Psychopomp Magazine Spring 2015 | Page 10

10 | Psychopomp Magazine

least today.

Well hi, Ellie! What can we do for you this afternoon?

Hi, Michelle. I studied her near-black manicure and chipped rhythmically at a scab under my sleeve, waiting for Mother to speak:

Hello! We don’t have an appointment, but I wondered if we could speak to a nurse for a few minutes, just to get a referral.

Of course—just a moment. Michelle spun her nest of grey-blond braids and familiar, flat features, wheeling over to whisper to a nurse walking past the far end of the desk. From where she called out to us her eyes squinched into two spidery asterisks. Mrs. Oliver? Judy will take care of you from here.

Mother slid a stiff palm between my shoulder blades and hissed into my hairline, ushering the stripy alien hide forward for sentencing: Here I am, Lord. For there is nothing covered that shall not be revealed. I squirmed in my clothes and thought of running:

If only he ever really supplied a ram.

I don’t know who was watching us in the waiting room that day, because I never looked up all the way. But I remember Judy blushing and stuffing her dark frizzy curls behind her ears as she led us out of the waiting room into an adjoining hallway for attracting too many troubled stares.

My daughter keeps doing this to herself—do you see?! I don’t know what to do. She was pulling up my pant leg repeatedly and pointing, as if the stretched and pus-rimmed slices there read more easily than words. Judy just nodded, shaky and sterile, rubbing her hands together in the same manic rhythm as Mother’s lyric, interrogative lift. Even if she’s not a danger to her own life, you can do something, right? Send her to Madison Center? Woodlawn? I’ve never believed in all that psycho-babble stuff myself, but I’m running out of options with Ellie. Our pastor has prayed over her so many times already.

Judy reached out to clasp my hand at this point, but aimed too high and cracked