Dr. Death

CHAPTER 12

MONDAY, NINE-THIRTY P.M., nearing the end of a very long day.

Robin was soaking in the bath and I was in bed, reviewing Stacy Doss's chart.

Tomorrow morning, Stacy and I would be talking, ostensibly about college.

She'd used college as a cover the first time.

March, a warm Friday afternoon. I'd seen two other kids before her, sad children caught up in the poison of a custody dispute. The next hour was spent writing reports. Then waiting for Stacy. Curious about Stacy.

Despite my preconceptions about Richard Doss- because of them-I'd labored to keep an open mind about his daughter. Still, I wondered. What kind of girl would result from the union of Richard and Joanne? I really had no clue.

The red light signaling someone at the side door lit up precisely on time and I went to fetch her. A small girl- five-two in brown loafers. Perfect genetic logic; no reason for the Dosses to produce a basketball player. A bright-green oversize book was sandwiched between her right arm and her chest, the title obscured by her sleeve. She wore a white cotton mock turtle, snug blue jeans, white socks with the loafers.

Normal teenage curves, a bit of flesh on her face, but certainly not overweight. If she'd gained ten pounds, as Judy Manitow had claimed, she'd have been extremely thin before. That made me wonder about Judy-her own tendency toward sharp angles, snapshots of her daughters in her chambers. A pair of bright-eyed blondes in very short, very tight party dresses… also skinny. The younger one-Becky-veering too close to skeletal?

No matter, Stacy was the patient. She had full cheeks but a long face that evoked her mother's college picture. Richard's high, broad brow, stippled by a few tiny pimples. Pixie features; another endowment from both parents.

She smiled nervously. I introduced myself and held out my hand. She took it readily, maintained eye contact, flashed a half-second smile that burned lots of calories. Making an effort.

Prettier than Joanne, with dark, almond eyes and the kind of small-boned good looks that would attract the boys. During my high-school days, she'd have been labeled a Gidget. In any generation, she'd be termed cute. Another paternal donation: her hair-thick, black, very curly. She wore it long and loose, glossed with some kind of product that relaxed the helixes to dancing corkscrews. Lighter complexion than Richard's-skin the color of clotted cream. Thin skin; traces of blue surfaced at jawline and temple. A cuticle picked raw on her left middle finger had turned red and swollen to a silky sheen.

She hugged the book tighter and followed me in. "That's a pretty pond I passed. Koi, right?

Right.

The Manitows have a koi pond, a big one."

"Really." I'd been in Judy Manitow's chambers several dozen times, never visited her home.

"Dr. Manitow put in an incredible waterfall. You could swim in there. Yours is actually more… accessible. You have a beautiful garden."

"Thanks."

We entered the office and she sat down with the green book across her lap. Yellow lettering shouted: Choosing the Right College for You!

"No problem finding the place?" I said, settling opposite her.

"Not at all. Thanks for seeing me, Dr. Delaware."

I wasn't used to being thanked by adolescents. "My pleasure, Stacy."

She blushed and turned away.

"Recreational reading?" I said.

Another strained smile. "Not exactly."

She began to look around the office.

"So," I said, "do you have any questions?"

"No, thanks." As if I'd offered her something.

I smiled. Waited.

She said, "I guess I should talk about my mother."

"If you want to."

"I don't know if I want to." Her right index finger curled and moved toward her left hand, located the inflamed cuticle. Stroking. Picking. A dot of blood stretched to a scarlet comma. She covered it with her right hand.

"Dad says he's worried about my future, but I suppose I should talk about Mom." She angled her face so that it was shielded by black curls. "I mean, it's probably the right thing for me. That's what my friend says-she wants to be a psychologist. Becky Manitow, Judge Manitow's daughter."

"Becky's been doing some amateur therapy?"

She shook her head as if thinking about that made her tired. Her eyes were the same dark brown as her father's, yet a whole different flavor. "Becky's been in counseling herself, thinks it's the cure for everything. She lost a lot of weight, even more than her mother wanted her to, so they shipped her off to some therapist and now she wants to be one."

