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expressed before, even to Doctor Marlowe. When I

  glanced at her, I thought she was hoping I would now

  and I thought maybe this was one reason she wanted

  me in this group therapy.

  "I can't imagine, could never imagine my

  mother having a baby the normal way," I began. "I

  have seen my father kiss her on the forehead and

  occasionally on the cheek, but I have never seen them

  kiss like people in love, never on the lips. Mother

  probably would be thinking of some contagious

  disease if he did. Even when he kissed her on the

  forehead, she would turn away and wipe it off with

  the back of her hand. Sometimes, he saw her do it;

  sometimes he didn't."

  "Don't they sleep together?" Star asked. "Not in the same bed," I said. "They always had

  twin beds separated by a nightstand. He's not there

  anymore, of course."

  "But even people who don't spend the night in

  the same bed can get together long enough to make a

  baby," Jade said. "I have friends whose parents even

  have separate bedrooms."

  "What do they do, make a date to have sex?"

  Star asked her.

  "I don't know. Maybe," Jade replied, thoughtful

  for a moment. She smiled. "Maybe it's more

  romantic."

  "Oh yeah, you're married, but you got to make a

  date to have sex. That's really romantic."

  "Passion should be . . . unexpected," Misty said

  with dreamy eyes turned toward the ceiling. "You've

  got to turn toward the man you love and have your

  eyes meet and then float into each other's arms with

  music in your heart."

  "You're living in your own soap opera," Star

  told her, but not with her usual firmness. She looked

  like she hoped she was wrong.

  "Maybe, but that's the way it's going to be for

  me and the man who loves me," Misty insisted. Jade drew her lips up in the corners and shook

  her head. Then she turned back to me.

  "So you don't think your mother and father had

  sex? Is that what you're saying?"

  "They had to have had it once," I said. "What do you mean? You just said they

  adopted you:'

  "My father told me there was almost a baby. He

  was alone with me one night when I was feeling very

  low, and he told me the story. He said my mother

  didn't know she was pregnant or didn't want to know.

  She found out when she had a bad pain in her

  stomach, went to the bathroom and lost the baby that

  was in her. She flushed it down the toilet."

  "Ugh," Misty said.

  "She collapsed and he had to help her to bed.

  She refused to go to a doctor even though she kept

  bleeding. My father made it sound as if she wanted it

  to happen. From the way he described it to me, I don't

  think she wanted to have sex and I think she was

  angry it had happened and she had become pregnant. I

  don't know. To this day I can't imagine them making

  love," I said. I guess I had a guilty look on my face.

  Misty widened her eyes a little and-leaned toward me. "What?" she whispered.

  "Nothing," I said quickly and looked away. My

  heart had started racing again, beating almost like a

  wild frantic animal in my chest.

  "Come on. We've told you lots of things we

  wouldn't dare tell anyone else," she urged.

  "You know that's true, Cat," Star said. "We

  hardly have a secret left."

  "You can trust us," Misty said. "Really. Who

  are we to talk about someone else, right?"

  I looked back at the three of them. They did

  look sincere.

  My mother's warning returned, but she didn't

  understand how important it was for me to get all this

  out. Look what keeping the ugliness inside her had

  done to her, I thought. I don't want that to happen to

  me.

  "After my father had told me the story of the

  lost baby, I would spy on them," I confessed and

  quickly added, "I was just very curious."

  "So? What did you see?" Star followed. "How did you spy on them?" Misty asked. "All our bedrooms are upstairs, next to each

  other. We have a two-story Spanish colonial with a

  deck running alongside their bedroom and mine." "A Monterey-style cantilevered porch,

  probably," Jade said knowingly. "My father designed

  a house like that and I saw the drawings," she

  explained.

  "Thanks for the information," Star said. "I

  couldn't have lived ten more minutes without it." "If you don't want to learn anything. ." "Let her talk!" Misty exclaimed, excited and anxious for me to continue. "Go ahead, Cat," she

  urged. "I'm listening even if they're not."

  "Usually, when they were both in their

  bedroom, I would hear some muffled conversation for

  a few minutes and then silence. I couldn't help

  thinking about it. I had read some things, knew some

  things."

  "So you went out on the porch and peeked in

  their window?" Star asked impatiently.

  "Yes, but only a few times," I added.

  "And?" she asked, holding up her arms in

  anticipation.

  "My mother sleeps in a nightgown with a

  cotton robe wrapped around her. Every time I looked

  in, she had her back to my father and he had his back

  to her. I never saw them embrace each other or touch

  each other or even kiss each other. I remember

  thinking they were like two strangers sharing a room

  for the night. How could they ever have made a

  baby?"

  "No wonder they broke up. I'm surprised they

  were together as long as they were," Star said. Misty

  and Jade nodded.

