This Body (25 page)

The Bennets and Katharine had gone to dinner before the play at a restaurant built beside the Lithia Creek. The elder Bennets
seemed tense and wary. When Robert ordered a pitcher of margaritas, the waitress asked, “How many glasses?” Robert answered
quickly, “Just two,” and then looked almost apologetically at Katharine, “That right, Thiz?”

Katharine had been distracted, not really taking in the nuances of the exchange. She had been waiting for the whispering to
begin, but there wasn't a sound. Not even one murmur of temptation. She laughed. God, she felt good. She laughed again.

“Not for me,” Katharine told the waitress gaily, “but can you bring me a virgin margarita with lots of salt?”

The waitress could.

Anne looked at Katharine again with that puzzled expression, but Katharine felt invincible, immortal, aglow. And what was
Anne's problem anyway?
She's got her daughter back and I'm not drinking, am I
?

It was child's play. She could do this.
No sweat
.

From there they had gone to the Bricks to watch the Green Show. Katharine had never seen or heard anything like it. The young
musicians, singers, and dancers were having so much fun, she couldn't help but clap and laugh and grin idiotically with the
rest of the audience. The troupe was dressed in period costumes — warm, cinnamon-colored pantaloons and skirts with soft-soled
shoes. Sometimes the musicians played instruments so curled and twisted with teeny, tiny reeds that Katharine wondered how
any sound came out of them at all. Quince took pictures and seemed removed, even bored, as did Anne and Robert, until they
turned their gaze on Katharine, and then their gaze became scrutiny. Their faces swam with concern, fear, and worry and then
anger and suspicion. Katharine tried to appear more aloof, the way Thisby would have been, but then she didn't care what they
thought.

This is my holiday
.

Nor did she want to maintain any aloofness in her seat, craning her neck this way and that to look around her. There was a
roar, and Katharine noticed everyone looking up. At the uppermost part of the theater, someone was hanging out of a paned
window and hoisting a flag on a pole mounted there. He waved and closed the casement.

The play began.

It was as if they were performing the play only for her. It made so much more sense now. Of course Anne had been Helena, one
of the women lovers, and not Thisby. That part had to be played by a young man, preferably a goofy one. She didn't like the
Duke — she hadn't expected to — but she felt differently toward Oberon. She decided that Quince was right. He was not to be
judged against human morality. It was true he wasn't especially nice, and when he told Puck to streak Titania's eyes with
the juice that would make her fall in love with the first thing she saw — in her case, the ass-headed Nick Bottom — Katharine
wanted to slap his smug face. She wouldn't have dared, though. She knew she would have been in the middle of something she
didn't understand. This was between loftier beings. Puck was mischievous just for the fun — or the nastiness — of it, but,
like with Oberon, the normal rules didn't apply.

When the play was over, she stood up and clapped madly with the rest of the audience, ignoring the waves of anxiety lapping
at her body from Thisby's parents and Quince's hiss. “Shit, it's not as if you haven't seen this a gazillion times.”

. . .

For the next couple of days Katharine felt as if she had indeed gone through the wardrobe and come out into the magical kingdom
of Narnia. Sometimes Quince and she hung out like friends, Katharine acting as silly as any teenager. Other times she just
took off, not caring whether she was supposed to be somewhere, coming back to shrug off the Bennets' equal mix of anger and
confusion. She forgot that she was miles from home, that she was Katharine, the good wife, the good mother. She forgot that
she was Thisby, the bad seed, the problem child. And she loved it. It was a self-centeredness, a selfishness she had never
allowed herself to indulge in. She
deserved
this.

One of the plays she saw with the Bennets was Ibsen's
Wild Duck
. It struck Katharine as an odd coincidence that the main character visits a family and thinks the truth — as he knows it
— is going to help them. He believes that revealing the truth will set them free. But the truth only ends up destroying them.
All of them. Katharine tried to have a deep, philosophical conversation with Anne and Robert about it, but, God, they were
so uptight. They kept looking at her as if they didn't recognize her, and it drove her crazy. It was useless to try and talk
to them.

It was easier to talk to Quince, who didn't look at her so weirdly. Sometimes Katharine wanted to spill everything to her
— reveal everything — but then everything didn't matter anymore. She didn't care who she had been. And the truth wouldn't
necessarily set anyone free.

In some ways she felt more solidly herself than she ever had, but not solidly her old self. It was a self she could have been
if events had been different in her life.

Friday evening some older guys tried to pick up Quince and Katharine by inviting them to participate in an old Ashland tradition:
consuming mulled wine while enjoying some outdoor hot-tubbing. When they finally ditched the guys, Katharine laughed so hard,
she thought she was going to pee in her pants. Quince stopped her by putting both hands on Katharine's shoulders.

“Thiz, you better be careful.”

“What do you mean?” Her laughter died out quickly; she didn't like the tone of Quince's voice.

“Whatever you're on, can you be more careful about it? I don't mind, but Mom and Dad are worried. Now they think you're some
sort of manic depressive.”

“I'm not on anything. I haven't been on anything. I'm just having a good time.” She shook off Quince's hands and stalked forward.
“Goddamn it. This really pisses me off. I'm just having fun. What do they want from me? A drug test?”

Thisby's mother was waiting for them on the porch when they got back. Since Anne could drive back with the girls the next
morning, Robert had taken the opportunity to fly home early.

Quince went inside, and Katharine sat down at the umbrella table.

Katharine found it ironic to be under suspicion for the wrong crime. She decided it would be best to take the offensive. “Quince
says you think I might be taking drugs. Well, I'm not. I don't know how to make you believe it unless I take a drug test.
And I will, if you want me to.”

