Sounds Like Crazy

by Mahaffey, Shana

  The banging on my chest intensified.

  I sat there in the uncomfortable pink chair feeling the same way I had at the lake that day.

  The banging on my chest intensified.

  Go away, I wanted to scream. It didn’t. I slid off the chair and crouched on Milton’s Oriental rug. My hands covered my ears like protective wear. I remembered how many times I had tried this over the years before I left the family nest. It never worked then and it wasn’t working now.

  The unwelcome visitor finally broke the Committee’s door down and a grief stampede rushed in right over the top of me. Fanning out through the house.Touching the Committee’s things. Turning them over. Asking the price with a complete disregard for the history and feelings, for what was at stake. Opening drawers and cupboards, using the bathroom, unpacking, and finally moving in.Then grief, wanting a little fresh air, opened the windows wide and the cold winter of reality blew, with a full-force gale, across me sitting there in Milton’s office.

  I had lost my Committee.

  I had lost my job.

  I had lost my boyfriend.

  I . . . was . . . lost.

  Milton handed me a box of Kleenex. When I was all cried out, I had a hillock of soggy tissues on my lap and we had about ten minutes remaining in the hour. I sat there feeling like a deer that had just gone through the windshield of some errant SUV. But the genie was not going back in the proverbial bottle.

  “I have an idea about how to proceed,” said Milton.

  “Will it bring them back?”

  “Do you want them back?” said Milton.

  “I do. Oh, God, I do.”A fresh round of pain spasms kicked off in my gut.

  “We’ll start Thursday then.” Milton’s eyes sparkled.

  { 15 }

  G roup therapy. Milton’s idea was group therapy. I was not thrilled. Not even close. I hated that touchy-feely let’s-all-love-each-other kind of crap. Milton knew this and yet he suggested that we try group therapy. And as much as I hated the idea of doing what was sure to be an exercise in exposing new-age bullshit like reflecting back what people said, I obediently sat in an empty waiting room, having arrived several minutes before the appointed time.That I was alone struck me as odd. Where’s the group? They should be here.

  I thumbed through last week’s New Yorker looking for any of the cartoons I’d missed. By my watch, it was two minutes to the hour. Not even enough for “Shouts & Murmurs.” I wondered if Milton had different waiting rooms and doors for groups. He could have a garage-door-opener type of device and push the button so all the doors sprang open at once. Inviting everyone in at the same time eliminated any hint of favoritism. We’d all charge right over the top of him to get to the most comfortable furniture. Or maybe not, since floorboards were more comfortable than Milton’s antique furniture. I laughed at the thought.

  “Holly.” Milton’s voice interrupted my amusement. I looked up. He appeared slightly amused himself. Did he know what the source of my mirth was? Then I thought it was funny how people always think they know what is on the other person’s mind. And even funnier how it almost never works out to be what you thought they were thinking.

  “Yep.” I dropped the New Yorker back on the end table as I stood. I paused for a moment, nodded, and followed him into his office. It was empty.

  “Where is everyone?” I said.

  “Have a seat, Holly,” said Milton.

  I sat on the couch.

  “Close your eyes, Holly,” said Milton.

  I did.

  “Do you want to resolve your issues with the Committee through therapy?” said Milton.

  I wanted to bolt from the room.

  “This is weird.” I opened my eyes. “I expected people and a group setting. Not that I want that, mind you. That seems weird too.”

  “Holly, please just trust me and answer the question,” said Milton.

  “Okay. I guess so.” I closed my eyes again.

  “You guess what?” said Milton.

  “I guess. I mean, yes, I want to resolve my issues with the Committee in therapy.”

  They appeared.

  My Committee.

  The sight of them was dizzying. Goose bumps erupted across my body. I wanted to hug them all.Touch each one of their faces, even the Boy’s blurry one. I clapped my hands and laughed. I waved at Betty Jane’s sunflower doing what appeared to be a dance of joy before me. I’d have danced too if my feet were steady enough. “They’re here, Milton,” I cried. “They’re back. Oh, they’re back.”

