Silent Bird (28 page)

“You have no signs of recent pregnancy. I am sorry,” the doctor said gently.

Dressed again,
I was sitting on the papered examining table of the same man who had treated my fungus-ridden toe all those long months ago. For I had been extraordinarily lucky; in Villefranche sur Lez, a person can knock on the doctor’s private residence and get an emergency appointment. An American without medical insurance can appear without an appointment for a nice long exam and soothing conversation.

S
ince I’d left Jeannot’s vineyard without telling him about the blood, I was lucky I even remembered where this doctor lived. Yes, lucky. He didn’t seem even slightly put out to be disturbed at home on a Sunday by someone he’d only met once. He didn’t ask after Jeannot; did not require how I’d ended up alone on his doorstep. He didn’t even ask me for money.

Not pregnant
. All in my head.

The doctor’s face had a long shape to it, like
that of a horse, with the kindest eyes I had ever seen. Perhaps like Jeannot’s eyes would look in another fifty years.
If
his father didn’t ruin him.

On the
wall was a framed poster by Bazille, a local artist from the nineteenth century whose work hung in Montpellier’s
Musée Fabre
. I had seen this painting before: a primly attired young girl sitting in fields below huddled red roofs. She, too, appeared calm and patient. Ribbons of innocence flew from her hair.

“
I was so sure,” I said. “I had…symptoms.”

The doctor nodded.
“The body can fool us. And stress can create all kinds of symptoms. A woman’s menstruation is the first thing to change. As for what else you describe—the sore breasts, the morning sickness—well, perhaps you
were
pregnant but lost it very early. Not in the last couple of weeks. Or perhaps you had a kind of false pregnancy...your mind creating your pregnancy for you, so to speak. It is truly amazing what the mind can do.”

I cleared my throat.
“But my period. I’m usually so—”

“
I know.” He patted my hand. “Would you like something to drink? A glass of water?”

“
Yes, thank you.” I accepted a small cup. It tasted like heaven. “How embarrassing,” I said after a moment, “to have created this whole drama.”

“
Not too big a drama, I hope.”

“But...why
? Why would I…create a pregnancy when I don’t even want to be…a mother.”

My eyes went prickly on me again.

The doctor shrugged, one of those Gallic shrugs I realized I had become quite fond of. He sat down like a person with nothing better to do.

Why couldn’t this doctor be Jeannot’s father? Why did the nicest young man in the world have to come with the Family from the Black Lagoon?

“I am not really able to tell you. I am sorry,” the doctor said. “I wish I could. Look at it this way.” All at once, he seemed inspired. “Perhaps a small part of you did wish to be pregnant. It is possible that you were not aware of it, but your body was. Perhaps you needed a little extra love, a little hope. Something to plan for. Your inner self merely accommodated you.”

I glanced back at the picture.
The girl with the ribbons looked so young, hardly a woman yet but most definitely of menstruating age.

The doctor kept watching me.
I could almost hear his mind ticking off possibilities. Exceedingly gentle, he took my water glass and refilled it. I had the urge to throw my arms around him, cry on his bony shoulder, and blurt out everything. Somehow I was sure that he would understand. Like Grandpa would have.

My Grandpa used to watch me like this, with his worried heart in his eyes. My beloved Grandpa, gone by the time I turned twelve. He had seemed so pensive around my father; so protective of me whenever possible.
And all that time he spent staring at my drawings: the house without windows, and the family with no mouths. “You can tell me anything, little one,” he used to say.

But I never did.

“You mentioned you were pregnant before, at a very young age,” the doctor said.

I nodded. “
Yes. Fourteen.”

“
So you know what it feels like. You remember these symptoms.”

“
Yes.”

“
The experience of pregnancy is not new to you…”

“…And therefore easy to imagine?”
I shrugged, feeling Gallic myself. “Maybe I am crazy.”
The Evil Eye.

To my
surprise, he laughed.

“
If every woman whose period did not obey her, who was late and had prolonged soreness and unexplained nausea—if every woman who experienced these things was crazy, then the psychiatrists would be very busy.” He patted my hand again.

