Chapter 12
"How do I feel?" Rickie said. "I feel anxious, guilty, and pessimistic, to name a few of my feelings."
"That's what I was afraid of," Judy said. "I think you should call the therapist Dr. Lerner recommended. The one you threw the Jell-O at. You should call Dr. Black."
Rickie awakened early in the morning to find Judy sitting in the chair Shank occupied the prior evening. In an attempt to put behind her the incident of the night before and also to avoid further her painful downward spiral of depression, she'd gone into action. Taking matters into her own hands, and, with Judy's able assistance, Rickie checked out of the hospital on her own recognizance, entirely against Dr. Lerner's recommendations.
Judy herself helped ease Rickie into the shotgun seat of the ancient "rusty but trusty" Plymouth Voyager and driven her wounded cargo slowly and carefully back to the tiny beach side abode, the small house with the big garden, so frustratingly close to the shore and yet without a view of anything but the utilitarian backside of Shutters hotel. On the drive over, Rickie detailed her interactions with her various and sundry visitors of the prior day and evening, which began with Dr. Lerner and included Dr. Black, and finished up with her surprise storm-trooper visit from the drunken Hirschfeld, and Shank's odd, but elegantly barbarian response to Hirschfeld's threats, which caused Hirschfeld to back down.
Rickie carefully omitted mentioning any of the feelings she'd found herself feeling for Shank, wanting instead to give the feelings an airing in the cold light of day.
The winter storm having spent itself the previous evening, and having failed to destroy the pier and beach, left in it's wake not destruction, but instead a crisp, clean, bright February's day, which inspired the two women to brew a strong pot of coffee. They soon found themselves enjoying the privacy of the heavy-hedged winter garden as they sat in the sunshine upon a cushioned bench beside a trickling fountain. Happy goldfish flitted about in the fountain's deep basin. From where they sat, they could see the gate which led onto the street.
A white, official-looking unmarked Crown Victoria pulled up outside the gate and a heavy-set woman in a blue uniform, her substantial bulk tackled with a wide leather belt hung with various leather-holstered security implements, including a sidearm of some sort, stepped out and gave a nod to Judy.
"Who's that?" Rickie said.
"Security," Judy said. "I'm having the place guarded for the duration."
"A female guard?"
"She looks tough enough to me. She's got a gun. I don't want you having to worry about Hirschfeld popping up out of nowhere like he did last night. Now don't change the subject. We were talking about you contacting the therapist. Rickie, you need to make the call."
"You can't afford to hire a guard, Judy!" Rickie's concern for her friend was real. Judy, in her job capacity as some sort of secretarial peon for the Rand Company, the world-renowned think tank to which the city of Santa Monica was host, earned certainly less than most of her neighbors, as was evidenced by the deferred maintenance on the bungalow, which was considerable.
"I've got some money saved, Rickie," Judy said simply. "You know Paul left me a little insurance money when he died."
Judy had been married to Paul, a crop-duster, and living in Fresno when his plane went down in a field of alfalfa and the crash claimed his life. Judy, after a year of mourning, upon waking one morning to find herself at the beginning of emotional recovery, and feeling within herself her childless, spouseless life (juxtaposed, as it was, in the family-oriented mosquito swept environs of Fresno County), to be much too lonely, chose to return to the family bungalow at the beach and start a new life.
"I'll find a way to pay you back," Rickie said. "Have her run the plate on my credit card. It's Hershey's money. He might as well pay to protect me from himself. Speaking of Hershey, he was supposed to send some people out to replace the window he broke. I can see by the cardboard and the duct tape nothing came of that promise."
"It's okay. You're still trying to change the subject. The important thing is to work on getting you better. I want you to call Dr. Black and schedule an appointment first thing."
"I'm drained. Burned out. A therapist needs something to work with. There's nothing left inside me to shape into anything wonderful. Hershey has beaten everything out of me. I'd only be wasting my time calling Dr. Black."
"So you're going to give up trying? You’re going to become a nothing? Why does that sound an alarm in my head?"
"Judy, I'm not suicidal, if that's what's worrying you. I’m not eager to reach out and embrace life right now. The best I can envision in the near term is sitting in your garden, stoked on painkillers, watching the fish skim the flies."
Rickie didn't tell Judy the truth. Which was she felt it useless to attempt therapy. The truth is, she was resigned to her fate. She was ashamed of herself for tolerating the battering, embarrassed by her role as a victim, and she found it humiliating to talk about it even to Judy.
