The One That Got Away (18 page)

“I am not coming over there for this,” she continued. “Especially because I know it simply did not happen. My son would never say
those
words to a teacher. He simply wouldn’t. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

She tapped the call off and slammed down the phone, then slammed back the rest of her drink. Then she checked her watch, smoothed her hair, and looked around for the waiter as if nothing had happened.

“Was that the school? Do you have to go pick up your son?” I asked. It seemed a natural enough question after what we just witnessed.

“No. I’m not going. They are always making up lies about Cranford. He would never insult a teacher. They just have it out for him.
You
know how they are there.”

She didn’t wait for me to answer. “And besides. I know Cranford would never disrespect an authority figure.”

“Doesn’t take after his mom, huh?” I chuckled but then stopped.

Betsy stood motionless, glaring at me. Ellen looked up at the ceiling, pretending not to hear. Only Mindy moved, turning and smiling at me and then Betsy in anticipation, unaware that in high school, the year we hosted the all-county basketball play-offs, Betsy Claiborne streaked naked across the gym floor, weaving around players, referees, and an angry rent-a-cop while her long black hair and the smell of really good weed trailed behind her.

“What did you say?” asked Betsy.

“Nothing. Just, well, you remember.”

She flicked her eyes to Mindy, who was slack-jawed with anticipation, and then back to me. “No. I. Don’t.”

“Oh, c’mon, Betsy. In high school. Streaking across the gym. You used to wear your arrest as a badge of honor!”

“Abbey, I don’t know why you are making stuff up, but I really don’t appreciate it. I think that accident has you all mixed up. You better go back to the doctor.” She looked at me with total seriousness, as if I
was
making this up. As if I hadn’t been there to witness it myself. As if it hadn’t made the local paper.

I watched her snap her purse closed and stand up with a jolt, and realized that it was okay to laugh about it back then, but not now. The reckless and carefree Betsy I knew in high school no longer existed. That person had been replaced with what stood before me: an elegant, sophisticated swan.

“Betsy, wait…” I stood up and tried to grab her arm, hoping we could all just laugh it off. Or change the subject. But she was so livid she wouldn’t even look at me or say good-bye. She hoisted her purse on her shoulder, motioned for a blank-faced Ellen to join her, then weaved around tables to the exit, her black hair and lipstick-pink jacket reflected in mirrors and glassware as she moved.

Once they were gone, Mindy and I settled the bill in silence. I tried to concentrate on the credit card slip and spelling my new name correctly, but my hands were shaking so much, it turned out illegible anyway. I was scared, the altercation with Betsy giving me an uneasy sense of foreboding. She and Ellen might have been insufferable, but they were Abbey van Holt’s good friends. Possibly the only two she had. And right now, I needed as many as I could get.

Alone, just the two of us in the small elevator, Mindy finally spoke. “I’m sorry, but I have to know. Did she really streak across the gym naked?”

“I plead the Fifth,” I told her, holding up my hand as if in court. “Apparently, anything that happened before 2002 is not approved lunch conversation.”

“Well, she should just own up to it. It actually makes me like her better.”

“I know,” I replied with a sad smile. “But, honestly, I’m not sure being liked is her primary objective these days. I think she’d rather be admired.”

“Is there a difference?”

“Absolutely.”

My tone was serious, but Mindy howled with laughter anyway.

After the epic lunch, I had fifteen minutes to figure out which of the seven Dr. Cohens in the Philly metro area was the one Mirabelle had gotten to squeeze me in. As I flagged down a taxi, I checked the list Siri had found, eliminating Dr. Gerry Cohen, who specialized in holistic healing; Dr. Emily Cohen, age twenty-eight; and J. J. Cohen, who, though a general practitioner, operated out of Fishtown. It was unlikely the van Holts would travel above Spring Garden Street, and even more unlikely for them to go to a doctor named “J. J.” So William R. Cohen, an internist at Pennsylvania Hospital, just
had
to be the guy.

As I looked at his photo on the practice’s Web page, I hoped he was kind and patient and maybe a little unorthodox. And a lover of movies—particularly
Freaky Friday
.

His office was on the third floor of an old brownstone on Washington Square. The waiting room was empty, quiet, and genteel chic, with a worn Oriental rug and mahogany furniture, a world away from the crowded, noisy, urgent care centers we used in Grange Hill. A nurse, one of the few I’d ever seen who still wore a white skirt and blouse, led me back to the examination room, which was more modern, except for two high-backed upholstered chairs beside a bay window.

