I Like You Just Fine When You're Not Around (28 page)

Tig's mouth dropped open. Was there anything more incongruous than sitting in a cookie-cutter coffee shop, listening to the antithesis of ordinary?

“They call it other things, too: Asphyxiophilia. Scarfing. My husband was a gasper.” Carolyn scoffed in frustration—or disgust? “I had no idea.”

“I don't think that's all that unusual—that you didn't know.”

“Apparently, he used the prostitutes to keep it from me. So, when he couldn't get help with it—y'know, from the prostitutes—he tried to do it himself. That's when I found him.”

A moment of vertigo washed over Tig. She closed her eyes and visualized walking into the garage. Seeing him hanging.

“The few people who know . . . my parents. The police. They hate him. Oh, they don't say it, but it's in their faces. Like he was a pervert. Like he did it without regard for anything.” Carolyn looked in earnest at Tig. “He didn't, though. He did it with full regard. Can you imagine the shame he lived with? Keeping the secret, using the prostitutes. He wasn't that kind of man. He was a good man. A good father.”

“You loved him.”

“You're catching me on a good day. Yesterday, I wanted to dig him up in his grave. I have speeches in my head. Long tirades that leave me exhausted. What makes a person do that? Risk it all for something so fleeting. Why couldn't he tell me?”

“I'm sorry,” said Tig. “I don't have any answers for you.”

“God, I know it.” Shaking her head, she said, “I have to tell you. If I wanted to sue someone, it wouldn't be you. It would be the makers of that ligature thing. You should be able to release it when you want. Christ.” She put her head in her hands and sniffed.

The bell on the front door tinkled, and Tig glanced around the room. An older man with a newspaper and an empty coffee mug sat a few tables away, oblivious. Tig wondered if he had some sexual secret he kept from his wife. Maybe he was gay, or a woman, or a cross-dresser. People had secrets, proclivities, problems. As a counselor, Tig, of all people, knew that. Today she was just getting a refresher course.

“What will I say about how he died? To our daughter?”

“It will be several years before you have to find those words. You will be older, more experienced; you'll have a whole dictionary full of new words that will describe an entire world of new feelings that are coming your way. Be as gentle with yourself as you are being forgiving to your husband. You'll find the words when you need them.”

“You think?”

Carolyn looked out the window and said, “I'll tell you one thing. I'm not going to keep it a secret from her. Secrets are the pin pulled from a grenade. It's just a matter of time until it all blows. The closer you stand, the more you have to lose.”

“Why not start by thinking of your husband giving up something that made you unhappy, the prostitutes, as an effort of love that went wrong?”

“I want to both hold him and slap him.”

Tig said, “That defines all of my relationships.”

“That's why I listened to you on the radio. You make people see how ridiculous life can get and still be normal, okay. Speaking of ridiculous, I think I'm close to getting his family to drop the suit.”

“I should have told you to get therapy. To talk. To explore what was happening.”

“You would have if I hadn't hung up. I'd heard as much that day as I wanted to hear. Prostitutes are wrong. End of story. I wanted a bottom line. I got what I wanted. That's what I told my mother-in-law.” Carolyn wiped her hands on her thighs. “I'm a different person now. I used to make these snap judgments. Divorce is wrong. Abortion is bad. McDonald's is the devil's food. I think God maybe did this to shut me the hell up.” Nervously, she glanced at Tig and said, “But, y'know, in a good way. I was on my high horse, never letting anyone live. Really live. Make choices without my self-righteous, high-court decisions. I was careful not to talk about what I was thinking, but I was judging people, sending that poison into the universe.”

“I'm no spiritual leader, that's for sure, but I'm pretty sure there are people out there sending more poison into the universe than you,” Tig said. “I just don't think the Holy Spirit operates that way. I think it's too busy with Africa to spend time pointing fingers of terror at you.” Tig held her hands up. “Just a thought, don't hold me to it.”

This seemed to unlock Carolyn's tears. “My husband was a great guy, and now this terrible thing defines him.”

