Change of Heart (13 page)

The
E.
in the nameplace on Dr. Rosen's door did not prepare Walter for the red-haired woman who ushered them into the sunny office. He knew his face registered shock, and he turned to see Margaret smirking at him. He held out a chair for Margaret and waited until Dr. Rosen was seated behind her desk before he took a chair next to his wife.

“Isn't that a little underhanded, that
E. Rosen, M.D.
on your door?”

“Underhanded,” she repeated. She was tired, and ran a weary hand through her hair. Walter noticed how the late afternoon sunshine glinted on the soft curls, making a golden halo around her face.

“How's anybody supposed to know you're a woman?
E. E
for
Edward, E
for
Englebert.”

Dr. Rosen's smile stiffened. “I guess you put your full name on your door to warn people you're a man.”

Walter sniffed but settled back in his chair. Dr. Rosen sifted through the file on her desk. She ran her finger down a page of medical history, then looked up, controlled and professional. She directed her first question to Margaret, figuring she'd let the husband get used to the sight of what was probably his first woman doctor, and by the look of him, his first psychiatrist.

“How do you feel about your daughter's operation?”

Margaret said quickly, “Fine. Fine. I mean, of course, I wish it weren't necessary, but if it's going to help her …”

“It appears from the records that she's lived at home with you all her life. Is that true?”

“Yes. Except for the times in the hospital.”

“It must have been tough on you.”

“Well, we didn't have any choice.”

Walter interjected, “You do what you have to do.”

“Of course,” said Dr. Rosen, giving Walter a brief glance before turning back to Margaret. Walter felt himself resenting all the attention his wife was getting from this redhead, as if Margaret had done something besides wring her hands all these years.
He
had coped with Sharlie. Why didn't this headshrinker ask
him
a question?

“How do you think you'd feel if your daughter were to get well and become independent? Move out of your house? Live her own life?” Dr. Rosen asked Margaret.

“Hallelujah,” Walter said, more loudly than he had intended.

Dr. Rosen turned to stare at him. “You'd be very glad, Mister Converse?”

“Well, I meant I'd be overjoyed if she got well enough. It would be a miracle, what we've been hoping for,” he said, floundering in an attempt to rectify the harsh sound of his interruption. She thinks I'm a brutal bastard he thought. Dammit, she's got me all twisted around, this lady with the tired green eyes. Who gives a shit what she thinks anyway?

He gave her his best commander-of-the-fleet look and said, “Is there some special way we can help?” He was forced to admit she didn't look overly impressed by the manly authority in his voice.

“You
are
helping,” she said.

Was that a condescending smile, the bitch? he wondered.

“What we want to ascertain is what effect a heart transplant would have on your daughter emotionally. It's impossible to predict with total accuracy, of course, but we like to get a general impression of her life up to now, and what you envision for her after the operation, should it be successful.”

“You already met with her, didn't you? And Brian Morgan,” Walter asked. Dr. Rosen nodded. Walter meant to make the point that Sharlie's emotional condition should have been evident already, but somehow the words twisted away from his tongue. Instead he blurted, “What did they say about me?”

They all sat in silence while Dr. Rosen gazed at Walter. He felt his face redden and suddenly remembered the time he'd strayed into the midst of his mother's weekly bridge game to ask her what the word
menstruation
meant. He was six years old and curious about something he'd overheard at school, but Mother was not amused.

Dr. Rosen watched the embarrassment rise in his face. She let the query pass. After a moment Walter asked, “When can we see Dr. Lewis?”

“I've spoken with him already, dear,” Margaret said quietly.

Walter forgot his recent embarrassment. “You did what?”

“While you had your conference call. I happened to pass his office as he was coming out. I introduced myself. He was very gracious and helpful.”

Walter felt his jaw muscles clamp down against the molars in the back of his mouth. He glanced at Dr. Rosen and saw her watching him intently. She wants me to lose my cool, he thought, sitting there with her little pad and pencil waiting for me to go nuts. He turned to his wife. Okay, Margaret honey, I'll be oh, so civilized. But I'll get you later, I swear it. “Did you ask him for the statistics and the information about the procedure? We don't want any surprises,” Walter said, trying to mute the petulance in his voice.

“I wrote it all down,” Margaret explained. “We can go over it after dinner if you like. Whatever I didn't get, you can ask him yourself.”

Walter brooded in silence. He might as well have stayed home and gotten all the news from Margaret over the telephone. He gave Dr. Rosen a sickly smile.

“I was delayed in New York, unfortunately, so I have to catch up with Margaret here.”

“Yes, I see,” Dr. Rosen said pleasantly.

I'll bet you do, thought Walter. He rubbed his jaw. Dr. Rosen closed her file and looked up at them.

