Intensive Therapy Read online

  Flora Márquez Arrestia was the heiress to Duke’s, a family-owned restaurant chain founded by her father, Luis José Márquez, a Cuban refugee who made omelets and sandwiches for years in West Chester. By 2004, his business had expanded to seven locations in the Philadelphia suburbs.

  Donato Arrestia, an Italian tenor whose opera career went nowhere, settled down with Flora after years of affairs with his students. Donato assumed control of the restaurants when Luis retired. The Arrestias had one daughter.

  Duke’s was predominantly a cash business. When an audit revealed a three-hundred-and-fifty-thousand-dollar discrepancy, Donato installed security cameras, which caught the operations manager, Horace Barlow, raiding cash registers at all seven branches. A private detective tailed Barlow to the Atlantic City casinos where he lost much more than he won. However, Barlow was never charged, because the security films were inconclusive and Duke’s bank deposits didn’t fully correspond with the missing loot.

  Someone besides Horace—most likely Donato—was skimming, too, Victoria realized.

  Barlow sued his former employers for lost wages, defamation of character, and age discrimination, retaining flamboyant lawyer Denise Mather. Martin and Victoria quickly realized that publicity-hound Mather—already a talking head on CNN—would relish having a bully pulpit from which to broadcast her indignation over ageism, her cause de jour. So the real agenda behind Schone-Braun’s involvement was to muzzle Barlow and Mather and prevent a scandal that might expose Duke’s dirty dealings and implicate the accountant.

  “How can they think we’re going to pay him?” Flora Arrestia asked Victoria. “We have it all on tape.”

  “The tapes are going to be a problem,” Victoria counseled. “Barlow’s attorney is very shrewd. She’ll turn them against you—that’s what I would do—alleging you harassed Barlow into quitting so you wouldn’t have to pay his benefits and pension. We cannot have you acting outraged in front of the jury. That’ll make you look worse in their eyes. Remember, we want the jury to believe how pained you were by Barlow’s behavior, how hard it was to accept that someone you trusted would steal from you. It had to hurt, didn’t it?”

  Victoria saw something in Mrs. Arrestia’s eyes. Had she and Horace been lovers? Did Horace blackmail Flora, taking the money as a payoff to keep him from telling Donato? Or was Barlow, whose arrest was splashed all over the newspapers, out for revenge against Donato, a tacit partner-in-crime who had ratted him out? No matter what, the case smelled.

  Victoria prompted Flora, “Horace Barlow wasn’t an employee; he was family. The pain of being robbed by someone you trusted—this is what the jury has to see on your face.” Victoria imagined supplying Flora with a bottle of fake tears. “We want the jury to feel your pain—the tapes, the detective; you did that because you didn’t want to believe it.”

  Looking at Flora’s face, Victoria wondered, Are you acting your part, too?

  For the rest of the meeting, Victoria made notes about jury selection, the key as she saw it to settling the case before it deteriorated into a media circus.

  She was still preoccupied with Melinda. What would her daughter do next?

  The ten o’clock deposition at Attorney Buddinger’s office was even worse. Geologist Jonathan Ramey presented diagram after diagram about the underpinnings of a newly constructed Bucks County outdoor amphitheater whose foundation was crumbling. To rebuild would cost a fortune. Everyone involved in the design and construction blamed each other. Schone and Braun represented the architects.

  Victoria, who usually relished thinking on her feet, spent three grueling hours defusing Buddinger’s attacks on her witness’s qualifications, disrupting the flow of his intimidating questions by objecting every time Buddinger raised his voice. By the end she felt like a tenth grader expected to compare and contrast Elizabethan poets. Her mind wandered from Flora Arrestia to Martin’s inconvenience taking Melinda to school. Did Donato and Flora have an understanding, an arrangement? Could the same be said of Martin and her?

  Back at her desk after the deposition, flowers from Martin awaited, along with an invitation for a late lunch at Bookbinder’s in Old City. “Meet me at 2:00 PM,” the message said in Martin’s handwriting, his signature above a Cupid’s arrow. That’s nice, Victoria thought, wondering if Martin had noticed the negligee and got his hopes up for a romantic evening. Although she really wanted to, her heart just wasn’t in it.