"You two friends?"

"We used to be. Actually, Becky's not… I don't want to be cruel, let's just say she's not into school."

"Not an intellectual."

She let out a small, soft laugh. "Not exactly. My mom used to tutor her in math."

Judy had never mentioned her daughter's problem. No reason to. Still, I wondered why Judy hadn't referred Stacy to Becky's therapist. Maybe too close to home, keeping everything in neat little boxes.

"Well," I said, "no matter what Becky or anyone says, you know what's best for you."

"Think so?"

"I do."

"You don't even know me."

"Competent till proven otherwise, Stacy."

"Okay." Another weak smile. So much effort to smile. I wrote a mental note: poss. depress, as noted by J. Manitow.

Her hand lifted. The blood on her finger had dried and she rubbed the sore spot. "I don't think I really do. Want to talk about my mother^ that is. I mean, what can I say? When I think about it I get down for days, and I've already had enough of those. And it's not as if it was a shock-her… what happened. I mean it was, when it actually happened, but she'd been sick for so long."

Same thing her father had said. Her own little speech, or his?

"This," she said, smiling again, "is starting to sound like one of those gross movies of the week. Lindsay Wagner as everyone's mom… What I'm saying is that what happened to my mother took so long… It wasn't like another friend of mine, her mother died in a skiing accident. Crashed into a tree and she was gone, just like that." Snap of the inflamed finger. "The whole family watching it happen. That's traumatic. My mother… I knew it was going to happen. I spent a long time wondering when, but…" Her bosom rose and fell. One foot tapped. The right index finger sought the sore spot again, curled to strike, scratched, retracted.

"Maybe we should talk about my so-called future," she said, lifting the green book. "First could I use the bathroom, please?"

She was gone ten minutes. After seven I started to wonder, was ready to get up to check if she'd left the house, but she returned, hair tied back in a bushy ponytail, mouth shiny with freshly applied lip gloss.

"Okay," she said. "College. The process. My lack of direction."

"That sounds like something someone told you."

"Dad, my school counselor, my brother, everyone. I'm almost eighteen, nearly a senior, so I'm supposed to be into it-career aspirations, compiling lists of extracurricular activities, composing brag sheets. Ready to sell myself. It feels so… phony. I go to Pali Prep, freak-city when it comes to college. Everyone in my class is freaking out daily. I'm not, so I'm the space alien." Her free hand flipped the edges of the green book's pages.

"Can't get into it?" I said.

"Don't want to get into it. I honestly don't care, Dr. Delaware. I mean, I know I'm going to end up somewhere. Does it really make a difference where?"

"Does it?"

"Not to me."

"But everyone's telling you you should care."

"Either explicitly or, you know-it's in the air. The atmosphere. At school everything's been split down the middle-sociologically. Either you're a goof and you know you'll end up at a party school, or you're a grind and expected to obsess on Stanford or the Ivy League. I should be a grind, because my grades are okay. I should have my nose glued to the SAT prep book, be filling out practice applications."

"When do you take the SAT?"

"I already took it. In December. We all did, just for practice. But I did okay enough, don't see why I should go through it again."

"What'd you get?"

She blushed again. "Fifteen-twenty."

"That's a fantastic score," I said.

"You'd be surprised. At PP, kids who get fifteen-eighty take it again. One kid had his parents write that he was American Indian so he'd get some kind of minority edge. I don't see the point."

"Neither do I."

"I honestly think that if you offered most of the senior class a deal to murder someone in order to be guaranteed admission to Harvard, Stanford or Yale, they'd take it."

"Pretty brutal," I said, fascinated by her choice of example.

"It's a brutal world out there," she said. "At least that's what my father keeps telling me."

"Does he want you to take the SAT again?"

"He pretends he's not pressuring me, but he lets me know he'll pay for it if I want to."

"Which is a kind of pressure."

"I suppose. You met him… What was that like?"

"What do you mean?"