Dr. Cohen was a soft-spoken man in his sixties, with a trim gray
beard and sparkling blue eyes shining through his rimless glasses. He was shorter than me and slight, wearing a conservative yellow bow tie and maroon sweater vest that may have been purchased in the boys’ department. But despite his miniature stature, he was handsome and confident, and I noticed he wasn’t wearing a wedding ring. He was exactly the type of guy I wished Roberta would fall for, but her halfhearted attempts at dating men her own age always ended badly. Ditto for her attempts at dating short guys.

“Abigail, my dear,” he said as he hugged me hello. “You gave us all quite a scare last weekend. How are you feeling?” He stepped back and looked me in the eye, with genuine concern.

I smiled and let my shoulders drop. Something about doctors, especially older ones, always made me relax. Like they could fix anything, from broken bones to broken hearts.

“I feel fine, really, just thought it wouldn’t hurt to check in,” I said. “It was such a bizarre thing that happened.”

“I’ll admit, I was baffled,” he said. “You were unconscious for hours.”

“You saw me? At the hospital?”

“Oh yes, I came right over when I heard,” he said. “I got called away before you woke up. But I spoke with Dr. Aaronson and went over the scans. They were perfectly normal, like nothing had happened.”

But something did happen,
I wanted to tell him.
Something huge.

“Let’s take a look, shall we?” he said. He asked the nurse to come in, and while she checked my blood pressure, he asked some routine questions. He had me stand and perform various balance tests that felt more like a field sobriety check than a neurological work-up. Then he peered into my eyes and ears and at the area above my right ear, where my head had slammed into the piano. His hands were cold on my neck; I shivered in my flimsy paper gown.

“Tell me, Dr. Cohen,” I said, trying to be nonchalant. “Do head injuries ever cause delusions?”

“Delusions?”

“You know. Like some sort of reverse amnesia or memory loss or something like that?”

“I’m not sure I follow. There is no such thing as ‘reverse amnesia.’ And clinical amnesia is extremely rare. And usually only temporary. And from what we could tell, your injury was superficial, with no effect on the intracranial areas.”

“What about some sort of psychiatric episode? Like, alternate reality–type stuff?”

“That’s just in the movies,” he said with a laugh. “Pyschoses or psychotic episodes are from a chemical imbalance, not blunt trauma. Or from taking drugs—like PCP.”

He put down his penlight and looked at me: “Why, Abbey, are you having some sort of problem? Strange thoughts? Anxiety?”

“No, nothing like that,” I said, trying to be nonchalant. “Just curious.”

“You sure?” he said, touching my arm in concern.

“I’m sure. It’s nothing. Though sometimes I do feel like I’m living someone else’s life.” I laughed at my own joke, but he didn’t. Instead, he picked up my hand and took my pulse, then peered into my eyes once again.

As he began to examine my bruised knee, I couldn’t resist more questions. “But let’s say I did have some sort of chemical imbalance. What would you do for me? Pills? Electroshock?”

“Psychiatry isn’t really my specialty,” he said, grave faced. “If you feel like you need to talk to someone, why don’t I write you a referral? I have a colleague who would be a great fit for you. She’s very good with housewives.”

I smarted at the term “housewives” but nodded assent.

“It’s not a bad idea,” he continued. “Mirabelle tells me you are under tremendous stress with the campaign—and the new beach house. And of course your charity work.”

He walked over to a drawer, took out a prescription pad, and scribbled down a name and number. Then he slid the pad back into a drawer, locked it, and turned back to me as I sat motionless, wondering why Mirabelle was discussing my health with Dr. Cohen. I guess she felt the same way about doctor/patient confidentiality as she did about calling before stopping by someone’s apartment. Those silly rules didn’t apply to
her
.

“I almost forgot!” said Dr. Cohen, spinning around again. “I have that referral for Gloria. Dr. Ramsey. He’s at Cypress Street Psychiatry, so not too far from you. He said he could see her right away.”

I stared at him.

“To help with her enuresis,” he continued.

“Enuresis?”

“Bed-wetting.”

I stopped mid-buckle and stood up straight.

