Chapter 15

Two nights later, Harry said to Bea. “Well, I did it. I had lunch with Michael.”

“I hoped you wouldn’t do it, but now that you did, what did he say?"

“It was shadowboxing all the way, but he got the message."

“And just what was that?”

“To leave her alone. Goddamn it, Bea, I don’t want to see her hurt."

"She’s a grown woman. Some hurts you can’t avoid."

“She’s a young girl.”

“She’s a woman, Harry. But what did Michael say?”

It had been an easier lunch than Harry had anticipated. He had simply called Michael and suggested that they meet at Heilman’s, on the west side. Harry knew that if they tried to eat downtown they’d be continually interrupted. More business was done at lunch than in theoffice, he knew. He never had a quiet lunch downtown. At Heilman's they’d settled down to a good lunch in a quiet atmosphere.

“So how are things going with Sandra’s case?”

Michael knew that the case itself wasn’t Harry’s main interest, but he realized that it would serve as a springboard. “All right, I think, but of course it’s tough. I realize I’m taking a tack that you probably don’t approve of."

“We all have our styles.”

“True. I’m a born litigator. And Sandra’s scrappy. She has to be, I guess, fighting a handicap like blindness. I’m glad Mairin brought her to see me. I hope Mairin’s getting something out of this case.”

“I wonder if you realize how she’s reacting to it.”

“What do you mean?”

“You see her as a fledgling trial lawyer. Sure, on the surface she does look like one. She’s bright, alert, active, well-spoken. But the adversary process is very uncomfortable for her. She gets very upset at the hostility.”

Michael was looking quite surprised. “She doesn’ t show it. She's never said a word.”

“She won’t. She’s embarrassed by her reactions, I think. But she has them. All negative.”

“But why?”

“I’m not a psychologist. I guess it goes ‘way back to her childhood. Who knows? But the point is that this case is too much travail for her. It would be one thing if she just had a bad reaction to the trial process, but there’s the time bind, too. She just doesn’t have time to work on that case. She’s going to school, she’s working full-time. Where do you think she’s supposed to find time to be in on this case?”

“I thought she was taking some of the time from work.”

“Theoretically she is. But she’s so conscientious that she won’t neglect her clients. So, all in all, she just works overtime."

“I’ll talk to her.”

“Please do. She doesn’t need any more stresses in her life."

“I understand,” said Michael.

Harry took that to mean that Michael had accepted his warning so he turned the conversation to other things. What did Michael think of teaching? What did he think of the current judicial candidates? What did Harry think of them? The business was done.

But Harry only said to Bea, “He’s going to talk to her about the depositions, about the way she feels about them. He didn’t realize that they upset her.”

Michael had gone back to his office but hadn’t accomplished much. He’d ended up sitting at his desk, trying to think out his feelings about Mairin. He'd involved her in Sandra’s case. But then, she had called him about the case originally. It was good experience for her. And it was a great help to him to have what amounted to a law clerk for that case. But, yes, it was more than that. Mairin was a delight to have around. She was spirited and she was funny. He’d been able to talk to her, too, about Harriet. He hadn’t been able to do that with anybody else. Not the partners that he’d worked with for years. Certainly not his children, though his daughter had indicated that she’d like to discuss the fact that her parents were separated. In some ways he was looking for Harriet in Mairin. If Harriet had become a social worker at the age that Mairin had become a social worker, what would she have been like? What would their relationship be like? Mairin had listened to him. Now the least he could do was to listen to her. She was coming down at the end of the week to help prepare for another board member’s deposition. They’d talk about it then.

When that day came, it was snowing lightly, the first snow that winter. Mairin came into the agency late in the afternoon, after making home visits. She hung her coat in the locker, shaking off the snow flakes. She wrote out a request for a talking book machine and a request for an evaluation by a home teacher. Then she put her coat back on, still lightly damp from the snow.

She drove downtown, against the traffic. By the time she got there, the receptionist had left, and she had to ring the night bell.

Michael came out to greet her. "Cup of coffee?” he asked.

“Oh, yes," she said, “it’s been another unbelievable day.” She followed Michael down the hall to the coffee room. They took the cups back to his office, and Mairin dumped her coat on the sofa, taking a chair in front of the desk.