  Victoria tried to stay in the mood, but she couldn’t. Soon she and Martin were squabbling over the Duke’s case, from which Victoria was sure Schone and Braun would never receive a dime, seeing as the brouhaha in the papers had reduced Duke’s business to a trickle, and the detectives, video surveillance experts, and forensic accountants had all but bankrupted the company.

  “Why are we doing this stupid case?” Victoria asked over her tea.

  “Because Dad’s been very good to us, Vic,” Martin said. “He could have cut me off years ago when I left Braun Brothers to become a lawyer. Instead, Dad gave us the money to start Schone and Braun.”

  “You’re right. And I do want to help your father,” Victoria said.

  “If Barlow doesn’t go quietly, everyone who had anything to do with Duke’s will wind up under a microscope. The fallout could tarnish the reputation of Dad’s most loyal friend. You know how touchy it is.”

  “That could happen anyway,” Victoria said.

  “True, Vic, very true, but Dad wouldn’t have asked us to get involved unless he trusted us. I owe him a lot, Vic. This is the first time he’s ever asked for our help.” Martin took hold of Victoria’s hands. “I love my father. I love him very much. He loves you, too. When I brought you home for the first time, Dad saw your sparkle—how you made me come alive. If it hadn’t been for you, I might still be languishing in the family business; I would have never have gone to law school, never made a life of my own. He saw how good we were for each other. Dad wanted us to be together—to have a family.”

  Some family, Victoria reflected silently, Melinda weighing heavily on her mind. For the moment, hers and Martin’s courtship seemed like it belonged to someone else. She squeezed Martin’s hand with as much affection as she could muster. “Even so,” she said. “All this work for nothing.”

  “Is that what’s really bothering you?”

  “No, you’re right, Martin. Melinda has me incredibly upset. If anything ever happened to Gregory …” she paused to consider what she was saying, “or to Melinda. I don’t know what I’d do. I have to speak with her when we get home.”

  “Are you sure you should to do that?”

  “I’m not sure about anything Martin!” Victoria flared. “But I can’t just sit by and let her destroy everything I’ve worked for.”

  “Destroy? Isn’t that going too far? And what about me? I’m part of this family, too.”

  “I didn’t mean it like that, Martin,” Victoria said. “But you have no idea what’s going through my mind. I went through a terrible time in college. A total nightmare. I thought it was over. The Arrestia case reminds me of Bleak House, the Dickens novel. A property dispute destroyed a family and drained the estate. One of the heirs couldn’t cope. He killed himself. I grew up in a bleak house. I can’t live in one again.”

  “I remember that book.”

  “That book changed my life.”

  “The girl’s guardian was a real mensch. His name is on the tip of my tongue.”

  “John Jarndyce. The case was Jarndyce versus Jarndyce. I remember it like yesterday.”

  9

  Monday, October 12, 1981

  Victoria’s class before therapy on Mondays was nineteenth-century British literature. They were reading Charles Dickens’s Bleak House, a story that gripped Victoria as if the novel had been written about her.

  Her preoccupation with tall buildings had not recurred since the first session, but she had descended into a pervasive sadness. She found solace in talking about it to Dr. Speller, but her mood remained black.


  “Why am I so sad?” she began that day’s session.

  “You’re mourning,” the doctor replied.

  “For whom? For what?”

  “I’m not sure. Why not do what we always do? Let your thoughts come freely and say whatever comes to mind. We’ll figure it out.”

  “I never told you how Bleak House ended,” Victoria said. “Esther’s guardian considered marrying her but stepped aside to let her marry a dashing physician who had loved her for years. Because of her smallpox scars, Esther believed no man would ever want her. But in the end, her guardian encouraged the relationship between the younger people and outfitted a cozy cottage for them.”

  Dr. Speller opened his file cabinet’s bottom drawer to prop his feet on.