“We can talk again soon when there's been more testing. But if you find you want to talk, don't wait for a formal appointment. Call my office anytime, and I'll clear an hour for you.”

Margaret got up and held out a hand to Dr. Rosen.

“Thank you, Doctor. It's comforting to know you're available.”

Dr. Rosen walked around her desk to show them to the door, and as he got out of his chair, Walter noticed the trim legs under the psychiatrist's soft pale-gray skirt. He felt the impulse to know all about her, whether she was married, whether she had kids, whether she liked sex, and if so, what kind of sex. She had firm breasts under that white jersey top. Not the big clunkers so many other men seemed to find attractive, but enough to know she was a woman, enough so that lying above her he would feel their soft pressure against his chest.

By the time he reached the door, he was sweating a little, and he surreptitiously wiped his hands on his jacket so that he could offer Dr. Rosen a dry palm on his way out.

In the elevator Walter and Margaret were silent. They walked to the parking lot without exchanging a word until finally Margaret coughed and said, “She seemed like a pleasant person. Intelligent.”

Walter slid behind the wheel of their rented Chevy. Goddamn rental people didn't even have a Buick, for Christ's sake, and this thing felt like a Mack truck compared with his own comfortable Coupe de Ville. Every bump jolted him to his back teeth.

“Do you notice how bumpy this car feels? Maybe there's something wrong with it,” Margaret said.

“You just don't have the proper padding on your ass,” he replied. “The princess and the pea.” He swerved to avoid another pit in the road.

Margaret didn't respond, and when he stole a look at her face, he saw the tight knot beside her mouth.

Lost her sense of humor, that's what. Well, under the circumstances he supposed it was understandable.

“You've done quite a job out here. I'm proud of you,” he said, enjoying his magnanimity.

“Brian helped.” Her voice was cold.

That was all, just “Brian helped.” She came out here and plunged right ahead with all these plans, picked out a ludicrous-looking motel with pink walls—
pink,
for Christ's sake—and stuck their daughter in some room back in the boondocks at least four miles from the nearest elevator. Jesus, he'd never have stood for it, and here he complimented her on the fantastic job she had done without even so much as a small choke on his words, and what did he get for his effort? No pleased smile, no tender flush of delight at his praise, not even a polite “thank you.” Come to think of it, she hadn't even kissed him when he got off the plane.

They stopped at a red light, and he turned to look at her, his face red with self-righteous anger.

She met his gaze. Her face was filled with wrath, too, but hers was tight-lipped and stony. Walter's jaw dropped, and his voice sounded more astonished than irate.

“Well, what the hell is the matter with
you
?”

Margaret's eyes narrowed. “A lot is the matter with
me,”
she said, mimicking him with heavy sarcasm. Horns started bleating behind him, and in his flustered state, he pressed down too hard on the acelerator and lurched forward, tires squealing.

“How impressive,” she murmured.

“Now,
look,”
Walter said, “I've had about enough of this.” He pulled the car off the road and onto a side street lined with jocular-looking palm trees with fat trunks. He switched off the motor and turned to glare at his wife. She was looking straight ahead, but he could see the crimson spot on her left cheek.

“Spit it out, Margaret,” he said, and waited.

Finally she turned to him. “I don't like the way you talk to me … I don't think you're respectful or polite, and you are most certainly not sympathetic.”

He waited again. She was having a hard time, he could see that, stopping and starting between words and twisting the strap of her handbag.

“I try to be pleasant, and you always have some … remark. You are damn rude, that's what you are.”

Damn? Did his Margaret say “damn”? Hell must be freezing over someplace in the universe if Margaret just said “damn.”

She paused to pull herself together, but she was close to tears. He could see her chin quiver.

“What did I say?” he asked.

“Everything
you say to me!” she wailed.

Walter was shocked at the passion in her voice. She began to cry, and between gasps she sputtered out something about the princess and the pea and her ass and the way he always humiliated her in front of other people with his smart remarks.

Finally, after a deep breath, she said, “I didn't mean to cry. I don't want to, and I'm going to stop. Right now.”

Walter reached a hand out and laid it gently on her shoulder. He felt the muscles grow rigid at his touch. She looked at him now. Except for the red-rimmed eyes and the wet cheeks, you would never guess there'd been any emotion in that face for weeks, or months. Maybe ever.

“You should listen to yourself sometime,” she said coolly.

He took his hand off her shoulder and started the car. “I'll try to watch it.”

He pulled away from the curb, veered sharply to avoid a little towheaded boy on a skateboard, and moved out onto the highway again, driving fast.