  My smile split wider across my face. Milton nodded impassively. “Betty Jane, the Silent One, Sarge, the Boy, and . . .” I pushed myself forward on the couch. The Committee’s therapy room mirrored Milton’s.There was nowhere for Ruffles to hide. “And . . . her pillow . . .” I turned to Betty Jane, teeth bared, and said out loud, “Where is she?”

  “I have no idea what you mean,” said Betty Jane inside my head.

  “Ruffles is missing,” I said to Milton. “Ruffles isn’t here. Where is Ruffles?” I said to him and Betty Jane.

  “Holly,” said Milton, “before we proceed I am going to ask you to do something you might consider unorthodox.” That jolted me out of my upset. What could possibly be unorthodox at this point in our work?

  “Okay,” I said, “what?”

  “I would like to ask you to allow all the voices to speak out loud while we are here doing our work. All responses should come from your mouth. It is the only way we can make sure nothing is kept from me.”

  “Shuffle like a deck of cards, you mean?” The Silent One, the Boy, Sarge, Ruffles, and I used to do this when I was a teenager. Before Betty Jane arrived there was never an issue of control. Ruffles figured out pretty quickly that with her, you couldn’t give a fraction of an inch, so we stopped shuffling. “Are you sure it’s safe?” I said.

  “Perfectly safe,” said Milton. Betty Jane’s face looked just like it did in the hotel after the Emmys. I blanched.“She cannot harm you, Holly. Remember the rules we agreed upon? The ones that made it possible for you to become a voice-over artist?”

  “Vaguely,” I said. I thought back to that day in therapy when Milton and Betty Jane negotiated, him for my sanity and her for fame.

  “Please trust me.”

  “Will it help find Ruffles?”

  “I’m not sure, Holly, but it will help regardless.”

  “This is what you meant by group therapy?” I said. Milton nodded.

  I alternated between Milton’s and Betty Jane’s faces. Her caution about my choices felt prescient at that moment. But I didn’t know if that was good or bad. If Ruffles were there, I’d choose group therapy, shuffling personalities, and Betty Jane’s presence without looking back. But Ruffles wasn’t there. I didn’t know why but I suspected it had to do with Betty Jane. Is four better than five? Will I be able to find Ruffles if I agree to do this? I thought I saw Sarge nod. Maybe I wanted him to. I don’t know. All I know is I finally said, “Okay, I’ll do that,” and then I said to Betty Jane, “Now tell us what you’ve done with Ruffles.”

  “You know exactly where she is,” said Betty Jane out of my mouth. But instead of being in the Committee’s room, I hovered near her like in the old days. I relaxed.

  “I don’t know where she is,” I said.

  “Well, that’s your loss, then,” said Betty Jane.

  “Okay,” interrupted Milton, “all in good time. Now, here is how we are going to work.We will meet two days a week during your regular sessions, Holly—”

  “But what about—”

  “Why don’t you let him finish,” said Betty Jane. Sarge sat forward as if he were going to get up and throttle her. The Boy hid his face in the back cushion.

  “Betty Jane, please refrain from interrupting.” My eyebrows shot up. I didn’t expect this much support. “We will start each session by checking in. A check-in is how we indicate our general mood for the day. It should be fairly short.And since you seem so intent on speaking,
why don’t we start with you, Betty Jane?”

  “Well . . .” She held up my hand and inspected my manicure. I expected that to stop her cold, because I hadn’t attended to my nails since she left.“To tell the truth, I am feeling inconvenienced by this whole thing. Coerced is more like it. But I agreed to do it, and a Southern woman always keeps her word.” She didn’t comment on the state of my nails. In the Committee’s therapy room, she was seated on the pink chair that always reminded me of an old-fashioned commode. I heard the flushing sound that always accompanied the sight of that chair. I smiled.

  “Sarge?” said Milton.

  “Doin’ okay,” said Sarge. My heart ached at the sound of his voice. I didn’t know who I missed more, him or Ruffles.

  The Silent One came forth to bow his head, and then he drifted backward. Nobody said a word. Inside my head, Betty Jane arched her eyebrow at me.

