Francis Levy - Seven Days in Rio

The sole thing I was capable of blurting out was, “That banana really looks hard!” to which Tiffany replied with a tantalizing, “Ooooh,” shaking her bum at me as she sashayed over to the table occupied by China. Schmucker had signaled to the waitress for the bill in the impatient manner typical of New Yorkers. For a moment I mused on the differences between Brazilian waitresses and their counterparts in the States. To begin with, relatively few waitresses who work the dining rooms of luxury hotels in the States are hookers, although they might as well be, considering how they debase themselves for a good tip. Secondly, few waitresses I had met would have chosen to use a name like Tiffany during working hours (even if it was their given name), and fewer still would have stuck bananas in their uniform pockets in Tiffany’s suggestive manner.

I felt a moment of yearning, but I also realized that I had to seize an important opportunity to get the help I needed. Once the talk on erotomania started, both China and Schmucker would become absorbed in the presentation, and even though I might get into an academic discussion with them, it would be hard to shift the conversation to my personal sufferings. It was now or never.

I drifted over to the table where Schmucker and China were seated and was lurking behind Schmucker, hoping he wouldn’t notice me approaching. It was only when China slunk back into her seat and asked Schmucker, “How much do I owe you?” that she noticed me and exclaimed, “Dr. Cantor!”

For a moment I wasn’t going to say anything. After all, my mother had always wanted me to be a doctor. But I realized that with time being so short, it made no sense for my therapeutic progress to perpetuate a lie.

“I’m not an analyst. I’m not even a doctor. But I need one.” I tend to be a macho male when it comes to making myself vulnerable or expressing emotion. But all of a sudden I was overcome both with tears and a countervailing feeling of total humiliation. Walking around in my underwear might have been mildly embarrassing, but now I felt totally ashamed. At the same time, I was cognizant of the fact that I had been through a lot and that this was my way of asking for help. I felt China’s heart going out to me, as her eyes welled up in response to my emotionality, and her empathic response made me think that she would be the perfect analyst for me — at least for the duration of my stay in Rio. For some reason, I had the idea that she would empower me. I also thought that if she empathized so deeply with my desires, she might end up going to bed with me.

“Dr. Dentata,” I managed to stammer through my tears.

“Just call me China,” she said, reiterating what she’d said to me the first time we’d met.

“Oh, my experience is that most analysts like to be called Dr. and refer to their patients as Mr. or Ms.”

“Yes, but there has been a whole breakdown in the notion of analytic neutrality,” China explained. “Basically, the world has been turned upside down. Patients are becoming friends with their analysts, and in some cases even sleeping with them. The idea of the analyst as a distant figure who should be a tabula rasa, a vehicle for transference, has been disproven. It was becoming obvious that patients knew a lot about their analysts, and that to pretend otherwise was patently dishonest. Analysts who once watched their beautiful patients suggestively hike up their skirts in silence have become freer to express themselves. It’s like the Russian Revolution. Neutrality and professionalism are now looked on as Czarist, as forces of repression to be toppled. There was some precedent for this during the ’60s in the Sullivanian communes in New York, where doctors slept with their patients, exclusivity and possessiveness were frowned on and boundaries broken. But this is the first time we have seen this kind of change in analytic technique on such a mass scale.”

“So, can I make an appointment?” I ventured.

“Would you like to come back to my room?” Schmucker fixed his gaze on me when China posed this question, looking at me with a mixture of pity and beneficence, as if he were a priest bestowing forgiveness. At this point I can only say this: careful what you wish for. Here I was getting an invitation to analysis and what looked like a proposition for sex all in one shot. It was every patient’s dream come true, but I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised that such serendipity would occur in a city that stood on the edge of the heart of darkness, with its primitive tribal history and huge Amazonian wilderness.

“I just want to make sure I don’t miss the lecture on erotomania,” China added wistfully.

China looked at me quizzically when I responded: “It would be great if you could fit me in.” I wanted to get into the brisk rhythm that I’d imagined for my analysis. In truth I was a bit taken aback by China’s willingness to have me come right up to her room. I have always wanted to enter my analysts’ inner sancta, but now that I was given access, I was apprehensive. I didn’t want to know China’s inner workings. I wanted to keep her at a distance as the idealized parent who would one day rescue me from myself. I was concerned that her analytic couch was in fact her bed. If we proceeded to undertake a full analysis, and simultaneously began an affair in keeping with the latest trends in analysis, where would I find the time to meet whores? I still hadn’t been to The Gringo.

Schmucker was wearing his customary outfit — blue blazer, rep tie, and thick rubber-soled shoes. I wondered if there was a chain of stores that catered to analysts like Schmucker, supplying certified non-descript attire. I was aware that he seemed to be disturbed about something. He was fidgeting with the check and seemed to be reading over the figures with great concern.

“I think I had more than you,” Schmucker said. “I had three eggs over, bacon, juice, and toast, and you only had two scrambled eggs.”

“Why don’t we split it right down the middle,” came China’s endearing response.

Even though I make a good amount of money as a CPA, I have always been particularly careful in negotiating my fees with analysts. The fact that China exuded an air of magnanimity when it came to financial matters was encouraging to me. Although I could already have been negatively transferring, I also got the impression that Schmucker was smirking to himself about getting a few slices of bacon at her expense.

Once the bill was settled, I followed China across the lobby. Her clothes looked so good on her that I couldn’t stop thinking about taking them off. Clearly, I was already getting my wires crossed. Whenever I picked up a hooker back in the States, I would inevitably follow her to the sleazy hotel she used with her customers. Once again, I was following a sexy woman whom I was about to pay, even if nominally it wasn’t for sex. But I knew that even if China wasn’t a hooker, there was some relief in store. I would be able to say whatever came to my mind, even if it was something lurid about my analyst, like the fact that she dressed like a little whore and I wanted to reach under her flowery skirt and pull her little thong down to her ankles and then fuck her in the doggy position. I made a firm commitment to myself that I would tell her this and anything else that came into my head, no matter how embarrassed I felt or how difficult it was to utter the words. I’d never had a woman analyst before, so expressing my desires to her would be a first. Had I chosen Schmucker as my analyst, I would have found myself in the position of criticizing him for being a weak asexual male. I would have told him that I felt superior to him because I would be the winner in the imagined contest I was having with him for China’s affections. The triumph was so real to me that I was already feeling Oedipal guilt for vanquishing the father figure in the competitive struggle for mommy’s love.