“What did you do today?” asked Michael.

Mairin seemed a bit surprised by the question. "Well, if you really want to know, I went out to the state hospital this morning with a home teacher. They've got a very disturbed blind boy who wants to team Braille. Ruth is willing to work with him. Lord, she’s good.

"Then, after lunch, I talked to the Brushes again. Well, Mrs. Brush I talked to. They’re at the rehab center now. There’s a chance that they can send him to the sheltered shop.”

Michael listened very intently, not, as usual, bursting out with what his day had been like.

“Well,” Mairin stopped. “Let’s not spend the evening talking about my day. What shall we do first?”

“Let’s go over what we want to ask Barbara Gill.”

“Okay,” said Mairin, getting out a legal pad and pencil.

They went through a couple of areas. Then Michael said, “You don’t like this process too much, do you Mairin?”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“Tell me how you feel about these depositions.” Michael was looking at her with a quizzical expression.

“I’m not crazy about them, Michael, but they’re necessary. Now let’s see, we’ll want to ask about that incident with Wanda.” Mairin was writing again.

“Mair,” said Michael, “what do you mean when you say you’re not too crazy about the depositions?”

She looked up. “Just that. I’m not too crazy about them. They’re unpleasant, but they have to be done.” She looked tired, her hair was tousled. She ran a hand through it, tousling it even more. “I don’t know why you’re asking this, Michael.”

She was being stubborn. Michael felt that he had to beak her down. There was no other way to get at what was bothering her. It must be the emotional charge of the depositions that upset her. What emotion was that? What did he use? Anger. That’s what scared her. He jumped up from his chair. “Damn it, talk to me!” he bellowed at her. “Don’t just sit there pretending it’s not your problem. You’re screwing up the whole process!”

Mairin looked as though she had been physically attacked. He could see her tremble. She shook her head as if trying to shake tears out of her eyes. She got up to leave the room. Michael moved quickly, heading her off. He grabbed her by the arms, from behind, as though in a football tackle, and spun her around. She was crying, sobbing. He put his arms around her and held her. He kissed the top of her curly head. “It’s all right, honey,” he said. He kept murmuring that phrase.

Mairin cried until she couldn’t cry any longer. In a way she wished she could keep crying because it was so comforting to be held by Michael. But it was also something else. It was dangerous, and she knew that.

So when he murmured, “It’s all right, honey” she pulled away.

“No, it isn’t,” she said. “No, Michael, I can’t get involved.”

“You’re upset, Mairin, please talk to me.”

“Michael, it goes ‘way back. It comes from my childhood. That’s all I can tell you. Anger frightens me. When I run into it, it provokes a real anxiety reaction in me. That’s all I can tell you.”

“There’s more,” he said.

"That’s all I can tell you.” She was stubborn. “I’m going home."

She left, and Michael didn’t really try to stop her.

She went home. For one of the few times since she’d moved in with Bea and Harry, she wished that she had her own apartment. She needed to be alone, but she didn’t want to seem rude. When she went into the apartment, Harry was reading in the living room.

“Hi,” she said, hanging up her coat.

“How’d it go?” he asked.

“Okay,” she said. “I’m awfully tired, though. I think I’ll go to bed early.” She went into the bedroom and lay down on the bed. She wanted so badly to fall asleep, but she couldn’t.

There were a number of feelings that she needed to sort out. There was some anxiety left from the confrontation with Michael. He had seen that the depositions made her anxious, and he had used that. And then there was the attraction she felt to Michael. But there was something else. Loneliness.

She went to her desk, dug deep into a pile of old letters and pulled out an envelope. She remembered that that one particular letter had a phone number. She picked up the extension and dialed.

“Hello,” Charlie’s voice came on the line, half a continent away.

“Charlie, it’s Mairin,” she said.

"Mair!” He was pleased. His voice was gentle and soft. “Are you okay?”

“I don’t know,” she said, truthfully. “Law isn’t what I thought it would be, I guess.”

“Are you disappointed?”

“I’m a disappointment. I can’t adjust to law. I’m supposed to be working on a very interesting case right now, but I just hate the wrangling.”

“And that makes you wrong?”

“Maybe not wrong, but out of place, for sure. Charlie, why can’t I change? I know where all my anxieties come from. Why can’t I get rid of them?”

