Walking on Broken Glass - Christa Allan [32]
At that moment I wanted to bash Annie and her magazine-addicted self over the head.
15
On the way down to breakfast, Cathryn announced the day would start with a group session with Dr. Sanders.
“That ain’t no good after breakfast,” Benny grumbled.
“Yeah, so what meal is it good after, huh, kid?” We could always count on Doug for our reality check.
“Me, I don’t care when it starts as long as I got time to go the bathroom,” Theresa said.
I shifted to let Theresa out of the elevator and caught Annie either twitching or actually winking at me. The corners of her mouth seemed suspiciously turned skyward for a nanosecond. Her usual slather of green eye shadow had been replaced by an iridescent violet, meant, I think, to coordinate with the tie-dyed pink and purple blouse shoved into waist-cinching khaki shorts. Annie's clothes had not yet surrendered themselves to what must have been a new body shape.
“So, how are you and Theresa working out?” Annie didn’t lift her eyes from the gray cafeteria tray she pulled from the stack. I looked over my shoulder, not even sure she was talking to me. We were the last two in line, so she really was breaking her vow of silence.
“I can tolerate anything for twenty-three more days,” I said. “Even these scrambled eggs with bits of what I’m praying are bacon or some sort of meat substance.”
Annie stopped to survey the bread options. “Yeah, but now you’re doing it sober.” She picked up two lumpy biscuits, stacked them onto her plate next to her mini-tower of sausage patties, picked up her tray, and walked toward an empty table at the far edge of the cafeteria.
So much for the beginning of that friendship.
How could Annie not like me? Most people at least liked me. Well, if I didn’t count my mother-in-law, and I didn’t. The thud of absolute loneliness that crashed into my gut echoed through the dining hall. How ridiculous! I’m a professional. I have a college degree. Plus graduate hours. I have friends. I have a husband. A house in the right zip code. I drive a Lexus. And not one person in this motley assortment of human beings talked to me.
I ate at a table for two near a window. At least I had a view if not a human companion. I swirled the syrup on my disorganized stack of pancakes. Not at all like Carl's. What was he thinking as he ate breakfast this morning? Probably not about dreading group therapy.
Dr. Frank Sanders already sat in the group room when we arrived. He stationed himself in a chair closest to the door. Was that to expedite his getaway or to prevent ours?
A circle of submarine gray folding chairs waited. The only seats not occupied were on either side of the doctor. Naturally. But my teacher-self realized the advantage of not being in eye-lock view of the man in charge. Peripheral vision tended to eliminate the possibility I’d have to be subjected to one of his squirm-inducing stares.
Everyone was quiet. Sanctuary quiet. Like any moment a priest or minister or rabbi or Dali Lama would start services quiet. Even Theresa was mute. She held her pudgy hands hostage under her thighs, which seemed to ooze off the seat, and stared at her kneecaps. Doug's long legs acted as ballasts as he teetered on the back chair legs, his neck barely holding up his head. His splotched hands, threaded together on his bloated stomach, were the shade of pancakes I barely ate for breakfast. The boy teens’ U2 fire-red shirts were the only bolts of color in the otherwise naked room. The overhead lights were so white and punishing they could have been used for police interrogations. The unforgiven in an unforgiving room.
Dr. Sanders looked around, taking emotional temperatures as his eyes flicked from one of us to the other. He smelled fresh, like pine trees, like my brother. If I closed my eyes for just a moment, I could pretend Peter sat next to me, and we were in the movies waiting for the lights to fade into black. Only there's no black, no fading, no Peter.
“First day, first group. Let's start with an introduction.