Tig watched Carolyn, head down, beautiful hair falling forward and thought,
No one is immune. No one has enough antibodies to fight off life.
“I counseled a woman once. She was amazing, brilliant, loving, charitable. She was a surgeon who rebuilt breasts after mastectomies. She'd also had few friends, shoplifted, and got pregnant on a casual hookup. She came to me because she defined herself by the latter instead of the former characteristics. She couldn't forgive herself. The truth is, it's hard to be human, but the definition of ‘human' is flawed.”

Carolyn Hammer looked at her hands. “I feel very flawed. I feel like I betrayed him, and I miss him so much. He didn't need to protect me; I have my own secrets. Problems. We could have talked them out. Now what possible good can come of all of this?”

“It's a small thing, but I came to see how I could have done things differently by you.”

Carolyn said, “Look. You'll be doing me a personal favor if you stop blaming yourself. He needed a myriad of counselors and sex therapists. If we decide there's no external blame, then we all have to understand it was his internal issue; and if that's the case, nobody has to do anything but miss him and remember loving him.”

“That is very astute, Carolyn. You have no idea how astute.”

“To be honest, I don't think I'd be feeling this way right now if I hadn't been listening to your approach on the radio. You listened and gave it straight up. That's what I'm trying to do now.”

The overhead music transitioned from bluesy jazz to reggae, and the atmosphere in the room became all don't-worry-be-happy, a lift in the air that filled the coffee shop.

Tig's mind drifted to Pete and Hawaii, and then back to Carolyn. “What's next for you?”

“Raise my daughter. Calm my family down. Miss my husband. Maybe go back to school to do what you do.” Carolyn took a sip of water. “What about you, Dr. Monahan? When will you go back on the air? People need you.”

After Carolyn left the coffee shop, Tig continued sitting in her small wooden chair while considering secrets. She tossed her unfinished coffee into the trash and walked outside, the bell jingling a light goodbye.

She thought about taking a walk in the sunshine, letting the summer breeze crazy-comb her hair, and learn how to do what Carolyn Hammer was doing: let secret dogs lie. She turned, considering going to the park to think softly, realistically, and categorically about Pete and Alec. She flirted with the thought of greeting Dr. Jenson without giving him the third degree, allowing her mother's past to stay in the past.

Instead, Tig reached into the pocket of her jeans and pulled out the theater ticket from her mother's cedar box. She examined the softened paper and ran her fingers over the date of the show: September 9, 1972, the date of her father's death. She'd known her mother hadn't been home when her father died. Knew she had found him ostensibly resting on the sofa, forever in cardiac-arrest repose.

She reached for her phone, dialed her sister, and waited. Checking her watch, she saw it was afternoon naptime and was about to hang up. Out of the blue, a woman answered.

“Wendy?”

“Hi, Tig. No, this is Geri. Pete is running. He left his phone in the lab.”

Tig closed her eyes. She'd called Pete, something she often caught herself doing, her awake mind picturing her sister while her subconscious was looking for Pete.

Tig felt a little sick, then another emotion she couldn't quite nail down. She started to hang up, but instead said, “Tell him Tig called.” In her car, her levelheaded plans for a walk in the park hijacked, she thought about the musical chairs of relationships. Geri hadn't wasted any time slipping into Tig's chair; or had she? Maybe the phone answering was just helpfulness, and Tig was confused. With that thought, the answer to her mother's secret came to her.

She felt the throb of her heart in her throat, and when Hope House came into view, the feeling sped up. She slipped through the glass doors, past the birds, the front desk, and the supply closet; she was moments away from looking her mother in the eye. She silently prayed for a window of clarity from her today . . . a glimmer of memory . . . a slice of recognition.

Tig shoved open the heavy door to her mother's room. The bedside curtain swayed and Tig stopped, unable to move. Dr. Jenson and her mother stood, embracing. Her mother's arms were locked around Dr. Jenson's neck. One of his arms was around her torso, his hand fanned in the center of her back. The other arm hung self-consciously down at his side, a teen at the edge of a senior class party knowing a slow dance wasn't just a dance. They swayed lightly to a muted song on the radio. Tig recognized it as her mother's favorite, “Me and Mrs. Jones,” the Billy Paul version from the seventies. Her mother said, “
Mon chèvre
.”