"Did you get along? He told me you were smart, but there was something in his voice-like he wasn't sure about you." She cracked up. "I've got a big mouth… Dad's super-active, always needs to keep moving, thinking, doing something. Mom's illness drove him crazy. Before she got sick, they were totally active together- jogging, dancing, tennis, traveling. When she stopped living, he was left on his own. It's made him cranky."

That sounded detached, a clinical assessment. The family observer? Sometimes kids assume that role because it's easier than participating.

"Tough adjustment for him," I said.

"Yes, but he finally caught on."

"About what?"

"About having to do things for himself. He always finds a way to adjust."

That sounded accusatory. My raised eyebrow was my next question.

She said, "His main way of handling stress is by staying on the go. Business trips. You know what he does, right?"

"Real-estate development."

She shook her head as if I'd gotten it wrong, but said, "Yes. Distressed properties. He makes money off other people's failures."

"I can see why he'd view the world as brutal."

"Oh yes. The brutal world of distressed properties." She laughed and sighed and her hands loosened. Placing the big green book on an end table, she pushed it away.

Her hands returned to her lap. Loose. Defenseless. Suddenly she was slumping like a teenager. Suddenly she seemed truly happy to be here.

"He calls himself a heartless capitalist," she said. "Probably because he knows that's what everyone else says. Actually, he's quite proud of himself."

Undertone of contempt, low and steady as a monk's drone. Deriding her father to a virtual stranger but doing it charmingly. That kind of easy seepage often means the lid's rising on a long-boiling pot.

I sat there, waiting for more. She crossed her legs, slumped lower, fluffed her hair, as if aiming for nonchalance.

Her shrug said, Your turn.

I said, "I get the feeling real estate isn't a strong interest of yours."

"Who knows? I'm thinking of becoming an architect, so I can't hate it that much. Actually, I don't hate business at all, not like some other kids do. It's just that I'd rather build something than be a… I'd rather be productive."

"Rather than be a what?"

"I was going to say scavenger. But that's not fair to my father. He doesn't cause anyone else to fail. He's just there to seek opportunities. Nothing wrong with that, it's just not what I'd like to do-actually, I have no idea what I'd like to do." She rang an imaginary bell. "Dah-dah, big insight. I have no goals."

"What about architecture?"

"I probably just say that to tell people something when they ask me. For all I know, I might end up despising architecture."

"Do any subjects in school interest you?" I said.

"I used to like science. For a while, I thought medicine might be a good choice. I took all the A.P. science courses, got fives on the exams. Now I don't know."

"What changed your mind?" The death of your scientist mother?

"It just seems… well, for one, medicine's not what it used to be, is it? Becky told me her father can't stand his job anymore. All the HMOs telling him what he can and can't do. Dr. Manitow calls it mismanaged care. After all that school, it would be nice to have some occupational freedom. Do you like your job?"

"Very much."

"Psychology," she said, as if the word were new. "I was more interested in real science-oh, sorry, that was rude! What I meant was hard science…"

"No offense taken." I smiled.

"I mean, I do respect psychology. I was just thinking more in terms of chemistry and biology. For myself. I'm good with organic things."

"Psychology is a soft science," I said. "That's part of what I like about it."

"What do you mean?" she said.

"The unpredictability of human nature," I said. "Keeps life interesting. Keeps me on my toes."

She thought about that. "I had one psych course, in my junior year. Non-honor track, actually a Mickey Mouse. But it ended up being interesting… Becky went nuts with it, picking out every symptom we learned about and pinning it on someone. Then she got real cold to me-don't ask me why, I don't know. Don't care, either, we haven't shared common interests since the Barbies got stored in the closet… No, I don't think any kind of medicine's for me. Frankly, none of it seems too scientific. My mother saw every species of doctor known to mankind and no one could do a thing for her. If I ever decide to do anything with my life, I think I'd like it to be more productive."

"Something with quick results?"

"Not necessarily quick," she said. "Just valid." She pulled the ponytail forward, played with the crimped edges. "So what if I'm unfocused. I'm the second child, isn't that normal? My brother has enough focus for both of us, knows exactly what he wants: to win the Nobel Prize in economics, then make billions. One day you'll read about him in Fortune."