Sharlie sat in her wheelchair, gazing curiously at the psychiatrist. Rather than pull the curtains against the sparkling sunshine, Dr. Rosen leaned against a bookcase to the left of the window so her patient wouldn't be staring directly into the blinding light. Sharlie regarded the relaxed figure, wondering how old she was. In her midthirties, at least. An M.D. with a psychiatric specialty. And who knew what esoteric degree one needed to treat potential transplants—three years' internship with Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde?

“What are you thinking over there?” asked Dr. Rosen with a smile.

“Nothing much.” Sharlie looked out the window. She could hardly ask Dr. Rosen her age, nor could she admit to the curiosity. Far too personal. “I guess I was wondering what kind of preparation one needs for the kind of work you're in.”

Dr. Rosen said, “Funny. You looked so sad and young just now, I thought perhaps you were missing somebody.”

Sharlie shook her head, but felt a sudden lump in her throat.

“Tell me about Brian,” the doctor said.

Sharlie thought a moment, then said, “Well …” Nothing more came out. She said, “Well,” again and started to laugh.

“What?” asked Dr. Rosen.

“It's as if you just asked me to explain the creation of the universe. I don't know where to begin.”

“All right, let me be more specific. Or …” She swung around in her chair to face Sharlie more directly. “Let's try it this way: What's the first word you think of when you hear me say
Brian
?”

Sharlie sat still, her eyes flickered, and then she shook her head.

“I distinctly saw a word go past,” the doctor said.

“Brown.”

“Brown,”
Dr. Rosen repeated.

“Well, it isn't a very … romantic … word. I wanted to think of something like
clouds
or
roses.
But
brown?
How embarrassing.”

“Why?”

“Well
brown
is, well … kind of disgusting.”

“How disgusting?” the doctor prodded.

“Maybe it's his initials.”

“Brian Morgan,”
Dr. Rosen said. “Okay.”

Sharlie laughed. “It's absurd …” And then the words began to flow. “He's got that warm curly brown hair that feels so good. It's a safe word, too—reliable.”

Dr. Rosen watched Sharlie's fingers curl around one another as she spoke of touching Brian's hair.

“He's always wearing brown wool clothes when I visualize him, like the first night I met him … the first conscious night, that is. The very first time I was unconscious, and he could have been wearing silver lamé for all I knew.”

Dr. Rosen asked her about it, and Sharlie told her the whole story, from the taxi ride to Saint Joe's, right through to the California trip.

“And now he's here with me, and I haven't any idea what to do with him.”

“You don't mention sex.”

“Oh. Didn't I?” Sharlie knew she hadn't pulled off the casual response. She began to blush. Dr. Rosen continued to watch her, and Sharlie stammered, “Well, I can't say as it's exactly a platonic relationship … oh, God, that's ridiculous, I nearly raped him, to tell you the truth. I mean, if I'd had any idea how to go about it … but he jumped right in, and … oh, dear … I mean, he took over, and basically it was very … basic.” She faltered to a stop, feeling like an adolescent fool. After a moment had passed and the doctor hadn't responded, Sharlie said, “You know, I don't think I'd be any use on those talk shows where women discuss their mastectomies or sexual fulfillment. I can't even talk about it with a psychiatrist all alone just the two of us.”

“You think it's necessarily easier just us two?”

“No, I guess not.”

“All right. There's no need to tell me all the details. But I'd like to know how you believe sex fits into your life, into your relationship with Brian. And how you think it will be after the operation.”

“Sex is important. I would have said, to him, but I know it's just as important to me. Maybe even more so, and I haven't even experienced … everything … yet.”

“You mean orgasm.”

Sharlie nodded, grateful for not having to say it herself. She felt stripped.

“Nice girls like it, too, Charlotte,” Dr. Rosen said, and Sharlie thought immediately, What about you, doctor? Do you like it? Maybe you're a nymphomaniac or a lesbian. No, impossible. Psychiatrists, like parents, never do such dirty things. They reproduce out of a sense of duty, prolonging the species. Certainly never, never for gratification. Not lady psychiatrists, anyway.

“Do you feel inhibited by your illness?”

“Uh, yes,” Sharlie said with difficulty, wishing they could move on to another topic. “But not as much as I would have thought. There's more a feeling of not caring what happens to me. My attraction to him is very … powerful.”

“Do you think the holding back is more an emotional response than fear for your physical safety?”

“Yes,” Sharlie said.

“Would the operation change that?”

“I don't know. I don't see how it could, unless I got the heart of a nymphomaniac or something.”

The girl's skin had turned ashen all of a sudden. The sun's rays filtered through the gardenia branches and cast sinister shadows across her face.

Dr. Rosen got up. “I'm sorry we have to stop, but you need some rest.” She came around behind Sharlie's wheelchair and put her hand on the thin shoulder.

“We'll get you fixed up, Charlotte,” she said softly, then wheeled her out and called for the nurse's aide to take her back upstairs.