Chapter 2 #7
In my dream, the baby’s body is pliant and supple, chubby, slick with soap. She kicks and splashes.
But then the kicks become frantic. Something is wrong. She’s struggling to breathe. Her skin turns blue.
It’s all right, I whisper. It’s going to be fine.
I am her mother, so it soothes her.
Even though I am the one pressing the washcloth over her face.
Adam asked me to marry him the summer of 1998, just after we moved to New York City in a sweltering June heat wave.
We lived in Washington Heights, and we had one tiny air--conditioning unit in our bedroom—-a room so small that we could fit a double mattress but no nightstands.
We were lying on our backs there, naked, when Adam asked, “Have you ever heard of the marshmallow test?”
I shook my head, too hot to speak.
“This psychologist at Stanford? He was studying delayed gratification in children. He put a marshmallow in front of a kid and told them he was going to leave the room. They could either eat the marshmallow right away, or—-if they waited for him to come back—-they could have two. The majority of the kids ate the marshmallow.”
On cue, my stomach growled.
Adam came up on his elbow. “You’re my marshmallow, Ellie. I don’t want to wait until we have enough money or the right jobs or we’re old enough for people to stop thinking we’re making a mistake. Marry me?”
From beneath the pillow, he slid a little velvet pouch. Inside was a small diamond ring.
I was twenty--two. After graduating from Brown, Adam had gone to MIT for a master’s in civil and environmental engineering, commuting back to Rhode Island to see me on weekends.
I had graduated that spring from RISD, winning an award for my senior project.
He had a job lined up in New York City, as did Evie—-she’d sent out a single job application and managed to get hired doing graphic design at BBDO.
I was planning to trade teaching mosaic classes to children in exchange for studio time at a community college.
I turned on my side, a slow smile spreading. “Can I marry you, and get two treats?”
He pounced, pinning me to the mattress. “Is that a yes?”
“Yes.” I laughed. “A hundred times yes.”
Adam pushed the ring onto my finger, and then his lips skipped to my jaw, under my ear, between my breasts. He shifted lower, his tongue tracing my hip bones, his thumbs in the creases at my thighs. I tangled my hand in his hair.
“Don’t mind me,” he said, grinning. “Just claiming my marshmallow.”
One Saturday morning, Evie kidnapped me.
By now she had traded her ripped fishnets and leather jackets for pencil skirts and oversize glasses.
She looked like a sexy librarian, and apparently, it was working, because as she dragged me to the subway, she regaled me with the story of how a late night at work had ended up with her drinking bourbon in her boss’s office and having sex on top of her mock--ups for a PepsiCo campaign. “Isn’t he married?” I asked, shocked.
But Evie shrugged. “It’s just sex.”
“He’s your boss,” I pointed out. “It’s . . . transactional. Messy.”
“All sex is transactional and messy,” Evie replied.
“What about his wife?”
“What about her?”
“How do you think I’d feel if Adam was sleeping with someone at the office?”
Evie rolled her eyes. “Adam,” she said, “is not even aware there are females other than you on this planet.”
We were buzzed into a brownstone on the Upper East Side. Evie flung open a glass door etched with the words anastasia bridal. “Ta--fucking--da,” she said. “Someone has to get you dressed for this shindig.”
It was like entering an ice forest. Everything was white and crystal and gleaming and mirrored. Two slender mannequins modeled wedding gowns—-one with a belled skirt and one that hugged from neck to ankle. “Evie,” I hissed. “I can’t afford this.”
“Nope. But Adam’s parents can.”
Adam’s parents were eager for the wedding; his father had been diagnosed with dementia, so the sooner the better. His mother had hired a wedding planner and drawn up a list of two hundred guests.
In the bridal store, Evie drank free champagne and applauded each time I came out of the dressing room. When I modeled the fifth dress—-one that looked very Grace Kelly—-she gasped. “What do you think?” Evie asked.
I looked in the mirror and burst into tears.
I hurried back to the dressing room and sank to the floor in a cloud of satin. Evie came in and sat next to me. “Do you want to talk about it?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I should be happy, right?”
Her dark eyes met mine. “What is it?”
I pleated the satin between my fingers. “I think I spent so much of my life trying not to be noticed, that the idea of everyone watching me walk down an aisle is freaking me out.”
“Well, could you elope?” Evie asked.
“Adam wants this. He wants to make his mom happy.”
“He wants to make you happy more.” Evie yanked me to my feet and unzipped the dress. When I was in my own clothes again, she pulled me from the boutique.
Adam was eating half a bagel when we got back to the apartment. “Hey, asshole,” Evie said. “Your fiancée is having panic attacks over the thought of the Wedding of the Century your mother is planning, but she’s afraid to tell you.”