  “Oh. Me? Well, I feel here. I mean to say, I am here. Okay, we know I am here. I mean, okay. I am okay.” I had so many mixed emotions running through me. She rolled her eyes. I looked at the Boy.

  “Little Bean. I like to be called Little Bean,” he said. I felt a jolt at his new name. I shuddered and pushed it aside.“And I feel lonely,” he said softly, “desperately lonely.”

  Me too, I thought. Me too.

  I wanted to ask Sarge, Little Bean, as the Boy now liked to be called, and the Silent One if they knew where Ruffles was, but I didn’t want Betty Jane to hear. I decided I’d wait until she went to bed to ask and instead sat there and enjoyed their faces until Milton announced that we had five minutes remaining in the hour.

  “All right.” I said. Then to the Committee, “The apartment is kind of a mess, and, well, I’ve been smoking indoors. But only because I was afraid to catch the cat without you, Sarge.” The lines on his face deepened when I said this. “I know. I’m sorry. The smoke is bad for the Boy, I mean Little Bean . . .” Sarge’s eyebrows came together as he closed his eyes. My body went hollow. “Milton?” I said. “They get to come home with me, right?”

  Milton shook his head and I felt like I’d been shoved hard. This must be how torture victims felt when they realized the nice gesture of seeing their loved ones was really just coercion to get them to do what was asked of them.

  “Then I won’t leave,” I whispered as I clenched my fists.

  “Holly—”

  At that moment, everything on the other side of the door to Milton’s office seemed black and treacherous.“No! I won’t leave. I can’t. I won’t.You can’t make me.”

  Sarge stood up slowly. His eyes were still closed. “Do your duty, soldier,” he said softly. My breath caught in my throat. The command was harsh when Sarge said it a second time. I wanted to ignore it, but then I noticed he had a torrent of tears running down his face. He opened his eyes and blinked. “Soldier?”

  “HUA,” I whispered. He raised a hand in salute. Betty Jane watched the whole exchange with a bored expression.

  Somehow I walked out of Milton’s office, but I don’t remember anything between the Committee disappearing when I closed the door and turning the key in the lock to the door of my apartment.

  Milton called me the next day. I answered before the phone could ring a second time. He said he thought it was a good idea for us to speak in between sessions and proposed the daily noon call I’d rejected before.This time I accepted.Then I asked him, “Where is Ruffles; where did she go?”

  “Holly, can you please recount again what happened after the Emmy awards?”

  I did. When I finished, Milton said, “Holly, is it possible that Ruffles believes that standing up to Betty Jane is what caused her to kidnap the Committee, and because of this she’s hiding?”

  “That’s stupid,” I said. “I don’t care what she did. I’m not mad. I mean, Milton, come on, no shopping trip can fill the hole a three-hundred-pound friend leaves.” My attempt at being flip fell flat.

  “I only want her back,” I said. “I miss her. I’m not mad.”

  “Perhaps stating this is enough,” said Milton. “I have an idea. I’d like you to go along with me during our session on Tuesday.”

  Once bitten, twice shy obviously never made an impact on me. I agreed.Then I counted the hours until Tuesday.

  On Tuesday, I made my resolution statement and the Committee appeared. No Ruffles.The disappointment rendered me speechless, and when Milton said, “And?” all I could do was shake my head no. Then he said, “Holly, it’s time we started talking about the past.”

  What? Says who? I shot eyeball daggers at Milton. He peered at me over the top of his square lenses. I knew this gesture was meant to remind me that I’d agreed to “go along” with him. Typical that what I agreed to ended up being one of Milton’s off-the-menu specials.

  A couple of seconds passed; then Betty Jane said, “I agree. Let’s talk about the past.”

  “Oh, really?” I snarled.“Well, if that’s how you feel, why don’t we start with how you made your way into my life?”

  “Go right ahead,” she said. “I am sure you’ll get the story wrong.”

  I hated her for being agreeable, and I hated Milton for doing this instead of working on getting Ruffles back.

  “Holly?” said Milton.

  “Oh, all right,” I said. “I have to start with my high school graduation, and Little Bean has to leave the room.” Sarge nodded and directed him into the waiting room.

