Mia Like Crazy

by Cordoba, Nina

  When they arrived, I came downstairs and made a pot of coffee. I sat in the living room with Meridith, while the doctor worked on Drew a few feet away at the dining table. I’d showered and changed, but I was weary down to my bones and it showed.

  “Mia, sweetheart, you don’t have to stay down here with us. You look tired,” Meridith said.

  Drew overheard. “Mia sweetheart,” he said mockingly, “did you tell your sister-in-law who the guy was in the parking lot?”

  “She told me the whole story, Drew.” Meridith sounded annoyed, for once.

  “And I guess you’re taking her side, huh?”

  “Could you be any more childish?” I was way past annoyed. “There’s not a side for her to take, here. You were a jerk, then I did an incredibly stupid thing, and then you acted like a lunatic.”

  “So we’re even?” He sounded like an eight-year-old.

  I put my face in my hands. After a few seconds I slid them up slowly until my forehead rested in my palms and my fingers were laced through my hair. I closed my hands into fists. I had a flashback of myself, as a young child, sitting in my room in the same position.

  “Meridith,” I said. “I can’t do this.”

  “Don’t make any decisions until you’ve had some sleep,” Meridith advised.

  Drew chimed in, “Besides, you’ve learned your lesson, now, so this kind of thing won’t happen again.” He had the audacity to smile.

  I wanted to slap him again. “You’ve already driven me to violence once tonight. We could make it a double homicide.”

  “You mean me and Lance?” He chuckled.

  “Still think I’m good for him, Meridith?” I asked.

  She held her tongue.

  ~

  I got up the next morning starved and thinking I would need to rustle up my own breakfast after what had happened the night before.

  Instead of making myself presentable, as I had each morning since I moved in, I went downstairs with my hair a mess wearing my exercise pants and a big T-shirt.

  I headed for the kitchen, hoping to find some cereal or bread for toast. What I found was Drew, whistling while he whisked eggs as though nothing monumental had occurred between us a few hours before. He turned and looked at me in my disheveled state.

  “Wow, I’ve never seen you like this before. You look hot!”

  I found his teasing in poor taste, considering the fact that he had never even consummated our marriage.

  “Don’t start something you can’t finish, omelet boy.” After noting the dark shadows under my eyes, as reflected in the chrome refrigerator door, I started searching the cabinets.

  “What are you looking for?”

  “Cereal.”

  “Don’t have it. Don’t believe in it.”

  “It’s nice to know you have some convictions,” I said. “I was starting to think you were amoral.”

  “See, you don’t know me at all—oh, Meri’s on her way over for breakfast.”

  “Great,” I answered sarcastically, thinking the last thing I wanted this morning was to have breakfast with two denial junkies. The doorbell rang.

  Drew was in mid-omelet at the stove, so I walked to the front door and opened it. I could see by the look on Meridith’s face she was taken aback by my appearance.

  “Mia. I’m so glad to see you, sweetheart. How are you feeling today? ”

  At least she didn’t tell me I looked hot.

  I turned and walked toward the stairs without answering Meridith’s question. “Drew’s in the kitchen,” I said. “I’ll be right back down.”

  I took only a few minutes to apply some concealer to my dark shadows and brush my hair back into a low ponytail. I steeled myself for whatever ridiculous conversation I was going to have to sit through in order to earn my breakfast.

  We ate quietly, with only the sound of Meridith’s sporadic compliments on Drew’s culinary talents breaking the silence.

  I couldn’t even taste the food. My appetite had nearly disappeared from the stress of sitting there with the two of them, not talking about what we would eventually have to discuss.

  Then I remembered Meridith’s car. “Meri, I left your car in the parking lot of the—”

  “Don’t worry,” Meridith interrupted. “I had Brad go and get it last night.”

  “Who’s Brad?” I asked.

  “Brad the Butler,” Drew cut in.

  “Drew, he’s my personal assistant and he doesn’t like it when you refer to him as a ‘butler,’” Meridith chastised. “I don’t even have a butler.”