"That is pretty specific."

"Eric's always known what he wants. He's a genius- picked up The Wall Street Journal when he was five, read an article on supply and demand in the soybean market and gave his kindergarten class a lecture the next day."

"Is that a family tale?" I said.

"What do you mean?"

"It sounds like something you might've heard from your parents. Unless you remember it yourself. But you were only three."

"Right," she said. Confused. "I think I heard it from my father. Could've been my mother. Either of them. My father still tells the story. It probably was him."

Mental note: What stories does Dad tell about Stacy?

"Does that mean something?" she said.

"No," I said. "I'm just interested in family tales. So Eric's focused."

"Focused and a genius. I mean that literally. He's the smartest person I've ever met. Not a nerd, either. Aggressive, tenacious. Once he sets his mind on something, he won't let go."

"Does he like Stanford?"

"He likes it, it likes him."

"Your parents went there?"

"Family tradition."

"Does that put pressure on you to go there, as well?"

"I'm sure Dad would be thrilled. Assuming I'd get in."

"You don't think you would?"

"I don't know-don't really care."

I'd put some space between our chairs, careful not to crowd her. But now her body arched forward, as if yearning for touch. "I'm not putting myself down, Dr. Delaware. I know I'm smart enough. Not like Eric, but smart enough. Yes, I probably could get in, if for no other reason than I'm a multiple legacy. But the truth is, all that is wasted on me-smarts are wasted on me. I really couldn't care less about intellectual goals or tackling challenges or changing the world or making big bucks. Maybe that sounds airheady, but that's the way it is."

She sat back. "How much time do we have left, please? I forgot my watch at home."

"Twenty minutes."

"Ah. Well…" She began studying the office walls.

"Busy day?" I said.

"No, easy day, as a matter of fact. It's just that I told my friends I'd meet them at the Beverly Center. Lots of good sales on, perfect time to do some airhead shopping."

I said, "Sounds like fun."

"Sounds mindless."

"Nothing wrong with leisure."

"I should just enjoy my life?"

"Exactly."

"Exactly," she repeated. "Just have fun." Tears welled in her eyes. I handed her a tissue. She took it, crushed the paper, enveloping it with a fine-boned, ivory fist.

"Let's," she said, "talk about my mother."

I saw her thirteen times. Twice a week for four weeks, then five weekly sessions. She was punctual, cooperative, filled the first half of each session with edgy fast-talk about movies she'd seen, books she'd read, school, friends. Keeping the inevitable at bay, then finally relenting. Her decision, no prodding from me.

The final twenty minutes of each session reserved for her mother.

No more tears, just soft-spoken monologues, heavy with obligation. She'd been sixteen when Joanne Doss began falling apart, remembered the decline, as had her father, as gradual, insidious, ending in grotesquerie.

"I'd look at her and she'd be lying there. Passive- even before, she was always kind of passive. Letting my father make all the decisions-she'd cook dinner but he'd determine the menu. She was a pretty good cook, as a matter of fact, but what she made never seemed to matter to her. Like it was her job and she was going to do it and do it well, but she wouldn't pretend to be… inspired. Once, years ago, I found this little menu box and she'd put in all these dinner plans, stuff she cut out of magazines. So once upon a time, I guess she cared. But not when I was around."

"So your dad had all the opinions in the family," I said.

"Dad and Eric."

"Not you?"

Smile. "Oh, I have a few, too, but I tend to keep them to myself."

"Why's that?"

"I've found that a good strategy."

"For what?"

"A pleasant life."

"Do Eric and your father exclude you?"

"No, not at all-not consciously, anyway. It's just that the two of them have this… let's just call it a big male thing. Two major brains speeding along. Jumping in would be like hopping on a moving train-good metaphor, huh? Maybe I should use it in English class. My teacher's a real pretentious snot, loves metaphors."

"So joining in's dangerous," I said.

