Born That Way (15 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

There's a desk at the far end of the room under the window, but closer to the door is a small sitting area with five upholstered chairs and a side-table. In the middle of the table is a box of tissues and beside it there's a file folder with my name on the tab.

My mom takes a chair and motions for me to sit beside her. In an open act of rebellion I take a chair across from her and sit in it, arms folded. She and Dr. Cleveland can talk all they want—I'm staying out of it.

Dr. Cleveland sits beside Mom. Dr. Cleveland's posture is perfect. She's like a perfect composed picture of what a woman should be. Her hair is black and shiny. Her skin is flawless creamy-brown. There is a faint spray of freckles across her little nose. She flips open the file folder and reads out loud from Dr. Destrie's note, handwritten on a page from his prescription pad. “Please see Syl re: difficulties.” She clears her throat. “Not the most in-depth referral I've ever received. Do you go by Syl? Sylvia? Or . . . ?”

I have the feeling she's about to add Lambchop to the list, and maybe Mom does too because she bursts in saying, “Sylvie.”

Dr. Cleveland doesn't take her eyes off me. She ignores Mom, who is opening her mouth, maybe to repeat herself, maybe thinking she wasn't heard the first time, so I say, “Sylvia,” perhaps too emphatically because Dr. Cleveland jumps a little.

She picks up the clipboard and checks the form again. “So you're fourteen?”

“Going on fifteen,” I say, which is a stretch, but I'm daring her to say something about my size.

She nods and smiles. “Of course. And how's life so far?”

“It's okay.”

“And you're here because . . . ?”

I point a thumb towards Mom.

“Your mom,” she says, and I nod. She turns the form over and peers at my mom's handwriting, then holds the form out to her with her finger under one word. “What's this one say?”

Mom takes a quick peak. “Puberty,” she says.

Dr. Cleveland takes the form back and reads some more. I feel sorry for her. My mom's handwriting is really terrible. I lean back in my chair—this could take a while. I look at the certificates on the wall, all with Dr. Gelderlander's name on them. I survey the bookcase, the desk, the carpet. My mom is wearing her good beige pumps that coordinate with her beige skirt and jacket. Dr. Cleveland is wearing . . . I look away, and look back again to be sure. I can't believe it. I stare at her feet. There is the plain toecap, the reinforced outer sole at the instep. She crosses her legs in front of her and I lean sideways, hanging on to the arm of the chair, until I spy the spur rests. She's wearing Ariat paddock boots. I search her face. Could she be a member of the herd? It is too much to hope for, but still the thought overwhelms me and I say, “There's some question about my sexual orientation.”

She looks up and studies me carefully, nodding slowly all the time. “Do you have much sexual experience?” She doesn't look over at Mom once, not even with the slightest glance. Her attention is focused completely on me.

“No.” I stare at her, watching for a sign. The rest of the room disappears.

“I see. Well then, maybe you could tell me, even though you don't have actual experience, what about fantasies? Do you dream about kissing boys or girls?”

I only know of one dream which involved a kiss. I feel like my life is hanging by a thread. If Dr. Cleveland is a horsewoman, she'll understand and maybe she'll be able to save me, though if she lets on that she's a member of the herd I know she'll lose all credibility with my mom. “I dreamt I kissed a horse once.”

A little groan comes from Mom's direction but Dr. Cleveland ignores her. Her eyebrows have gone up as though she's on to something. “You like horses?”

I can't speak—any answer I can think of would only be an understatement, like trying to answer a question about how much I liked breathing. I manage one short sharp nod then I stare pointedly at her boots and say, “My mom doesn't.”

Mom mistakes this as a cue and clears her throat. I imagine with dread her launching into her notion of horseback riding as an early adolescent phallic activity.

I'm watching Dr. Cleveland. She looks from me to her boots. Then she looks to my mom and back to me again. “I understand,” she says and I see that there is more to her than physical perfection, more even than being a member of the herd. She is some kind of boss mare.

I tell her everything. I tell her about Grandpa, and about dreaming of horses, though I leave out the unicorn. I tell her about my friend Kansas, who makes up for not having friends at school. I tell her about not wanting to do ballet. I tell her about the barnacle project and how they are hermaphrodites (she didn't know) and how doing the research on the computer started the whole bisexuality question. I talk longer than I've ever talked in my life. I talk so much my tongue aches.

And when I'm finished she nods some more and looks out the window for a while and then she asks me some questions about how well I sleep and how well I eat and what kind of grades I'm getting at school and then she says, “Well, Sylvia, I'd have to say that from a psychiatric point of view there doesn't seem to be much of a problem here.”

I see Mom check her watch and pull her purse into her lap. I can't read her expression which has gone blank again. But I'm nowhere near ready to leave yet, because there's another matter to deal with.

“But there's still something wrong with me,” I insist because I know she knows and that finally, finally we are going to get to the bottom of it.

“Yes, I think so.” Dr. Cleveland laces her fingers in her lap and considers them for a moment before saying, “I'm concerned about what's happening for you socially at school because kids are pretty observant. I think they've noticed how unusual you are. Physically, I mean.”

“Like how short I am.”

“Right. You should be taller. You're pretty well off the bottom of the growth charts.”

“We've been expecting a growth spurt any day now,” says Mom.

“Of course,” says Dr. Cleveland, kindly I think.

“I do stretches—all the time. And I try to eat lots of protein. And I don't smoke.”

“Well that's all good, but I don't think it's going to be enough. I think there's a chromosomal problem, something you were born with. Ideally this could have been addressed sooner, but we might still be able to do something about it. We're a bit late, but possibly not too late.”

