Chapter Twelve #2
“Not everyone sees it that way.” I breathed in the scent of java and reminded myself that I was no longer a prisoner of the past—no matter what subconscious cues the hospital atmosphere was sending to my brain.
“In my, uh, last relationship before I moved here ... When he would say ‘we have nothing in common,’ that was code for me to join in with all of his interests, while he ignored mine. I know it sounds like such a small thing.”
“Not at all.” He waited for me to continue, drinking his coffee, giving me space.
But I didn’t say anything more. That was all I dared risk. If I slid down that Alice in Wonderland rabbit hole of memories, I might lose myself and let something slip. It was exhausting, keeping so many secrets. But the alternative? Risking landing back in my old life? Unthinkable.
I worked hard not to remember the time in the hospital—not this one.
The psychiatric hospital. The calendar insisted I’d been there for nine months.
My brain remembered only half as much. At times I questioned my own sanity.
Had Phillip been right in committing me?
Except why, then, did he never visit after that first week?
I’d long wondered. Was my mind clearer because of the treatments or due to the distance from Phillip’s influence?
Near the end of my stay, I’d needed an off-campus appointment with a specialist because of uterine cysts.
I hadn’t seen newspapers in the longest time.
As I waited for surgery, I tore into the society section of issue after issue to catch up with my friends.
Friends who hadn’t come to see me, but then, would I have visited them if the positions were reversed?
Likely, I would have told myself they needed rest and I didn’t want to disturb them.
Excuses to cover the truth of confronting uncomfortable subjects.
Looking back, I’m sure there were people in my Mobile social circle who pushed boundaries, but in those days, I still saw the world in black-and-white terms. All good. All bad. Not a healthy outlook.
Which was why the newspaper articles hit me hard. Photos of Phillip at one society event after another, a beautiful woman on his arm. No mentions of me. Nothing. Not even a comment about my absence. I’d been erased.
The cysts turned out to be worse than expected, and I ended up having a hysterectomy. While tears leaked from my eyes, the nurse had patted my hand, telling me how lucky I was not to have cancer. My husband had sent flowers. Wasn’t that nice?
As if a dozen roses made up for his absence.
My anger at Phillip grew, along with my hunger for information.
I asked the candy striper for newspapers and magazines, reading material to pass the time.
A young hospital aide would be less likely to question what I should and shouldn’t access.
But I needed to find some mention in one of those articles that I’d existed.
That I’d mattered. And at every turn of a glossy page, I came up blank.
With Russell, I felt seen. Such a simple thing.
But to me, it was everything after Phillip’s brutal dismissal.
The way he’d used his connections in the medical world to have me committed against my will.
How he’d cut me off from all contact with anyone except him, while making himself sole executor of the inheritance from my parents.
Memories of finding all those magazine articles with him out with other women while I stayed locked away.
Abandoned. Gaslit. With no legal recourse.
Which made it hurt all the more that I struggled to see a way forward with Russell. Because he deserved to be seen as well, all of him, his hopes and dreams. “Thanks for the coffee. I don’t want to keep you from your job.”
“Are you sure you don’t want me to call out of work?”
“Please, don’t do that on my account. I have the rest of the day off to sit with Annette.” We had plenty to talk about anyway. “I’ll catch up with you later.”
I arched up on my toes to kiss him on the cheek. Then froze. What had I just done? How could I think of setting him free one moment, then an instant later bring us closer?
Pivoting away before I did something even more reckless, I raced toward Annette’s room, tossing my empty cup in a trash can on my way past. I couldn’t afford a misstep.
Thea’s arrival had reminded me more than ever of my tenuous position in life.
Most of all, how isolated this reframed existence could be, unable to open up fully because of secrets. Except with Annette.
Right now, the last thing Annette needed was the stress of my confusion. I should focus first and foremost on the importance of the task she had given me. And my feelings for Russell? How the past shredded my ability to trust my own judgment?
I would sift through those later, in the quiet of my boardinghouse room. Small, but it was my space. Where I controlled my life.