She pressed a finger to her lower lip. "It's not that they put me down… I guess I don't want them to think I'm stupid… They're just… they're a pair, Dr. Delaware. When Eric's home, sometimes it's like having Dad in duplicate."

"And when Eric's not home?"

"What do you mean?"

"Do you and your father interact?"

"We get along, it's just that he travels and we have different interests. He's into collecting, I couldn't care less about accumulating stuff."

"Collecting what?"

"First it was paintings-California art. Then he sold those for a giant profit and got into Chinese porcelain. The house is filled with walls and walls of the stuff. Han dynasty, Sung dynasty, Ming dynasty, whatever. I appreciate it. It's beautiful. I just can't get into accumulating. I guess he's an optimist, buying porcelain in earthquake country. He putties it down with this wax the museums use, but still. If the Big One comes, our house will be one big crockery disaster zone."

"How did it fare during the last quake?"

"He didn't have it back then. He got into it when Mom started to get sick."

"Do you think there's a connection?" I said.

"Between what?"

"Getting into porcelain and your mother becoming ill."

"Why should there be-oh I see. She couldn't do things with him anymore, so he learned to amuse himself. Yes, maybe. Like I said, he knows how to adapt.

What did your mom think about the porcelain?

She didn't think anything, that I saw. She didn't think much about anything-Eric likes the porcelain. He can inherit it, I couldn't care less." Sudden smile. "I'm the Queen of Apathy."

At the end of the sixth session, she said, "Sometimes I wonder what kind of guy I'll marry. I mean, will it be someone dominant like Dad or Eric, because that's what I'm used to, or will I go in a totally opposite direction- not that I'm thinking about that. It's just that Eric was down for the weekend and the two of them went off to some Asian art auction and I watched them leave the house-like twins. That's basically what I know of men."

She shook her head. "Dad keeps buying stuff. Sometimes I think that's what he's all about-expansion. As if one world's not big enough for him-Eric was thinking of coming with me today to meet you.

Why?"

"He doesn't have classes till tomorrow, asked me if I wanted to hang out before he flies up tonight. Kind of sweet, don't you think? He really is a good brother. I told him I had to see you first. He didn't know about you, Dad makes a big thing about confidentiality. Gave me this whole big speech about even though I was under eighteen, as far as he was concerned I had full rights. Like he was giving me a big gift, but I think he's kind of embarrassed about it. Once, when I brought up Becky's therapy, he changed the subject really fast… Anyway, Eric hadn't known about you and it surprised him. He started asking me all these questions, wanting to know if you were smart, where you got your degree. I realized I didn't know."

I pointed to my diplomas.

She said, "The good old U. Not Stanford or the Ivys, but it'll probably satisfy him."

"Do you feel you need to satisfy Eric?"

"Sure, he's the smart one… No, he's entitled to his opinions, but they don't influence mine. He decided not to come, took a bike ride instead. Maybe one day you'll get to meet him."

"If I behave myself?"

She laughed. "Yes, absolutely. Meeting Eric is a reward of the highest order."

I'd thought a lot about Eric. About the hellish Po-laroids he'd shot of his mother. Standing at the foot of the bed, highlighting her misery in cold, unforgiving light. His father considered them trophies, carried them around in that little purse.

How badly had Richard Doss hated his wife?

I said, "How did Eric react to your mother's death?"

"Silence. Silent anger. He'd already dropped out of school to be with her, maybe that did it for him. Because right after, he returned to Stanford." Sudden chill in her voice. She picked at her cuticles, stared down into her lap.

Bad move, bringing up her brother. Keep the focus on her, always on her.

But I wondered if she'd ever seen the snapshots.

"So," I said.

"So." She looked at her watch.

Ten minutes to go. She frowned. I tried to reel her back in: "A couple of weeks ago, we were discussing how expressing opinions can be tricky in your family. How did your mother-"

"By having none. By turning herself into a nothing.

A nothing," I said.

"Exactly. That's why I wasn't surprised when I found out what she did-with Mate. I mean I was, when I heard about it on the news. But after the shock wore off, I realized it made sense: the ultimate passivity.

