Leaving Lucy Pear(79)

During her first session, lying on his couch, Lillian had waited for Dr. M. to tell her something. She had grown impatient. It seemed he should have answers. But by now, her fourth visit, she was used to the fact that he mostly asked questions, which she then tried her best to answer. It turned out she knew a lot about her own life, which shouldn’t have surprised her, she supposed, but did, which was another thing, perhaps, to discuss with Dr. M. But for now she was agonizing over what to give the girl. It was nearly her first thought when Henry told her. A granddaughter! The details about pear trees and robbers slipped right past her. A gift! Might a dress be more appropriate than jewelry? Or maybe a beautiful box, to hold trinkets? Dr. M. interrupted her to ask, “Is it possible with these gifts that there is something else you mean to say?”

She could not think how to answer his question. She went on to describe her mother’s rings, and in describing them to decide they were right. But later, it struck her that Dr. M. was wrong. She didn’t mean to say anything. She meant to change the girl in some way, leave a trace of herself, a mark.

This was the sort of thing she wasn’t sure she even wanted to know about herself. It led to all the dresses she’d given Bea, the hairpieces and stockings and assorted undergarments she likely never wore.

Lillian had not told Henry about Dr. M. She was fully clothed on his couch, of course—though she had wondered, the first time, she could not deny wondering. She was a woman, he was a man, here was a couch, he gestured for her to lie down. It was impossible to know what was expected of her! But that was not the point. The point was money, or rather Henry’s way of thinking about money: Either you bought a thing with your money or you saved it. If you paid for a service, it should be necessary, or at least measurable in some way—school for Bea, Fainwright for Bea, the hair salon for Lillian, who was too old for all the rest. If Lillian wanted to fix her nose, as she’d been talking about since the war, Henry would pay for that. But how could she argue that going to Dr. M. was necessary? She wasn’t clearly troubled. What proof would she have that it had worked? In Dr. M.’s office on Clarendon Street, amid the heavy furniture, behind the heavy door, reclining on his couch, Lillian forgot to hold her stomach in. She entered a loose, woozy state, as if she could be anywhere, anyone. This sensation crept up on her outside their sessions, too, Dr. M.’s baritone singing into her thoughts, But why? Why did you lie to the women at the club? Is that really so? And what is it you dream?

The second gift was from Estelle. Estelle had been unsurprised that Lillian and Henry weren’t bringing her to meet Bea’s baby, but not unhurt. She had given a twenty-dollar bill to Lillian that morning, and asked her to please pass it on to the girl. Lillian had protested—it was nearly a week’s wages—but Lillian held firm. So Lillian had that, too, though she’d stuck it in a little box with paper and a bow to make it look less crass than paper money.

The third gift was a doll. In the car with Henry and Albert, on their way to meet the girl, clutching her gifts, Dr. M. asked, Are you sure? The doll had been Bea’s, one of many Lillian had given her, though Bea had never especially liked dolls. This one had been sitting for years in her old bedroom, looking at the window. It was a collector’s doll, more valuable perhaps than the rings, with pale, porcelain cheeks, rosebud lips, blue eyes, yellow hair. For the trip to Gloucester, Lillian had put it in a white dress and tied back its hair with a pink ribbon. She held it in the crook of her elbow. But as the car neared Niles Beach, she started to doubt the wisdom of her choice, not just now but twenty years ago, when she’d given it to Bea. Not only did the doll look nothing like Bea, it was the very opposite of her, in every respect.

Lillian looked at the side of Henry’s face. His cheeks had slackened since the news about the girl. Even his chin looked more relaxed. He tapped his fingers on his leg. The worst gift Lillian had ever given Bea came back to her now. It was the day of Bea’s discharge from Fainwright. In a new mink coat Lillian waited, torn between satisfaction and alarm: Bea was done with this; but what would she do now? What could she be? At last Nurse Lugton appeared at the door to the reception lounge, holding Bea’s hand, and Lillian led Bea out to a waiting car as darkly tinted as the limousine that had disappeared her to Gloucester. Bea did not look at her. She looked out her window. Lillian applied lipstick, which cracked at once—it was deep winter by then. As the car left Fainwright’s grounds and pressed toward the city, she said, “Don’t worry. Estelle made you soup. I bought you a new robe.” She paused, looking out her own window, at black trees half etched with snow. There had been a storm, but the sky was blue. The robe waited at home on Bea’s bed, wrapped in tissue and ribbons. It was long, and mauve, and made of cashmere—Lillian had spent a full week shopping for it. She had missed her last visiting hour with Bea so she could find her the perfect robe. Outside the car, the trees began moving fast. She rested a hand on her daughter’s leg and urged, “Darling, it’s from Milan. It’s soft enough to wear all day.”

What did you want from her?

I must have wanted her to stay.

Now, again, a car. Trees. Hedges. Then they had turned up Ira’s drive and Lillian, reaching automatically into her handbag, realized she had forgotten her lipstick.

“I don’t have my lipstick,” she said. “I left it in my other purse. I planned to wear that purse but then I changed my dress. I’m so stupid! How could I have forgotten? I never forget. How do I look? How do I look?” And Henry, looking at her carefully—always, he looked carefully, when other women’s husbands glanced or ignored—said, “Beautiful.” And Albert, turning in the front seat, said, “He’s right.” But Lillian didn’t even know why she’d asked because she could never believe them.