22
Confident and Brash and Defiant
June brings up the expression “a reason, a season, or a lifetime” in their last therapy session before Christmas, and Nanette says, “Booker quotes that in The Bubblegum Reaper. ‘People enter our lives for a reason, a season, or a lifetime.’ ”
“I know, but he didn’t coin the phrase. It’s a cliché,” June says. “And sayings become clichés mostly because they are true. People tend to repeat what they feel is real—authentic.”
“Will Nanette ever find a lifetime person?”
“Maybe,” June says. “We all hope for that.”
“Do you have one?”
“Thought I did once,” June says. “Ended in divorce a few years ago.”
“So love didn’t win in the end.”
“Love is still out there doing her thing. I’m not dead yet, after all. And neither are you.”
“You just used the pronoun her. Do you think love is a woman?” Nanette asks.
“What do you think?”
“Never thought about it before.”
“I tend to think of love as a woman. The male version—Cupid, for instance—always seems so dumb to me. Shooting arrows like love is a weapon. Although Pat Benatar is a woman and she sang ‘Love Is a Battlefield,’ so maybe that theory is stupid. Because I love Pat Benatar.”
“Who’s Pat Benatar?”
“You just managed to make me feel extremely old, Nanette. Look her up on iTunes. You’ll like her.”
“Okay. But Nanette can’t stop talking in third person. People don’t like when she does this. She thinks this is why it is so pleasing to her. Maybe another rebel tendency?”
“Ah, you’ll eventually stop talking in third person, Nanette. Feel free to do so at any time. You’ve made great progress. And I think the experiment is officially a success now.”
“Why? How can you tell?”
“You curse at me less, for one thing. Your parents say you are pleasant with them. You seem far less anxious. You’ve made up with Booker. You have a positive relationship with Oliver. And you no longer call me ‘the rapist,’ which I appreciate more than I should, considering that I’m supposed to be neutral and objective with my patients.”
“What will Nanette do next year? What will she do after high school?”
“Whatever she wants to do.”
“What if she has no idea what she wants?”
“Well, then she’s lucky, because she is young. There I go making references to Pat Benatar songs again. ‘Love Is a Battlefield.’ Anyway, hardly anybody knows what he or she wants when they are young. You’re just being honest about it, maybe.”
Nanette says she wonders if she’s over Alex because she doesn’t think about him much anymore.
“And yet you just brought him up when we were talking about your future. That seems significant to me.”
“How so?”
“You tell me.”
But Nanette cannot. She realizes that she made some sort of unconscious connection between Alex and the subject of the future, but he hasn’t been in contact even once since he was sent away to reform school, which is perhaps even more unforgivable than the violence he unleashed. She had written a letter but never sent it because she had no address and didn’t know who would read her words if she just sent them addressed generically to the reform school.
June says, “It’s okay to love people who aren’t perfect. People who still have work to do on themselves.”
Nanette nods, but she’s not sure she agrees as she watches the snow fall lightly outside the therapy room window.
“Wrigley at the end of the book, when he’s just floating on the water’s surface—when he says he understands Unproductive Ted and vows to quit once and for all. Do you ever feel like that?” Nanette asks.
“Of course,” June says.
“What keeps you going?”
“My work—helping people. I’ve always wanted to go to Japan, too, which I haven’t done just yet but will. Also, ice cream.”
“Ice cream?”
“I really love ice cream. Especially coffee ice cream with chocolate jimmies.”
Nanette doesn’t know what she wants or loves, so she remains quiet.
June says, “I didn’t know I wanted to go to Japan when I was your age. I didn’t know I wanted to be a therapist, either. I thought I was going to be a surgeon, mostly because my father was a surgeon. You pick up goals and hopes along the way. Don’t worry, there are more in your future. You’ll see. And you will change. Change can be good. Caterpillar to butterfly.”
Nanette wonders why her parents have to pay three hundred dollars an hour for her to hear such reassuring positive words, even if they are clichés.
Why doesn’t anyone at her school say things like this?
She fears that June is paid to lie—or say what everyone else cannot.
Nonetheless, Nanette likes June.
She really does.
Later that night, June sends Nanette an e-mail with a link to a YouTube video. It’s Pat Benatar performing the song “Invincible” live. In the video, Pat Benatar is confident and brash and defiant and encourages Nanette to take control of her life. Watching Pat Benatar sing and move is empowering, and Nanette can see why June loves this performer. Nanette pictures June singing “Invincible” in the mirror all through her divorce, trying to channel Pat Benatar’s swagger.
Nanette watches the video several times and then downloads Pat Benatar’s Greatest Hits.