So you had no warning-"

"None. She never said a word to me. Never said goodbye. That morning she had called me in to say hi before I went to school. Told me I looked pretty. She did that sometimes, there was nothing different. She looked the way she always did. Erased-the truth is she'd already rubbed herself out by the time Mate got involved. The media always make it out like he's doing something but he isn't. Not if the other people were like my mom. He didn't do a damn thing. There was nothing left for him to do. She didn't want to be."

I readied my hand for a dive toward the tissue box. Stacy straightened, placed her feet on the floor, sat up straight.

"The whole thing's an incredible pity, Dr. Delaware." Back to the clinical detachment of the first session. "Yes, it is."

"She was brilliant, two PhDs, she could've won the Nobel Prize if she'd wanted to. That's where Eric got his smarts. My father's a bright man, but she was a genius. Her parents were brilliant, too. Librarians, they never made much money, but they were brilliant. Both died young. Cancer. Maybe my mother was afraid of dying young. Of cancer, I don't know. She brought Becky Manitow from a D to a B in algebra. When Becky stopped seeing her, she dropped down to a D again."

"Becky stopped because your mother was ill?"

"I suppose."

Long silence. A minute to go.

She said, "Our time's up, isn't it."

"In a moment," I said.

"No. Rules are rules. Thanks for all your help, I'm dealing with stuff pretty well. All things considered." She picked up her books.

"All things considered?"

"One never knows," she said. Then she laughed. "Oh, don't worry about me. I'm fine. What's the choice?"

During the last few sessions, she entered ready to talk about her grief. Dry-eyed, solemn, no changes of subject or digressions to trivia or laughing dance-aways.

Trying.

Yearning to understand why her mother had left her without saying good-bye. Knowing some questions could never be answered.

Asking them anyway. Why her family? Why her?

Had her mother even been sick? Had it all been psychosomatic, the way Dr. Manitow said it was-she'd heard him say so to Judge Manitow when the two of them didn't know she was in earshot. Judge Manitow saying, Oh, I don't know, Bob. He replying, Trust me, Judy, there's nothing physically wrong with her-it's slow suicide.

Stacy, listening from the bathroom next to the kitchen, had been angry at him, really furious, what a bastard, how could he say something like that.

But then she started wondering herself. Because the doctors never did find anything. Her father kept saying doctors don't know everything, they're not as smart as they think. Then he stopped taking her for tests, so didn't that prove that even he thought it might be in Mom's head? You'd think something would show up on some test…

During the eleventh session, she talked about Mate.

Not angry at him, the way Dad was. The way Eric was. That's all the two of them could do when faced with something they couldn't control. Get angry at it. Big male thing, get pissed off, want to crush it.

I said, "Your father wants to crush Mate?"

"Rhetorically. He says that about anything he doesn't like-some guy trying to cheat him in a business deal, he jokes about pulverizing him, wiping him off the planet, that kind of macho BS."

"What do you think of Mate?"

"Pathetic. A loser. With or without him, Mom would have stopped being."

At the beginning of the twelfth session she announced that there was nothing left to say about her mother, she'd better start paying attention to her future. Because she'd finally decided she just might want one.

"Maybe architecture, still." Smile. "I've eliminated everything else. I'm forging straight ahead, Dr. Delaware. Setting my sights on architecture at Stanford. Everyone will be happy."

"Including you?"

"Definitely including me. No point doing anything if it doesn't bring me satisfaction. Thanks for getting me to see that."

She was ready to terminate, but I encouraged her to make another appointment. She came in the next week with brochures and the course catalog from Stanford.

Going over the architecture curriculum with me. Telling me she was pretty sure she'd made the right choice.

"If you don't mind," she said, "I'd like to come in when I apply next year. Maybe you can give me some pointers-if you do that kind of thing."

"Sure. My pleasure. And call any time something's on your mind."

"You're very nice," she said. "It was instructive to meet you."

I didn't have to ask what she meant. I was a male who wasn't her father, wasn't her brother.