  “I don’t know what the difference is,” Drew argued. “You tell him to do stuff and he does it.”

  Meridith was silent, and for the second time in twenty-four hours I had noted irritation in my sister-in-law’s voice when she spoke to her brother.

  Drew can even try Saint Meridith’s patience.

  When everyone was finished eating, Meridith said, “Mia you’ve been very quiet this morning. Are you feeling well?”

  “She’s probably got a hell of a hangover,” Drew said. “She really tied one on last night.”

  My death glare settled on his eyes and remained there for several seconds, then I turned to Meridith. “I feel the same way I did last night. I don’t see how I can stay here.”

  His shoulders dropped. He looked down at his plate and pushed a speck of egg around with his fork. Finally he spoke, in a quiet, apprehensive voice. “Because you’re afraid of me now?”

  I couldn’t answer. It was much more complicated than that. My throat tightened and those damn tears tried to fight their way through my resolve again.

  “Mia, I think it’s really important for us to be completely honest, right now,” Meridith said. “Are you fearful of Drew?”

  I was exasperated with my own feelings, as well as with these two people who had entered my life and didn’t want to let me go.

  I stood up suddenly, and my chair fell backwards and clattered on the floor. Drew jerked forward as though he wanted to jump up and right it, but he held himself still.

  “No, Meridith, I don’t feel ‘fearful’ around Drew, but don’t you think that’s a little crazy at this point?” I didn’t wait for an answer. “I don’t trust my own judgment anymore. I thought I knew something about people. About human nature. I thought I could read people. I thought I would make good decisions in the person I would choose to lo—spend time with.”

  Meridith jumped in. “I hope this isn’t too presumptuous, but I asked Dr. Schultz if she had time on her schedule to do a little couples counseling with you two, and—”

  “Couples counseling?” I was incredulous. “Couples counseling? Really? We’re not a couple of newlyweds who can’t agree on what brand of laundry detergent to buy, or which side of the bed to sleep on!”

  I was on a roll and I could feel my hands gesturing wildly as I spoke, a habit I had worked hard to break back in college because I thought it looked too “barrio.”

  “In my previous life, I was an attractive woman, yet, now, my own husband has an aversion to touching me, my marriage has not been consummated, and he doesn’t have any plans to change that. I got drunk for the first time in my life last night, and put myself in a situation with a stranger that I never would have if I’d been in my right mind.

  “And when I pulled myself together and figured out this is where I wanted to be…” I jabbed a finger in Drew’s general direction. “My blood spattered husband came in and convinced me I’d made him murder someone.” I paused when I was about to deliver the last sentence of my argument, as I always did in court. “Perhaps this is just another wacky day in the Vaughn family, but it’s not normal, not by a long shot, not even where I grew up!”

  The tirade was answered by Meridith’s usual calm resolve. “Mia, I know it doesn’t seem like enough to you right now, but he is making progress. He’s never wanted to spend twenty-four hours a day with someone, albeit sometimes locked up in this apartment, and he has never been more happy than
he has since you came into his life.”

  “He’s happy? Well, I’m so glad he has managed to be happy,” I said sarcastically. “You know what Meri? I’m not sure that making Drew happy was ever in my job description. I’m not his shrink and I’m not really even his wife. But I do know, and have always known, that it is up to me to find a way to make myself happy!”

  “Were you happy before you came here?” Drew asked, with raised eyebrows.

  Damn it. All that time at law school, and some crazy ex-convict could ask me the one question I didn’t have a good answer for. His level stare let me know that he was waiting for a response.

  I wasn’t about to be derailed onto the topic of how screwed up I was. Instead of answering, I decided to counter with a proposal I knew was so ludicrous, he would have to refuse, and I could get out of this mess.

  “Okay, I’ll see Dr. Schultz,” I pretended to surrender. Drew and Meridith were visibly relieved. “But I want to see her alone to talk about Drew, and Drew, I want you to give her permission to be totally candid with me.”

