Perfunctory Affection Read online

  “So, that would be a no on changing sleep patterns,” Dr. Jillium said as she wrote that down. “How about eating? Does everything taste as it’s supposed to?” Meg stared blankly, and Dr. Jillium added, “Is there anything you liked and now can’t stand? Any new cravings you can’t satisfy?”

  “Oh. No,” Meg quickly assured her. Her mac and cheese was as mac and cheesy as always, and Ben and Jerry’s was as consoling as ever after midnight. If not for having to walk everywhere, she’d be ten pounds heavier.

  “Skin irritations?” Dr. Jillium questioned. “Any new rashes from detergent or fabrics?”

  “Ah, no.” Meg shook her head, surprised. These were detrimental side effects? They sounded like mere inconveniences compared to the ongoing hell her day-to-day was.

  Dr. Jillium looked up from her tablet, stylus at rest. “I want you to think about your encounters this past week. Is your anxiety better, worse, or about the same? In particular, are you having trouble with situations that you know are nonthreatening but feel as such?”

  Meg turned her lower lip in as she thought about the homeless man and his tiny dog on the corner. Flushing, she decided that was normal. For her. “Dr. J, I have fifteen new students that make my stomach cramp every time I walk into my classroom. But I’m not puking after class like I did last semester, so you can make what you want of that.”

  A smile crinkled the corners of Dr. Jillium’s eyes. “I’d say that’s a big no as well. I understand your frustration, but Meg, you really are improving.”

  Meg sighed, and Dr. Jillium’s smile widened. Progress? Maybe, but it was too slow for Meg. Maybe too slow to save her relationship with Austin, and definitely too slow for her liking. “I’m tired of being afraid,” Meg said, her eyes down as she laid her soul bare. “I want to be outgoing and happy again. I want to know I’ll be able to go to dinner or a concert without leaving halfway through because of the walls closing in or a nameless fear I can’t see.”

  Meg looked up at Dr. Jillium’s silence, surprised at the sympathy there. “I’m tired of having to look at Austin and see his disappointment as he tells me it’s okay,” she added softly. “He’s tired of never seeing the end of a movie or ball game, and I’m tired of the guilt when he leaves with me. You see progress, but I’m still living in the same hell I have been the last three years, and I’m tired of fighting for every last scrap of normal life,” Meg said, not caring that her tone was bordering on self pity. “I feel that if I stop, I’ll slide right back where I was, and I can’t keep fighting. Please. I want to try this.”

  Dr. Jillium was silent for a moment, and then, motions holding a balanced grace, she set the tablet on the table. There were little checked boxes, and Meg’s pulse quickened when Dr. Jillium hit an icon on the screen, and across the room, the printer hummed to life.

  “You seem to be handling the initializing dose just fine,” Dr. Jillium said as she stood. “I see no reason not to put you on a therapeutic level. Did you get the medical waiver signed and notarized?”

  Meg exhaled, her breath shaking in her. “Yes,” she said as she reached for her purse and found it. After two days spent scraping her courage together to go into the bank, Austin had told her there was a notary at the realtor office downtown. There’d only been one person to deal with instead of a bank full, and Austin had offered to pay the fee just so she’d do it. He really does love me, she thought as she looked at her silver pinky ring, ashamed that her irritability had driven him away.

  She eagerly held it up and out to Dr. Jillium, and the elegant woman took it, a smile quirking her lips as she eyed the notary’s signature. “You went to a realtor’s office?” she said in disbelief. “I was trying to get you into a bank.”

  Meg smirked knowingly. She hadn’t been in a bank in five years. Between her fears and the internet, she’d turned avoiding people into an art form. “That’s what Austin said, too.” It had cost Austin fifty bucks whereas the bank notary would have done it for free, but he’d said it was worth every penny to get her to stop worrying about it. Slowly Meg’s smile faded. That had been the day before he’d left. I don’t even remember what we argued about.

  Dr. Jillium’s heels were silent on the carpet as she went behind her desk. Leaving the medical release there, she took the paper from the printer. “Then all you need to do is verify your statements concerning your side effects, or lack thereof, rather, and I can start you on a therapeutic dose.”

