San Andreas Island Page 4

  I think I wouldn’t have as much resentment if I’d come home after work to a nice meal every night and him already having gone to the market, and done laundry and cleaned the house and picked up Lily from daycare, and helped feed her, bathe her, and put her to bed. But instead I do every single one of those things, and he just sits back and wants more!”

  I’m exhausted from speaking for longer than ever at one time.

  “I had no idea you felt so alone.” My mom’s voice is soft, and she sounds so sad. “You’re always smiling, and telling me how well things are going at home and work. I just never knew. I’m so sorry.”

  I come back to reality, turn on my car, and the clock flashes, reminding me that I’m inevitably going to be late for work. Of course. I sigh and roll my eyes, which are probably going to get stuck up there if I have one more day like this.

  It usually takes me forever to squeeze out of my parking space and escape the ant farm that is my morning school routine. But because of my flip-out this morning, the school traffic has passed and I coast out of the neighborhood. “Mom, I’m super late to work already. I have to go. Can I call you later?”

  “Oh, of course. Please tell me if there is anything I can do to—”

  I cut her off. “I’m sorry, I really can’t do this right now. I love you.”

  “Oh, ok. I love y—”

  I press End as fast as my finger can reach the button. I can’t afford another minute of this emotional thunderstorm.

  Chapter Five:

  Stunning

  I turn right and land at a dead stop on 10th Street, then we inch our way forward, and finally get onto Wilshire Boulevard, only to make it to another complete standstill. There must be an accident. We’re not even moving more than five miles an hour, as we crawl to our respective destinations. I’m glancing at my phone, trying to check the balance on my checking account to see if I have to make a transfer from my savings so my checking account isn’t negative again.

  How is this happening? I did everything right. I went to college, got my degree, haven’t stopped working since I was 17, got married to a good guy who had a job and a degree. How am I stressing right now about needing to transfer $50 so that I don’t get hit with another overdraft fee?

  I glance up and my bumper smashes into the car ahead of me with a loud thunk. You’re fucking kidding me! As my vision adjusts, I see my car kissing the back of a brand new Maserati. Great.

  The next thing I know, I hear the most alluring voice, and my whole body feels tingly. We’ll call her Stunning for now, since it’s the only suitable name. Stunning is the owner of the Maserati that just formally introduced itself to the tip of my car.

  Did someone press slow motion on this scene, mute all the other cars’ engines and that guy honking behind me? I can smell her Jo Malone perfume from all the way over here, inside my off-white ride. My subconscious chose this shade of paint over the years by insisting a car wash remain one of the neglected items on my to-do list that gets rolled over to the next day and the next, and never gets crossed off.

  My eyes stay hooked onto Stunning’s lips. Is she really a foot away from my face? She invites me in with her wavy mocha-colored hair down to her waist, light brown eyes and glowing smile. I feel pulled towards her and transported into a tingly daydream. Butterflies flitter in my stomach and I’m intoxicated by her scent. The driver behind me lays on the horn. Thank you, Sir. My slow motion love scene is officially over.

  She tilts her head a little, and looks at her bumper and then at mine, while I’m frozen there like an idiot. “You know what? It’s not a big deal. Can you promise me something?”

  She takes the wind out of me. My God, anything you want. “Um yes?” I whisper.

  “That neither of us will look at our phones while we’re driving, ok?” she says.

  I’m embarrassed. Texting and driving is just as bad as drunk driving, isn’t it? My shame won’t let me make eye contact.

  I step out of the car and get a better look at her bumper for the first time, and I gasp. My face is doing that twisted thing I hate that it does anytime I’m caught not being perfect. My cheeks are flushed with a perfect shade of bright red. I still can’t even look at her, the highest level my eyes will reach is that mashed-up black bumper.

  “Hey,” her voice is like a cool mint I put in my mouth and I can feel her in my lungs. “It’s gonna be ok.” Her smile is gentle and softens me. My eyes meet hers.

  “Really,” I breathe out. I tuck my hair behind my ear nervously. “I should give you something. You know, just in case.”

  A car flies by, laying down on the horn. I jump a bit as he startles me out of my trance.

  I proceed to tack on another layer of embarrassment, because this encounter’s not quite awkward enough yet. I get back into my car and lean over to the glove compartment. My hand reaches in and grabs a stack of business cards—not my registration, not my driver’s license, no, that would be too logical and appropriate. I hand all twenty or so cards to her.

  Stunning looks down at my cards in her hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Jelina. I’m intrigued.” Her eyes are serious, as if she’s studying me like an art piece at The Getty.

  “Ok, um. Thank you?” That’s all my brain is allowing me to articulate right now.

  She smiles, nods and gets into her car and disappears back to her life - and out of what feels like a dream. My skin feels her aura, as if she just took an ice cube and ran it slowly along my arms, across the back of my neck and down my spine.

  Chapter Six:

  Panic

  Tick...tick...tick...tick.

  It’s a momentary pause in our session. I know Kim all too well by now. She’s gathering her thoughts, taking comfort in the slow ticks of the clock, and savoring the silence—something quite rare in her life outside of these four walls. Kim has been sitting on that couch at one p.m. every Thursday for a little over two years. She's one of my most punctual patients. In fact, I get a little worried if the clock reads 12:58 p.m. and my call light isn’t on yet.

