"You don’t have to hold yourself like a crate of eggs. God hasn’t dropped you yet, now has he?"

Theresa Cubbins stood nearly six feet tall, and she heard the echo of her mother telling her not to stoop. But no, the voice had a smile in it. It was gentle and encouraging. It’s owner was a short, sturdy woman with reddish brown hair brightened at the temples with silver stripes.

"Welcome to Oak Lawn Place," the woman said. She stepped out of an office door and bustled toward the foyer, offering her hand. Theresa put down her cloth suitcase and cautiously reached out. The woman’s touch was surprisingly firm.

"I’m Twinkie Kahane, born Mary Margaret and renamed by my children’s friends, who think I’m a softy. And you must be Theresa."

"Yes," said Theresa. I guess I’m where I’m supposed to be, then." She surveyed the hallway beyond Twinkie. "Either I’m feeling better than usual, or this place is bright and clean."

Twinkie nodded. "Yes, you’re in a good place either way. Whenever I visit the state hospital, it seems to me that a grey cloud of poverty and hopelessness hangs over everything." Theresa looked at her closely. "Yes, I see that sort of thing, too. It’s okay to see the world differently from the way most people do. Okay for me, anyway. I was raised in a large Irish Catholic family in Chicago, and my grandmother, from the old-country, told my parents that I had second sight. I was about five at the time.

"All children have ‘second sight,’ I think, ways of knowing the world that most adults have forgotten down to hunches and picking up vibes. My grandmother just gave me permission to keep seeing that way. And you have my permission to keep seeing things—how mood influences perception, for example. That’s a good insight."

"But you can’t tell everyone that," said Theresa.

"No, you can’t," said Twinkie. "That’s common sense. My grandmother liked common sense, too. Now: we’ve got some forms for you to fill out." Brusquely, confidently, she turned and led the way.

Theresa picked up her suitcase. "I’m Catholic, too," she said. "I think it saved my life."

…

Under orders to make herself at home and then wrap some silverware, Theresa looked over the lunch room, matched an annoying whirr to a juice dispenser, went to it, and filled a glass with orange juice. A bearded, bespectacled man of about 40 came through the door, waved, and strode toward her. His face offered an interesting mix of scowl and laugh lines. His jeans and blue oxford dress shirt were stained with sweat and bore a light layer of sawdust.

"Hi, I’m Hugh Longacre," he said. "And you are fresh off the bus from…?"

"Terrell," said Theresa.

"Terrell State University, where they call the grounds ‘the campus.’ I graduated from there two months ago, myself, with a degree in abnormal psychology. Welcome to Oak Lawn Finishing School and Home for Recently Divorced Women.

"The staff," he said in answer to her lifted eyebrows. "Almost all female and recently divorced. My name-tag is ‘paranoid personality’—I’m not paranoid, I just come across that way. What did they stick you with?"

"Manic Depressive," she said. "Bipolar Illness, they’re calling it now. The hospital shrink said I was far too healthy to be a schizophrenic." They had wandered over to the table with the silverware on it.

"I must be so uptight I’m suffering from brain freeze," said Theresa. "Ms. Kahane showed me how to wrap the silverware not thirty minutes ago and, poof, now I can’t remember."

"Silver?" said Hugh, "Looks like second-hand stainless to me. Look, half of the people here are from another planet and the other half don’t care. Nobody’s going to complain to management, ‘My flatware isn’t wrapped right.’"

Theresa watched herself feel like a four-year-old who had just been slapped. "Do you despise everyone," she asked him, "or just yourself?"

For the first time he looked directly into her eyes, a man who had been kicked in the face. "Ouch," he said. Then he smiled. "You’re good. You’re very good. Longacre Incorporated, an equal opportunity despiser, a danger to self and others. What did you say your name was?"

"I didn’t because you didn’t ask. Theresa Cubbins."

"Okay, Theresa Cubbins, you’re right, I’m wrong, this is silverware and there’s a right way to wrap it. Let’s see, how do they wrap it in restaurants? Knife, fork, and spoon on top—that look about right? Here we go," he sighed. "Let’s show the world what a bright future we have in food services."

"It’s automatic with you, Isn’t it?" said Theresa. "The put-down, I mean."

