"She often has breakfast in bed on Sundays," he said; "she's come down recently only because you're living with us now. She says I have my face buried in the newspaper, especially on Sundays, and she'd rather watch television than the back of the business section," he added, shrugging.
What struck me about Wade was his utter lack of rationalization or attempt to excuse and justify himself. He was who he was, and he couldn't deny it or change. He was basically telling me he didn't blame her for remaining in bed to have breakfast. She was right. He ignored her.
He left earlier than he had before to join his business associates at their club, but told me to tell And he would gladly take us to dinner if she wanted to do that. Despite appearances, he was concerned about her happiness.
Mrs. McAlister returned from Ami's bedroom to tell me Ami wanted me to know she would be down shortly to speak with me, and I should wait for her.
When she did come down, she was still in her robe and fluffy pink silk slippers. She looked like she had slept even less than I had, but she was determined we have our talk, and she wanted us to go outside. I thought she would be cold dressed as she was, but that didn't seem to concern her. She looked like she was in some sort of daze, as if she was still in the midst of some dream. She moved like a sleepwalker over the tiled pathway through the lawn, with me following close behind. My head down, I felt like a child about to be reprimanded.
For a while she simply sat there, her eyes blinking, her lips twitching slightly. "I gave all this a great deal of thought last night, Celeste, and I made some very serious and important decisions," she began. "I hesitated to tell you everything about my own youth," she continued, "because I really didn't want to give you the impression that everything I've told you and tried to teach you about male-female relationships stems from any one horrendous experience. I would have had these insights to offer you no matter what. These were all things I had learned before I was . . . before my traumatic experiences occurred. I hope you believe me." She took a deep breath.
We were beside each other on the built-in bench, looking out at the pool, which was now covered to pre-vent it from being filled with the crisp orange, red, and brown leaves of autumn rushing over the property on the backs of northern winds. It was far from freezing yet, but the air had begun to take on that underbelly of coolness that warned us winter was not far behind. It hovered anxiously and eagerly under the ever-lessening weight of time, casting days and weeks off its shoulders as it closed in around us.
I could remember first snows in upstate New York falling as early as mid-October. The flakes would cast a thin white blanket over everything, but in the morning they would be gone under the warm breath of sunlight. When I was little, it seemed quite magical, a "Now you see it, now you don't" trick Nature pulled. It reinforced my belief that the world outside my windows was a world full of illusions, which of course made the possibility of spirits hovering around us even more credible.
"I know you're sitting there now and thinking about the things I told you the other night at the restaurant about my therapy and reasons for it. I know you're probably thinking I'm about to tell you I was raped or I went too far with a boy when I was younger and I got pregnant and had to have an abortion, or even gave birth and gave the baby up for adoption. Those stories are typical, and far too common. I know they happen often, too often, but that's not what happened to me," she said. "That's not why I've been in and out of therapy so often and why I am involved with a new doctor right now."
She looked down, and when she looked up, I saw her eyes were filled with tears. They looked like two tiny glass balls under water, and she had her lips pulled so tightly, they lost all color. Her chin quivered.
"Ami, you don't have to tell me anything," I said quickly. "I don't want to hurt you or see you suffer. I'm sorry for what happened last night. I won't let it happen again. Please, don't put yourself through any more pain on my account," I pleaded. Her face was bringing tears to my own eyes.
"No, no, I've got to do it," she insisted. "I have to tell you everything so you don't think I'm just some ogre who doesn't want you to have fun and enjoy your youth. You must believe that I am sincere when I tell you I want you to be aware of every minefield out there, and believe me, there are many.
"Parents," she said, suddenly filled with anger, the word seeming to be spit out of her lips instead of spoken, "for one stupid reason or another, let their children go forward in this world without warning them of the dangers looming or in waiting. They are either too embarrassed themselves or simply Pollyanna. They expect or hope that nothing terrible will happen to their children. They bury their heads in the sand and pretend that none of the evil exists, and certainly none of it will touch or affect their children.
"It's what happened to me," she added in a softer tone. "My mother was quite unsophisticated actually, despite the airs she put on in front of others. She was protected and spoiled most of her life, and my father behaved as though sex was something married people had only once, and just to make children. He never ever brought up anything remotely close to the subject with me, and neither did my mother. And if I asked him anything that remotely suggested male-female relations, he would always answer with the same words:
" Ami, remember, sex is just a trick to bring people together, just Nature's trick. Don't make anything more of it and you'll always be fine.'
"That was his advice. Those were my parents. Why, my mother didn't even prepare me for the advent of my first period. When I had it, she looked as shocked and surprised as I was. It was almost as if she had forgotten I was a girl.
"'Oh dear,' I remember her saying, 'we'll have to get you properly equipped right away.'
"Properly equipped? I remember thinking. What was I doing, preparing for a mountain climb or a hike? What about the cramps, the reasons for it? Are we just to go by those words in Genesis my
grandmother liked to quote: 'I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children'? We were being punished forever because Eve gave Adam the fruit of the Tree of Good and Evil? Was that the only explanation for the blood and pain and the sick feeling? And were we simply to accept it as that and grit our teeth?
"In my school we didn't have health-education classes to do for the young girls what their parents failed to do. Everyone had to learn everything on her own.
"Decent young women didn't talk about those things, you see. That was how my mother was brought up, and how she was bringing me up. Do you know that never once in all the time I was living with my parents did I ever hear my mother say the word 'bathroom,' much less 'toilet'? It was always 'the powder room.' When I was little, I used to look for the powder. What powder? I wondered.
"Until I was bathroom trained, we had a nanny. My mother never once changed a diaper. Can you imagine that? If I ever said I have to pee, she would correct me instantly with, 'No, say you have to go to the powder room, or just say I have to powder my nose.' You can't imagine how girls and boys my age would laugh at me when I did say that. Every other girl would raise her hand in elementary school and ask if she could go to the bathroom. I would ask to go to the powder room. Finally I stopped, but I never let my mother know."
She smiled.
"Once I got very angry at her and stood there reciting the forbidden words: 'urine, toilet, penis, vagina . . She had my mouth washed out with soap.
"Anyway," she said, waving her hand, "I seem to be getting off the track. I'm not. I'm just trying to get you to understand how young people your age are left on their own to handle the experiences and traumas they will confront. No wonder so many get into trouble.
"We are," she continued after another deep breath, "comprised of all sorts of contradictions. That's why so often we will do things that will even surprise ourselves. There are depths and depths of contradictory emotion in us all, in you, Celeste, and definitely in me.
"Oh, dear," she said, biting her lower lip. "I just realized you might be so turned
off by what I'm about to tell you that you and I will never be able to be close."
"Ann, don't--" I began, but she put up her hand and shook her head vigorously.
"I can't be concerned about that now. I can't be selfish. If that's what results from all this, then so be it. At least I would feel I had given you everything I could, everything my own mother didn't give me."