“
Can I talk to you about that pregnancy?” I said in an impulsive rush. “The first one?”

If he was
surprised by the outburst, he didn’t show it.

“
Would you like to sit on a chair instead of that table? You cannot be very comfortable.”

“
I'm fine here, thanks.”

“
What would you like to tell me?”

With as much hope as despair, I began.
“I had a boyfriend at the time. His name was TAG—Theodore Allen Garfield. But I’m not sure the baby was his.”

The doctor nodded.

I took another breath, glancing at the picture on the wall.
Somehow I liked the idea of finishing my story in French, the way I’d begun it in French. This was a language I would always find less emotional than the angles and flat consonants of English. English was, and forever would be, the language of my heart. French remained just a promising landscape.

“
What I mean is, my father…he might have got me pregnant.” Pause. “So I had an abortion, without telling him. Or TAG, or anyone except my mother. Later I tried to tell
her
—my mother—the rest of it. About my father. But she didn’t want to know. Didn’t listen. And I…I didn’t make her.”

The doctor’s eyes got more liquid in them, as if he'd forgotten to blink.

“
When I was very small,” I went on, the truth flowing now as it tore away bits of the dam inside,
“my father touched me. For a long time, he never—he didn’t try to—you know, penetrate. That happened later, and only when he was drinking. But I let him do it. I
let
him.”

The doctor said nothing. His eyes spoke volumes.

“When I was eight, he quit drinking and everything got better. For a while, I mean. But when
I was thirteen, he started drinking again. And touching me.
And I let him again. I don’t know why. Maybe I've always been—like that.”

“
Like what?” the doctor asked, his voice so soft it was barely audible.

I shrugged, ready to move on to the next point.
I
had
to move on to the next point. Here, now; not later.

“
It happened only twice—the penetration. After that he never bothered me again. He developed heart problems, got sober for good, found himself a girlfriend for a while. Then he dropped dead of a heart attack. And I
cried.
Would you believe I missed him? By then I knew what we’d done was wrong. I thought I hated it, but that’s a lie too. Because part of me
missed
him. Everything was so mixed up…like some kind of freak—”

“
Not a freak.” He patted my hand and looked sad.

We sat together in silence, both sad.

“Thank you for listening,” I whispered after a moment. “Jeannot doesn’t know I came to see you. He doesn’t know I…got my period.”

“No?”

“We have our own problems. Our secrets. It’s like history repeating itself.”

“Everyone has secrets, yes?”

“I guess so.”
Do you?
I wondered.

“
Some of what happens to us in life cannot be helped,” the doctor said. “The other part? Well, this is life. We can only do our best and then learn to let go.”

He sounded as sensible as Monique.

“
I know,” I said, and that was also the truth.

Learn to let go
. Of Jeannot? Of France? Or just my past?

If I left even for a while, Jeannot would
turn to Thérèse. I hated the thought. But I couldn’t control him, could I?

Learn to let go.

“Is there something else I can do for you?” the doctor asked.

I thought about it.
“Yes. Please keep this visit confidential. Not that I have to say that.”

“
No, you do not.” He shook my hand warmly with both of his and led me to the door. “Take care of yourself, young lady. Above all, take care of
you
.”

When
I stepped outside, Villefranche sur Lez appeared as timeless as always. Yet I had the strangest impression that it had changed over the last few hours. These lovely old buildings and quaintly narrow streets and courtyards felt…less alien.

I
don’t
see evil everywhere, I realized.

Not in the doctor.
Not in Carole or her kids and maybe not in Jeannot’s mother. Definitely not in Monique. Not in the nice man at the reception desk of the hotel the day I first arrived in France. Not the nice taxi driver. Not Jeannot; never Jeannot. Not everyone, not everywhere. Just whoever deserved it.

I thought of my cartoons
: all those childish drawings with their dismal themes: cats stuck in refrigerators and socks missing soul mates—not much more cheerful than houses that sneezed or faces without mouths. But maybe that was okay, too. Stories need to be told, right? We can always choose what to listen to.