  The day after I graduated from high school I walked through the door at ten o’clock in the morning. I had never before stayed out all night. Doing so felt more like a rite of passage than receiving my diploma the day before had.

  Sarah and my mother were in the living room drinking coffee. My mother sat on the couch in her bathrobe with unbrushed hair and a face that looked lined and tired. Sarah was next to her holding a coffee cup in one hand and some papers in another.

  I opened my mouth to say good morning.

  “Dad’s gone,” said Sarah.

  “Gone where?” I said.

  During the past several years, my father had spent most of his time traveling.We saw him only on the weekends.After Sarah left for university, I felt as if I were living alone. My mother insisted we eat together when my father was home or if Sarah was visiting. Otherwise, she had dinner in bed with her television set. I am not sure what she did during the day, and she never asked me what I did. I stayed in my part of the house and she stayed in hers. We were strangers sharing space.

  “Your father left,” said my mother. Holding the dainty saucer in her left hand, she picked up the coffee cup, pinkie extended, with her right. “Moved out.” She sipped her coffee. “You drove him away.”

  “Mom!” snapped Sarah.

  “Oh, that’s right. She never does anything. Poor Holly. Poor Holly, the lazy, selfish liar, just like her father,” snarled my mother.

  “You made me what I am,” I said. “Go look in the mirror if you want to find the person who’s responsible for how I turned out.”

  “You are going to take me on now, Holly,” flared my mother. “Do you think your little blame game will work on me the way it did your father?” I didn’t need to answer her. My mother was a heartless woman, and because of this, I knew my so-called “little blame game” would not work with her, because it wasn’t a game. It was survival. My father had come this close to breaking me. If it hadn’t been for the Boy, he would have.

  “Mom.” Sarah covered my mother’s hand with her own, trying to quiet her. “Maybe you should go get some rest.”

  “I do not need rest,” said my mother. “Get dressed. We are going shopping.”

  “Shopping?” said Sarah. “Don’t you think—”

  “What? I have your father’s credit cards; we are going to use them.” My mother got up. “Be ready in two hours.That is final.” She carried her coffee cup into the kitchen.

  All told, we spent almost five thousand dollars that day, half of it at the cosmetic counter in Bloomingdale’s. My mother had them do a
full makeover on me while she and the saleswoman lectured me on the importance of beauty, skin care, lipstick, and so on. I escaped to the bathroom as soon as I could. When I faced the mirror, Ruffles told me I looked like a streetwalker. I unrolled the bathroom tissue and proceeded to wipe everything off.

  After my mother went to bed, Sarah and I sat in darkness in my room. “Do you remember Linda?” she said. Of course I remembered Linda. And her tiny bikini. How could I forget her? I slipped my scarred foot out from under the covers and held it up in the air. The curtains were open and the light from the street made my pale foot appear ghostly.“Dad was going to leave us for her.Then the accident—”

  Everything went black and I found myself riding in Sarge’s Chevy. The Boy sat between us. Ruffles occupied the whole backseat. The rear bumper scraped the pavement, sending up sparks. She usually didn’t ride in the car because even the counterbalance of the Hemi engine Sarge had installed was not enough to offset her bulk.

  A car careened toward us. Sarge swerved to avoid it.Then he jumped the Chevy off the road.We hit a wire fence. Sarge gunned the motor.The fence stretched until it snapped and we bounced along in a field. After a while Sarge eased up on the gas. Finally he stopped the car and rested his head on the steering wheel.The scene changed back to their living room in my head.The Silent One nodded at Sarge.

  “Why do you use that weird voice?” Sarah sounded far away.

  “Is it safe?” Sarge asked the Silent One. Safe from what? I wondered. My head nodded. I felt the pillow against my back again.

  “Holly, who was that speaking to me?” said Sarah.

  “Who spoke to you? What did they say?” I said.

  “Holly, what’s going on?” said Sarah.

  “I can’t tell you. I—” Sarge stood. The Silent One held out his arm as if to stop him. “I’m not supposed to tell you,” I said. We sat for a moment.The Silent One nodded.“Sarah, if I tell you a secret, do you promise not to tell anyone? Ever?”