Big Swiss(83)

“Well, if you’re hysterical, it’s historical,” Om said, softening. “Your wounds are getting some much-needed air. You’ve been covering them up for years, probably out of necessity, but wounds need air to heal.”

“How long have you known I’m Rebekah?”

“Couple weeks,” Om said. “Look, I’m angry and upset, don’t get me wrong, but I feel partly to blame. Hiring you was a gamble, I knew that, but you seemed perfect because you were new to town and you didn’t know anyone except Sabine. I’ve known Sabine for years, by the way. If she trusted you enough to live under her roof, I figured you were solid. But I should’ve known better. This town is too tiny.”

“Who’ll transcribe your sessions now?”

“I have enough material,” Om said cryptically. “But I need to ask: are you really suicidal, Greta? Be honest.”

“A little,” Greta said.

“Do you have anyone to talk to?”

“Sabine,” Greta said. “Pi?on.”

“I hope I don’t regret this, but—well, here’s my offer: two or three sessions with me, after which I’ll refer you to someone else. Deal?”

“Why?”

“I’d like to help, if I can. I don’t trust you right now, but I do care about you.”

“Thing is, you were my only client, so… I can’t afford you.”

“I’d like you to transcribe your own sessions, Greta. That’s your payment to me.”

Dear god in heaven. Talk about eating shit. Was there anything worse than your own recorded voice playing in your ear? In both ears? About feelings? Your own feelings? If she were only a little suicidal now, this would probably push her over the edge.

“Fine,” Greta said.





16


“Greta.” Her name had never sounded more guttural, more like the wrong note in a musical performance, more like loose gravel, than it did in Big Swiss’s mouth.

“Greta.”

Greta pulled the comforter over her head and wondered if the stink bugs felt threatened by the voice on the other side of the door. The linens smelled powerfully of their farts. Luckily, cilantro was Greta’s favorite herb.

“Greta,” Big Swiss said again. “Come out of there, please.”

Greta held her breath like a coward. Big Swiss had arrived unannounced and let herself into the house, and then into Greta’s room, and now she was standing outside the antechamber. Although sleeping in the antechamber was unnecessary at this point—the brick walls had finally absorbed enough sun—Greta had been hiding in there for days, passing out and waking up at odd hours, lost, confused.

“I let Pi?on out,” Big Swiss said. “He’s running around with Silas in the yard. Come out of there now and talk to me.”

Greta listened to Big Swiss’s heavy footsteps move away from the door. Big Swiss was a heel-striker. Greta’s feet, on the other hand, were leaves floating on water. She sometimes envied the nerve of loud walkers. Her mother had been the loudest.

Big Swiss paused at Greta’s desk. Her hands shuffled papers, seemingly in search of something. Transcripts, probably.

“Is this your diary?” Big Swiss said.

“What?”

Greta rolled out of the bed, opened the door, and poked her head into the room. Big Swiss sat at Greta’s desk with her feet up. Red Swedish clog boots, bare legs, a linen shirtdress the color of unripe olives. They hadn’t seen each other in six days, a record.

“There you are,” Big Swiss said. “Hello, Greta.”

“Are you going to say my name every thirty seconds?”

“Maybe,” Big Swiss said. “Do you dislike your name, Greta?”

“I guess you’re still mad?”

“Is your last name really Graves?”

Greta felt naked in her nightgown. She was also wearing what she called a blood diaper, having run out of tampons. Nevertheless, she fox-walked across the room and sat in the armchair next to the desk.

“Greta Graves,” Big Swiss said gravely. “Sounds fake.”

“We were in the cemetery when you asked for my last name,” Greta said. “Seemed like a natural choice.”

Big Swiss looked alarmed. “We’ve never been to a cemetery together.”

“Haven’t we?” Greta asked.

“No,” Big Swiss said slowly. “We were at the dog park.”

If they remained friends, which seemed unlikely, they’d have to revisit all of Greta’s lies. Where and when they were told, how and why. It could take weeks, years, forever. It would be a lot of work.

“My last name is Work,” Greta said.

Big Swiss frowned. “Greta Work?”

“Disappointing, right? I’ve never gotten over it.”

Big Swiss freed her hair from its bun. Her red lipstick had been applied very recently, probably in the driveway.

“Did you lose your job?”

“Of course,” Greta said. “Did you get my email?”

“I skimmed it,” Big Swiss said.

She’d spent six hours writing two paragraphs, roughly the same amount of time she spent on a transcript. It had been nearly impossible to apologize without making excuses. Hence, the dozen times she’d typed and deleted “PMS” and “the wreckage of my past.” But she knew that excuses of any kind infuriated Big Swiss, and so in the end she’d simply said she was sorry, which was true, and that the experience had galvanized her into considering therapy again, also true, and that if Big Swiss wanted to see Greta, she had Greta’s permission to spank her bare bottom mercilessly, which Greta suspected Big Swiss found appealing, possibly on a very deep level, and then Greta apologized a couple more times.