Alarmed, Tig cleared her throat. Dr. Jenson, startled, pulled away from Hallie.

Hallie beamed. “Hello! Is it time to go?” To Dr. Jenson, she said, “I'll get my wrap.”

Tig's lips twitched. “No, Mom. You can take a seat. I need to talk to . . . .” She hesitated. “I need to talk to him for a minute.”

Dr. Jenson eased Hallie into the chair nearest the picture window, handing her the baby doll. “I'll be right back.”

Hallie called to him, “Don't be long. We don't want to be late.”

Tig nearly jogged down the hall and into the conference room, a flustered Dr. Jenson trying to catch up. When he entered the room, Tig said, “Why is she calling you ‘cheese'? For God's sake, what is going on?” Tig thrust the ticket stub at him. “I just figured it out.”

Without thinking, he said, “It's not ‘cheese.' It's ‘goat.'” At the same moment that Tig heard the translation of the French word, Dr. Jenson touched the ticket stub. He looked at it first with question, then recognition, then disbelief. He touched it with reverence. “Where did you get this?”

Tig said, “You're the Goat?”

His face opened like a morning glory. “She saved this? She's kept it all this time? I . . . I don't know what to say.” Then in a rush, like the words had been backed up, he reached for her. “Nothing is certain, Tig. Nothing has ever been confirmed. Hallie wanted it that way. When we discovered Dan that night, she pushed me out. After the funeral, when she discovered she was pregnant, she wouldn't talk to me about anything.”

Tig's head snapped back as if struck. “What? What are you talking about?”

Dr. Jenson duplicated Tig's expression of confusion and terror. “What are
you
talking about? You said you figured it out. What did you figure out?”

“Just that you and my mom were together that night. At that musical.” She took a step back, gesturing to the ticket. “That you had a thing for her all those years ago.”

Dr. Jenson said, “It wasn't a long-ago thing. I still love your mother. I have always loved your mother, from the moment I met her to this very day.”

Tig bent over, supporting herself on a chair. “Did your wife have something to say about that? Did my father?”

Dr. Jenson swept his hand through his hair. Tig moved away, pacing along the conference table. She trained her eyes on Dr. Jenson. “You were having an affair with my mother while my father lay dying?”

“No, Tig. It wasn't like that.”

“My mother cheated on my father. That's what you're telling me.” She moved to the corner of the room and folded her arms across her chest. Then horror filled her face. She was born nearly nine months after her father's death.

Dr. Jenson moved closer to Tig. “If you could just stop talking and listen to me.”

“You're lying.”

“Lying?” Suddenly insulted, he said, “People do things for the people they love, Tig.”

“You're stalking my mother. You're the ultimate stalker. How did I miss that?”

“No. God, you are your mother's daughter. Always so sure her reality was the only one that mattered.” Sounding exhausted, he said, “She calls me ‘Dan.' You think I get some kind of sick enjoyment out of that?” He gestured to the stock paintings of soothing landscapes and faux wood chair rails. “Before all this, Hallie and I meant something to each other. I'm not apologizing for the best night of my life, the best years.” His voice shook. “Stop being your mother for five minutes so I can finish this. So I can tell you. Finally.”

“No. I won't hear it.” Tig turned away from Dr. Jenson and put her hand on the doorknob.

“I loved your mother. She loved your father, but none of us were perfect. She and I were together just once. Yes, there were a lot of questions about that one time, the timing, the pregnancy, the future, but there was never a question of love.”

Tig raised her hand, trying to keep her composure. “Okay. That's enough. I need a minute.” She left Dr. Jenson there, his story only partially told. A woman in a wheelchair sat at her breakfast chanting, “My, my, my my, mmmmmm.” A call light buzzed, along with the repeated pinging of a WanderGuard, announcing a perimeter breach.

Then, at the front doors, Tig turned around and moved to her mother's room. She rounded the corner. She would bully her mother's dementia into giving up her secrets; this would end today, she thought.

“Tig! Dr. Monahan.” Tig pulled up abruptly. Pam Gibson squirted antibacterial lotion on her hands, frowning. “Where are you going in such a hurry? If you had a gun, I'd call 911.”