15. Guest v. Finbow Day Two
GUEST V. FINBOW: DAY TWO
A cold dread spreads over me as Mary is presented with the oath, vowing quietly to tell the truth.
Across the aisle, Anna stares horror-struck at her daughter.
She hasn’t seen Mary in a year and a half, and she must be shocked by the sight of her: the mousy hair, how nervously she casts her eyes about the lower well of the court.
“Ms. Finbow, in your statement,” Ms. Ibrahim begins, “you say: ‘The decision to take a healing separation from the harmful relationships that no longer serve me is a choice I have reached of my own accord, without undue influence from the claimant beyond gentle professional support.’ Is this still your view?”
Mary’s chin and gaze are lifted, as if her mind is elsewhere.
“Yes,” she says solemnly. “And I want the court to recognize that this is a personal matter. The scrutiny I have endured has been intolerable. I am only here because I felt it was important to honor my therapist and in honor of the truth.”
“Understood,” says Ms. Ibrahim, nodding at Mary to acknowledge the gravity of her appearance.
“We will try to move through this as quickly as possible. I first want to draw attention to an assertion made by Mrs. Finbow in the newsletter she published, not about Ms. Guest, but about you. She states that, before you met my client, you were ‘the happiest, brightest girl.’ You, on the contrary, affirm that your childhood and late adolescence were very difficult times. Which is the truth?”
“The truth is that I suffered. And my upbringing worsened my suffering.”
“Could you expand on that, Ms. Finbow?” Ms. Ibrahim prompts gently.
“Where do you want me to start?” Mary asks darkly.
“Perhaps with your diagnoses?”
“Well, I was twenty-eight kilos when they first took me to a rehabilitation center, aged fourteen.”
“This was a treatment center for your—”
“Bulimia. My parents dropped me off and went on a sailing holiday. I had to make my own way home from Arizona.”
“Did you make a full recovery?”
“I don’t think anybody really does. But we manage it.”
My chest aches to think of Mary carefully navigating those huge dinners we ate in Rome.
And how that we means Jean. But now Ms. Ibrahim is asking about other diagnoses that Mary received at different ages: her chronic self-esteem issues, her generalized anxiety disorder.
Then, from her late teens, the drug and alcohol addiction, the sexual promiscuity.
“They were all manifestations,” Mary admits, “of my inner pain.”
“So, when your mother wrote online that you were the happiest child, that was a total misrepresentation?”
Mary’s face hardens. “A complete delusion.”
“Stop!” Anna explodes, addressing Mary, who refuses to look at her. “Darling, you know that isn’t true.” Ms. Carr hushes her, but Anna claws her shoulder. “It’s lies!” she hisses. “It’s all her lies!”
Ms. Ibrahim is pleased with the interruption.
She blinks patronizingly at Anna while the judge calls for order, and then she goes on.
“Mrs. Finbow claims that during your healing sessions with my client, you are being consciously turned against your parents. To quote her text: making ‘demons out of those who love her most.’ Is that also your view?”
“No, it is not my view. Anna and Bonamy made demons out of themselves. Your client is simply giving me the strength to acknowledge my experiences.” Mary pauses. “And their reaction is quite characteristic. They’ve always obstructed my relationships with those who loved me.”
“Could you give an example?”
Mary laughs cynically. “This whole spectacle is an example! They’re jealous of Jean.
It’s pathetic. But there were others who faced her envy.
Boyfriends I had. Even a girlfriend in school.
Anna always found a way to muscle in and wreck things.
Which is ironic.” A flash of anger crosses Mary’s face.
“Given that I saw her with other men throughout my childhood—”
“How dare you!” Anna storms. “This is outrageous !”
Once again, the judge calls for order in his courtroom. There is a brief pause in proceedings as Anna is told once again to calm down. Ms. Ibrahim drinks water. Jean’s lips twitch with excitement.
“What happened when you witnessed this adulterous behavior at home, Ms. Finbow?” Ms. Ibrahim proceeds sensitively.
“I was told not to say anything.”
“Yesterday, your household was described as ‘permissive.’ Would you agree?”
Mary’s jaw clenches. “There were drugs around, but that didn’t mean it was permissive.
What I experienced was actively repressive.