I used the ten minutes waiting outside Annette’s door to file away my jumbled emotions and focus on my mentor. Once the doctor ducked back into the hallway, his curt nod offered little indication of her condition. Much how Phillip—the all-powerful physician—so often dismissed me.
Teeth clenched, I reminded myself Phillip wasn’t here. He was off making some other poor woman’s life miserable.
“Hello,” I called through the door, tapping two knuckles on the panel. “It’s me.”
“Come on in,” Annette called out.
I let myself indulge hopeful thoughts that she sounded stronger today. I tucked inside and closed the door behind me so that we could talk freely. Although the sight of her in a hospital gown gave me pause.
She didn’t even raise the head of the bed as she motioned me closer. “Catch me up on how things went at the library.”
The other bed in the semiprivate room was empty.
Still, I kept my voice low. “All went well yesterday, and our ‘guest’ is settled. Being on this side of things, seeing the impact, I want to be you when I grow up.”
“Now that’s a first,” Annette said, smiling, fanning laugh lines that seemed deeper than before. Proof of her mortality beeped from the monitor beside her bed. “Well done, my dear. I look forward to hearing all about it.”
I dragged a chair as close to the bedrail as I could get to minimize the chance of anyone hearing. Also, to clasp Annette’s hand because I needed that connection, to feel the reassurance of her alive and warm.
Sparing no details, I reviewed Thea’s intake, including the bit about the secret code and my caution. Annette’s nods of approval made me feel like a child winning a parent’s endorsement. Better, in fact, than all the first prizes I’d won as a child in art competitions.
Out of breath as I finished my recap, I sagged back in the chair, inordinately proud of myself, almost managing to forget where I was and Annette’s health scare. “Is there anything else you need for me to follow up on?”
“Nothing that I can think of right now. Best to keep things low key after a success like this. I knew I could count on you.” Annette adjusted the bleached hospital sheets before leveling a somber stare. “Although to be clear, I’m still not okay with you and my grandson being together.”
Her words shocked me, like a slap across the face. And also confused me. She didn’t approve of me? “Then why did you trust me with ... what I did yesterday?”
Her weary sigh seemed to deflate her under the sterile covers. “Because I’m getting old, and my work here is too important to let it die with me. I need you to step in.”
Again, Annette surprised me silent, even as I stung from her reproof. I must have misheard. “Annette, I’m confused. You’ve warned me away from Russell in one breath, then suggested this huge responsibility should be mine. May I ask why you disapprove? Is it because ...”
“Of the color of your skin,” she said simply.
I had feared that, even if I hadn’t been able to say as much.
It was tough finding the right words that wouldn’t offend—or more importantly, words that wouldn’t hurt.
I hadn’t grown up in a family that talked about race.
We discussed classical literature, Broadway plays, and overseas travel.
But we never discussed this, a subject that mattered so much more.
Annette squeezed my hand. “I want what’s best for you.
And what’s best for my grandson.” She rubbed her other hand along her collarbone, weariness stamped on her lined face.
“I’ve seen a lot of change in my life. I was born in a house with no electricity or indoor plumbing.
It wasn’t a matter of poverty. That’s just how most folks lived in rural South Carolina. ”
She drew in a few drags off the oxygen tube at her nose.
“My daddy farmed, and we had plenty to eat. I recall riding horseback, swimming in the river, reading every book I could get my hands on. But I also remember sitting in the back of the bus, drinking from a different water fountain, and taking my grandson to first grade in a segregated school.”
“But things are changing.” The sentence felt inadequate on my tongue. “Aren’t they?”
“Yes, things are changing, but not nearly fast enough. Just like I want you safe from the past that hurt you ...” The heart monitor’s beeps increased, along with the fire in her eyes.
“I need my grandson to stay safe from people in the present who would still do him harm for looking at you the way he does.”
I wanted to reassure her that I understood we couldn’t have a future for so many reasons, my past being high on the list. But I also recognized this was a moment I needed to listen. “Thank you for talking to me, for being patient with me. I hope you know, I’m really trying.”
“I do recognize that.” A smile flickered across her face, along with a wince as she shifted in the narrow bed. “But there’s going to come a time when people like me are going to get tired of carrying the burden of helping white folks trying to understand.”