“I might ask you to. But for the moment, I'll take your word for it.”

Katharine tightened.
So this is the way it's going to be, is it? Guilty by suspicion
.

“You have been acting very strangely this week.”

That's your evidence
? “I've just been having fun,” Katharine said with some desperation. She could feel this body weighing down into the chair.

Anne looked at her, right through the pupils.

What do you see
?

“I have not seen you have ‘fun’ since you were a teenager. ‘Fun’ has not been a part of your repertoire for years. It's not
something I recognize easily.”

“Me either.” Katharine leaned forward on the table and struggled against the air that was pressing down on her. “But I feel
like a teenager. It feels wonderful. Is there anything wrong with that?” There was almost a whine of panic in her voice.

“No, of course not. It's just not like you.”

Guilty as charged
.

“I'm not like —
her
— me … anymore.” Even to Katharine it sounded feeble.

“I realize that. And that's why I think you need help.”

The air was oppressive.

Here it comes
.

“I know your father and I haven't been a part of your life for a long time now. You haven't asked for anything from us for
years either. Now you have. And now I ask for something in return. The exhibit in exchange for going back to Dr. Mantle. Your
father and I are worried that this exhibit might be more than you can handle right now. We think going back to Dr. Mantle
will help you level out the ups and downs. We love this new expressiveness you have, but it's as if you're trying too hard.
We're afraid … We want …” Anne wavered as she must have seen the animal panic in Katharine's eyes, but she pushed forward
in cold blood. “As Puck would say, this offer is nonnegotiable and final. Should you not keep up your end of the bargain,
you lose the exhibit. High stakes, I know.”

The lightness of being that Katharine had felt all week deadened and the weight clamped down over her.

Anne stretched her hand toward Katharine but didn't touch her. Her voice lost its steely resolve. “I love you. I want you
to be well. You're an adult. But that doesn't change anything. You need help, and I'm still your mother.”

Denial flared up in Katharine, then sputtered and died. She knew she owed Thisby the exhibit; she had promised Thisby the
exhibit. The gods were just going to make the feat harder, that's all. Katharine knew
she
needed the exhibit. It was the one thing, the one concrete thing, the future held for her.

Anne pulled back her hand and hid both of them under the table. “Sometimes I can't sleep. It's almost like I'm waiting. I'm
waiting for the doorbell to ring. And there'll be a policeman standing on the step. ‘Mrs. Bennet? There's been a terrible
—’”

Katharine's brain, from long rehearsal, joined in, —
accident. I'm sorry, Mrs. Ashley, your son
—

“— your daughter —”

—
is dead
.

“— is dead.”

Now she was coming back into LA — a fugitive from her old life, and a defeated participant in her new one. On the dashboard
of the Range Rover was a picture that Quince had taken and gotten developed of Katharine standing enraptured, watching the
Green Show. Katharine hadn't seen a picture of herself in Thisby, and she had scrutinized it minutely to see if she could
see any of herself, superimposed on Thisby like an aura. As she took the Santa Monica exit, Katharine looked at it now and
didn't know either of them.

There was no way out.

Yeah, I'm a real lioness. Unless you make that cowardly. None of it got me anywhere
. She was back where she had started from. She didn't deserve anything.

There may be no place like home, but what happens when you don't have one
?

Act 3, Scene 3

What we've got here is a failure to communicate.

— S
TROTHER
M
ARTIN
,
Cool Hand Luke
(1967)

It was full dark by the time Katharine pulled into Thisby's parking garage. She had declined the offer of dinner at the Bennets'
and dropped an anxious Quince off at Gert's house to see Oberon.

Her body felt as though it weighed a thousand pounds; there didn't seem to be enough left of her northern self to keep her
afloat, her thoughts sinking into an abyss.

She was heading for the elevator, pulling her suitcase by its strap, when a body stepped out from behind a pillar and blocked
her way. She raised an arm in reactive defense, and Hooker grabbed her wrist and held it above her head. He didn't say anything,
but stared at her; she felt pinned down in the headlights of his eyes. He smelled of warm yeast, cologne, and cigarette smoke.

Things began to separate. Katharine could feel the ribbons of her mind, body, and soul unraveling.
Parts is parts
. She tried to wrap herself back up, keep herself together, but it was too hard, and she was too tired. The resolution of
her surroundings blew up into a grainy blur. Sound distorted to a roar. She could see the body heat between them. It glowed
with effervescence. Her skin bubbled like champagne.

. . .

She kissed him, her whole body in her mouth. Her free hand scrabbled at the buttons of his shirt; she wanted to scratch her
name in bloody letters on his chest. He let go of her wrist, and she slid her hand between his legs, feeling through the cotton
and silk. She burrowed her head down and started to bite at his clavicle. He moaned and exposed his neck.

I made a guy moan
? was Katharine's last coherent thought.

She would have taken him right there in the elevator, but he held her off while he pushed the third-floor button. She got
the door of the apartment open, and it slammed solidly behind them as he pressed her up against it. She toed off her leggings,
and he held her up to him with his arms under her butt and her legs wrapped around his waist, the core of her centered over
and around him. He swore as he tripped on the puddle of clothes around his ankles and lost his grip on her. She slid off,
and howled in frustration. “Hold on, hold on,” he yelled as he skipped out of the quicksand at his feet and kicked off his
shoes. In his stocking feet, he dropped down on the floor and pulled her on top of him as he lay back. He pushed her denim
shirt down her arms and yanked her tank top over her breasts and suckled her. “God, I love it when you eat,” he muttered and
bit at her nipple, setting off a series of squibs that shook them both.