I went to my mother about many difficult things that happened to me, on account of the way my parents lived.
Her response was always the same: Don’t make a fuss.
Their support came in the form of pills or sending me away to school.
They only reacted when my struggles became too inconvenient to ignore.
Like I said,” she recounts bitterly. “ Twenty-eight kilos .”
I hold my breath, wondering if Ms. Ibrahim will probe into these loaded allegations, but instead she offers her sympathies for everything Mary has endured, and how she has been misrepresented in the newsletter online.
As her argument shifts, her tone sharpens; she is about to argue how Jean has been misrepresented, too.
“To the present day, you state your mental health has improved?”
“Transformed,” Mary answers, but tonelessly.
The lawyer smiles. “Do you attribute this improvement to my client?”
“Primarily.”
“How long have you been working with her?”
“Coming up two years. We were introduced in Rome.” A proud smile appears at the corners of Mary’s mouth.
My stomach sinks low into my body. I glance to the left of me.
Lucy Ayres and I briefly lock eyes. She smiles at me with encouragement, but I look away.
Mary goes on. “Just before I met Jean, I was in a very low place. Getting wasted all the time. Forging destructive relationships. I had no purpose whatsoever. Jean helped me regain control. I began to see my patterns of behavior had been inherited; they weren’t intrinsic to my personality.
After only a few sessions, my life started to change for the better. ”
“So when Mrs. Finbow wrote that Ms. Guest, who had been an enormous force for good in your life, was a ‘cult leader,’ did you believe her?”
Mary laughs softly and shakes her head. “Absolutely not.”
“And when she wrote that Ms. Guest inserted false memories during your sessions, did you recognize this?”
“I did not.”
Ms. Ibrahim lifts her chin. “Are the examples about your home life that you provided today false memories, or real ones?”
Mary looks offended. “That’s a ridiculous question. I’m speaking the truth. I simply gained the strength to name my experiences now. That’s what we do in our therapy: We give voice to impermissible things. Eventually we feel better.”
My skin prickles. That we again.
“It sounds as if you are on your way to recovery, Ms. Finbow, and I’m pleased for you. Before we conclude, is there anything else you’d like to tell us? For example, are there any other areas of your life which have improved, thanks to the support of my client?”
“My artistic career,” Mary says defiantly, “has blossomed. I’m making the best paintings of my life.”
Ms. Ibrahim beams. “No longer portraits, is that correct?”
Her smile disappears. “No. I’ll never return to those. I’m actively trying to unlearn everything from that art school.” There is a considered pause, then she continues, bringing her hands to her stomach. “I’m on a much better path now, in every sense.”
“And where, may I ask, is that path headed?”
Mary delivers a smile that makes my heart kick. I remember how she used to look that way at me, or on the rare occasions that she was satisfied with her work. She looks over toward Jean, who gives her a little nod.
“Toward motherhood.”
A sudden quiet drowns the room. And yet I’m sure that I can’t have heard her properly. Or I must have misunderstood, some disturbance through the microphone.
Mary continues. “I’m actually six months pregnant.”
Anna’s head jerks upward. My gaze falls to Mary’s tunic, which is just visible above the witness box. I realize, with creeping horror, that beneath the loose material, her stomach has swollen into a pronounced curve.
“Congratulations, Ms. Finbow,” Ms. Ibrahim gushes. “I am sure that everyone in this courtroom wishes you the best for the remainder of your pregnancy.”
There is a rushing sound in my ears as the lawyer announces the closing of her questions, which becomes deafening as Ms. Ibrahim walks back to her desk and sits down.
That word: pregnant. Alien, and yet fat with meaning.
My thoughts spiral. Does this mean Mary has a boyfriend now?
How is that possible? And how am I the last to know?
I glance frantically around the gallery in case he’s here, but no one seems young enough.
Then I check myself, aghast. He doesn’t have to be young.
He can be anyone. I’ll have Augusta. Doesn’t Mary always get whoever she wants?
But as she carefully descends from the witness booth, I start to picture Mary’s changing body: how warped her stomach will become.
Body like a bent spoon. Udder breasts. Stomach drooping into a teardrop, rutted with stretch marks.
No longer mine, but belonging to others: the man she’s fucked, her unborn child.
And, most worryingly, belonging also to Jean.