Mom shifts in her chair. Her eyes are big. Dr. Cleveland says to her, “It's not uncommon for family doctors to miss some things, especially in children who are otherwise high-functioning. And not a lot of parents catch the signs.”

Not a lot, I think, but some. Mom won't be happy about this.

Dr. Cleveland asks for my hand and looks at my palm, like Taylor did when she was trying to read my future, only Dr. Cleveland doesn't sound surprised at what she finds. She traces the single horizontal line on my palm with her finger. “Sometimes this is called a simian crease,” she says. Then she asks me to make a fist. She shows me her fist for comparison. She has four bumpy knuckles and I only have three. “You've got abnormal bone development, which is another indicator.”

My Mom cranes over to see, then checks her own fist. Her cheeks are pink.

“I've got a mane too,” I say excitedly, flipping up my hair and turning so they both have a good view of the back of my neck. “Mom's hairdresser noticed, right, Mom? Is this part of it?”

“Smart girl,” says Dr. Cleveland. “I think so.”

“And my nails. They're kind of like claws.” I hold my fingers out for inspection but she doesn't need to see.

“I already noticed. I wasn't going to mention them, in case you were self-conscious.”

I stand up and step in front of her. I am at her eye level even though she is still seated in her chair. I feel like throwing my arms around her neck. “Are you kidding? This is the best day of my life.”

“To be able to talk about these things?”

“Yes.”

“If I'm right, there's treatment for some of what you're dealing with, but not all of it. Not the hairline, the nails.”

“All I care about is my height. I have to get to five feet if Grandpa is going to buy me a horse.”

“Pumpkin . . . ,” says Mom. Her whole face is pink now.

“I'm going to be honest with you,” says Dr. Cleveland. “I don't know if we can get you there.”

“But you can try.”

Mom's eyes are overflowing. I put a hand on her shoulder. “Mom, they can fix me. You don't have to be sad.”

“Well Sylvia, I don't know about fixing you, but we can certainly treat some of your symptoms,” says Dr. Cleveland. “Though not me, actually. I think you should see a pediatrician for a start. We need to confirm a diagnosis and check out a few other things.”

“But I want to see you.”

She thinks about this. “Maybe as a follow-up. I'll have to see if I there's a diagnostic code on my billing form for horse nut.”

Mom doesn't get the joke. Her face is red and her eyes are streaming. I don't understand why she isn't relieved like I am that I'm not bisexual and that whatever is wrong with me is at least somewhat fixable, but she's looking so sad and frightened that I sit down beside her.

“A pediatrician?” she says. “What for, exactly?” She takes my hand and squeezes it so hard it hurts.

And then Dr. Cleveland tells us that she thinks I may have Turner Syndrome. I don't absorb much of what she says; I figure we can always go home and Google it to get the details. The one part that strikes me is when she talks about medication for my height. “There's a window of opportunity for treatment, usually prior to adolescence. With Sylvia being fourteen, we won't know if the window is still open for her, until she has some tests. If her epiphyses haven't closed, that is, if the growth plates at the ends of her long bones aren't fused yet, then she can be prescribed some growth-stimulating medication. It would be good for her to reach five feet.”

This is truly amazing. For once it may be a good thing that I am a slow developer: my growth plates could still be open. I turn to Mom to see if she also understands the significance. She grabs a tissue, blows her nose then looks at us both suspiciously. “Five feet,” she repeats.

“Generally speaking it helps people psychologically if they can break the five-foot barrier,” explains Dr. Cleveland.

“Even people who aren't . . . .” My mom hesitates like a person attempting to say something in a totally foreign language, then takes another run at it. “Even people who aren't horse nuts?”

“Right,” says Dr. Cleveland. She sits back in her chair, more relaxed now, as though the hard part is over. This makes me relax too. I pat the back of Mom's hand, which is white as chalk from gripping the arm of her chair.

“You should know,” says Dr. Cleveland, “that in my experience being a horse nut is not a treatable condition.”

Mom presses her lips so tight they almost disappear from her face.

“It's a wonderful thing, actually.” Dr. Cleveland continues calmly as though she is completely unable to read parental facial expressions. She must have trained for years and years to learn to do this. “Some people never develop passions, they spend their lives wandering along aimlessly looking for something meaningful and fulfilling to do. I'm sure you've run into people like this in your practice.”

Mom nods reluctantly. “Of course.”

“Whereas some fortunate people discover very early in their lives what is meaningful to them. And the luckiest of them find ways of pursuing their passion.”

Mom doesn't say anything.

“I'm not saying you have to go out and buy a horse. Something like riding lessons would be a good start.”

I hold my breath, hoping I don't turn blue.

“We were thinking ballet would be better exercise,” says Mom. Now that we're not talking about my possibly having Turner Syndrome she's not upset any more. She's sounding more like her normal opinionated self.

“People who don't ride often find it difficult to believe how much physical fitness is required. Riding is great exercise when it's done properly, with a good instructor. There's nothing wrong with ballet, except that she doesn't want to do it.”

“Oh,” says Mom noncommittally.

I'm thinking Mom doesn't like being lectured to any more than I do. I'm hoping Dr. Cleveland leaves it at this and doesn't try to make any more of a point. Especially, I don't want her to talk about her own interest in horses, which is totally obvious to me, though Mom still doesn't get it. So I smile at Dr. Cleveland and say, “Thank you.”

Dr. Cleveland smiles back and tucks her feet under her chair.

Mom says, “Well perhaps we can look into riding lessons after we've seen the pediatrician.”

I take this as a huge breakthrough—it's all I can do to stay in my chair and not leap up screaming.