Песах Амнуэль - Zion's Fiction - A Treasury of Israeli Speculative Literature

And it disappears.

I look up at Professor Parks. “Yes!” I whisper at her. “That was it! That was the same emotion! Right there at the end….”

Professor Parks purses her lips, and—

Stephanie is home, again. I have time to feel the inner gyro. She’s almost seven. Mom and Dad are —

“I don’t want a clown!”

“But clowns are fun and funny and you wanted a birthday just like everyone else,” Dad reasons calmly. Mom and Dad are standing over her, telling her what they have planned for her seventh birthday .

“I don’t want a clown!” Can’t they understand how sad clowns make me feel? “I don’t want a clown!” They make me cry! Can’t you see? Don’t you believe me? And in frustration, she begins to stomp the ground with her feet and shout, out of control and in tears: “I don’t want a clown! I don’t want a clown! I don’t want a clown!”

And it’s gone. That was the emotion. It was the precisely the same emotion that came at the end of the last incident. Without Parks I would never have thought to look in places like this, but that’s not why she showed this to me.

I look into her eyes. I think she’s taking me back in time! I think she’s taking me down to Stephanie’s core!

And suddenly Stephanie is four years old and she’s at eye-level with Mom’s bed. Mom is lying on the bed. There is sun outside. It’s almost noon. Mom is lying there, on her stomach .

“Mom, let’s go outside! Let’s do a picnic! Let’s sit in the sun!” And that emotion is here again! She feels pleasure and fun and joy. No, that’s not true. She’s faking it. She wants her mother to feel that .

Mom lifts herself slightly and gives Stephanie a questioning look, her face mooshy from sleep .

“Come on!” Stephanie tries to excite Mom. “It’s such a great day!”

Events zip in fast-forward, at Parks’s behest—

I see Mom getting up, and setting up a picnic outside .

Parks slows down events—

Mom is hugging me. “You are so pretty and lovely. You’re the best and wonderfulest little girl in the world. What would I do without you to keep me sane?”

And suddenly events zip back, in quick rewind—

Before the picnic, before Mom got off the bed, before Stephanie woke her up, before Stephanie walked into the room —

Stephanie stands in front of Mom’s closed bedroom door, about to come in and wake her. Something is wrong. Something is wrong with Mom again. No: Mom is in pain .

She looks at the door, and chooses to go in .

Stephanie decides to go in. She shoves everything she feels aside, and puts on her cute face. She opens the door ….

And it’s gone.

“There were hundreds of these incidents all through her childhood,” Parks says. “Stephanie’s mother was deeply depressed. When she congratulated Stephanie the way she did she made Stephanie responsible for her happiness. Stephanie felt she bore responsibility for her mother’s good mood. And, eventually, for everyone’s good mood.”

I look at her. “But… that wasn’t it.”

She smiles. “I know.” She leans closer and her smile grows wider. “That’s the point. Watch.”

“I don’t want a clown!” They can’t understand how sad clowns make me feel. (The pain hits her. I can distinguish it better the second time around.) “I don’t want a clown!” They make me cry! (Pain!) Can’t you see? (Pain!) Don’t you believe me?

“I (Pain!) don’t want a clown! I don’t want (Pain!) a clown! I don’t want (Pain!) a clown!”

And it’s gone.

“Was that the same thing you felt before?” Parks asks me.

I crinkle my eyes. “Yes.”

“Did you see it more clearly now?”

“Yes.” What does she want from me?

“Did you see the pain?”

“Yes.”

“Did you recognize it?”

“No.”

“All right.”

She blinks and—

“Oh, gawd!” (Stephanie shouts at her mother. We’re back to the day she died, again.) “This isn’t about you! (Pain!) Not everything is about you! (Pain!) This is my (Pain!) pain! Stop making everything (Pain!) about yourself! (Pain!)” And she shouts so loudly that she becomes hoarse, having uttered just those words. And without words, she keeps shouting in her head: This is mine. (Pain!) Mine! (Pain!) Don’t you get (Pain!) that?

And the scene changes —

She looks at her body (Pain!) before she dresses for the date with Michael (Pain!), checking for spots (Pain!), blemishes (Pain!), new fat (Pain!), old fat (Pain!), each carries its own series of these pains. Will he notice? (Pain!) Will he still like me? (Pain!)

“Wait,” I move my hand away.

She looks at me patiently.

I recognize the pain. When four-year-old Stephanie opened the door, when she shoved her emotions aside, there was a feeling of loss at losing yourself, at pushing yourself aside. That was the pain that was flooding her all the time now, in her grownup life.

I look at Parks. I want to ask her to play it again for me. But I don’t need her for this.

“Oh, gawd!” (Stephanie shouts at her mother. We’re back to the day she died, again.) “This isn’t about you! (Pain!) Not everything is about you! (Pain!) This is my (Pain!) pain! Stop making everything (Pain!) about yourself! (Pain!)” And she shouts so loudly that she becomes hoarse, having uttered just those words. And without words, she keeps shouting in her head: This is mine. (Pain!) Mine! (Pain!) Don’t you get (Pain!) that?

Stephanie’s pain, her great pain, that great, bottomless depth it had—it dissolves before me now, made of smaller, completely trivial pains.

I look at Parks, my hand wavering out of her reach. “Wait,” I say. “Wait.”

Let’s try something else.

“Stephanie,” her mother says. “How can you react like this when all we’re doing is going to see Grandma?” (Pain!)

“It’s not Grandma, it’s the fact that it’s Sunday.”

“But (Pain!) it’s just a few hours.” (Pain!)

Something sinks inside Stephanie. It’s that sense of feeling the door, replayed. She has to shove herself aside, she has to put herself on hold. She is so helpless. “This is how I feel, Mom.” And she is in greater pain because she knows her mother will never understand . Because inside she knows her mother will need her to put herself aside again .

It can’t be! Her pain was so important to her! It defined her! It defined her personality! It was there every second of her life!

No. I run everything I’ve seen of her in my head, and everything is different now.

Stephanie was wrong.

Everything she understood was wrong. Everything she felt was wrong. Everything she had felt was so trivial, so ridiculous. It all boiled down to nothing.

But….

“Professor Parks…” And she looks at me with patience. “Professor Parks, Stephanie’s pain, the reason I liked it so much… I also have it. I also have that same pain. All the time! Are you saying that everything I have, everything I feel is wrong? ”

Professor Parks looks at me for a second, and then she smiles graciously. “Welcome,” she says, “to the Indianapolis Academy.”

God.

“It’s not true!” I scream. I am so weak. “I am not dust! I am not nothing !”

Professor Parks doesn’t move.

That’s it. She’s done with me. She just sits there and looks at my face. Why would she even talk to me? Why would anyone love me?

But someone does love me. Or at least he did love me. I have to call him. I have to see him. I have to feel his touch again.