  “Thank you,” Meg breathed in relief, and Dr. Jillium’s focus sharpened, her grip not letting go of the paper when Meg tried to take it.

  “There will be extra homework,” she said as she released it, and Meg took the offered pen as well, her focus divided as she skimmed the document for accuracy before signing it.

  “Bring it,” Meg said as she handed the pen and paper back, willing to do anything to find some peace—some stillness.

  Dr. Jillium took the paper with a slight smile. Narrow hips swaying, she returned to her desk and filed both papers before taking a key from her desk drawer and opening the smoke-glassed cabinet. Meg leaned to see a short row of amber pill vials, and then Dr. Jillium shifted to block her view.

  “I need your assurance that you’ll call me day or night if something doesn’t feel right. I also want to know if any of the side effects we talked about begin to manifest. Hallucinations, both auditory and visual, extreme fear of strangers and avoidance of once relaxing activities are just a few of the problems that can occur in extreme cases, but they are always heralded by the minor ones. Seeing them won’t necessarily mean taking you off Fitrecepon, but I want to know about it so we can adjust your levels. And then we have the diary.”

  “A diary?” Meg protested, having already gone around this with Dr. Jillium last year, and the year before that, and the year before that.

  Dr. Jillium was smiling as she came back, a vial of pills and a student’s theme book in her hands. “Fitrecepon is still highly experimental. I know your feelings about keeping a diary, but it’s essential that I have an accurate account of your intake and emotions. You will keep a record of when you take it, and you will jot down at least a few sentences every day about how you feel. If you wait, whatever improvements you see will blur how you view the past and it won’t be accurate. I’d very much like complete sentences and maybe a paragraph or two a day, but I know how painful that is for you.”

  Meg smirked at Dr. Jillium’s dry sarcasm. Eyes rising up from the vial, she blurted, “I’ll try.”

  Standing over her to look like a modern-day goddess, Dr. Jillium gave them to her. “I’d appreciate that.”

  The vial was the usual brown plastic, but to Meg, it felt priceless. The rattle of pills made it sound as if there weren’t a lot in there, and setting the theme book aside, she read the instructions, seeing they were the same as for the trial dosage.

  “One pill as needed for anxiety,” Dr. Jillium said as Meg spun the vial to read it. “Do not take more than four a day, and wait at least four hours between doses. As before, you can take it on an empty stomach or full, but do make a note in your diary when you take it. I mean it, Meg.”

  Meg nodded at the woman’s tight admonishment. She couldn’t wait to get out of the office and try one. She might even be able to teach her class without jumping at every clink of a paintbrush. “I will,” she said as she stood. She shoved the diary into her purse, but the pills went into her pocket. “Thank you, Dr. J.”

  “Wait up,” Dr. Jillium admonished. “We haven’t talked about your weekly goals.”

  Meg swung back around with a grimace. Dr. Jillium stood before the couch, her silhouette sharp against the cloudy sky outside.

  “I want a firm commitment from you to increase your social interaction,” the woman lectured. “Volunteer to teach a painting class at the retirement village. Go shopping at a new grocery store. And not at midnight, Meg. Make a new friend by next week. I want some real progress with Austin. Be prepared to talk next week about both yours and his needs and
what you’re looking for in a relationship. This is not a magic pill, and if you don’t make an effort to lay down some new, positive patterns, I will take you off it. Understand?”

  Meg felt breathless, but it was a good breathless, not the soul-stealing cramping of a nameless fear. “I do. Thanks, Dr. J.” On impulse, she leaned across the narrow coffee table and gave her therapist a quick hug. Dropping back to her heels, she smiled sheepishly, thinking she’d crossed a line until Dr. Jillium reached out and squeezed her shoulder in understanding.

  “Call me day or night if something seems wrong. Okay?” she prompted, and Meg nodded.

