“That would be great,” I said fervently.
“I’ll pick out a nice place,” he said. And then he creamed, not into his daughter’s mouth, which really would be against the law, but up inside his own shirt. Clee’s hand was under there, discreetly milking out the last drops. A flood of nausea and sadness washed over me. I missed Phillip’s familiar member. Where was I now and where was he? The snails were everywhere. Not only underfoot and glued to the kitchen walls, but all over the rest of the house. They weren’t the slow kind. One was procreating asexually on a lampshade. I watched two disappear under the couch. Was this the bottom or would my problem get worse? It was a problem. I had a problem.
SOMETHING LIKE THIS HAD HAPPENED to me once before. When I was nine a well-meaning uncle sent me a birthday card. It wasn’t really an appropriate card for a young girl; a group of rough-looking birds in rakish hats were playing cards with cigars in their beaks. It said something I can’t remember, but on the inside was a phrase like a virus or a self-replicating parasite waiting for a host. When I opened the card it flew out, gripping my brain with merciless talons: “Birds of a feather flock together.” It couldn’t be said just once, only repeated and repeated and repeated. Birdsofafeatherflocktogether, birdsofafeatherflocktogether. Ten million times a day: at school, at home, in the bath, there was no way to hide from it. It receded only as long as I was distracted; at any given moment a bird or flock of birds or a cigar or playing card or anything could bring it on. Birdsofafeatherflocktogetherbirdsofafeatherflocktogether. I wondered how I would live a full and normal life, how would I get married, have kids, hold a job with this handicap. I was under this spell, on and off, for a full year. Then, quite unknowingly, the same uncle sent a card for my tenth birthday. This one had a Norman Rockwell painting of a girl covering her eyes on the front. It read: “Another year older? I can’t bear to see!” And then on the inside: “Because what’s happening to you, is happening to me.” It worked like a gunshot. Each time a flock of grimy birds began to descend, I incanted What’shappeningtoyouishappeningtome and they immediately dispersed. The uncle is dead, but the card is still on my dresser. It hasn’t failed me once.
“Until now,” I finished gravely, leaning forward on the leather couch. “It doesn’t work on this new spell.”
Ruth-Anne nodded compassionately. We were moving past my inappropriate behavior in last week’s session.
“So we need an antidote,” she said. “A corrective, like the card, for this particular spell. But not What’shappeningtoyouishappeningtome, it’s too short.”
“That’s what I thought, that it might be too short.”
“You need something that will take a little time.”
We tried to think of a longish antidote.
“What songs do you know? ‘O Come, All Ye Faithful’? Do you know that?”
“I really can’t sing. I can’t hold a tune,” I said.
“I don’t think that’s a problem, you just have to know the words. ‘Mary Had a Little Lamb’?”
I bleated out “Mary Had a Little Lamb.”
“What do you think?”
“Well…” I didn’t want to disparage her idea. “I’m not sure I want to sing ‘Mary Had a Little Lamb’ all day.”
“Of course you don’t. That’ll drive you crazier than the blow jobs. What’s a song you love? Is there a song you love?”
There was a song. A girl in college played it all the time; I was always hoping to hear it on the radio.
“I’m not sure I can sing it.”
“But you know the words?”
“Yes.”
“Just say them. Chant it.”
I felt hot and cold. I was shaking. I put my hand on my forehead and began.
“Will you stay in our Lovers’ Story?”
It sounded terrible.
“It’s by David Bowie.”
Ruth-Anne nodded encouragingly.
“If you stay you won’t be sorry
“’Cause weeeee believe in youuuu”
I kept gasping; the air wasn’t going in and out of my throat in the regular way.
“Soon you’ll grow so take a chance
“With a couple of Kooks
“Hung up on romaaaancing”
“That’s all I know.”
“How do you feel?”
“Well, I know the tune wasn’t right, but I think maybe I captured some of the energy of the song.”
“I mean about Clee.”
“Oh.”
“You got a little break.”
“I guess I did.”
The next morning I rose early, awaiting my first chance to test the song. I took a shower, gingerly. The spell kept its distance. I dressed and waved to Rick — he was looking at the snails with distress.
“Good morning!” I stepped outside with a hearty mug of tea.
“This situation is out of control.”
“Yes, I know. I ordered too many.”
“I will deal with four of them. That is the number of snails I am prepared to supervise. I don’t have the training to care for a herd.”
“Perhaps you can call them? Round them up?”
“Call them? How?”
“A snail whistle?”
The words were hardly out of my mouth when Clee began sucking on the tiny snail whistle between Rick’s legs. He was shocked and so forth, etc.
“Rick, I’m going to sing a song now.”
“I don’t think that will work. They have no ears.”
“Will you stay in our Lovers’ Story…” Rick politely lowered his eyes. He’d seen crazier things living on the streets. “If you stay you won’t be sorry, ’cause weee belieeeve in you.”
It sort of worked. It wasn’t like saying abracadabra to make a rabbit disappear, poof. It was like saying abracadabra billions of times, saying it for years, until the rabbit died of old age, and then continuing to say it until the rabbit had completely decomposed and been absorbed into the earth, poof. It took dedication, which I had when I first woke up — but my resolve decayed with the day. Faced with the option of singing or rubbing her warm puss through her jeans, I always decided tomorrow was the day to begin.
CARL WAS WEARING DRESSY LOAFERS that clicked on the sidewalk like tap shoes. There was some confusion about who should sit in the front seat — me, because I was older, or Clee, because she was the daughter. I sat in the back. We drove in silence.
The wine tasted off to Carl; he asked for another bottle.
“That’s why they let you try it,” he said. “They want you to be happy.”
Clee seemed bored but I knew her well enough to know this was just a look. Like me, she was wondering why we were here. What didn’t look bored were her nipples; they sat upright, attentive in a stretchy green tube dress. It was very hard to hum the song and make polite conversation at the same time.
Carl showed me his new cell phone and I felt a little sick. What if he was here because I had summoned him, given him an overwhelming and inappropriate desire to see his daughter? But he wasn’t looking at her. He took a long sip of wine, watching me over the rim of the glass.
“How many years have we known you, Cheryl?”
“Twenty-three.”
“That’s a lot of years. A lot of commitment, a lot of trust.”
When he said trust he gestured to Clee; she was wide-eyed and chewing on a hangnail. He knew. Kristof had told him about the old videos I had borrowed. He had figured out the rest. Bruises. The missing pummel suit.