  She continued, “The night I finished it, I dreamed about the book. I didn’t want it to end. In my dream, I was at a wedding on a spring day at a park. I assume it was Esther’s. A string quartet was playing. People were dancing. I looked all over, but I couldn’t find the bride. I wanted to see her face, to see how she felt about the groom.

  “My parents were there. A bartender served drinks to my father, who was conversing animatedly with someone. Lorraine was in another group. I felt shunned, like they were ashamed to introduce me. Grandma was there, too, carrying a gold necklace for the bride. I followed her, hoping she would leave it where I could pick it up.

  “When I tried to dance, my head spun, and I felt nauseous. A man talked with me. He made me feel better.

  “In the dream, I thought, ‘This can’t be my family’s wedding, because we don’t have that many relatives.’ It felt like the hosts had invited me as an afterthought, not because they really wanted me. I woke up sad, very sad.” Victoria eyes welled with tears. “How long will I feel like this? It seems like it’s gone on forever.”

  “Perhaps your dream can explain your feelings,” Dr. Speller said. “Let’s start with the park. Are there any thoughts, memories, daydreams, or associations with it?”

  “It reminds me of Fairmont Park in the spring. I hate being cooped up all winter, so I go walking in the park the first weekend I can. I visit Grandma Jeanine. She lives on Ben Franklin Parkway near Boathouse Row. I usually go by myself, but I always wish I had company. Talking about it makes me sad and lonely.”

  “It’s a memory about loneliness.”

  Victoria reached for a tissue. “Usually it’s chilly, and after a bad winter, there are grayish mounds of snow that won’t melt completely until the spring thaw, until the crocuses bloom. I love flowers. When I have my own home, I want lots of flowers. It looks like the grass won’t ever start growing. The ground is muddy, and my feet sink in.”

  “Was the park in your dream sad?”

  “No, it was warmer, brighter. The grass had turned green. There was a warm breeze. That’s right! I must have been wearing the clothes I got in Florence—Lorraine hated everything I chose. Shopping with her was torture.

  “I just thought of something. Remember that leather jacket? Lorraine bought it for me the morning we climbed the Duomo—at a fancy leather-goods store across from the Medici Palace. Florence was warm that day; I remember beads of sweat on my forehead, like in my dream.

  “The more clothes we tried on, the more excited Lorraine became. She didn’t care how much things cost, which I knew would make my father mad. We picked two things for me: a short leather jacket, and a mid-calf leather skirt. In the wedding dream, I must have been wearing them. Lorraine and I finished shopping early that afternoon.”

  “Like in the dream?”

  Victoria nodded. “On the way to the checkout—and this really happened—I saw a coat I thought Grandma would like, but when I mentioned getting her a present, my mother’s face contorted with rage.”

  “Do you know why?” Dr. Speller asked.

  “When Jeanine was younger, she ran the fine jewelry department at John Wanamaker’s. Her father was a goldsmith. Lorraine always maintained that Jeanine took the job to get away from her, but she just wanted her own life.”

  “As for your mother’s anger about getting your grandmother a gift?”

  “It ruined the moment. When we tried on clothes, Lorraine sparkled like a diamond, but then her whole persona changed. When the bill came, she looked at me like I was a pig. When we rejoined my father, she blamed the high cost on me, saying I had demanded she buy the clothes. Both my parents barely spoke to me that afternoon. It makes my blood boil to think about it.”

  “You felt angry at them.”

  “Angry? I was furious. But also confused, very confused. I kept asking myself what I did wrong. I must have done something wrong. All I wanted to do was disappear.” She went silent. A moment later, she blinked.

  “Did something just happen, Victoria?” Dr. Speller asked.

  “That explains it,” she said. “I can’t believe it took me this long to see.”

  “To see what?”

  “How I felt at the top of the Duomo—that’s when my fears about tall buildings began. Thinking about it makes me nauseous, like I’m really sick.”

  “That’s what happens when you come in touch with powerful feelings. Trust me. You’ll feel better when you say it out loud.”

