The Uses of Enchantment (31 page)

Helen, as though reading my mind, flashed me a strangely complicit smile; I was struck in that instant by an uncanny resemblance to her niece. Feature for feature, they shared nothing; but I sensed a deeper psychic resemblance, a prevailing caution that mutes the spirit’s instinctive ebullience and causes, in effect, a constant inner tension that can be read, by certain receptive members of the opposite sex, as profoundly sexual in nature.

Her mother’s desire to appear a non-meddler might be misread as a failure to care, I clarified.

A failure to care might be misread as a failure to care, said Helen.

How would you describe your relationship to your niece, I said.

Mary is an impossible girl to know, Helen said. I have tried. I have given up. So has her mother.

Mary’s mother has given up on Mary, I said. That’s quite an extreme statement.

Helen blinked owlishly.

Don’t you agree? I said. To give up on one’s own daughter? Especially when her daughter was abducted and possibly raped?

I said this for my own benefit as much as for Helen’s. Trying out the sound of this new story:
Mary was abducted. She was possibly raped
.

Helen winced.

I didn’t come here to make excuses for Paula, Helen began.

To this I said nothing.

What I meant when I said she’d given up…

Helen paused, retooled her response.

Paula is struck, she said, on a daily basis, by the fact that this child, who was once so uncomplicated and loving toward her, has become a vindictive stranger.

She stared at me meaningfully.

Clearly Paula has suffered, I said.

Let’s say it’s been a
uniquely trying experience
, Helen said.

I don’t know how
unique
it is, I said. Isn’t what you’re describing in Mary the textbook definition of adolescence?

Helen’s expression wavered momentarily before turning scornful.

Most adolescents don’t fake their abductions, said Helen. Most adolescents don’t torment their families by letting them wonder, for weeks, whether or not they’re dead.

But the cigarette case…I began. I was confused. Wasn’t the cigarette case proof of just the opposite? Mary
had
been abducted. She was a victim; she hadn’t tormented her family on purpose.

Exactly
, Helen said. The cigarette case.

You’ve lost me, I said.

Helen didn’t reply.

To me, I continued, the cigarette case suggests a very different interpretation.

That’s because you’re easily stunned by the obvious, said Helen.

Helen reached into her purse and withdrew a compact. She checked her nose, she checked both cheekbones, she snapped it shut, she rested it in her lap. Her index finger, I noticed, drew vague spirals over the fauxtortoiseshell cover.

Let’s start again, I said, trying to maintain my patience. To whom does it belong?

The cigarette case? she asked.

I bit back my annoyance.

Yes, I said. The cigarette case. Isn’t that what we’re discussing?

Presumably we’re
meant
to believe that it belongs to K, Helen said. Hasn’t she told you about K? What do you two talk about?

Helen crosshatched an insect bite on her wrist with her thumbnail.

I have a policy, I said.

You have a lot of policies, said Helen.

My policy is never to divulge details about a patient’s treatment to another person, particularly a family member.

Your policy is to play dumb so that you can trick me into revealing what I know, she said.

I grew testy.

You would not be the first family member who came to my office claiming a discovery of “extraordinary significance,” but who in fact wanted to fool me into violating the confidence of my patient by asking leading questions such as “Hasn’t she told you she’s in love with Todd?”

I glared at Helen.

I see, she said contritely.

Do you? I asked.

I do, she said. We need say no more about “Todd.”

Excellent, I said.

I don’t want to violate anything, she said.

I appreciate your sensitivity to this sensitive situation, I said. Many family members feel threatened by the access a total stranger is afforded to a relative, especially when their own access has been blocked.

Cuttingly put, Helen said. Are you always so gentle with your patients?

You’re not my patient, I reminded her.

Yet here I am paying for the pleasure to talk to you, said Helen.

She smiled insincerely.

I smiled insincerely.

Why don’t you explain to me the significance of the cigarette case, I said.

It has no significance, she said. That’s the significance.

Helen withdrew a slip of paper from her purse and handed it to me. She was nervous as she did this, as though trying to pass off a counterfeit bill. The piece of paper was a receipt—handwritten on a green restaurant pad—rubber-stamped at the top with a store logo and the name
DEN OF ANTIQUITY
. According to this receipt, a silver cigarette case had been purchased three months earlier for $13.65 cash.

Despite myself, I again felt “easily stunned by the obvious.”

You look unwell, said Helen.

I’m fine, I said. It’s warm in here.

I opened the window above the radiator.

You understand what this means, said Helen.

You suspect that Mary purchased this cigarette case.

I think that’s a reasonable suspicion, don’t you?

A reasonable
suspicion
, yes, I said.

She’s planting evidence. This means that there is no K. And if there is no K, then there was no abduction. If there was no abduction, there was no rape. If there was no rape, then she’s not a victim. She’s just a very selfish and needy little girl.

That’s a reasonable suspicion, I repeated dumbly.

Helen cocked an eyebrow.

A circumstantial
leap
, I cautioned, though of course I was thinking exactly what she was thinking, and as a result was feeling, inexplicably, sickened. Can one feel sick from relief? I did, like the nausea one experiences after an adrenaline rush.

Really I think we cannot make that assumption, I said.

Helen twisted her neck, stretching it from left to right, trying to release a tightness.

You realize that this cigarette case has put Paula in a terrible position, Helen said.

Of course, I said.

She’s been given the choice between a daughter who’s been raped and a daughter who is a liar, Helen said.

Choice, I said. That’s a strangely empowered way for Paula to view her daughter’s possible trauma.

It isn’t about
empowerment
, Helen said. It’s about coping. Paula will cling to whatever conclusion makes her most comfortable. That is her right as a mother.

Not if she’s aware that it’s her right. If she is aware it is her right, then she is obligated to overcome that sense of “entitlement”—also known, in my profession, as denial.

