Yelena Akhtiorskaya - Panic in a Suitcase

I’ll go back and get him, she heard herself say. Cataract stares bored into her back. The bathroom door was just barely ajar, with no light inside. Frida nudged it with her foot. Dr. Gamsky wasn’t inside, but she was, staring at her own glistening face in the mirror. She lifted her shirt — breasts. Farther in, two doors led to examining rooms and one, on the opposite wall, was to Dr. Gamsky’s private office. The examining room at the far end was used as storage, but the first examining room was fully functional, at least in appearance, imparting a very necessary sense of hope. That’s where Frida went, knocking but not waiting for a reply and finding it empty. A wad of used paper towels lay on the floor like squashed vermin. The bariatric footstool was standing on the counter, and a cabinet door hung open. The roll of paper over the exam table didn’t reach the table’s edge. It wasn’t torn or dirty but was no longer crisp. It was just terribly old.

That left one option. Frida knocked on Yuri’s private office. There was no reply. She pressed her ear to the crack — silence. Dr. Gamsky, she called. No answer. She tried the knob, and it gave. What was she afraid of? It was the expression on Dr. Gamsky’s face; unfortunately he was only too capable of mustering shame. But the room, which reeked of ammonia, was empty. She peeked into the storage room, dark and dense. This confirmed her suspicion: a hidden door. All this time she’d been wondering what Yuri was doing back there, and actually he hadn’t been back there at all.

More seniors had gathered. This qualified as civil commotion. These people had nothing to get back to. They could easily stay in the office all day. Perhaps the only thing more valuable than the ten-dollar bill was the opportunity to band together when it was denied them.

The doctor isn’t feeling well right now, said Frida. No one seemed to register this inane announcement.

Nu, said the woman. Where is he?

He said he’d be here in a minute, said Frida. But I’ll go see what’s taking so long. She grabbed her purse and went in search of the hidden door. It couldn’t be very hard to find, as it had to be large enough for Dr. Gamsky to fit through. Her cheeks were burning. She must’ve been crying. She entered the office and looked around. A shelf of medical textbooks, framed diplomas, a desk stacked high with papers, manila folders, binder clips, a coffee-stained mug — perhaps everything was fine after all. But if everything were fine, she wouldn’t be putting her hand on the wall and walking the length of the room, feeling for disturbances that might indicate a hidden passageway. In order to pass behind the desk, she pushed in the chair, but it wouldn’t go. She pushed harder. A groan issued from beneath. Frida’s heart thumped, and a bubble of icy fluid punctured in her chest, releasing the substance in all directions. She managed to squat down to inspect. At first she didn’t understand what she was seeing. Tufts of salt-and-pepper hair, knuckles, cuff links. Dr. Gamsky was folded tightly into the space under his desk. His knees were drawn into his chest, spine twisted and neck bent so that his head rested on his left shoulder, the one pressed up against the back of the desk. A half-empty bottle stood beside his usable hand.

I’m sorry to bother you, said Frida. It’s just that the situation out there isn’t good.

They’ve come for me, he said with resignation.

Patients came, said Frida, trying to espy in Yuri’s face the barest glimmer of relief.

Those geezers? What else is new? They come here like it’s the toilet.

They’re demanding the money.

What else do they have to live for?

And they’re very upset I’m not giving it to them.

Yuri’s chin stirred. Well, why aren’t you?

Because you said… Oh, never mind! As she stood up, her calves tingled from scrutiny. She pretended to inspect the notebook on his desk in order to prolong the moment, letting her legs be slathered in admiration. As she took a step away, something tenderly grazed the back of her ankle, and she got the distinct sense that this something was Dr. Gamsky’s lips, that mix of smoothness and bristle.

Wait, Frida, he said when she turned the knob.

She hurried back, squatted down again, steadying herself with a hand on the seat of his chair. She checked in with herself and knew she was prepared for whatever happened. He had that look on his face now, the one she was afraid of. Was it shame at his intentions, natural embarrassment at the situation they had found themselves in, or just an attempt at concentration? That look would’ve been fine on anybody else, but Dr. Gamsky was too manly for facial expressions. Yet he insisted on having them. She wanted to assure him that there was no need for shame or embarrassment. Suddenly dizzy, she toppled softly onto the carpeted floor. Her legs folded under her, calves pressed into the small rubber wheels of the swivel chair. Her fingers were tugging at the carpet’s individual fibers, or the fibers were tugging on her fingers. Her hair seemed to be everywhere, tousled, like in the bedroom of a French film. Dr. Gamsky was looking at her unwaveringly. Overwhelmed by the certainty that they were about to kiss, that it was only right, Frida leaned in. Dr. Gamsky’s hand, which was the size of a German shepherd’s head, shot outward. Frida didn’t flinch. The hand scratched Dr. Gamsky’s nose.

You know, Frida, he said, you should call Diane. The two of you were such good friends, always running around together, sly looks on your little faces. Always up to something, weren’t you? And then you lost touch — why?

Was it possible he didn’t remember?

That was a long time ago, she said, keeping her face immensely close, figuring that abrupt recoil would be suspicious. We were kids.

You were a good influence on her. All that trouble she got into, who knows, maybe if you’d stayed friends, it would’ve been different. And now she’s living in the pit of Harlem, just as long as it’s Manhattan. Let me give you her number. She’d be so happy to hear from you. There are pens up there, on my desk.

The desktop was at eye level — Frida strained to reach up. She tore a thin strip from a yellow notepad, plucked a fat blue marker from the pen holder. Ready, she said, tensing as she took dictation, because just identifying Dr. Gamsky’s baritone approximations and translating them into digit form with a marker her fingers barely wrapped around was an incredible feat. Once it was accomplished, read back, confirmed: relief. Underneath the digits, she wrote Dinka .

While Frida was handing out bills, a mental reel began to play — jumping on a bed trying to touch a motel’s popcorn ceiling, rollerblade racing to the sole intact swing that hung like a last tooth in a ravaged mouth (Frida always won, the reward for which was pushing Dinka as she swung), biting into a blistery hot dog with ketchup-smeared fingers as they sat in damp bathing suits whose rampant itchiness was relieved by the rough texture of the sloping concrete steps overlooking the ocean, gulping down bottle after bottle of peach Snapple and weighing themselves obsessively, the scale reading seventy-eight pounds, eighty-one pounds. Oh, the splendor of those long-gone days. What fun they had! The supply of fond memories was endless, and the painful ones, while also in abundance, had been rendered void by time — Frida couldn’t possibly still be angry at the summer-camp snubbing of a ten-year-old, even if it had incorporated some advanced tactics of persecution. When she finally left Dr. Gamsky’s office, which was situated behind a large plastic-surgery facility with window-walls featuring ads of stone-faced women whose foreheads were being injected by arm-size syringes, she was clutching the yellow scrap with Diane’s number, wondering how so many years had elapsed without an attempt on either of their parts to revive the friendship.