  He looked like I’d slapped him in the face again. Meridith was visibly shocked. “You want the doctor to discuss Drew’s confidential sessions with you?”

  “And his prognosis,” I added. “And I think I should do so before I spend another night in this house with him.”

  I had never seen so many emotions cross Drew’s face in such a short time, or maybe in all the time I’d known him. For once, he didn’t seem the least bit angry or cynical, but the bewilderment and indecision apparent in his look actually made me feel sorry about my request.

  But I was committed. It was the only option that might give me the insight I needed. I’d given up my job, my career, and my self-control.

  At this point, I had to have a professional opinion about whether or not I was on a path to destruction, since I no longer felt qualified to judge for myself.

  He wasn’t meeting my gaze anymore. He was looking out the window. The fork he held drummed nervously on the table.

  Meridith opened her mouth to object again, but must have thought better of it. We all knew this couldn’t be her decision. Drew was a man, and he needed to determine his own boundaries and priorities.

  He got up slowly and walked into the kitchen. The door swung shut behind him. His sister and I looked at each other, uncertain as to whether the conversation was over. We sat for several minutes in heavy, somber silence. The door finally swung open and he stepped through.

  “It’s done,” he said. “She can see you at twelve-thirty this afternoon. Total access.” He crossed the room and strode quickly up the stairs. I heard his door close firmly behind him.

  I looked at Meridith, completely shocked. “I didn’t actually think he’d agree to it. Do you think this is for real?”

  “Yes. I do,” Meridith replied.

  I said goodbye to her quickly and went to my room to shower, change, and think. I wanted to meet with the doctor as my confident, competent self, not looking like the basket case I’d become.

  God knows what Drew has said about me. I felt a new wave of anxiety hit.

  Once I was presentable, I went to my office and took out a legal pad. I wanted to have my wits about me when I spoke to the psychiatrist. What were the logical questions a person in my situation should ask?

  No logical person would be in my situation.

  I ignored my inner voice and started writing. Maybe if I pretended I was a client seeking my counsel . . . Is Drew actually progressing, or regressing? Does he pose a danger to society, or himself? Am I in danger living with him?

  I looked over my list and realized these weren’t the questions I truly wanted answered at all. I tried to put those questions into words, but couldn’t make myself write them down on the page. Finally, I decided to wing it and hope I could learn enough to satisfy my heart and mind.

  ~

  When I entered Dr. Schultz’s office, I was surprised to see the psychiatrist was rather young, and black. I had imagined an older white woman with glasses and a bun in her hair.

  I had never been to a counselor before, and was pleasantly surprised when I didn’t have to talk to Dr. Schultz across a huge desk, as I had imagined. Instead, I sat on the couch, and the doctor took a comfortable-looking chair nearby.

  After an initial greeting, she waited for me to begin.

  “Doctor, I know this is very irregular and, believe me, I know irregular.” That wasn’t what I wanted to say. It was my one chance and I didn’t want to blow it. I began again, this time from my heart.

  “Doctor, I’m in love with a man who should be unlovable. He’s a convicted felon, notoriously hostile, and possibly incapable of intimacy.” I paused to gather my thoughts. “If I had caring relatives or good friends to advise me, which I don’t, they would tell me to run away from this relationship and not look back.”

  Doctor Schultz listened quietly with a sympathetic expression, giving me the courage to continue.

  “The problem is I feel a connection with him like I’ve never felt with anyone else. There’s a caring, a love, and as strange as it sounds, a passion, between us that’s hard to describe. I understand intellectually that I should be afraid of him, but I’m not. I’ve read the articles, heard the stories, but I just can’t see it. I can’t feel it. I’m afraid I’m repeating a pattern I saw played out in my childhood when my mother was always attracted to men who couldn’t commit to her and maybe I’m like a moth to the flame.”

  I searched for the questions, which were tangled up with all the emotions I’d been feeling since I met Drew. Finally, I gathered my thoughts again.

