. He hovered between her and the window, casting shadows on the bed.
On the other side of the curtain, a nurse announced that they had squeezed Katie in next for surgery. With much effort and many encouragements from her parents, a crew of family and hospital personnel helped her onto the gurney. They took her away. The room quieted for a moment.
“The squeaky wheel,” Craig said dismissively. “Wonder what other poor schmuck will have to wait while they fix her miserable, self-abused breast.” He walked to the foot of her bed and held the metal bar, looking at her. “If you'll get ready, we'll go. If not, I'm leaving.”
She knew he didn't mean it. “I need more water. One more, okay?”
He started over to the sink, but before he got there, two people arrived with armloads of fresh linens and began to make Katie's bed. Silently, he watched. After they left, Gretchen pulled back the curtain and watched him pour her water, then wash his hands.
“What a sordid little life. I guess those people were her parents. What losers,” he said, handing her the glass.
“How do you mean?”
“Smoked since she was ten. Where were they?” he asked. “Lots of teen piercings. Nipple rings.”
“She's an adult. She's twenty-one.”
“And free to act like any old adult fathead, apparently. They popped her out and gave up. Let her roll in the slop on the floor.”
“You don't know what they've been through with her. Maybe this is the best way. Maybe being forgiving, unconditional… people can do that, love unconditionally.”
“To hell with her pain. I'd have had her over my knee. I'd be ripping the damned ‘jewelry' out one by one.”
“I got something different,” Gretchen said, reaching into the bag for her clothes. She pulled the hospital gown down onto the floor and threw on a sweater.
“Oh? What did you get? That they're such good people because they let her ruin her life? Come on, you were as staggered as me about what a waste she is. She won't live to be thirty.”
“She seemed very young to me. Immature, and very, very desperate. She was hurting. The dad kept track of everything for her. He ran out to find help. The mother cuddled her because she needed that. They forgave her everything, every dumb thing she did.”
“They're irresponsible idiots. People like that should never be parents, and that girl had no business living, she was so screwed up.”
“How is it you're so responsible? Remind me. I forget.”
“My life is honest, at least. When I knew I had to change things, I told you.”
“You always overrated honesty. What matters isn't what you say, it's what you do. I don't think you're responsible at all. I think you depend on other people too much, and I think your ego gives you the idea you're running your life independently, when you don't. You need me. You always will. You've got to face that before you can understand real love.” Gretchen pulled on her underpants carefully, up and over her injured leg. He came over to help her with her sweatpants.
“No.”
“That looks awkward. Let me help.”
“You'll push too fast and it will hurt. Please don't. Leave it.”