"Who’s putting down who here?" said Hugh. "I’m trying to impress you with my ironic wit, all right? You’re pretty and intelligent, and I want to impress you. And all I have to offer is my sense of humor, such as it is. Can you see it as that, rather than as a symptom of a personality defect? Give me a chance. Please."

"Sorry. It never occurred to me that you were showing off for the new girl. I’m glad you think I’m pretty, but that’s a little scary for me."

"How’s that?"

"Men are dangerous. They leave without warning, and you don’t know why, but it must be all your fault. I don’t want to talk about it right now. Are you a carpenter? You smell of freshly cut wood."

…

Theresa was smoothing the sheets on her just-made bed when she heard her roommates coming down the hall. She guessed it was them because their voices matched objects in the room. The soft, smoke-cured voice went with the framed photo of two blonde children and the containers of Haldol and Vivactil on one dresser . The nasal, edgy voice went with the thirteen-inch TV and the Ativan on the other dresser. She met them at the door.

"Hi," she said. "I’m Theresa Cubbins, your new roommate."

"Hi, Theresa," said the soft voice. "I’m Rose Phelan and this is Liz Kaplan. We’re going to school to become computer wizards."

"Hi," said Liz. "Time to knock down an Ativan, kick back, and relax." She took a thermos from her tote bag, and flipped on the small color television to helicopter noise, then a camera panning white fragments floating on dark waves, with voice-over: "World War II hero Earl Mountbatten was killed today when IRA terrorists blew up his family fishing boat off the coast of Ireland. Mountbatten was the last Viceroy of India and…" She flipped it off, shook a small white tablet into her hand and washed it down with a swallow from the thermos. She and Rose looked at each other for a moment, then at Theresa.

"You look all right," said Liz. "You haven’t killed a husband or anything lately, have you?" Theresa laughed and shook her head.

"Private joke," said Rose. "Our last roommate let us know…"

"It just came out in passing," said Liz.

"…that she had killed her husband."

"Or thought she had," said Liz.

"Or wished she had," said Rose. "With her, you couldn’t tell."

"Very stiff," said Liz. "And her eyes—You know, the cartoon maniac, the wide stare?" Liz paused for effect. "She now has a job as a live-in baby-sitter."

"Good Lord," said Theresa.

"So, in case you’re wondering why your bed is shoved into the corner and separated from our beds by two dressers," said Rose, "that’s why."

"We can change that," said Liz. "Beds against this wall, dressers against that wall, one big slumber party. What do you think?"

"I like the idea of having a little space to myself," said Theresa. "I’ve been living on a hospital ward for the last three months, a dozen beds side by side and no privacy at all."

"Terrell?" said Rose.

"Yes. Terrible Terrell. Have you been there?"

"No, they had an opening on Parkland’s eighth floor when my husband had me hospitalized."

"Rose really got screwed," said Liz. "Tell her."

"My mother died and I got depressed," said Rose. "And drank, I’m sorry to say. For a long time, months. ‘Maybe you need to see a doctor, Honey.’ So we went to a psychiatrist. ‘The doctor says you need to go to a hospital, Honey. To regulate your medication’ ‘Well, all right. But who will take care of the children?’ ‘It’s okay, Honey. I’ll take care of the kids.’ After about a week in the hospital, I’m feeling pretty good. Doing therapy, going to AA. They tell me it was mostly stress. Then Saturday my husband shows up. ‘Here are some divorce papers, Honey.’"

"Oh, shit," said Theresa.

"This is the best part," said Liz: "They gave her the diagnosis Displaced Housewife."

"Should have been Re-placed Housewife," said Rose. "He moved me out and moved his girlfriend in right behind me. ‘To take care of the kids.’ There’s no question about child custody, of course. The mother’s in a mental hospital."

"And you can tell she belongs in a mental hospital," said Liz, "because she’s crying and crying and can’t seem to stop."

"But enough of my soap opera," said Rose. "What’s that?" She pointed at Theresa’s night stand. "Is that a statue?"

"That’s Saint Patrick," said Theresa, handing Rose the statuette. "He’s chasing the snakes out of Ireland. My mother gave it to me my first Christmas in a mental hospital. My last year in high school."

"Look at the detail," said Rose, passing it to Liz. "Look at the face."

"Stern," said Liz, "and, … Wild, I think."

