. Anderson hoped I would help return Grace to a balanced enough state of mind so she could return and recapture her own child for both their sakes. It added pressure to my efforts, of course, and a solid reason for my letting her go. Neither of us could be selfish enough to see Linden without his mother. (It brings tears to my eyes just to write this, to write the words, let her go, for as you will see, that was just what I had to do.)
"Yes," I replied after a moment. "I'm sure what you did, you did for good reason. Jackie Lee."
She liked that and obviously liked I had stopped calling her Mrs. Montgomery.
"Exactly.' She paused, dabbed her eyes again, and looked at me, her face turning dark and serious. "You don't think that it had a lot to do with what she... what she attempted to do to herself, do you?"
"It's best to wait for me to begin my
examinations before we come to any conclusions about anything. I would be doing you a disservice to shoot from the hip. Jackie Lee. Give me same time."
"I know Dr. Anderson believes that it did. I could see it in his face whenever he spoke to me about it," she said. smirking. Then she sighed so deeply. I thought she had cracked her heart. "She was such a happy child once. When her father was alive, before his terrible helicopter accident, he doted on her and she practically worshiped the ground he walked upon. I was always warning him that he was spoiling her, not so much with gifts as with love. You can give someone too much love, you know.
''Grace will never be able to love any man because she will always compare him to you and find fault with him.' I warned him, but he didn't listen and that's exactly what happened."
She leaned toward me.
"You know she's not had one satisfactory romance and she's in her twenties!"
"It's not so unusual. Jackie." "Jackie Lee."
"I'm sorry. Jackie Lee. Not unusual at all, especially these days," I said softly.
"It is for Grace. Wait until you see her. She's a very attractive young woman when she wants to be. Right now she looks like something the cat dragged home, but when she's had her hair fixed, especially by my stylists, and she puts on one of her designer dresses and has her makeup done properly, she's a little movie star. I saw the way men looked at her at charity events and parties.
"But she was always pushing them off for one reason or another." she said sadly. She nodded and then she stared at me a moment. "You know what she believes, don't you? I imagine it's down there in that report Dr. Anderson sent you." she said, nodding at the folder on my lap as though it were a criminal record instead of a doctor's file.
I didn't reply. I didn't want to reveal anything in Dr. Anderson's report.
"You don't have to read it. I'll tell you. She believes she carries a Jonah curse, that everyone or anyone who loves her or whom she loves will have something terrible happen to him or her. She'll tell you all about it. I'm sure, about all of them, her victims." she said, throwing her head back and rolling her eyes dramatically.
"We'll try to get her to think differently about herself," I said. She sucked in her breath and sat straighter.
"Yes. Well, what do you think? Can you cure her? Will she ever be a normal woman and marry and have a family and a home?" she demanded.
"I hope so, Jackie Lee, It's my intention to make that a reality. yes. She does have a son to care for and raise, of course."
"Care for and raise." she muttered. "Well, I can't just toss him out there to be at the mercy of those sharks, now can I? For now, I'll continue being his mother."
That might do him some harm in time. Jackie Lee. Perhaps you should think of how you can gradually get him to understand the truth," I suggested softly.
"Yes, well, we'll see. I don't want to make promises to him that will never be fulfilled. I know how mentally ill people can be, how their recoveries can be false or only temporary, especially someone in her condition. I've read a number of magazine articles about it."
"There is a lot of misinformation about that. Jackie Lee. Perhaps the old adage, 'A little knowledge is a dangerous thing' applies to this more than anything. Just be patient and give it all some time," I told her.
"Time. Exactly. How often should I come here?" she asked, rather demanded. I thought.
"Not far a while," I said. "Let's see how it goes and I'll call you." She looked satisfied with that answer, thought Grace was going to put up a fight or an argument about coming here, but she didn't so much as utter a little reluctance.'
"That's good." I said.
"Good? Who would want to come here? How can that be something good?"
"Perhaps she realizes she needs help. That's what good, Jackie Lee. You have to recognize you have a problem before you can solve it."
"Um," she said. "Maybe. You know what she did, don't you? You know about her jumping off the dock in the middle of the night and then telling us she was getting on a ship with her dead father. She would have just let herself drown if we hadn't realized what she had done!"
"When people are so troubled, they lose their hold on what's real and what isn't. -We all live in a little bit of illusion," I said. "but the difference is we know when to come back to reality."