Shelly Small had been raised to speak about herself as though she was the most interesting thing in the world. Listening to her, Dottie almost admired this. Because even having—perhaps—caught Dottie’s desire to laugh, Shelly could not be stopped. She was speaking now of the people in this town where their lake house was, how these people had been pleasant and welcoming before the renovation. Now neighbors drove by without even waving. One had stopped, rolled down his window, and accused her of spoiling the lakefront with a McMansion. “Oh, honestly,” Shelly said. “Imagine such foolishness. We kept the original footprint!”
Dottie stood up and walked to her desk, pretending that something there required her attention, all this to avoid having Shelly see her face. “Sorry, but if I don’t put this bill on the top of my papers it won’t get paid.” Dottie rustled some papers and added, “I don’t believe Annie said any of those things about you. She doesn’t sound like a person who would say that—at all.”
“But of course she said it!” Shelly wailed from her chair in the living room.
“That your house was your penis?” Dottie didn’t often say the word “penis,” and she enjoyed it. She came back around from behind her desk and returned to sit near Shelly again. “Does that really sound like what this Annie would say? ‘David, this house is Shelly’s penis.’？”
Shelly Small’s cheeks were quite red. “I don’t know.”
“Well, true enough,” Dottie agreed. “You don’t. But I think—if you really think about it—well, isn’t saying that the house was your penis something a psychiatrist would say? Think about it, Mrs. Small. Who thinks in those terms? Why, my friends and I might say things about other people we know, but we don’t go around saying their house is their penis. Look at this house. This is my house. Would you say to Mr. Small—would you say to Dr. Small tonight, this house, this bed-and-breakfast, is that woman’s penis?”
And right then the door opened and Dr. Small walked in with all the breezes of an Illinois autumn surrounding him. “How are you, ladies?” he asked, unbuttoning his coat. “Shelly?” As though the poor wife should not sit and chat with a B&B proprietor. And off she followed him to their room.
What Dottie had not understood until the Smalls came to stay was that there were different experiences she attended to in this business that made her feel either connected to or used by other people. For example, there had been the dear, dear man who came in one night about dinnertime—a man almost but not quite her age—and took his room and then decided he’d rather watch television, and she’d sat with him watching one of those British comedies—oh, Dottie thought they were funny, and she tried not to laugh out loud since this man was not laughing—when she became aware that he was in serious distress. He began to make a noise that she had never heard before; it was not entirely unsexual in its sound, but it was a sound of terrible pain. Unspeakable pain, she often thought later. He mimed to her, as she quietly asked questions, and Dottie found it remarkable how much they were able to understand each other. First thing, she’d asked if he needed a doctor, and he shook his head and waved a hand in a way that indicated this was nothing a doctor could help with. Tears began slipping sloppily down the man’s deeply creased face; oh, bless his poor soul, she always thought, remembering him. Okay, she had said, and she sat on the couch next to him, and he looked at her so searchingly, so deeply, she had never been looked at by any man so deeply, she thought, or looked at a man that deeply herself, and he was positively mute, even though earlier, asking for a room and then permission to watch television, he had most certainly been able to use words. She stayed calm and made statements he could either agree with by nodding or disagree with by a dismal shake of his head. For example, she said: “I’m going to stay right here to make sure you’re all right.” And he nodded, those poor tired eyes searching hers. She said: “Something seems to have happened to you, but you will be okay, I think.” She said: “I’m not frightened by this, just so you know.” And that caused a sudden extra burst of effluvia from his eyes, and he squeezed her hand hard enough to almost break it. Then he held up the same hand in what Dottie took to be a gesture of apology. She said: “No worries, I know you meant no harm.” He shook his head sadly in agreement. Dottie could no longer recall every part of this, but the two of them did, it seemed to her, communicate quite well, all things considered—and apparently there were many things to consider!—and she was able, by asking, to find out that at midnight he could take a pill and sleep for five hours. “All righty,” she said. “But not too many pills, am I correct?” He had nodded. And in this way—really, it was a remarkable event—they had spent the evening together while he seemed to wash out his very soul in front of her. At midnight she brought him water and walked him to his room and told him where her room was should he need her, and then she had raised an index finger and said, “Not an invitation, which I’m sure you understand, but I always feel it’s best to be clear about things,” and he had almost laughed, with real mirth, she could see his eyes relax, and they had this sort of not-out-loud but quite riotous laughter about what she had said. He left at seven in the morning: a tall man, and not altogether bad-looking now that his face was washed by rest, and he had said “I thank you very much” with embarrassment and sincerity. She did not ask if he needed breakfast, she understood the awkwardness of his being served eggs and toast by a woman who had seen something she had not been meant to see, that no one had been meant to see.