This is why she does not go to therapy, said Helen, sighing again.

Her leg continued to bob in its casual/noncasual way, clearly a practiced façade meant to disguise her anxiety. I suspected that Paula had been rejected early as an infant—her mirroring phase had clearly been disrupted—and she subsequently suffered from a mild narcissistic disorder. Her daughter’s situation could only be viewed in terms of how it affected her.

It’s a shame Paula won’t consider therapy during this stressful time, I said. She might find the experience enlightening.

You think she needs enlightening? Helen said nervously.

When it comes to ourselves, I said, we are never blinder.

Therapy would be a futile exercise for her, she said. Trust me. I’ve known her longer than anyone.

Many people, before they begin treatment, share those exact feelings, I said.

Paula is completely aware of her shortcomings as a parent and a person. But awareness does not mean a person can change the way she intrinsically is.

That is true, I said. Awareness is just the first step.

For some. For most, however, awareness is the end point. Honestly, Dr. Hammer, how many patients have you “cured”?

We don’t use terms like “cured,” I said. We respect the process over results. To be result-oriented—

Would mean getting results, Helen said.

Helen’s hostility levels, I noticed, had increased dramatically; the underpinning erotic aspect of this hostility, however, was muffled by an almost palpable distress—a sense of true emptiness and of loss. I wondered if perhaps she was hiding a deeper hurt or rejection—possibly the hurt existed between herself and Paula. Maybe she and Paula had had a falling out, or an act of deceit or betrayal had cleaved them apart. Regardless, I sensed there was more to Helen’s story than she was telling me.

You and your sister think very little of psychologists, I said. It’s strange she would choose to send her daughter to one, given her low opinion.

She’s aware of the contradiction, she insisted fervently. See? She’s
aware
of it, but that doesn’t mean she has the power, or the desire, to behave in a more consistent manner. She knows she’s a flawed person. She remains a flawed person who lives, in your opinion,
in denial
. That does not mean that she is impervious to emotion. That does not mean that she is incapable of being ruined.

As I said, I began, awareness is just the first step.

Awareness is a taunt to the people in your life who share your poor opinion of yourself, Helen said bitterly, her eyes rising to meet mine. They were greenish brown gray, the noncolor of the ocean on a poor day.

What is the taunt, I said.

Since you know your shortcomings, the assumption is that you will change them. And how often does that happen?

People do change, I said.

I’m sure they do, said Helen. But should they? That is a different question.

A person is not an island, I said. Denial is a disease; it infects entire families. Denial is also linked to an inability to take responsibility for one’s actions, and the shifting of blame onto innocent parties. It is linked to depression. It is linked to a higher divorce rate among adults, and suicide attempts among adolescents.

Helen, clearly, was not listening to me.

But if a person lives in denial, she said, don’t you think there could be a decent reason why she does?

Of course, I said. Denial is, in the short term, an easier way to manage emotional stress.

Some people are not built for emotional clarity. Some people thrive best, emotionally speaking, on confusion.

Then a few of us will have to take responsibility for the shortcomings of the happily confused, I said.

Really? she said, appearing sadly bemused.

Really, I said.

My end-of-session alarm sounded.

Well, Helen said. Paula will appreciate your taking the time to see me. She’ll be eager to hear what we’ve discussed.

I’d prefer that you didn’t speak to Paula about this meeting, I said.

Oh? she said.

If Paula wants to see me, Paula will come to see me.

But I need to tell her that you understand, she said. How did you phrase it? About “the shifting of blame onto innocent parties.”

Understand
, I said.

What Mary has tried to do to you.

Helen, moving mechanically, replaced her compact in her purse, along with the cigarette case and the receipt. She stood from the couch, coat slung over her forearm.

To me, I said.

Of course, Helen said, her expression lifeless. For all we know, you are her intended victim.

M
y next session with Mary followed a lengthy session with my own analyst. I had come to the conclusion, after a restless night, that Mary, her aunt, and Bettina Spencer were involved in a plot to destroy me; that they were attempting to enact revenge on me via a stealthy psychological game. His assessment of the situation was, of course, moderate and logical, so moderate and logical that I lost my temper. Not that I believed my own story—but I wanted validation that my perceived scenario was a plausible one. My analyst accused me of suffering from a metaphorical case of
penis captivus
and forced me to admit that my own unresolved issues with my mother—a passive aggressor who suffered from lifelong premorbidity—had led to my failure with Bettina and were threatening to destroy my professional relationship with another patient. He made me repeat the words
gray
,
watch
,
daisy
,
justice
, as he does when I am beset by paranoiac feelings related to my mother. I left his office with the phrases
gray watch
and
daisy justice
riding on the coattails of every brain wave, these two phrases coming to represent to me, in her chilly abstraction, my now dead mother.

Mary arrived at my office, four days after Helen’s visit, as her usual, moderately unkempt self.

You look terrible, Beaton, said Mary. Did you catch the flu?

I feel fine, I said.

Hmmmm, said Mary. She stood by my bookshelf, fingering my brica-brac.

What is this? she said.

A Chinese cricket cage, I said.

And how about these? She pointed to a series of increasingly smaller brass chickens.

Opium weights, I said. A souvenir from Thailand.

Did you know that Freud was a coke fiend?

Cocaine was once used for medicinal purposes, I said.

He was a coke fiend. Did you ever go to Thailand or China?

It sounds like you’re interested in travel, I said.

It sounds like you’re avoiding the question, she said.

I have never been to either place, I said.

Gifts? she said. From your devoted former patient? The girl who gives you the books? Have you ever played the game props?

I’m unfamiliar with that game, I said curtly.

Do you want to play? I like it better when we play games.

Why is that?

You’re less anxious, she said.