  “I felt how easy it would be to climb over the stone wall of the observation deck and disappear. That began all those bad thoughts.”

  “They enraged you,” Dr. Speller said. “They pushed you over the edge, metaphorically speaking.”

  Stunned by his interpretation, Victoria couldn’t speak. “How come I never looked at it that way?” she said several moments later.

  “Because you needed to understand yourself better. That’s what we’re doing here. You’re searching for yourself—like the bride you can’t find—at someone else’s party, not yours.”

  “Who would want to come to mine? I don’t know anybody I feel that close to.”

  “That needs to change.”

  “I liked what you just said about the dream. It makes me look at things differently. I felt that way the first time I told you about Esther’s scarred face. Right then, I felt my childhood ending. Will I ever stop being so sad?”

  “Does anything in your dream resonate with the sad feeling?”

  “The yearning to find the bride. It feels like heartbreak.”

  “I think your heartbreak comes from looking for love in the wrong place.” Dr. Speller paused, then added, “One thing’s for sure.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You won’t find it in Abington.”

  “You’re right about that. Everything feels so up in the air. I don’t know where I belong anymore.”

  “I know where you belong,” Dr. Speller said. “You belong here, in therapy.”

  10

  Monday, November 2, 1981

  On the first Monday in November, Victoria awoke in a good mood from a dream she could not remember. One thing was certain; her sadness had lifted.

  Working on dreams in therapy had become enjoyable with Dr. Speller as a trusted ally. I have to remember that dream. I want to tell him, Victoria said to herself. But the harder she tried, the more it eluded her, like grasping for the vapor she exhaled on crisp mornings.

  Carol Hancock, her dormitory suitemate, noticed the change immediately. “Well, well, you’re all smiles this morning,” she said. “Most mornings, you drag yourself around like the boy in Peanuts with a cloud over his head.”

  “It’s that bad?”

  “’Fraid so,” Carol said. “Are you mad at me? You’ve been avoiding me.”

  Victoria felt it was time to say what was on her mind, even though it might upset Carol. That, Victoria had learned in therapy. “The truth is that I think I’m disappointing you because I don’t come along when you invite me to mixers and fraternity parties. I know you’re trying to include me, but the boys are so infantile—bragging about Daddy’s Pep Boys franchises and what they’re going to do after graduation. They really turn me off. And they ply me with alcohol and marijuana—wh
ich makes me nauseous—and try to get me in the sack. Not that I don’t want to sleep with a man. I’m no prude. I think about sex as much anyone, probably more. But I want someone older, someone who knows what he’s doing. I like that you care about me and want me to have friends, but I don’t want to be part of that scene.”

  “I was just trying to be a big sister,” Carol said.

  “I know, but it can’t depend on me doing what you want. I’ve had a lifetime of that. My mother is forever telling me what to think and how to act. I can’t do that anymore, Carol. I hope you still want to be my friend,” Victoria said as if she were facing an executioner.

  “Are you out of your mind? Of course I want to be friends! My sister went here, and she showed me how to have a good time at Penn. I wanted to do that for you. I’m glad you told me. You’re such a good person, Victoria. We’ll always be friends. Besides,” Carol confessed, “you’re not the first person who ever said I’m too pushy.”

  They laughed and hugged. It was the first time Victoria had embraced a friend so affectionately, which brought the previous night’s dream so close to mind she could almost taste it.

  Bursting with pride, Victoria skipped down the hall toward room 921 that afternoon. “You’re going to be happy to hear what I did today,” she told Dr. Speller. “Something I’ve never done before.”

  He returned her smile. “Terrific. Let’s hear it.”

  “I had an honest talk with my roommate. It was about something stupid. I knew she was coming from a good place, but I didn’t want to keep up an act. So, I told her how I felt.”

  “Good for you! What was the ‘something stupid’?”

  “She wanted me to go to parties with her, and I felt obligated, because I was afraid she wouldn’t like me if I said no thanks. It sounds ridiculous when I say it out loud.”

  “Ridiculous?”

  “My mother is always saying how ridiculous I am.”