Mind Games (24 page)

I didn’t phone Sally back. When she made no effort to call me either, my sense of bereavement worsened. Maybe she was ashamed for kissing me Sunday night before going to the bed of another. (He owns a small airplane. Sally loves flying. That’s what this is about. But I’m flailing, refusing to see reality. I may have to free myself from Sally just to save my sanity.)

My mood wasn’t lightened by a visit from Celestine Post the other day. I was in my consulting room, in a bleary state of angst, when she slipped past security. James had lied poorly, and she saw when she peeked in that I was not, in truth, occupied with a distraught patient. She entered uninvited.

“What do you do in here, jerk off all day?”

“This is my quiet time.”

“I want to say I’m sorry.”

I studied her, expecting irony, the raised eyebrow, but what I saw was the flaccid facial tone of the mendicant, of one who has been on the run too long and has decided to turn herself in.

“I accept that I am a nerd,” I said.

“I’m not sorry for insulting you. Or for having the hots for you. I’m sorry about Sally. I’m sorry that you’re hurting.” She sat on the arm of the stuffed chair, stiffly, like a bird. “I felt like shit after I checked my horoscope today. It was like, ‘Confess your sins to a friend who is in pain.’”

I felt a bleak satisfaction in learning I was right. Sally had been titillated at the prospect of a sexual adventure, Celestine had taunted her to bend to Cousineau’s importuning, then covered for her. When I spurned Celestine’s advances, she realized she’d made “a horrible mistake.”

I felt a dull pain when Celestine added, “I didn’t think it would lead to this. It’s gotten serious. He’s been taking her out on his Cessna, and maybe she likes flying more than she likes fucking, but he’s head over heels, and she’s flattered. She’s going off to some pokey Gulf Island to think things over.”

I said I was too depressed to talk further.

Images from my dreams continued to plague me: the lurking satyr, the rock music, the sounds of the banjo from the tent, a woman’s moans. These weren’t products of a mysterious power that permits me to crystal-gaze upon past events – they came from a lifetime of receiving Victoria’s signals. Unspoken truths she’d struggled with over the years had been absorbed by me, in the deepest part of me, and were now seeping from my unconscious.

Finally, on Wednesday evening, I stopped procrastinating and invited myself to Victoria’s home for an encounter session over a bottle of wine.

She was welcoming but seemed harried – she’s been trying to catch up on her obituaries, which she’s been neglecting
while she concentrates on her second novel,
Desirée
. Is Desirée, with her witchlike powers, to be burned by the vengeful townsfolk of Chickadee, B.C., or is she innocent? Horror grips yet another small town.

Her publisher was pestering her to complete it.
When Comes the Darkness
is selling well as a result of publicity over her libel trial, and
Desirée
, if finished in time, would grace New Millennium’s spring catalogue.

We sat at her dining-room table, where she prefers to work – it was laden with manuscript and notepads and reference books, the computer humming. On the screen:
Recently honoured with the title of life member of the Teamster’s Union, Mr. Kozak came peacefully to the end of the road on the day of the Autumn Solstice, after a brief illness
.

“What do you think?”

“How about, ‘Completed his last journey’?”

“I used it last week for a train brakeman.”

In a vase on the table was a huge bouquet. Sending flowers seems all the rage these days, and in this case the sender turned out, on brief cross-examination, to be a TV producer Victoria has been seeing, a new suitor. She’d already had one date with this bearded, sensitive yet rugged designer of a cable arts show. Fifty, divorced (twice, two teenagers), climbs in the high Rockies when on holiday.

Before I could say anything, Victoria began a lecture about how I, predictably, would not approve of this liaison, how I could always be counted on to discover some wart of character.

I assured her I wanted her to enjoy close male friendship, intimate even – or better: a life partner. But I also wanted her to be loved. She has a history of choosing unwisely. Maybe this Edmund Hillary was the right person – she should check him out but take her time doing so. He may be a paragon, but she should be aware of the statistics regarding twice-divorced men.

“I’m not planning to marry him. I’m just going out with him. Open the wine, dear.”

She needed a drink, she said: tomorrow she had an appointment with my psychiatrist. “I’m not keen on it, but from the look of you, I can see I’d better talk to her. You look like the ghoul that emerged from the cesspool. For God’s sake, tell me what happened.”

I filled our glasses, then told her of my cold night outside Cousineau’s love nest. As my tale unfolded, Victoria softened, tut-tutting, shaking her head, squeezing my hand across the dining table, offering words of solace.

