Alison Lurie - The Nowhere City

“All around your eyes,” Iz repeated, smoothing his sherbet gently with the back of his spoon. “That’s really too bad. It sounds to me as if you wanted to cry.”

“I don’t,” Katherine contradicted. “I never cry. Why, I haven’t now since I can’t remember how long, years and years. No matter how terrible the pain is, I just,” she shrugged, “can’t cry.”

“You can’t cry.” Iz repeated her words softly. “That’s very interesting. Why not?”

“I don’t know,” Katherine said; she was aware of being handled, but it was so agreeable to find someone who was interested in her complaint, and Dr. Einsam himself had just spoken about much more personal matters. “Maybe it all goes into my sinus.”

“You mean that when something occurs that would naturally produce tears, the reaction is turned inwards, and creates instead a sinus condition. You are crying all the time, only inside.”

This was not quite what Katherine had meant, or rather, she had meant it only facetiously. What Iz said struck her like a sudden, glancing blow, or the flash of a light on a cloudy day. Maybe she had meant that. Certainly, today—She caught her breath, and parried the attack (if it was an attack: Iz was sitting eating ice-cream so casually, not even looking up) with another joke. “Well, maybe,” she said. “Anyhow, if that’s so, I ought to be grateful. At least it keeps me from making a public fool of myself.” She laughed slightly, or rather simultaneously hummed and blew air through her stopped-up nose so as to create the impression.

“That’s an unusual attitude,” Iz said, slowly stirring the remains of his orange sherbet round with his spoon. “It’s also non-utilitarian.”

“Non-utilitarian?”

“Yah. Because weeping doesn’t cause you as much pain, or last as long as a sinus attack, does it? It is after all the natural reaction, under many circumstances.” Now Iz raised his head and looked at her. He had bright gray eyes behind his glasses. “Why shouldn’t you cry sometimes?” he asked. “Maybe you have a good reason.”

At these words, all Katherine’s despair and mortification, pent-up for nearly twenty-four hours now, seemed to flow throbbing into her eyes and nose. Suddenly she felt as if she were going to burst out sobbing right there.

“You’ve got to let it out,” Iz went on. “It’s important. I know this from my own experience. The danger is, if you inhibit yourself completely from expressing one kind of emotion, eventually you get so you can’t express any kind of emotion. You feel depressed, so go ahead, cry.”

“I—” Katherine began, and swallowed. “Of course, I—” This time the word rose from her throat in the form of a wail. “As a matter of fact, I am rather depressed today,” she managed to say, but then she was caught up in a series of dry, creaking shudders.

“Come on,” Iz said. “You can let go now.”

Katherine recognized the professional phrases, the standard sympathetic tone, but could not stop herself from being affected by them. Covering her face awkwardly with spread hands, she began to sob: a loud, uneven, tearing noise.

Iz watched her; his face showed sympathy. He reached out to touch or hold her arm, which, in a pale violet sweater, was not far from him. But a half-inch away he hesitated, as if remembering some precept, and finally withdrew his hand.

“What is it?” he asked quietly, after allowing a minute’s interval. “Tell me.”

“It’s. Uhh. It’s Paul, I suppose,” Katherine sobbed. The realization came over her that she was about to tell Dr. Einsam everything. She wanted to get up and run away; but she was so sick, so cold, so confused, she simply didn’t have the energy. “It’s just that he’s deceiving me. And I found out last night. I’ll get over it.”

“Ahh. How did you find out?”

“Well, when I came home from work.” Katherine swallowed. “When I walked into the house I knew, really. I mean I knew he must have been there with somebody, because everything was all wrong. The towels for instance: they were hung up the wrong way in the bathroom.” Her voice trembled. “I always fold them into thirds, and Paul just kind of throws them over the pole; but last night they were folded in half, and the wash-cloth was next to them, instead of over the tub. And the bed was made up all wrong, with the quilt—” She groaned, despairing of explaining what was wrong with the quilt; she thought how hysterical and silly she must sound to Iz. But he did not smile; he continued to look at her with serious concern. “And on the carpet in the living-room,” she went on. “You know that fluffy pale nylon carpeting we have? Well, there was this big kind of bruise where it was all flattened down. As if animals had been rolling on it. And hair.” Katherine choked down a final sob. Iz had not changed his expression, did not look shocked. Perhaps he didn’t believe her. She looked at this floor, gray stained cement marked into tiles. “It really was.”

“Ya,” Iz murmured. He pulled at his beard, thinking. “And what did your husband say about this?”

“He didn’t say anything; he had a late meeting, so—Maybe it wasn’t a meeting. I don’t know. Anyhow, I was asleep when he got in, and he was asleep when I left this morning. So nobody said anything.”

“Ah.” Iz took off his glasses, and began to polish them with the paper napkin, which had a scalloped border. Was he going to have no reaction?

“In my own house,” she said in a tight voice. “I suppose that’s the worst thing. Right in my own house.”

“That makes you feel worse about it,” Iz said in a very sympathetic, yet somehow neutral tone. “You mean, you wouldn’t mind so much,” he added slowly; “if it weren’t for that?”

“Well, I ... It wouldn’t be so awful. So disgusting.”

Again Iz paused. “Maybe you already knew about it?”

“Oh no. I didn’t know anything—I—He’s always—” Katherine looked down. “There’ve been things before,” she admitted. “I mean, back East, not out here. Well, I have wondered here, once or twice, but I didn’t say anything. I think it’s better not to say anything, if you really don’t know, then you don’t have to know. I mean—” Her voice, either out of pain, or as if realizing what it was saying, trailed off, and Katherine sat staring into the middle distance, at a mess of tropical vines swarming out of a plaster pot. “How can I be talking to you like this?” she said, letting her forearms fall on to the table. “It’s just terrible.”

“It’s not so terrible.” Iz slid his hand out again towards hers, and again drew back; he blinked as if in irritation with himself. “You need to talk to somebody: why not me?”

“Well, it’s very kind of you,” Katherine said, sitting back. “You must spend so much time listening to people tell you their troubles. Professionally, I mean. And of course, they pay you for it.”

“Ah, cut it out,” Iz said. “Tell you what,” he added clumsily, as the look on her face did not alter. “I’ll pay you when I talk, and you can pay me back when you talk, so today we’re even. Okay, Katherine?”

Katherine smiled an uneven smile. She realized that Iz was also embarrassed; that he was really asking for her confidence. “Okay, Iz,” she said. “But it’s really not fair; you must have so many people you can talk to already here.”

“What makes you think that? Sure, for my work I have many good friends, colleagues. But they don’t want to hear my personal problems. They would be embarrassed.” He frowned, as if aware of how unlikely this sounded. “Anyhow, a lot of them think it was unbalanced of me to marry Glory; I told you so, they would say. Because they don’t know her, they are prejudiced. Sure, she has an unpromising background, and she has learned from it some very bad values; but basically she is a very warm, spontaneous person. She has more ego strength than most psychologists I know.”