  “Promise,” she said, then turned and showed herself out, clomping down the wood stairs and hustling over the vintage tile with only the faintest guilt for having dirtied them. She paused inside the building’s tiny lobby, fumbling with the cap to her new meds until she could shake one of the light green tablets into her hand. She took it, holding it on her tongue while she found the bottled water she always carried, and with a hurried eagerness, washed it down.

  “I’ll write it down tonight,” she whispered as she dropped the bottled water back in her purse next to the diary. Frumpy sweater coat over her arm, she strode out into the late morning. For the first time in weeks, it felt as if she might dare to believe there was hope left in her after all.

  Three

  The wide line of black narrowed as Meg eased the pressure of the brush on the canvas. The slick feel of the oil laying down whispered up through her arm, soothing, luring her into another stroke. Fingers nimble, she spun the second brush in her fingers into play and highlighted the previous brush stroke, lifting the pigment far too soon and leaving the length of the tree’s branch unrealized.

  The soft exhalation of understanding behind her was a shock and Meg stiffened, not liking having lost herself so deeply that she’d forgotten she wasn’t alone. Back aching, she lifted her eyes from the high-contrast of black and white spilling onto the surface that hinted at a tortured tree at midnight. Her two-minute “technique demonstration” had stretched for an unexpected hour, right to the end of class. She’d found a place to hide from the anxiety, and she’d lost herself, oblivious that the entire class had clustered behind her to watch, not just the one student who’d asked. It hadn’t been her intention to paint anything, but there it was, the twisted tree in stark black and white. And I didn’t know they were even there, crammed behind me like side-show gawkers.

  Not sure if it was the meds or pure concentration, she gripped her two brushes together, smearing the paint as she spun on a heel to face them. Her breath grew tight in her chest at their waiting expressions, and it was all she could do to not flee to the back of the room and out of the sun spilling in through the wide windows. The peaceful perfection in her mind was gone. But I had it, if only for a moment.

  Meg took a steadying breath, hoping her students wouldn’t see. “It’s not so much using the actual pigment to define the space, but its absence,” she said as she shifted behind the easel, dropping back an unexpected step when they clustered closer to try to pick apart the unique look. “Leave it unfinished,” she said, glad they were focusing on the painting and not her. “It’s the so-called imperfections that give it its strength and uniqueness. Allow the observer’s mind to fill in the blanks to find the form, and the observer is empowered.”

  “I don’t get it,” a twenty-something woman complained, and the student next to her gave her a dry look. But it was obvious the class was over, and almost as one organism, they began to break up, the familiar clink of brushes spinning in cleaning jars and the scent of mineral spirits rising like a familiar balm.

  The tightness in her chest eased as Meg crept back out from behind the canvas, studying them as they prepared to leave: seeing who put their brushes away still holding pigment with the intent to work at home, who cleaned them for the weekend, who looked at their own work with a frustrated determination.

  An unexpected disappointment that the class was over colored her mood. Whether it had been the new meds or the pure bliss of painting, something had calmed her mind enough that she’d forgotten they were there, letting her find peace.

  “Monday…” she began, voice breaking. She’d shown them something unique, and a few were beginning to look past her frumpy clothes and take her seriously instead of as an artistic fluke. “Monday,” she said again, and several students paused to attentively listen. “I want to see from you three examples of the same object, same perspective. Choose something simple enough to get three full renderings, but complex enough that you get a feel for the exercise. Make the first the way you usually would, the second pull out half the dark, the third, pull out half the light. See what you can come up with. And have fun with it.”

  Her pulse was fast, but she forced herself to maintain eye contact and that startled-deer smile she knew she was wearing. I’m the flakey artist in residence, she thought. Quirky, not scared.

  “Three renderings?” that same young woman complained. “Just because she doesn’t have anything to do over the weekend doesn’t mean I don’t.”

  “Shut up, Lisa,” her friend muttered as she carefully wrapped her brushes in clear plastic so she wouldn’t have to clean them. “I know three people who will take your slot if you want to quit.”

  Meg’s flush of gratitude hung with her, but she still felt awkward as she waited for the last of her students to leave before venturing out past her canvas. Slowly her shoulders eased, and she exhaled in relief. One down, an entire semester to go, she thought. But it had been a good three hours. A positive pattern, as Dr. J would have said.