"Yes," said Theresa. "That’s Saint Patrick. My faith is my survival mechanism. It’s my way of going crazy while staying sane."

"I don’t think faith in God is crazy," said Rose. "Sooner or later you have to call in the real management. Otherwise your life just keeps getting…"

"That’s not what she means," said Liz.

"No," said Theresa. "God’s okay. But how about a heavenly bureaucracy? ‘Dear Saint Patrick, please chase the snakes out of my daughter’s life.’ ‘Dear Mother of God, please tell your Son I hurt like hell because my guardian angel is three stories tall and angry. I’ll say a Novena, I promise.’"

"Ouch!" said Liz.

"What’s a Novena?" said Rose.

"Nine rosaries. You know, the string of beads with a cross you see Catholics holding sometimes. Nine rosaries in nine days—or nine rosaries in a hurry curled up on your bed until the pain goes away."

"Your guardian angel went postal?" said Liz.

"I had an imaginary playmate when I was a little girl," said Theresa. "Daddy left us, but I had a guardian angel. I named him Yonkerdu. As I grew up, he was still there, on the edge of my consciousness, in case I needed him. He was a good listener. When I was seventeen, my boyfriend broke up with me, he wouldn’t say why. Yonkerdu told me why: I wasn’t doing it right. He would show me how to do everything right."

"Uh oh," said Liz.

"Part of me caught on and rebelled against the imaginary playmate that was running my life, and told God’s Mother about it. I even told my therapist, finally—It’s a long story, and some of this hurts to hear myself say. Yonkerdu has turned out to be a part of me it takes pills to control."

…

As she passed by the first-floor group room on the way to supper, Theresa noticed a slight, dark man working at the blackboard. He stepped back and looked over what he had drawn.

"Sine wave," said Theresa. "Are you taking trig and analytic? Everybody here seems to be going to school."

"Right," said the man. "I just hold out my hand, and the Texas Rehabilitation Commission puts something in it. Actually, I gave them a pretty good reason: I said I needed to experience success, and school was the place I was most likely to do that. Besides, mathematics exercises the reason. I’m hoping it’s a kind of sanity insurance."

"It’s not. I was an math major. I started my second year in summer school and couldn’t slow down enough to sleep—until they put me in the hospital. I was taking second year calculus and turning into a genius. Only I could see the relationship between ‘There exists some x such that thus-n-such’ and ‘The summation of the series x equals thus-n-such’—The existential quantifier looks like a backwards E, you know, and the sigma looks like a forwards E, and that was terribly significant. All because I couldn’t understand the lectures or do the homework. My brain just couldn’t absorb it, because it was busy solving riddles of the universe. My name’s Theresa Cubbins."

"I’m Reynard Scobey. I was working as an attendant at Austin State Hospital and working on a bachelor’s degree in psychology, until my colleagues convinced me that they really needed people on the staff who were better off than the patients. It was really weird, standing there watching the fourth of July parade with all the other patients from my ward and realizing, ‘Now I’m one of Them. I used to be one of Us, but I’m not any more.’"

…

"Time for R and R," said Liz after the meeting. "Come on Theresa. Let’s remind ourselves that’s there’s life after Oak Lawn Place."

"So what did you think of Karen Coates?" said Rose as the three women walked to the rear exit, where they were joined by Hugh and a hawk-like man with blue eyes and a shirt that advertised him as Dennis, Service Manager of Northway Dodge.

"Commander Coates," said Liz. "Repress for success."

"Right," said Hugh. "The Iron Maiden, down from Mount Ararat with the rules."

"Noah came down from Ararat with the animals," said Theresa. "Moses came down from Sinai with the rules."

"Maybe it was the mountain that wouldn’t come to Mohammad," said Hugh. "Whatever—every Monday evening Madam Moses comes down it with the rules: ‘Thou shalt have no alcohol nor drugs beneath thy temporary roof…’"

"Hugh," called Liz, "look at those clouds, lit by the setting sun. Peach and gold together."

"Yeah," said Hugh. "Bright against the sky’s perfect blue. Where’s Cecil B. De Mille when you need him?" They all looked a long, silent moment—broken suddenly by trees full of summer-borne birds singing down the light.

"Way to go, God," said Rose.