Sad or not, it was time for me to accept my art; to throw myself into it with love and acceptance; to
branch out, mentally and emotionally.

Even geographically?

I had used France as a hiding place. I had kept my vision so very close to the ground. Meanwhile, nearby in Italy, the most beautiful, inspiring art in the world waited to be explored.

Michelangelo’s
David
.

The Sistine Chapel.

What
might I learn from seeing those classic works in real life? Would there be something else I could draw for myself? Some other past that was starting today?

Because no matter what happened in the long run between Jeannot and me, I had to
leave him for a while. I had to visit those other places, those special places, whether it meant I left my footprints all over the world or not.

I had to
go home, too. If I wanted peace, I needed to return to New York and see Mom and Grandma.

But f
irst I had to get back to Montpellier in one piece.

In
Monique’s car.

“A relationship is not a game, Pilar!” Monique said in English, sweetly lecturing me, as usual.

We were
at the farmer’s market on her street, after I’d handed back her sweaty car keys and told her about my intention to leave France. In other words Monique took my news in her usual fashion: by giving me a loving and uninvited lecture.

“
You know why I am saying this, yes?” she said.

“
No,” I said.

I watched her
select cantaloupe the size of bowling balls, tomatoes as shapely as pumpkins. She switched to French while squeezing avocadoes.

“
I believe that love is a kind of fishing game. You have this game for children in America? ‘To Fish’?”

“
I remember a game with a small fishing rod where you have to catch these little plastic fish on a rotating thing.”

“Yes! In my opinion, you and Jeannot must catch this
little fish.”

Who wants their relationship to be compared to a toy? “
Please, Monique, skip the metaphors. Why don’t you just say what you mean?”

She wrinkled her brow. Then she shrugged. “
I mean this. I am happy that you explained to Jeannot the problem with his family and your family. But a
little
truth may not be enough.”

Annoyed, I gazed into Monique’s eyes.
Her kind, patient eyes. How did she know me so well, dammit? “You’re a good friend,” I said.

“
I know.” She smiled. “And our love is simple, yes? Too bad romantic love is not. Do you want to hear my theory about romantic love?”

“Only if it doesn’t involve fishing.”

“Stage Two of Love is a troubling time,” she continued firmly, as if pronouncing gospel.

“
Stage Two?”

“
Yes. That is when we can call it intimacy. Before that it is only hope.”

Hope for what?

“You see, the ostrich pulls its head out of the sand, and you have a human being in front of you. Like when you first met Jeannot. You said he was perfect, yes?”

I made a face.
That, of course, did not stop her.

“L
ove must not be a story of fear. This is true for me too. Love is never perfect. It is not an Ingres in a museum. It is a finger-painting, precious because it belongs to your child and is on your refrigerator. It is all yours,
tout simplement
.”

Did people really talk like this?
With examples from the art museum?

“
What are
you
going to do? About Louis?” I asked.

“
I have a plan to make my marriage work. First I will get to the bottom of what happened to us. What happened to him, and what happened to me, because it takes two to make this love work. Once I know why he did what he did, what my part is and especially what we have learned from it, I will decide.”

“
That sounds so…rational.”

“
Yes, perhaps. In times of trouble we must think with the head, not the heart.”

She had
n’t mentioned thinking with one’s genitals, which I suspected Louis had been doing all along.

“
And
,” she went on, “while my husband and I solve our problem, he will sleep on the couch. This way we will not confuse sex with trust.”

“
Have you told him that?”

“
Yes, of course. I do not play games. I wish to face life and live it to its fullest, with or without Louis.” Her voice suddenly cracked and she released the avocado she was crushing. Just one moment of despair before she straightened her shoulders and composed her face, and flashed me a brave, if weary, smile.

She was amazing.
I wanted to learn from her, though of course she had never walked in my shoes.

“
What would you do,” I asked suddenly, “if you had to tell your mother something that would crush her more than anything else ever has? Would you play just a little bit of a game then or would you take the risk of destroying all the family you’ve got left?”