  I glance over her shoulder. We have 27 more minutes left in our session. A fire truck next door wails its siren, announcing to all of us on Ocean Avenue and Cali Street that it's leaving the station on a mission. Neither Kim nor I flinch. It's a sad truth, but we hear these sirens at least every other session, so we don’t skip a beat.

  Her gaze is on her shoes, as her feet rest on the flowery footstool.

  “Do you ever wonder if you’re living the wrong life?” … and I guess she’s ready to begin.

  “Can you say more?” I hand her back the question.

  “Like, I think about my life. I sit indoors all day. My boss doesn’t give a shit about who I am. I’m replaceable. What am I even doing?”

  “What would you prefer your life to look like?” I ask.

  “I thought by now I’d at least be married with a kid and have a house. You know, something fulfilling,” she says.

  “What leads you to believe those things will fulfill you?”

  “Common sense.”

  “Ouch. Alright, I hear you,” I say. Her passive aggressiveness leaves me with a little sting of shame. I channel Professor Burgeon from college. He used to tell us to pay attention to what we feel in the room. It might be what the client’s feeling. “I’m curious about something.”

  Kim’s arms are a bit tense as she hugs her pillow against her stomach. She’s listening - I think.

  “I’m curious if underneath all of this… if you’re questioning your worth and value as you compare yourself to your friends as you go to their weddings or baby showers and hear them talk about the houses they’re looking at?”

  “Yeah, I have to say, it sucks being a bridesmaid. It’s getting old.”

  From my periphery I notice my phone is blowing up with notifications. They’re from a random number, and they’re not stopping. But, of course, I know whom they’re from. He’s sending Bible verses and pictures
of us together when I was a kid. The notifications won't stop scrolling across my phone. I’m trying hard to stay focused on Kim but my eyes are pulled towards these images. I feel a bullet of shame shoots through me.

  “I’m feel shame and worthless,” I hear her say, but it’s if she’s so far away.

  I force my vision to find Kim in this office again. I see her face now, but my ears haven’t caught up. I can only catch bits of what she’s saying about her inner critic and negative self talk. The rest is muffled like I’m wearing noise-cancelling headphones. I see her mouth moving, and I'm trying to concentrate and make out what she's saying, but I am frozen by this wave of dizziness that's come over me.

  I interrupt her mid-sentence. “Kim, can you hold on a second? I’m feeling a little dizzy. I just need a moment.” There are two of her—maybe even a third now, and my silencing headphones are less snug.

  “Sure?” She’s thrown off too. Her silhouette is visible from my periphery, and I’ve disrupted her flow. She’s leaning forward now on the edge of the couch, oozing concern. “Jelina, are you okay?”

  “Strange. I don’t know why I’m feeling dizzy all of a sudden.” I feel guilty that I’ve switched into the one in the vulnerable chair. I make a failed attempt at standing up to refill my mug. My legs buckle as soon as I'm on my feet, so I drop back into my chair. I can hardly keep my eyes on Kim, but I manage to push out the words, “I need some air,” as I’m hyperventilating. She opens the sliding glass door, leaves the office for a minute, and comes back with a cup of water. I can feel myself trying to keep my eyes from seeing double. Then it hits me. I know exactly what this is. It's taken a much different shape this afternoon with the dizziness, and in front of a patient. Those are firsts. A panic attack and vertigo at the same time, this is nuts. The room won’t stop spinning. Damn it! I can’t believe this is happening right now, in the middle of a session!

  As my panic attack grabs the reins, and my vicious vertigo subsides, I feel the all-too-familiar powerlessness, as if I’m six years old again. I can’t stop hyperventilating. My heart feels like it's going to jump out of my chest. My hands are shaking. My body feels like I’m in ice cold water.

  It’s just a panic attack, ride it out, I think to myself, trying to use a strategy I teach my patients. Between breaths, I slide into surrender. Just let go. I close my eyes and breathe for a moment, giving myself permission to sink into my chair, and just be human.

  A stream of images flashes across my mind, as if I’m on a train watching the scenery going by. My breath is the rapid chugging of the engine on the tracks.

  Chug-chug chug-chug chug-chug. My breath follows the pace and rhythm.

  I rub the healing cut on my hand. Still shots of me pass like mental scenery on this express train: me yelling at Dylan, losing it in the car, another one of me looking through the peephole seeing the gun pointed at me and the camera clicking pictures, an exhausted me soothing a crying infant Lily, the sweet little blonde girl sitting on the kitchen floor.

  Chug-chug chug-chug chug-chug.

  My breath follows the pace of my mental train. The scenery keeps going by in my mind, slower now. The little blonde girl is writing in her notebook.

  Chug...chug chug...chug.

  The mental train has slowed to almost a stop. As my panic attack slows down and my daydream continues, I see the pages in the little girl’s book: a drawing with sparkles of light reflecting on the sea water. She turns the glittery page and shows me another drawing of an island in the sea.

  My eyes open, and my mind is back in the office with Kim. “What the hell, Jelina?” she asks, eyes wide.

