The Venus Fix

Seventy-Nine

Dulcie called me from her cell at ten-thirty, on her way back to Mitch’s, and thanked me for the flowers.

“Mom?”

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“Are you okay?”

“Sure, why?”

“I don’t know. But I keep feeling like something is wrong. It’s kind of the way you describe it when something’s wrong with me and you feel it, you know?”

I nodded. “Yes, honey, I know.”

“So are you okay?”

I decided not to wait until the weekend and told her about my wrist. When I was done, I heard her give a little sigh.

“It was really strange. I kept feeling like something hurt, but it didn’t really.”

“Oh, baby, I’m sorry. That must have been scary.”

“It was, but kind of interesting, too. Could you do it with your mom? I bet you could. I bet it’s something else we inherited.”

“I don’t know.” I bit my bottom lip and waited to hear what other amazing thing she was going to say.

“We’re here, Mom. I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Hope your wrist feels okay.” And then before I had a chance to wish her a good night, she clicked off.

I walked into the apartment and played my messages before I even took off my coat. I was expecting calls from Blythe and Nina. There was only one call and it was from Noah, asking me to call him back. I wanted to but I didn’t trust myself to talk to him yet.

With nothing to do but wait for Nina to call, I went to the corner of the den where I kept my sculpture. I desperately wanted to chip away at the stone, become lost in the rhythm of the mallet hitting the chisel. But you can’t sculpt with only one good hand.

I rotated the piece on its base.

The form escaping was rough and amateurish. That I had less talent than desire for this art form had bothered me once, but not anymore. It had been either accept my limitations or give up the one thing that helped me escape the voices in my head: my patients’ fantasies, fetishes, pains, perversions, deep losses and thwarted hopes.

I clicked on the television.

Finally, at twelve-twenty, Nina called.

She’d been at a concert at Lincoln Center and then out to a late supper. I listened to see if she sounded tired. I didn’t want to tax her, even though I desperately needed to talk to her. Relieved to hear the energy in her voice, I told her what had happened that afternoon with Amanda and about the CD she’d given me and what was on it.

“Simone?” Nina asked when I finished. “Do you know Simone’s last name?”

“Alexander,” I said. “I think that’s what she told me. Why?”

“Do you have the CD with you?”

“Yes. I didn’t want to leave it in the office.”

“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

“Nina, it’s after twelve-thirty.”

“I have to see it for myself, Morgan. I have to be sure. You don’t know whose daughter she is, do you?”

I didn’t.