Wally Lamb - We Are Water

Later, when the meal I’d made was starting to go cold, she came back. We sat in silence across the table from each other. Chewed, swallowed. Each bite I took landed like a stone against my stomach. “Look, if you’re confused, then go see someone,” I finally said. “Or maybe we can go together like we did that other time. I can make some calls, get a referral to a good marriage counselor and we can—”

“I am seeing someone,” she said. “Romantically, I mean, not professionally.” I stared at her, a forkful of food poised in front of my mouth. “I still love you, Orion,” she told me in tears. “I always will. But I’m not in love with you anymore. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for this to happen, but I’ve fallen in love with someone else.”

That someone else, she said, was Viveca.

“Viveca? … Viveca? ”

Annie had gone with me to see that movie, I remember— Natural Born Killers . It was my idea, not hers. And about ten minutes into it, when Juliette Lewis and Woody Harrelson began murdering people in a bar for the fun of it, she took hold of my arm and whispered that she needed to leave. “It’s satire ,” I’d whispered back. “ Cartoon violence. Don’t take it so literally .” But she let go of my arm, stood, and walked out of the multiplex. Walked around the mall until the film was over. I finally found her sitting at a table outside of Au Bon Pain, cardboard coffee cup in front of her, looking sad and lost. Was she thinking of leaving me even back then? Wrestling with her attraction to women, maybe, or suffering because of my insensitivity? There was that lesbian friend of hers who visited us one time—that woman Priscilla. She and Annie had waitressed together back when Annie was in her teens. They’d been close, she said, and for a fleeting moment I wondered how close. But I’d dismissed it. Because even if they had been intimate, it was no big deal. Some kids experiment at that age. It’s how they figure out who they are … No, I should have been more in touch with her feelings and her fears. Should have gotten up and left the movie with her that afternoon—been less of a therapist trying to fathom my patient Petra’s psyche and more of a husband taking care of my wife. But no, I’d stayed, had sat through a film that, frankly, sickened me, too. Well, what does it matter at this point? The divorce is final. Their wedding invitations are already out. Mine, ripped in half, is in the second, smaller duffel bag I packed last night—the one filled with the stuff I’ve taken along for the little oceanside ceremony I’m planning to have once I get to North Truro. Or maybe I should say if I get there. I don’t think we’ve moved a mile in the last fifteen minutes. Well, so what, dude? It’s not like you’re going to be late for work. You’re unemployed, remember?

My “early retirement” from the university was an exhausted surrender, not an admission that Jasmine Negron’s version of what had happened that night was accurate. Instead of giving the benefit of the doubt to a colleague they’d known and worked with for years, Muriel and her cohorts had gotten behind a doctoral student who’d received a lukewarm evaluation from me the semester before. Once upon a time, Muriel and I had been friends. Lunch pals. We’d served together on committees, carpooled to conferences. We two and our spouses had seen each other socially during those early years. But after she was named director, things changed. She informed her counselors of her intent to create a “paper trail” about everything that transpired in our department, then generated a maddening number of forms and reports. And she expected all this additional paperwork to be completed on time, not a day or two late, no matter how much our caseloads had swelled because of the policy changes she had put into place. She was a stickler about those deadlines—a pain in the ass about them—and a strictly-by-the-book administrator who expected the rest of us to recast ourselves in her image, irrespective of our own treatment styles and philosophies. She intimidated the younger members of the department, many of whom sought me out about how to deal with her demands and criticisms. And because I’d gone to bat for some of them, Muriel pulled me into her office one afternoon and accused me of undermining her authority and encouraging others to do the same. She and I had butted heads on a number of occasions and on a number of issues. And so, when Jasmine filed her complaint, Muriel appointed an ad hoc committee to investigate: Blanche, Bev, and Marsha, feminists all, none of whom could be considered my ally. Beyond a shadow of a doubt? Innocent until proven guilty? Not with that gang of four. Muriel went to Dean Javitz and argued that my behavior had undermined the integrity of the entire Counseling Services program.

Word got around. People took sides, and the numbers were lopsided against me. My one supporter was Dick Holloway, a holdover from the department’s “good ole boy” days when men had run the show. Muriel tolerated Dick because she knew she’d outlast him, but he’d told me on more than one occasion that he was “sticking around” for the pleasure of being a thorn in her side. I’d never liked Dick, and when he stuck his head inside my office one morning to offer his support—“I hear the dykes are trying to cut you off at the knees, but hang tough” was the way he’d put it—it was small comfort. As for the other members of our department, some of whom I’d counted among my friends, they began nodding uncomfortably and looking away when we passed each other in the hall. A lot of the women in our department started giving me dirty looks. One lunchtime, I walked into the staff lounge and four women stopped their conversation, stood, and walked out in solidarity against me. It had hurt like a kick to the nuts.

Even my two best friends in the department, Marina and Dennis, began to distance themselves. Look, counseling students all day? You really care about these kids. You root for their mental health and try to promote it, but it’s hard, imperfect work. You worry about the ones who are in the worst shape, and at the end of the day, you can’t always shut it off like a faucet. So there’s this informal support system. When it’s after hours and you can’t stop hearing a patient’s voice or seeing the kid’s tortured face? You can begin to doubt yourself. So you call a colleague you can trust with whatever vulnerability you’re wrestling with. You have them listen to what’s bothering you and maybe offer a suggestion or two, a little perspective. Seek out a little counseling from another counselor. Dennis, Marina, and I had done that for one another. Had helped each other out like that for years. For years .

“Look, Orion, I sympathize with you. I really do,” Marina said when I stopped her and Dennis out in the parking lot one afternoon to ask for their support. “But I’m between a rock and a hard place with this one, okay? Because I’m your friend, yes, but I’m a woman, too. And I’ve been on the receiving end of unwanted—”

I put my hand up to stop her and turned to Dennis. “What about you? Because I’m telling you, this thing is a witch hunt. Was I dumb enough to give the girl a ride home when she came into my office that night like a damsel in distress? I was! Was I stupid enough to say yes when she invited me in for a drink? God, yes! But goddamnit, Dennis, she’s rewritten history. Because it just did not happen the way she’s claiming it did.”

He stood there, nodding sadly.

“So you believe me?”

“I do.”

“Then are you willing to—”

“Personally, I’m with you. But professionally? I’ve got to remain neutral on this one, Orion. I’ve got to be Switzerland.”