  "So your mother had gotten pregnant against

  her will, didn't want to have sex with your father anymore, and therefore, the only way they would ever

  have any children was by adopting," Jade concluded. "Maybe someone else had made her pregnant,"

  Star conjectured.

  "No, I doubt that," I said.

  "Maybe your father practically raped her,"

  Misty suggested, "and that was why she wanted to

  lose the baby."

  "You ought to write soap operas," Star told her

  Misty shrugged and motioned for me to continue. "Why would her father remain married if he

  had no love life?" Jade pondered.

  "Maybe there's something wrong with her

  father now. Maybe he's one of those men who can't

  have sex anymore," Star suggested. "I heard that can

  happen to a man. He's impotent or something," she

  added, insecure about the word.

  "No," I said, a little too fast.

  "What do you mean, no? How do you know?

  Have you seen him with some other woman? Is that

  why they got divorced?"

  "That's it, isn't it?" Misty asked, smiling.

  "Welcome to the club."

  I looked away again, took a deep breath, and

  then looked at them and shook my head.

  "No, I never saw him with anyone else." "So then, how can you be so sure?" Star

  queried. She turned her eyes on me like two tiny

  knives. What she saw in mine made her eyes widen as

  she continued to look at me.

  "I know what she's
saying," she said almost in a

  whisper.

  They were all staring now, a cold look of

  realization moving in a wave from one face to the

  other, and with it, an explosion of pity, fear and

  disgust in their eyes.

  It felt like all the blood in my body was rising

  and gathering at my throat. Suddenly, I couldn't

  swallow, but I couldn't breathe either. I guess I was

  getting whiter and whiter. Doctor Marlowe's face

  erupted into a look of serious concern. She rose from

  her chair.

  "Let's give Cathy a short break," she suggested.

  "Come on, honey. I want you to splash your face in

  cold water and relax for a few moments."

  I felt her helping me to my feet, but I wasn't

  sure they wouldn't just turn to air and let the rest of

  me fold to the floor. Like a sleepwalker, I followed

  Doctor Marlowe out to the bathroom and did what she

  prescribed. The cold water revived me. The blood

  retreated and I could swallow again and breathe. "Feeling better?" she asked.

  I nodded.

  "You don't have to continue, Cathy. Maybe I'm

  rushing you," she suggested.

  I considered it. How comfortable and easy it

  would be for me to agree and go home, return to my

  room and go to bed. I could pull the blanket up to my

  chin and shut my eyes and squeeze my legs against

  my stomach and wait for sleep to open a door into a

  happy place, someplace where I could just drift, float

  on warm clouds and forget and forget and forget. But another part of me wanted to come out, to

  leave the room and be in the real world again. How

  would I ever get back to the real world if I just ran

  home?

  "No," I said. "I want to keep trying." "You sure, honey?" she asked.

  I looked at my face in the mirror. It was still a

  mask. I was tired of looking at it. It was time to tear it

  off and take a chance on what I would find. Would I

  find a little girl again? Had all that had happened

  stopped me from growing up? How silly that would

  be, a little girl's face on a body as mature as mine Or would I simply find a shattered face, cracked like some piece of thin china, the lines running down from my eyes where tears had streaked over my cheeks and chin. How long would it take to mend that face? Would it ever be mended so that the cracks would disappear and not look like scars of

  sadness?

  Was I pretty? Could I ever be pretty? Did I

  have a face that someone could love under this mask?

  Could I ever want to be kissed and touched? Could I

  dream and fantasize like Misty just had and find

  myself in a romantic place?

  Daddy used to tell me so. He would cup my

  face in his hands and kiss the tip of my nose and say I

  was blossoming and soon all of my mirrors would

  reflect my beauty. When he spoke to me like that, I

  felt I was in a fairy tale and maybe I could be

  someone's princess. For a long time, he made me feel

  like I was his special princess, but because of that had

  my ability to love someone been crushed like a small

  flower, smashed into the earth, fading, fading, dying

  away like some distant star given a moment to twinkle

  before it fell back into the darkness forever and ever? No, I didn't want to go home again. I had to

  keep trying.

  "I'll go back," I insisted.

  "Okay," Doctor Marlowe said, "but if you

  change your mind or have any problems, please don't

  hesitate to stop and ask to go home. I don't want to

  lose all the progress we've made to date. That can

  happen if things are rushed sometimes," she said. "Rushed?" I laughed and the sound of that

  laughter seemed strange even to me. I knew it was

  strange and worrisome because Doctor Marlowe

  didn't smile but grimaced instead.

  "Rushed? You know what it's like to look out

  the car window and see girls my age and younger

  walking on the sidewalk with their friends and

  boyfriends, their faces full of joy, their lives full of

  promises? I feel like an animal in a cage. I didn't put

  myself into that cage, either. It's not fair. I want to get

  out, Doctor Marlowe."

