Peter understood now that Rachel hoped for marriage or a commitment like it, that she had expected his therapy to make him feel that his marriage to Diane was an illness, or a symptom of an illness. This discovery had none of the shock of revelation; rather, it was like noticing a color in familiar wallpaper, seeing something close by, always there, but previously ignored. He was offended by Rachel’s presumption.
(“Aren’t you flattered?” Dr. Kotkin asked.
(“Flattered?”
(“That a bright, successful, attractive woman wants you?”
(“She’s not that attractive,” Peter said, and laughed sheepishly at his cruel joke.
(“If she were more attractive, would you be flattered?” Dr. Kotkin asked, suddenly stripped of her sense of humor.
(“No. Of course not. I’m just not flattered.”)
He was bored. Rachel believed she was very important in his life. Obviously that was her problem. Unless Peter gave her absolute confirmation, she would forever be unloading her things into his soul, matching her fabric to his, lighting the same areas, completing his set of china. If she couldn’t possess the thing of him— marriage — she wanted to own his feelings.
Rachel yelled at him. She told him she couldn’t see him for a while. Peter looked downcast, but was secretly thrilled. One less cloying person.
(“I want you to get rid of them.”
(“Get rid of who?”
(“In our first session you asked what I wanted from you. I want you to get rid of all of them. My mother, my father, my stepmother, my stepfather, Larry, Diane, Byron, Rachel. Get rid of them.”
(“And then what will happen?”
(“Then I’ll be happy. I’ll buy a Winnebago and drive to Wyoming and live free and wild.”
(“How can I get rid of them?”
(He took that one seriously. His legs felt stuck to Kotkin’s couch. His head sank into the pillow. He closed his eyes and the lids burned. “Make me not care about them. About what they say. Or what they want. Or what I owe them.”
(“And if you didn’t care about all that, then you’d be free of them?”
(“Wouldn’t I?”
(“I don’t know. Is that what you’re saying?”
(“What do you think? Or will you really never tell me what you think?”
(“I think all of this talk about getting rid of them are made-up feelings.”
(Peter tried to raise his head, but the weight of his soul held him down, vulnerable to her omniscient voice. “You do!”
(“I don’t think you want to be free of them. I think you make that up. You bring it to me because you think it’s naughty, and that’s fine. You can come here and say naughty things. You want your wife and son dead. You don’t want to see Rachel. Maybe some of these things you do want. But that’s not why you’re saying it.”)
That was thrilling. Therapy was more fun than life. He was glad not to have to see Rachel for a while. He could see Kotkin instead.
NINA TOLD Luke the truth. She explained that she had to go to school to learn how to make designs, that she wanted to do something, the way Daddy did something.
“But you take care of me,” Luke said.
She didn’t tiptoe. She said she had to do something besides be a mommy. She contradicted Eric’s halting, guilty speech of the previous night. Eric had told Luke that Mommy had to work, that people worked to make money, and money was needed to live. That wasn’t the truth. Nina couldn’t bear to hurt Luke — and pretend the hurt wasn’t intended. She didn’t bother to explain her logic to Eric; it wouldn’t be logic to him.
Luke’s blue jewels, shimmering with emotion, bravely held her in their light, wanting to know more. “What kind of designs?” he asked.
She showed him the dresses in her closet to illustrate. Luke made a game of it. He ran into the ocean of hanging fabrics, their hems washing over his head, waves of silk and wool and cotton. “Soft,” he said for the silk.
“Right, that’s silk.”
“Scratchy!”
“That’s wool.”
Luke paused under the cotton dress. His head popped inside, then appeared again. “Soft and scratchy. Like a towel.”
“Right! Very good description, Luke. That’s cotton. Towels are made of cotton.”
Luke ran into her legs and hugged her knees. “Mommy,” he said in his sweet, high trill, singing to her. “Mommy.”
“You want to see where I’ll be going?”
Luke looked shocked, as if she had offered something forbidden. He nodded cautiously, afraid of the admission. She took him to FIT and pointed to the featureless, undesigned buildings where her classes would be. After that, they ate in a coffee shop, a room of trapped air that had been heated and reheated. Its only color was a dull red — the vinyl booths, the pointless glass-colored panels, even the waiter’s jackets. Nina thought it funny that this masterpiece of ugliness was so near the Fashion Institute.
Luke adored the coffee shop. He smacked his lips with each sip of his chocolate milk shake, and exclaimed about each glass horror, each phony wood panel, and was delighted by the plastic container of artificial maple syrup made in the shape of a bear.
They took a taxi home. Luke’s energy waned, and with it, the props for his courage collapsed. The blue jewels’ glint was dulled by water, he leaned his head against her soft breasts, no longer hard with his sustenance, no longer able to soothe every hurt. He cried softly into her lap. She stroked his head and said nothing. Nothing she could say would be true.
Her head throbbed. She loved him, but she wished he would stop. Each tear burned her skin. Each sob punctured her heart.
And was it worth it? Was she really going to make something of her attempt at a career? The chances she would land any kind of job were probably slight. She had never really finished anything. Except for Luke, what crop had she sown and harvested?
And now I’m abandoning him, she thought, sighing as Luke stopped crying and fell into coma, his mouth open, his pacifier falling out. He was still such a baby: still in diapers, still with a plug in his mouth, still clutching his favorite stuffed animal in his crib.
If only Eric’s lie had been true. If only they needed the money. What a good, solid excuse for leaving.
Anyway, the value of a mother staying home, that was in the heads of men, magazines, talk-show-segment producers, and the women who wanted to stay home anyway. From the park she knew plenty of children whose mothers worked, and with lousy nannies as caretakers to boot. Still, those children functioned. They had problems. But Luke has problems. Maybe he’s got them because I stay home, she thought. A few weeks ago, Eric had come back from the park raving about Byron’s gregariousness. Nina admired Byron’s boldness too. Byron’s mother, whom Nina had never seen with Byron, worked. What harm had that done Byron? Apparently none. It was all blather. The mothers who left their children to work, and the mothers who left work for children — both groups claimed reasons beyond their own interests, as though nothing in life were done for the self.
I have to work. We need the money.
It’s better for my child, during these formative years, to have my full attention.
We’re having another child because I think it’s better not to be a precious only child. Studies have shown that—
The park was littered with women who talked like that. Nina held the limp soft pad of Luke’s hand in hers. It was still an exquisite miniature. Of course, sometimes, she wanted to make another baby, another finely worked masterpiece from the forge of her womb. Nothing she had ever done was like it. To repeat the triumph, why, it was pure ego, pure power. It’s better not to be an only child, indeed. She kissed the sleeping Luke’s hand. No, in this great big greedy world, it was impossible to find people who did things to satisfy their own desires.