The Break-Up Retreat(69)

Martina looks at her without speaking, and Katarina continues, voice faltering slightly.

“And, well, of course I’m excited to start talking about . . . well, about my issues.”

She looks around the circle.

“I look forward to hearing what you think I should do. I like getting feedback. It’s so easy to get stuck in your own head otherwise.”

“Stop that,” Martina snaps, and Katarina flinches.

“Stop . . . stop what?” Her shoulders draw together.

“Stop trying to please me,” Martina orders her. “Stop acting the way you think I want you to act.”

“I’m not,” Katarina whispers.

Martina laughs. It’s not a kind laugh; it’s the laugh of a delighted child pushing a pin through a still-wriggling butterfly.

“I don’t know what you want me to say.” Katarina sounds helpless, and I feel it echoing in me.

Stuck. We’re all stuck here. There is nothing we can do.

“That’s your problem,” Martina says. There is no feigned softness left, now; the facade has fallen.

She turns, and says:

“Clara,” with sudden warmth.

“Yes?” Clara snaps to attention.

“How are you feeling right now?”

“About Katarina?” Clara asks.

Martina smirks.

“No,” she says. “Not yet. About everything. About the weather. About the breakfast.”

“Bad,” Clara answers, immediately. “It’s cold. I’m uncomfortable. I barely slept last night. I’m worried about the storm. And I’m irritated with Katarina.”

Martins turns to Katarina, eyebrows ever so slightly raised.

“See? Clara is frustrated. She is uncomfortable. I think everyone is. You had to eat a cold, stale breakfast. It’s damp, and rainy, and dark. Of course you’re unhappy with it. So why can’t you just say so?”

Katarina is visibly shrinking in her chair.

“I’m sorry,” she says.

“No!” Martina explodes, her voice bouncing of the walls and seeming to multiply. “No, don’t apologize! Stop apologizing! Have you ever stood up for yourself in your life?”

“Yes.” Katarina’s lower lip is quivering. “No, I mean.”

Martina slowly leans back in her chair, crossing her arms over her chest. All the while, she’s staring at Katarina.

“Tell me how you feel right now.” She makes it sound like a test. Like a challenge.

As though this is her final chance, and there will be a price to pay if she gives the wrong answer.

“I feel . . .” Katarina whispers. “I feel . . . sad.”

“Sad?” Martina repeats. “Really?”

Katarina is staring down at her lap.

“No,” Martina snaps. “You feel angry. At me. For doing this to you. For putting you on the spot.”

“I’m not mad at you.” Katarina is speaking very quietly. “You’re trying to help me.”

“Like your parents tried to help you?” Martina raises her eyebrows.

Katarina looks up. There is a flash of some intensely felt emotion in her eyes but only for a fraction of a second.

“I’m sad,” she repeats, voice slightly stronger now.

Martina looks around.

“Do we think she’s sad?”

“No,” Clara jumps in again, hungry and eager. “She’s angry. She just doesn’t want to admit it.”

“Why do you think that is?” Martina asks Clara.

“She’s worried we won’t like her.” There is something sharp and raw in Clara’s face. Excitement, tinged with fear. Like she’s smelling blood.

Yesterday, she was the prey; today, she gets to be the predator.

This is all wrong. Someone has to put a stop to this.

“She wants to be liked so badly .” Clara says the last word so forcefully I see spit flying from her lips. “She wants us to think she’s all sweet, and nice, and caring—and she’s scared of being anything else, or saying anything that might offend someone, so instead she just does nothing. She never acts. She only reacts.”

“No, I don’t,” Katarina protests.

Clara draws a deep breath, as if to keep going, but then, out of the corner of my eye, I see Leyla putting her hand on Clara’s arm and shaking her head, and Clara deflates.

Martina doesn’t catch it. She’s turned back to Katarina.

“Now how do you feel?” she asks.

“I don’t know,” Katarina mumbles.

“Really?” Martina asks. “How do you feel about Clara? About what she just said?”

Katarina chances a glance up at Clara.

“I guess she’s just saying how . . . she feels.” She swallows, audibly. “What she thinks. That doesn’t make it true. But maybe it feels true to her.”

Martina is sitting very, very still. Her back is straight, her hands clamped down at the sides of the chair.

The lamp in the corner is casting her shadow to the left, long and spindly, climbing up the wall. It’s quivering in the light, as though it might start moving of its own accord.

“Okay,” she finally says, nodding slowly. “Okay.”