  Only now did Meg take a critical look of what was supposed to have been a quick, demonstrative sketch of an old oak tree hung with wisteria. Nodding, she decided it was good enough to keep working on. Austin was gone, and she’d need something to do this weekend. If she was lucky, the unusual sensation of three solid hours with no anxiety would come home with it.

  “Sure feels like a magic pill to me,” Meg said, her voice filling the empty room as she went to clean her tools. The stark white and heavy black on the twin brushes had been smeared to a muted gray of commonality in her carelessness. She’d have to start over.

  Quick from long practice, she scraped off the excess color on her tiny three-color thumb palette. Her brushes were next, and she watched the flash of bright and dull mix into nothing in the bath of mineral spirits. Seeing everything fade to a dull gray, it was easy to see what creatively pulled her. It was the extremes: the light, the dark. The spreading middle ground was lost in the noise much as average people were never noticed as they moved through existence. Like me.

  Her brushes clattered to the counter, and Meg used the pigment-stained tub of lotion to rehydrate her hands when the oil-stripping mineral spirits bled through the drying cloths. She gave her bare nails a wan smile. She’d never have polish, but the bare nails went with the homespun artist look she had going for her. Sighing, she wondered if maybe with this new medication, she could actually get to the mall while the sun was up. Dr. J would be pleased.

  Going back to her canvas, she tucked everything in her large satchel purse, pulled the canvas carefully from the easel, gazed over the quiet, sun-drenched space, and left leaving the door unlocked behind her. Maybe the last few hours weren’t just a skip in the beat of her daily hell, but a new beginning of peace.

  The thought brought her head up, and Meg felt good enough to acknowledge the few people she met on her way out of the fine arts building. Emboldened, she let her free arm swing, enjoying the warm spring sun as she went down the wide steps to the quad’s sidewalk.

  But a questioning admonishment that she had no right to feel this happy sent her eyes to the campus clock tower. She couldn’t take another pill for hours, and a nervous tension flashed through her. It left behind the insistent feeling that she’d been remiss about something.

  I should call Austin, she thought as she angled toward the quad’s central fountain. It was a beautiful
day, and there wouldn’t be anyone going to the movies. With the stress of her last class behind her, she felt as if she could handle someone sitting behind her in the dark. But even as she thought it, she wondered if it was a sign of improvement, or just finding a better way to avoid her triggers.

  Meg’s grip on her canvas tightened in annoyance. The chill shadow of the fountain’s statue fell upon her, and she looked up, shifting until the sun was behind the cold gray stone. The lithe, graceful form of an angel was forever pouring out one of the jars at her feet, but what caught Meg’s attention were the glistening strands of spider silk floating from the goddess’s head, catching the sun and glowing like glory itself.

  Spiders, Meg realized. Hundreds, if not thousands, of young spiders were ballooning away to new territories. Setting her canvas down, Meg rummaged in her bag for her phone. If she could get a good enough shot, she’d use it as a subject for her students. The stark contrast of sky and golden thread, of cold stone and warm sun, was amazing.

  “Got it,” Meg breathed, and then after seeing what she’d captured, she took a few more from the same angle.

  It wasn’t until she was putting her phone away that she noticed the petite woman standing just outside the fountain’s mist zone, a slip of tissue-thin paper in her hand, a puzzled frown on her angular face. She was dressed impeccably in a red skirt, white leggings, and a matching white blouse. A red leather coat and stylish beret warded off the lingering chill of the morning rain. Sunglasses hid her eyes and made her blond hair seem even brighter, but the trendy red frames made her seem as if she belonged on the colorful west coast, not here in the dour, conventional east.

  Student? Meg thought upon seeing the class list in her hand. She was certainly flamboyant enough for one, but the quality of her clothes were outside most students reach. She was slightly shorter than Meg, well-proportioned, slim, blond, in her late twenties, pretty under makeup so carefully applied that it looked natural…and clearly lost.