  “Seriously,” I agree with her. I look over at the clock. 2:02. “Let’s pick back up again next week.”

  Chapter Seven:

  Her

  That was by far the most bizarre thing that’s ever happened to me in a session in all these years. Wow. I open my work bag and check my phone.

  Dylan: You meeting the girls today?

  I type back.

  Me: In a bit. Sunkissed Cafe. Hey, I got in a little fender bender this morning.

  Dylan: Oh fuck

  Me: It’s fine. No big deal

  Dylan: We can’t afford this kind of shit right now

  Me: I’m ok, the car’s ok. The other car was worse, but she said not to worry about it

  Dylan: Cool. Can you stop by the cleaners and pick up my dry cleaning after work

  Me: You can’t do it?

  Dylan: I have a project to work on all night

  Me: Fine, I can get it tomorrow

  Dylan: Thanks. How was Lily this morning

  Me: Sweet, quiet. She loves Miss Kayla

  Dylan: Good. I miss her already. My little Lilykin

  Me: She’s adorable. It would be nice if you dropped her off some mornings

  Dylan: Babe, you know I’m not a morning person. I’m our night shift, remember?

  I roll my eyes.

  Me: I have to go. Meeting the girls.

  Dylan: K, love you babe

  I set my phone down and pull the spiral notebook out of my bag that I’d tossed in it earlier.

  I flip it open to where I left off...

  September 20, 2016

  We closed escrow today. Finally. Damn that entire process was so stressful, it’s almost hard to take in the excitement. But our house is perfect, especially since we’ve been talking about having a baby. And we’re going to start rotating our weekly wine and cheese dinners with Jake and Jane, and of course, Helen and Sarah, too.

  I skip chunks of pages...

  July 12, 2019

  I told him I’m tired of our money stress and that all the pressure is on me to cover the bills now because he keeps quitting jobs and changing careers. I was hopeful when we met and he was studying law and I thought it was the right thing to do to be supportive when he ended up changing his major and decided he didn’t want to be a lawyer anymore, and got his liberal arts degree. I liked that he was into wanting to teach for a while, and to follow his passions and live a more inspired and free life, and I got a bit anxious when he opened his own surf shop and became a surf instructor. He loved it though, and was the most charming, coolest surfer in town. But after he got tired of the cattiness on the waves, he sold the business and insisted on getting his personal training certification. When that lost its spark, he quit. We’ve poured most of our savings (that is, my savings from before I met him) into each of these ventures, not to mention all the student loans we racked up. We keep fighting so much lately about how I didn’t want the pressure of carrying all the financial burden, and I need him to contribute something to my income, which he calls “our” income, when all he’s doing is spending what I’m making! This was a discussion that I never remember having when we talked about our lives together. I’m such a minimalist and he’s so materialistic. I wish I’d gotten the memo to never share bank accounts. He has no tolerance for discomfort whatsoever, and demands to have everything handed to him straight from the top. So instead of applying for any paying job, he pushed and pushed for us to take out another loan so that he could switch careers yet again, going back to law school to get his JD. All these years later, and he still hasn’t finished. He just has no patience and doesn’t like people telling him what to do. I know this has everything to do with how he was raised, but it still doesn’t make marriage easy, when I’m the one who has to hold down the fort. He spends all day hanging out with other people under the guise of studying and“doing projects” and they are so loud when they come over, leaving their beer cans and crumbs everywhere. I try to force myself not to clean up after them, but I left it all there and after a four days, he told me, “Don’t worry about it, I’ll do it.” It never happened. If I don’t do it, no one will. And I can’t live in a pig sty.

  July 13, 2019

  We just had one of our biggest fights. He’s been insisting on getting a drone so he could sit back and take videos around our house!! I’m no
t even making this up. I feel like his mom, not his wife. I can’t believe this is even a conversation. I’m so livid right now and I feel so fucking alone in this marriage!!

  Uggg. My stomach is turning. I flip past more pages...

  August 2, 2019

  Right when I walked into work, Mel asked me again if everything’s ok. I hate when she does that. She always asks me right before I have to run my grief group. And then I cry for no reason every time, and have panic attacks and it’s impossible to pull it together before I have to lead the group. I never even have the strength or time to talk to her. And I’m so embarrassed. How on earth can I even admit that my own marriage is a mess? I feel awful, but I ended up mustering up the courage somehow to tell her to stop asking if I’m ok, because it’s too hard to gather my composure every time right before patients walk in and I have to run group. I don’t even know who I am anymore. I don’t wear makeup like I used to, the clothes I want, or do my hair how I prefer. I’ve lost myself. Lately, Dylan has a negative comment about every little thing, and he’s not even taking care of himself anymore, but he finds time to criticize me. His drinking is getting concerning and every time I bring it up he gets defensive. He’s so fucking critical and controlling! I wear the shade of lipstick he insists upon, the style of haircut, the clothes he prefers. I want to just scream!! Why can’t I stand up for myself? What happened to you treating me like the queen like you did before we got married!?

  Tears are falling onto my cheeks. I miss how we were at the beginning. I keep flipping pages.