My head snapped to Evie. “That’s not—-”
“Ellie?” Adam said, looking crushed. “Is that true?”
“How would you feel if the only people you knew at your own wedding were me and Evie?”
He frowned. “You said you didn’t want to invite your parents—-”
“I don’t.” I’d told Adam the bare minimum about my childhood: I’d been raised in a church that felt like a cult, that I had a sister who’d died, that I’d run away from home at seventeen.
He’d met Ms. Robichaud and her sister a couple of times when we were living in Providence.
He knew that if he steered the conversation to my upbringing, I’d shut it down fast. “But I don’t want to get married in front of a bunch of strangers, either. ”
“So we’ll get married at City Hall. Shit, Evie could get ordained and marry us in our living room.”
“Pass,” Evie muttered. She started putting cream cheese on the other half of Adam’s bagel.
I blinked up at Adam, teary. “Really?”
“Really.”
“Your mother is going to kill you,” I pointed out.
He shrugged. “Then she can turn the event into a very fancy funeral.”
Adam leaned down to kiss me.
Evie took a bite of the bagel. “Get a room,” she said.
Over Adam’s shoulder, I caught her eye. Evie’s eyebrows arched. You’re welcome, she mouthed.
My wedding took place on a Friday at City Hall, with me, Adam, and Evie.
I wore a white dress from Century 21 and Adam was in jeans.
I carried a bouquet of tulips that we bought from a vendor’s cart for seven dollars.
The ceremony took ten minutes, and then we went to a bottomless boozy brunch in SoHo to celebrate.
Evie clinked her glass to give a toast. “To Eloise, the sister of my heart, and to Adam, who better not fuck this up,” she said.
She knocked back the contents of her glass and poured another Bellini from a pitcher.
The timing of this was not ideal: Two days earlier, Evie’s married boss had dumped her and she’d spent hours on our couch sobbing.
A wedding—-even one as low--key as this—-was surely not where she wanted to be right now.
Adam lifted his glass again. “And to Evie,” he said, “who introduced us.”
Evie clinked her flute against his, drained her drink, and got unsteadily to her feet. “We need more booze.”
Adam frowned. “When the waiter comes back—-”
“That takes too long,” Evie scoffed. She lifted the empty pitcher and wandered off.
“She is a hot mess,” I murmured.
“Yes, but she’s our hot mess,” Adam said.
“Do I go after her?”
Adam lifted my hand and kissed the inside of my wrist. “How about on our wedding day, we don’t make it about her?”
But when the waiter brought our meals, Evie was still missing. With an apology to Adam, I went looking for her and found her in the ladies’ room, sitting on the floor of a stall with the door open. She looked at me, bent over the toilet, and threw up.
I was annoyed at her for ruining my wedding brunch. I was devastated for her. With a sigh, I knelt beside her, pulling her hair back as she retched. Finally, she turned to me. “Does he fuck you from behind?”
I let go of her as if her skin was on fire. “What did you say?”
Evie was spent, her cheek resting on her outstretched arm. “I asked if it was fun being the bride.”
I handed her a wad of toilet paper to wipe her mouth. “Maybe you should slow down.”
“I’m not drunk.” Evie sat back on her heels. “I’m pregnant. My boss.”
My eyes rounded. “You’re drinking!”
“I’m not keeping it,” she muttered. “I have an appointment next week.” Her eyes were so dark I couldn’t see where the pupils and irises met. “Will you come with me?”
Adam and I could not afford a real honeymoon, but we had been planning to ride the jitney out to the Hamptons and camp on the beach. He’d taken the week off work. But it was Evie, and she needed me.
I squeezed her hand. “Of course I will,” I said.
After three weeks in the hospital, I am given a formal diagnosis—-bipolar disorder.
Twenty to fifty percent of people with BPD report psychotic symptoms, and since I’m in that camp, I will continue taking antipsychotics to keep the voices from returning.
As long as I take my meds, Dr. Gruner says, I can live a very normal and fulfilling life.
“That’s an interesting choice of words,” I tell her. “A normal life isn’t always fulfilling. Or vice versa.”
“Which would you prefer?”
“I can’t imagine either one,” I admit. “I don’t know who to be if I’m not a mother,” I blurt. “I don’t know how to be out there in the world.”
Dr. Gruner crosses her legs. “Let’s unpack that. You had a child, Georgia.”
“Had,” I repeat, swallowing hard.
“Logic suggests that if you had a child, you’re a mother.”
Not a very good one, I think. “Kind of like being a homeowner when your house has burned to the ground, though, isn’t it?” I say.