“Why don’t you just let her have her affair? Maybe she won’t feel complete without her romantic adventure. Is she being dishonest with you? I don’t think so. Sally dealt with you squarely, she had the grace and courtesy to ask for a trial separation, for the space and freedom and moral right to do this. Wait her out, honey. This isn’t the end of the universe.”

I was hearing but wasn’t listening. Victoria’s words didn’t bite in until today, as I recounted them to you, when you made me realize that I’d been deaf to her counsel. Sally isn’t my bond slave. This is the age of sexual freedom, I mustn’t adhere to an obsolete Christian ethos. Artists, say the texts, are characterized by a willingness to recognize their irrational impulses. I can accept that. How might going to bed with Ellery Cousineau be anything but an irrational impulse?

Hadn’t I been anticipating this? Hadn’t I settled my mind that I could endure Sally having a trial affair? Not with Ellery Cousineau, that still sits thickly in the stomach. On the other hand, our relationship will be made stronger by her realization of this gross error in taste.

But at the time, I was mired in self-pity, unable to drown it in Cabernet Sauvignon. Only with great effort did I hold back from telling Victoria about my speculation as to Cousineau’s forbidden tastes. And I was hesitant, after Victoria’s kindness, to raise a topic pregnant, as it were, with possible friction, so I let her hold forth about Clinton Huff, about the trial that was set to resume in October. With the uptick in sales of
When
Comes the Darkness
, her publisher, confident of victory, is happy to let the trial spin out. Victoria wants a quick end to it, though, and Brovak has come up with a strategy (foolish, I feel, and risky) to abort proceedings by having Huff declared mentally incompetent. Which is why, Victoria said, I should testify. I had the goods on Huff, only I could testify to his obsessiveness, his paranoia. And wouldn’t I feel more comfortable if my bête noir were made a ward of the health system?

I disagreed. If I were dragged into a courtroom, Huff would accuse me of whatever evil practices he thinks I indulge in – I don’t know what delusions he holds, what slanders he’s capable of. (A sudden sneaking thought: What if it is Huff who was writing threatening notes and skulking after me?) My presence could cause a deterioration in his condition, and I didn’t want to be responsible for that. When he recovers, he might be forever on my backside, a life of unremitting hassle.

That led to a tiff, I’m afraid. To put it bluntly, Victoria blew up at me, accused me of disloyalty, of putting self-concern ahead of feelings for her, of not caring, not loving, of abandoning her.

I bolted the last of the wine, attacked the cognac in her liquor cabinet. It fuelled my stubbornness – I was falling apart, I’d only blow it in court, I had a charity bicycle race in October, I’d be in hard training.

This trial was her goddamn
life
, she shouted. Writing had been her abiding dream, as long as she could remember, and she had a chance to launch a
real
career in it, escape from the ignominy of Literary Consolation Services. If she were to lose this trial, she’d be a one-novel flareout, a laughing-stock, condemned to everlasting literary failure.

I hate myself for this, but I’d drunk enough courage to pursue my mission, and I non-sequitured right into the subject of how I came to be. “I need to ask for the truth about Peter.”

A startled response from Victoria. She set down her glass unsteadily.

“Well?” I said.

She seemed lost, my change of tack took the wind from her sails. When she spoke, it was with subdued voice. “I’m sorry, I’m really behind with my body count. We’ll talk about it when you’re sober.”

Why was she withholding, why was my mother, despite a history of so much love and closeness, afraid to talk about Peter with me? I was hurt, and spoke harshly. “When you see Dr. Epstein tomorrow, I hope you’ll have the courage to tell her what you can’t tell me.”

I could see her face working. I was suddenly awash with remorse. Victoria has always resisted displays of grief, even or especially in front of me, so I just held her, kissed her, told her I loved her. I promised I’d be there to support her at her trial. She clutched my hand, then released me, and I could see tears coming, so I left.

I blew it, Allis, it exploded in my face. I was thoughtless, consumed by my own needs. This is a woman who survived on grants and loans, who raised me in student housing, working as waitress and housecleaner while she slugged it out for a university degree.

That’s when I decided to do the Xanax.

Maybe she’ll get a more sympathetic hearing from you. Maybe she’ll find it easier to talk to you.

I know the truth anyway; it has resounded in my ears like a thunderclap. It is shame that causes Victoria to shun the subject. Not the shame of having told me fairy-tale accounts, not the shame of having allowed herself to be a pushover, easily seduced. No, an act of enormity occurred by the shore of that lake. That is what she doesn’t dare tell me, that is what she fears I cannot face.

I am a child of rape …