  "I know, honey, and I'm going to help you do

  just that."

  I gazed at the bathroom door.

  "They all had bad times, too, but they looked so

  shocked and afraid back there."

  She nodded.

  "One or two of them might not want to stay, but

  somehow, I think you'll all get through it," she said.

  She squeezed my hand and I took a deep breath and

  smiled. "Ready?"

  "Yes. Take me back. I want to focus on all the

  bad things just like you told me to do, and I want to

  put all my anger and strength into smashing them to

  bits forever and ever. Will I ever be able to do that?" She smiled.

  "I know you will," she said firmly enough to

  make me feel confident.

  I walked out and returned to the office. I could

  see they had been talking incessantly about me. The

  expressions on their faces were so different, the

  hardness gone from Star, the smugness gone from

  Jade, and the innocence gone from Misty. We were

  doing what Doctor Marlowe had intended: we were

  changing each other as we changed ourselves. Like

  sisters related not through blood but through adversity

  and turmoil, we gathered around each other and

  warmed each other with our mutual pain and fear. Together, we would help each other kill the

  demons. I was anxious to go on.

  4

  Their eyes were full of many new questions now, questions I was still answering myself. How could all that have happened to me and right under my mother's eyes, too? How is a garden prepared and cultivated to grow black flowers full of thorns and poison? That was where I had found myself planted.

  They waited patiently for me to sit and gather my thoughts. I took a small breath and began.

  "When I was very little nothing seemed as important to my mother as my being able to care for myself. I was only three when she insisted I dress myself. She taught me how to run my own bath and I was given the responsibility to undress, clean and dress myself without her help. She would put out the clothes I was to wear, but she didn't stand around to help me put them on. If I didn't put something on correctly, she sent me back to my room to do it right.

  "Personal hygiene, being in charge of my own body, was the most important thing to her. It was more important than anything else, school, manners, anything.

  "It was hard when I got sick. I remember times when I threw up and she made me undress myself, bathe and dress myself even though I was nauseous and had cramps. I cried out for her, but she would stand outside the door and give me directions, insisting that I learn to guard and protect myself. To be naked in front of anyone, even my parents, was to be avoided at all costs."

  "That's sick," Jade said. "Why would she make her own child ashamed of herself?"

  "My mother doesn't think of it that way," I explained "She thinks you should be ashamed only if someone else looks upon you. Your body is holy, precious, very private."

  "No wonder your parents rarely had sex," Star muttered."

  "My mother doesn't even go to the doctor because of the way she thinks," I revealed. "She's never had a gynecolog
ist examine her and she hates taking me to any doctors. Whenever I was sick, she would try all her old-fashioned remedies first and take me only if they failed."

  "Not getting herself regular checkups is so stupid," Jade said. "She could get cancer or something she might have prevented."

  "What does she do when she's so sick that her remedies don't help?" Misty asked.

  "I don't remember her ever being very sick. She's had colds, but she's in good health, I guess, although lately, she occasionally loses her breath and has to sit for a while almost immediately after she begins to clean. She says it's because of all that's happened and in time, it will pass.

  "Anyway, I grew up with her ideas rolling around in my head like marbles pounding every time someone saw an uncovered part of me. It was especially hard in physical education class, dressing in the locker room. I never ever took a shower in school, not even in parochial school where we had individual showers."

  "What did you expect would happen if someone saw you naked?" Star asked.

  "I don't know. It just . . . sent a chill through me when it happened. I even imagined my mother standing there looking upset."

  "You're going to grow up like her, a weirdo," Star threatened.

  "No, she won't," Doctor Marlowe insisted. She turned to Star. "None of you will be weird."

  "You mean weirder, don't you?" Jade said. "It's already too late to stop weird."

  They all laughed. I felt a little better, stronger. I can do this, I chanted, trying to encourage myself. I can. I must face the demons and destroy them or Star will be right.

  I paused, looked down, thought about how I would continue and then looked up at them.

  "My father didn't have the same ideas about it all," I said, "although he behaved in the same way he did with everything else, which means he didn't argue with my mother about it. Right from the beginning, he pretended it was going to be our little secret, our special secret."

  "What was?" Misty said almost before the words were out of my mouth. She grimaced with confusion.

  "Give her a chance," Jade chastised.

  "Yeah, stop rushing her," Star ordered.

  "I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

  It struck me funny how they were all becoming as protective as Doctor Marlowe.

  "It's all right. I know it's hard to understand," I said, offering Misty a small smile. "I already told you that my father didn't have much to do with raising me. I rarely went anywhere with him without my mother along. He almost never attended any program at school that I participated in. He always went to bed early because he was up for the stock market so early. We didn't spend all that much time together in the evening. By the time we finished dinner and I did my homework, he was often on his way to bed. That was the routine year round."