"Amen," said Theresa. "The rightness of things… I just don’t get your attitude, Hugh. No weapons, no drugs—the rules make sense. They all make sense."

"’…Nor shalt thou soil the purity of thy lent bed with illicit love.’ Does that make sense? A Baptist Sunday School teacher read Mickey Spillane and wrote these things, right?"

"Rule Four," said the man with blue eyes to Theresa, "The most often-broken rule in the book. Hi, I’m Dennis Halfmeister. And you are tall and pretty and…?" They had arrived at Liz Kaplan’s car, a recent model Oldsmobile Cutlass.

"Theresa Cubbins. And you are up-up-up, Dennis."

"We call him ‘I’m not paranoid, just very alert’ Dennis," said Hugh, as he slid into the front passenger seat.

"I hate my job," said Dennis cheerfully, "and it feels SO good when I stop doing it.—Here, let me ride the hump in the rear between you two lovely ladies."

"’And it feels SO good,’" said Rose, "’that I just have to take a pocket rocket.’ "You’re speedin’, aren’t you, Darlin’?" They were in the car now, and Liz had started it and was pulling away from the curb.

"That’s strictly my business, isn’t it now, Darlin-Honeybunch-Sweetums-Loverdoll?—Hugh! Speaking of business, I think we’ve got a car for you. Nineteen sixty nine Chrysler New Yorker, two-owner, runs good. One thousand even for tax, title, and license, drive it away."

"What’s the Bluebook?"

"They don’t Bluebook ten-year-old cars, Hugh."

"Do you think we could talk them down?"

"Look, Bitch, I already talked them down from twelve hundred. I’m on your side, right?"

"All that testosterone, girls, and just for us," said Liz as she switched on the radio. "And, my, aren’t we impressed?"

"Negative," said Rose. "I don’t care for the word ‘bitch,’ Dennis. It reminds me of my ex-husband. If it wasn’t Honey, it was Bitch."

"But you’re all missing the point here," said Hugh, who had just finished rolling a joint and started smoking it. "For the one-hundred-and-eighty-third time this summer, Jimmy Buffet is wasting away in Margaritaville."

"He’s looking for his lost grain of salt," said Liz, taking a deep drag and switching the radio off.

"Some people claim that there’s a woman to blame—Dennis!" said Rose.

"But he knows," said Dennis grudgingly, "it’s his own damn fault."

"Until his third drink," said Hugh. "Then he achieves enlightenment and realizes, it’s nobody’s fault."

"Gilly would be proud of him," said Liz. They all laughed except Theresa.

"Gilly?" she asked.

"Guilliam Fouchet," said Hugh, offering Theresa the joint, "resident Fritz Perls and Guru of Wednesday evening group." Then, in a deeply relaxed voice: "Would you care to sit in the hot-seat?"

"No, thank you. Yes, I’ve tried dope before, and No, I don’t like it. What about Rule Two, ‘no drugs,’ and what’s this about sitting in a hot-seat? You make it sound threatening."

"Your car is your personal property," said Dennis. "If it’s parked on the street, it’s not ‘on premises,’ it’s on public property. They’d have to get a search warrant."

"Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom," said Hugh. "And the hot-seat, that’s me doing Gilly doing Fritz Perls."

"The hot-seat is if you want to do intense therapy," said Liz.

"Like when I decided to work on my mother’s death," said Rose. "At first all I did was cry. But then I got angry. I wasn’t ready for her to die. That crazy woman drank herself to death. Then Gilly got me to looking at my own situation, and there I was, sitting there in the hot-seat, a crazy woman drinking herself to death. Now I’m back in Alcoholics Anonymous. Listen, I’ve made up my mind: With God’s help, I’m going to remember this as the summer I did NOT waste away again in Margaritaville."

"Good on you," said Theresa.

"Let’s all remember this summer," said Liz. "This was the summer we had a chance to pick up our lives and start over. And we helped each other do it."

"Listen," said Rose. "Let’s keep in touch with each other, after we leave and get out on our own. Can we do that? Are we willing to do that?"

"I agree," said Theresa. "We may turn out to be the most important part of each other’s support system."

"I’m in," said Dennis. "Hugh?"

"Life is a long time," said Hugh. "But, ‘on my honor, I will do my best.’ Yeah, I’m in."

…