  “I guess what I need to know is…am I in danger and deluding myself? Is Drew even capable of love? Will he ever be able to be a real husband to me?” The tears I had been determined to hold back came streaming down my face. The doctor handed me a box of tissues and cleared her throat.

  “You can call me Valerie. May I call you Mia?”

  I nodded and dabbed at my cheeks.

  “I do want to help you Mia. Let’s address the most pressing issue first and that’s whether you’re safe with him at all. Drew told me what he did last night. Is that the reason you think you should be afraid?”

  “No, not exactly,” I answered, confused. “I thought most normal people would be afraid of him because of the rape conviction.”

  “You mean the one when he was eighteen years old?”

  “Is there another one?” I asked, startled.

  “No, no,” Valerie reassured me. “I’m just surprised because he’d said he was going to tell you the truth about it.”

  I stared at her, confused.

  “You’ve been living in the house all this time thinking he could be a rapist?” she said incredulously. “No wonder you’re a wreck.”

  I chose not to be insulted, but did wonder about such bluntness in a psychiatrist.

  “Mia, the only thing Drew’s ever damaged is property. He didn’t rape that girl.”

  At the doctor’s words, I gasped audibly and started to speak, but closed my mouth and waited, instead.

  “He did have feelings for her and she turned him down,” Valerie continued. “That night at the party, for whatever reason, she seemed to have a change of heart. They went into a back room and started making out. At some point, the girl turned on him and started berating him, using some of the same words his father always had. When she called him a ‘loser,’ he snapped and jumped back on top of her. He was going to hurt her. He felt like she needed to be punished, as he was always punished for displeasing his father.”

  “What happened?” My heart was beating so hard it felt like it would come out of my chest.

  “The girl started crying and pleading, and he empathized with her,” the doctor continued. “He couldn’t do it. He got up, and as he was leaving the room, two other boys burst in, wildly intoxicated. From what they told Drew later, they both had sex with her that night.”

  “Why didn’t any of this come ou
t at the trial?”

  “The girl was so drunk and stoned, she wasn’t much help. All she could remember was Drew. He never denied it, so he became the notorious rapist Drew Larson.”

  “Why in the world wouldn’t he tell the truth?”

  “Here’s where you have to understand about his upbringing, and the bizarre ‘rules to live by’ his father taught him,” Valerie explained. “The worst thing you could be to Jack Larson was weak. If someone crossed him in any way, he would take revenge on them, period. As a little boy, Drew didn’t show much aggression. In fact, he spent a lot of time drawing, and wanted to be in the kitchen with his mom. His father was embarrassed by what he perceived to be a ‘sissy’ living under his own roof. He constantly berated Drew for everything from letting other kids take his toys to talking too much.”

  “Talking too much? If he would have talked to me last night, none of this would be necessary.”

  “Mia, Drew’s father would hurt him if he did more than speak when spoken to. Jack Larson hated everything about him. He called him weak and told him if he didn’t toughen up he’d always be a loser. He was often beating him when he said these things. To set the right example, I suppose.”

  “That explains all those blue ribbons in everything. He had to compete and win, or else,” I said. “But what did that have to do with the night at the party?”

  “At the time it all happened, Drew was still living under Jack Larson’s roof, as he always had. He was ashamed for his father to know he couldn’t go through with the attack on the girl who had injured his pride so badly. In his world, this would prove to his father, once and for all, that he was a weakling. He couldn’t dole out the punishment, even when it was so obviously deserved.”

  “My God!” I exclaimed. “Better to be a rapist than a weakling?”

  “It gets worse. When Jack Larson heard what Drew was supposed to have done, he, privately, congratulated him. He told Drew, ‘she had it coming to her.’ Then he publicly denounced him. I’m sure the other boys were more than happy to let him take the rap. They knew she was fine when Drew left her. They kept his secret. He kept theirs. And, apparently, when Drew was arrested, he retreated so far into himself, he didn’t even care what was happening to him anymore.”