"Do you ever wonder how I feel?" Judy said. "I feel helpless, and a little angry. I wish I could do something besides sit and watch my best friend die a slow death by trampling beneath the split hooves of the pig from the underworld."
Rickie clenched Judy's hand. "I love you, Judy. Don't feel helpless. Without your help, I know I wouldn't have a chance of making it. The fact I can stay with you, in a place where I feel comfortable, means the world to me."
"I wish I could do more. I called Personnel and booked myself off for the week. They don't need me this week anyway; most of the braniacs in my group are attending some sort of fun-fest in Washington. Hillary's trying to enlist them to decode what she believes to be subsonic messages to her from whales or something. It's part of a promotion for her new book, It Takes a Humpback."
"You've got to stop reading The Enquirer. Besides, everybody knows she doesn't write her own stuff. She ought to name her next book, It Takes a Ghost."
"The Enquirer? I picked that one up off an internal memo from my department head. Look, Rickie, I'm not letting you out of my sight for a single minute. I'm going to do some of my famous French cooking and clean for you and see to your every need."
"Now I know I'm in trouble," Rickie said. "We both know you can't cook. Your frog legs don't taste like chicken. They taste like friggin' frogs."
Judy smiled. "We'll order in every meal, then. In fact, I'll walk down to the pier every afternoon and load up on fresh churros for our afternoon high tea."
"You know, Judy, right now I feel like I'm on one side of a brick wall too high to climb over. I've never felt so helpless, and weak. If you weren't here for me, I don't know what I'd do."
"It's not only me. Your son is here for you. Jesse Edwin loves you. He's coming over tonight after he gets off work."
"True, I have Jesse Edwin. He doesn't deserve to share in the punishment I received from Hershey. I don't want to bring my son down at the most critical time of his life. It's so unfair. He just got out of rehab and moved in to his new apartment. He's brand new on his job at the bakery. He should be getting my support and love. Instead, all he's getting are my wounds, my rage, and my misery. I hate it that I'm so weak! I should be able to solve my problems quickly, and easily!"
"It's not you who has the problem, it's your husband. I know where you're coming from. Your feelings are all over the place right now, telling you what a mess you're in, but in time your feelings will change and you'll see there's still some sunny days ahead."
Rickie drained the last of her coffee. "Jesse Edwin tells me the secret to happiness doesn't come from worrying about yourself, but instead from helping others."
Judy held Rickie's shoulders and spoke softly. "I know what Hirschfeld's done to you. Jesse Edwin's right. A life lived serving others with compassion will bring you back to life again. You can't spend your days hating Hirschfeld. Hate will use up all your energy. You've got to get some love in your life. You
can start by loving your son. Maybe that will lead you to love yourself."
"You're probably right," Rickie said. "I've lived through the worst of the disaster. I feel like it's broken me. Now all that's left is to try to put the broken pieces back together. Judy, there's something I want you to do for me."
"Anything, Rickie."
"I need you to call Forest Lawn Memorial Park. I want to arrange a small memorial service."
"Rickie?"
"It's for a child. I've decided it was a girl. She would have been a sister to Jesse Edwin. I've named her Jessica Edwina. There won't be a body, and there's no death certificate. In fact, I'm sure Dr. Lerner's already disposed of the remains as though they were so much trash. I'm going to make it up to baby Jessica Edwina. It's the first broken piece of my life I'm going to mend."
"Okay, Rickie. I'll call Forest Lawn."
"I want north side, overlooking the horse stables. Order the best headstone they have. Now, go get me the phone. I'm calling Dr. Black and then I'm going to take a serious nap."
In the garden, after Judy left her, silence held sway for a moment as the universe held its breath as if in wonder at Rickie's decision to find healing. A brief moment later, the universal breath released itself again, the gentle winter's wind rustling the leaves on the plants surrounding the fountain. It stirred the splashing waters into a mesmerizing spray, the flashing rainbow pattern of which Rickie, perhaps aided by the painkillers, or perhaps by her guardian angel, found enjoyable and hypnotic. The urge to nap rushed forward and claimed her where she sat. By the time Judy returned with the phone, the serious matters of arranging memorials for non-officially recognized fetuses and the contacting of therapists were postponed, for the moment, as Rickie's tentative exhalations soon became loud snores, of which Judy, the breezes and the goldfish, and the guard standing watch, minded not a bit.