False Memory

13

When Martie went into the restaurant to get the takeout — moo goo gai pan, Szechuan beef, snow peas and broccoli, rice, and a cold six-pack of Tsingtao — she left Susan in the car, with the engine running and the radio tuned to a station playing classic rock. She had placed the order from her cell phone, en route, and it was ready when she arrived. In respect of the rain, the cardboard containers of food and the beer were packed in two plastic bags.

Even before Martie stepped out of the restaurant, just a few minutes later, the car-radio volume had been cranked so high that she could hear Gary U.S. Bonds belting “School Is Out,” saxophones wailing.

She winced when she got into the car. The woofer diaphragms were vibrating so violently in the radio speakers that several loose coins in a change tray jingled against one another.

Left alone in a car, even though she was technically not in an open space, and though she kept her head down and her eyes away from the windows, Susan could often be overwhelmed by an awareness of the vast world beyond. Sometimes loud music helped by distracting her, diminishing her ability to obsess on her fear.

The severity of her attack could be measured by how loud she needed the music to be if it were to help her. This had been a grim seizure: The radio couldn’t be turned any louder.

Martie drastically reduced the volume. The driving rhythms and booming melody of “School Is Out” had completely masked the sounds of the storm. Now the drumbeat, maracas rattle, and cymbal hiss of the downpour washed over them again.

Shuddering, breathing raggedly, Susan didn’t look up or speak.

Martie said nothing. Sometimes Susan had to be coached, cajoled, counseled, and occasionally even bullied out of her terror. At other times, like this, the best way to help her climb down from the top of the panic ladder was to make no reference to her condition; talking about it propelled her toward an even higher anxiety.

After she had driven a couple of blocks, Martie said, “I got some chopsticks.”

“I prefer a fork, thanks.”

“Chinese food doesn’t taste fully Chinese when you use a fork.”

“And cow milk doesn’t taste fully like milk unless you squirt it directly into your mouth from the teat.”

“You’re probably right,” Martie said.

“So I’ll settle for a reasonable approximation of the authentic taste. I don’t mind being a philistine as long as I’m a philistine with a fork.”

By the time they parked near her house on Balboa Peninsula, Susan was sufficiently in control of herself to make the trek from the car to her third-floor apartment. Nevertheless, she leaned on Martie all the way, and the journey was grindingly difficult.

Safe in her apartment, with all the blinds and drapes tightly shut, Susan was again able to stand fully erect, with her shoulders drawn back and her head held up. Her face was not wrenched anymore. Although her green eyes remained haunted, they were no longer wild with terror.

“I’ll zap the takeout containers in the microwave,” Susan said, “if you’ll set the table.”

In the dining room, as Martie was putting a fork beside Susan’s plate, her hand began to shake uncontrollably. The stainless-steel tines rattled against the china.

She dropped the fork on the place mat and stared at it with a queer dread that rapidly escalated into a repulsion so severe that she backed away from the table. The tines were wickedly pointed. She had never before realized how dangerous a simple fork might be in the wrong hands. You could tear out an eye with it. Gouge a face. Shove it into someone’s neck and snare the carotid artery as though you were twisting a strand of spaghetti. You could—

Overcome by a desperate need to keep her hands busy, safely busy, she opened one of the drawers in the breakfront, located a sixty-four-card pinochle deck used for playing a two-hand game, and took it out of the box. Standing at the dining table, as far from the fork as she could get, she shuffled the deck. At first she repeatedly fumbled, spilling cards across the table, but then her coordination improved.

She couldn’t shuffle the cards forever.

Stay busy. Safely busy. Until this strange mood passed.

Trying to conceal her agitation, she went into the kitchen, where Susan was waiting for the microwave timer to buzz. Martie took two bottles of Tsingtao from the refrigerator.

The complex fragrances of Chinese food filled the room.

“Do you think I’m getting the authentic smell of the cuisine when I’m dressed like this?” Susan asked.

“What?”

“Or to really smell it, maybe I should put on a cheongsam.”

“Ho, ho,” Martie said, because she was too rattled to think of a witty reply.

She almost put the two bottles of beer on the cutting board by the sink, to open them, but the mezzaluna was still there, its wicked crescent edge gleaming. Her heart hammered almost painfully hard at the sight of the knife.

Instead, she set the beers on the small kitchen table. She got two glasses from a cabinet and put them beside the beers.

Stay busy.

She searched through a drawer full of small utensils until she found a bottle opener. She plucked it from among the other items, and returned to the table.

The opener was rounded on one end, for bottles. The other end was pointed and hooked, for cans.

By the time she reached the kitchen table, the pointed end of the opener appeared to be as murderous an instrument as the fork, as the mezzaluna. She quickly put it beside the Tsingtaos before it dropped out of her trembling hand or she threw it down in horror.

“Will you open the beers?” she asked on her way out of the kitchen, leaving before Susan could see her troubled face. “I’ve got to use the john.”

Crossing the dining room, she avoided looking at the table, on which the fork lay, tines up.

In the hallway leading off the living room, she averted her eyes from the mirrored sliding doors on the closet.

The bathroom. Another mirror.

She almost backed out into the hall. She could think of nowhere else to go to collect her wits in private, however, and she didn’t want Susan to see her in this condition.

Summoning the courage to confront the mirror, she found nothing to fear. The anxiety in her face and eyes was distressing, although not as evident as she had thought it must be.

Martie quickly closed the door, lowered the lid on the toilet, and sat down. Only when her breath burst from her in a raw gasp did she realize that she’d been holding it for a long time.