Joanna Rakoff - A Fortunate Age

“I thought,” she said, happy to seize on this small point, “that scientists don’t believe in fate.”

“Doctors have to believe in fate, otherwise they go crazy.” He sighed and stood up, brushing invisible crumbs off his jeans. “So, whaddaya say? You want to get married? My dad’s a rabbi. He can marry us if you want. Or we can just go to city hall.”

Again, Emily shook her head. “I don’t”—she was unsure how to respond to all this, where to begin her objections; he had to be kidding and if he wasn’t, well, that was just as strange—“know anything about you. Though you seem to know something about me.”

He grinned. “Dr. Lang talks a lot. What do you want to know about me?”

“Have you ever been married?” Emily asked.

“No.” He laughed. “I’ve pretty much been working night and day since I started med school. And I did everything the hard way: two residencies instead of one. I thought I wanted the excitement of the ER, saving lives and all that. Turned out I was wrong.”

“I’m not sure I can marry a workaholic,” said Emily, half laughing at the absurdity of this conversation. She knew, of course, that he wasn’t really asking her to marry him, and yet, somehow, she was arguing over the fine points of their arrangement. “Well, you won’t be. It’s all over. As of January, I’m no longer Dr. Lang’s chief resident. You’re looking at plain old Dr. Gitter, assistant professor of psychiatry, Cornell School of Medicine. From now on, it’s banker’s hours for me.” Flummoxed, Emily gnawed a hangnail. “Except,” he added, “when I have late patients.”

“Right,” she said, laughing. “I’ll miss you. But I can have dinner with friends.”

“Exactly.” He smiled at her. “I’ll miss you, too. But we can have a glass of wine when I get home, talk about our day.”

“This is all very, I don’t know, nineteenth century.”

“Yes,” he nodded. “There were some good marriages in the nineteenth century. I’m way into the Victorians. Dickens, Austen, Trollope. George Eliot. Mrs. Gaskell.”

“Yeh, me too,” said Emily, though she hadn’t read Trollope or Mrs. Gaskell. She was relieved, for clearly he was dropping the joke, and now she could turn over, go to sleep, and, maybe, never see him again—or maybe not. But then, slowly, he placed her hand on top of his.

“You know, I’m serious,” he said, still smiling. “And I know you like me.”

“I—” Emily began, feeling the blood rush again to her face—unattractive red spots would be appearing on her cheeks and forehead within moments—because, oh my God , it was true, so clearly, stupidly, obscenely true that she wasn’t sure how she’d kept herself from admitting it. And hadn’t she known, all along, that he’d had his eye on her? That he would be the resident Dr. Lang would send to her apartment? And the worst was: Hadn’t she, maybe, maybe, pushed things—allowed herself to start crying—because she knew he’d take her into his arms; wasn’t this what shamed her?

“Why did you think I kept calling you?”

“I—” But she could offer no answer.

“Admit it. I’m not so bad.” But Emily, somehow, had lost the ability to speak. She thought she might cry again if she so much as moved her head. “Look, I don’t want you to think I’m some kind of weirdo—”

“I don’t—” Emily managed, before her throat closed with tears. She swallowed, hard, and smiled. “I don’t. But you’re not really serious.” Her voice sounded hollowed out, a husk of a voice.

“You know I’m serious,” he told her, sliding her hand on top of one of his. And she did, she supposed, but it was just too strange to contemplate. It was just unfathomable . Not, she suddenly realized, that he really, actually wanted her to marry him, but that her life could change in an instant, that the grim routines of the past few years—her whole adult life—could be erased in a moment, simply by saying yes. And her heart began to beat faster because she knew, she knew that she was going to do this, that anything was possible. And then, with a start, she realized that no, nothing was possible.

“What about Clara?” she asked. “I can’t just leave her on her own.”

His face crumpled. “Emily,” he said, “you know she has to be hospitalized. She’s got to finish the ECT. She needs daily therapy.”

“No,” said Emily. “Not now. She’s doing so well. And she won’t go. She won’t even talk about it.”

Dr. Gitter shrugged and smiled. “Well, then she can come live with us. I can monitor her—”

“Oh my God,” Emily broke in, laughing. “You can’t be serious. You want my crazy sister to come live with us? That’s like the plot of a sitcom.”

“You’re not going to scare me off,” he said. “I’m not afraid. We can find a big enough place—”

Emily thought of something. “Wait,” she said. “Where? Where do you live? Do you live around here ?”

He nodded. “All the residents do. To maximize sleep. You roll out of bed ten minutes before your shift starts.”

Grinning, she shook her head gravely. “Well, there’s our problem. I don’t think I can marry someone who lives uptown.”

“Good,” he said. “I hate it here. My lease is up in January. We’ll move wherever you want.”

“Brooklyn?”

“Sure,” he said. “Brooklyn is great.”

For two weeks, Emily held court on the living room couch. Her friends brought her flowers and cookies and ice cream and containers of noodles from Planet Thailand. One by one, she told them what had transpired. None were surprised to hear she was engaged. She’d always been one to keep things close to the bone. And, after all, none of them had seen her all fall, since Clara’s arrival. They’d assumed she was dating someone new. But they were appalled that she’d been in such dire straits and not let on, even a smidge. “Oh, Emily,” said Sadie, jostling Jack on her lap. Ed was away again, in L.A. doing some retracking. They’d just found out that his film was going to Sundance and Sadie seemed almost manic with excitement. She’d extended her maternity leave for another month, unpaid, but after the New Year she’d have to go back. “Let’s not talk about it,” she told Emily. “I’m pretending it’s not happening.” She kissed Jack on top of his head. “Why didn’t you ask me for help?” she asked. “I wish I could have done something.”

“Weren’t you exhausted?” asked Beth, who came bearing the not surprising news that she was pregnant, and began crying before Emily even got to the part about dropping the keg. “It’s not fair,” she said, tears rolling out of her large brown eyes. “You shouldn’t always have to carry other people’s burdens.”

Dave brought a television and a DVD player—“I just got new ones,” he insisted, “they’re really cheap now”—and sat watching John Hughes movies with her all afternoon, gnawing on Twizzlers and shouting “Kiss her! Kiss her already!” at Eric Stoltz and Andrew McCarthy.

Lil wanted only to talk about Josh and the wedding. Where would it be? And when? Where would they live? Was she really going to quit her job? What would she do? “And what’s going to happen to Clara?” she asked in a low voice. Emily shook her head. “I don’t know. I guess she could come live with us.” Lil looked horrified. “Live with you . You’re kidding.”

They planned the wedding for the spring, the ceremony at his father’s synagogue, the reception in the backyard of his parents’ house. On the twenty-ninth, they put a down payment on a plain, brick house on Dean Street, cheaply divided into two apartments—Clara could live in the smaller place upstairs, they in the duplex below—a few blocks from Dave in one direction, and Beth and Will and Sam, in the other. “I wish Sadie hadn’t moved,” Emily lamented. “She’s just a few stops away,” said Josh. “And maybe she’ll move back.” Emily worried that Clara would be resistant to leaving Williamsburg, but instead she was excited about the prospect of another renovation. On the thirtieth, Emily’s cast came off and was replaced by a pneumatic shoe. “Let’s celebrate,” Josh said as the hospital’s glass doors parted, silently, and they stepped onto Sixty-eighth Street, Emily leaning on her new cane, which made her feel, really, rather jaunty.