“Mairin, Mairin, what would you say if a client said that to you?”

She laughed right through the tears that were gathering in her eyes. “I know. That's a dumb thing to say. But I can still wish it. Other people can play legal games without getting upset. Why can’t I?”

“Because you’re not a game-playing person. Mairin, you know what I think of law, you know what I think of lawyers. I thought you were crazy right from the start to want to go into law.”

Mairin didn’t want to start that argument again. It was probably moot anyway. "How are you, Charlie?”

“Fine. The center is a zoo, as usual, but we’ve got some okay kids here right now. There’s a really neat teenager. His parents threw him out when they found he’d tried marijuana. Up-tight pair, for sure! Can you believe throwing out a kid for being honest about trying marijuana?

"And we’ve got a little guy who refuses to stay at home. He’s all of eight.”

“You like what you’re doing. It was a statement rather than a question. “I envy you.”

"You don’t have to be a lawyer, Mairin. You’re a darned good social worker. No, really, you are.” He had heard her gather her breath.

“Yes, I guess I am,” she said truthfully. But that’s not what I want to do the rest of my life."

“But you don’t think you can stand law?”

“Not trial work, that’s for sure. Maybe something else, but I don’t know what. Look, Charlie, thanks for listening.”

“Mair, you know you can call me anytime. Don’t try to change your personality. Your personality is great. There’s nothing wrong with it. You’re a gloriously round peg. Stop trying to jam yourself into a square hole. I go crazy when I think of you--trying to change from a real person into a lawyer.”

“Oh, come on. We’ve been through that. Lawyers are people.”

“Not in my book.”

“Okay, we won’t argue about that. I know how you feel. But thanks anyway. It’s good to hear your voice.”

“Yours too, Mair. We’ll always be friends.”

“Of course," she said. ‘Keep in touch.” She hung up. She lay down on the bed again, this time relaxed, drifting into sleep. Were there any lawyers like Charlie? Probably not. Charlie got too involved. Everyone was more important than he was. "You need to take some time for yourself,” she’d told him so many times. “Sure, Mair,” he’d said, and then never did. She’d felt like a doctor’s wife so many times. Dates were broken so that Charlie could save a client from some undetermined disaster. Evenings together were interrupted by emergency calls. Someone’s problems always came before Charlie’s free time. And her. “But, Mair, you’re a together person," he always said. “You don’t need me. These others do." She’d seen the handwriting on that wall. It was too big to miss. She fell asleep completely dressed.

The next morning Mairin walked out into the kitchen, yawning, wearing the outfit she’d slept in.

“You certainly must have been tired,” said Harry, observing the wrinkles.

"You could say that," she said."Harry, you've talked to Michael, haven't you?”

Harry leaned back with his cup of coffee. “Yes.”

“I knew it. On his own he never would have noticed how I felt about the depositions. I don’t know whether to thank you or not.”

“I take it he talked to you about them.”

“Yes."

"Then that’s good. I’m glad."

“I’ve got to get to work," she said, “I'd better move.” As she was driving to work, her thoughts were, no Harry, I can’t thank you, and you wouldn’t thank yourself if you could have seen Michael with his arms around me.

Michael was doing his own thinking as to how Harry might react to that scene of him with his arms around Mairin. He was edging through mental debris toward the layer that held his own reactions to that scene. It had surprised him. It had frightened him a bit, too.

Michael had neither planned nor foreseen any particular sequence to the conversation with Mairin. Her reaction had been so swift and so strong that he, in turn, had reacted to her. It had been the most natural thing in the world for him to have held her, to have tried to comfort her.

It had probably also been the most natural thing in the world for him to have felt the way he had felt after he had put his arms around her, but that feeling had taken him by surprise, nonetheless. He remembered that he bad kissed the top of her head, that he’d kept calling her “honey.” That had not been in the game plan. He’d felt like doing it, however, and the question became what that meant. Was he in love with her? No, of course not, though she was attractive and, certainly, loveable. He loved Harriet, there was no doubt about that. Was he becoming emotionally involved with Mairin? Yes. Did he still see her as Harriet? Yes. He could not let that involvement grow any deeper. He shuddered to think what Harry Warncke would do if he did not immediately cease any involvement with Mairin.