“You want to send a five-year-old to a psychiatrist for bed-wetting? It’s a perfectly natural thing. Especially for someone whose bladder is as tiny as Gloria’s.” I had done enough online reading to know that the worst thing a parent could do was make a big deal out of it, to turn what is a mechanical issue into a psychological one. Nine times out of ten, children grow out of it by second grade.

“Of course, I didn’t mean to say she was abnormal,” he said. “But, well, her grandmother thinks this would be a really good thing for her.”

I don’t give a flying fuck what Mirabelle or anyone else thinks would be good for my little girl,
I wanted to shout at him. Jimmy and I had decided long ago, after a series of tests that made everyone miserable,
most of all Gloria, we would not make her size, or any medical ramifications of her size, an issue. I was not about to start now.

“Gloria is already aware of the problem,” I said. “And unless this Dr. Ramsey has some magical way of making her bladder grow bigger and stronger, I really don’t think—”

“Abigail, I realize this is upsetting,” interrupted Dr. Cohen, misreading my outrage as distress. “I urge you to give it a try. For everyone’s sake.”

For everyone’s sake? Isn’t the only “sake” of importance Gloria’s?
I was dumbfounded. Were Mirabelle and the van Holts embarrassed by this? And, God forbid, not just of the bedwetting, but of how tiny Gloria was? And had Abbey van Holt condoned this? Was this yet another aspect of parenting she had subcontracted? I was stunned. And furious.

I felt a sudden urge to hightail it to Gloria’s school, yank her out of class, and run far, far away.

But I couldn’t. This was my world now and I had to make it work.

“All right. I’ll consider it,” I said, taking the note and slipping it into my purse. He smiled and excused himself.

Later, walking across Washington Square, its dry concrete fountain full of toddlers writing their names in chalk and throwing tennis balls, I became angry again.

I knew what was best for Gloria; I had since the beginning. I tore the referral card in half and shoved the pieces into a trash can.

“Just a minute,” said the ultrasound technician, a forced smile on her lips. “I’ll be right back.”

Not the words you want to hear in the middle of your thirty-week ultrasound, your protruding belly exposed and vulnerable, your husband nervously tapping his foot.

“Jimmy,” I said, my head twisted toward him, my body heavy on the padded exam table. “Did you catch that? Did she seem worried?”

“No,” he said, but he wouldn’t look me in the eye. “I didn’t notice anything. I think she’s just going to get the doctor. She always goes to get the doctor.”

I wasn’t convinced, and I knew he wasn’t either. I stared at the ultrasound, trying to decipher what could be amiss in the blur of black and white. Waiting for the door to swing back open was torture. Jimmy tried to distract me by asking me what I wanted for lunch.

“Mr. and Mrs. Lahey,” said Dr. Zardari, a tall, thin Pakistani man who had a funny habit of ending every sentence with “okay?” like a Valley Girl. Everyone in Grange Hill knew him; he was the only ultrasound doctor at Delco Memorial and he had pretty much scanned every kid in town. More than once I heard a pregnant friend joke, “Don’t tell Dr. Z!” before stealing a sip of wine or taking a drag off a friend’s cigarette.

“Let’s see how we are doing, okay?” he said as he squirted more cold gel on my tummy. He scanned the baby’s head, limbs, and torso once, then twice, scribbling notes on my chart. He motioned to the technician and they spent a few minutes quietly conferring, ignoring Jimmy and me.

My heart was beating fast, my throat was dry, and Jimmy had stopped rubbing my arm as he focused on the doctor’s face. Dr. Z sat down beside us and, in his lilting tone, told us words no expectant parents would ever want to hear.

“I’ve found something concerning.”

Time stopped.

“It could be nothing, but it could be something,” he continued. “We just don’t know, okay?”

“Something like what?” Jimmy managed to say.

“The fetus is small. For thirty weeks, we would expect it to weigh
at least two more pounds, possibly three. Are you certain you are thirty weeks along? Did you mistake when you had your last period?”

“No,” I told him. “I know it was June eleventh, because that’s my husband’s birthday.” He listened, scribbled more notes in the chart, and then looked up at me.

“We have to get you in for some more tests,” he said. “The good news is that the baby seems to be functioning adequately, and the head size is disproportionally large compared to the body. That means the brain is getting most of the nutrients, which is what we want to happen. The body can catch up later, okay?”