In the elevator’s front mirror paneling, she and I made eye contact. She rolled her eyes and mouthed two words. Of course. Of course he would assume she wasn’t one of them, she meant, though it seemed to me an honest enough mistake, since she was outfitted to go skiing.
The doors opened to a lobby roaming with men yoked with lanyards. I followed Tina to the large poster board that read Welcome, Healthcare Professionals of America! Tina ran a finger down the day’s schedule until she found the listing and location for her breakout session. Offhandedly, I noticed that members of the Forensic Anthropology Group had been instructed to meet at the valet station. Their bus was departing promptly at nine a.m. It struck me as curious then—a forensic anthropology group. Was that something to do with horticulture? But what would that have to do with a medical conference?
“We have ten minutes,” Tina said, twisting and slapping the face on her clunky man’s watch, as though the battery had gone out.
“Do you want any coffee before we head in?” I asked her.
Tina shook her hands out, like a runner loosening up before a race. “Nuh-uh. I’m too jittery already. If you want to go grab some, I’ll wait here for you.”
The man from the elevator was blocking the table. “Excuse me,” I said. He took an exaggerated, almost scornful step to the side, but then he got a better look at me, and I felt a distinct shift in his energy.
“Not sure how you take it, but they’re out of milk,” he told me. “Someone is bringing out a fresh pitcher.”
“I burn my tongue without milk,” I said.
He held up his mug in solidarity. “Are you here with the psychiatric group?”
I could feel the weight of the tweed skirt on my legs, its warm, important swaddle. “I’m with my friend. She’s getting her license.”
“I did think, what are the odds that all three women on the elevator are here for the conference?” he mused, and I retracted the generous thought that he had made an honest mistake. “Smart move to include the shrinks this year. Healthy mind, healthy body, and that’s coming from a cardiologist.” He patted his ticker with a laugh. “Ah, here is the milk.” He reached for the pitcher, the fabric of his jacket setting off a spark as it brushed the wool of my sweater. “I asked for low-fat. Better for the figure and the heart.”
* * *
I’d envisioned an auditorium with a stage, velvet curtain drawn, prop couch on which the mock patient would lie, prop chair on which Tina would psychoanalyze her. Of course, Tina’s patient would be a woman. Women generally had more troubles than men, and it was the men, generally, who were trained to treat them. It was the way of things at Eastern State, and it was the way of things in that narrow banquet room painted to resemble a European chalet, no stage and no women but the two of us, that smelled of morning breath and aftershave.
At the check-in table, the moderator introduced himself as Dr. Harold Bradbar and gave Tina a name tag to fill out, along with copies of her patient’s medical transcripts to study. He indicated my coffee mug and asked if I’d like a refill, lifting a hammered silver carafe. I was wondering when Folgers became the official sponsor of libidinous old men when he said to Tina, “Could you run this back to the lobby and get us some more before we start?”
“I’m so sorry,” Tina said with a winning smile, “but I need to study this.”
I reached for the handle. “I can do it,” I volunteered.
Tina grabbed my arm and tugged me away. “You can’t either, remember?” As she muscled me to the back row, she said under her breath, “Frances warned me they would do that.”
“Do what?”
“Ask you to get coffee. Take minutes. Secretarial stuff. You have to say no, or they’ll never see you as one of them. But do it nicely, or you’re a lib bitch.”
“Oh,” I said, feeling thick.
“It’s okay,” Tina said as we took our seats. “I would have happily trotted back to the lobby if no one had warned me first. Helping is a bad habit I’m trying to break.”
“Helping people is a bad habit?”
“Feeding the hungry is helping people,” Tina said. “Getting their coffee is servitude.” She bowed her head over the transcript. “I really do have to study this now.”
* * *
When it was Tina’s turn, an amused hush fell over the room, as though the polar bear had climbed out of the water at the zoo and we were all waiting to see what it would do. It was so quiet you could hear the silky fabric of Tina’s blue dress swishing between her thighs as she made her way to the front of the room; there was something faintly vulgar about that sound and where it was coming from, and Tina was pink-cheeked by the time she took her seat.