Sclerotherapy
Karen found out the tattoo of the Chinese character on her right ankle actually meant soybean five months after she got it. Inner resolve and outer peace, a general levelheadedness and tranquility was the translation printed under the thin black character she had chosen from the chart on the wall. Soybean was the translation her brother’s Asian roommate awkwardly gave her after she modeled it for him in the smoky dorm room on the fifth floor. He asked if the artist was Chinese, and she shook her head. She asked if he was high, and he shook his. Karen slid the leg of her jeans back down and bit at a nail. The roommate fidgeted. I mean, he probably just copied them onto the chart from a takeout menu. The tang of incense clung to Karen as she walked down five flights of stairs.
*
“So it’s five veins today, right?” The nurse made small movements with her pencil as she flipped between thin papers on a clipboard. Karen didn’t respond but shifted her weight back in the chair. The thickly set woman pushed her lips out and adjusted the waistband of her brightly patterned scrubs. “Five veins, yes?” The question was repeated slowly, with an emphasis on the word five.
“That’s what they tell me.” She was a woman of sixty-two; it wasn’t her first time sitting in the polyester recliner. Wasn’t the first time the thick substance would be injected carefully into her calves. She hated the experience. Not just the pain of her legs thickening then thinning, but also the two-hour view of nothing but her ankles. Socks were usually the solution, folded down and over the youthful rebelliousness stamped above her anklebone. But in the Sclerotherapy Clinic, there were no ridged socks to cover her shins, and no smile to cover her keen self-consciousness. In the Sclerotherapy Clinic, she thought, there were only fat nurses and varicose veins.
The blood in Karen’s veins was beginning to drain out. Her body lay inflexibly strapped to the recliner, tilted at a harsh angle so her feet were raised high above her head. The sting of the injected gel still tingled over her skin, making the thin unshaven hairs on her legs stand up.
“All right now, Karen, try to relax.” The nurse opened a small drawer and removed a bundle of compression stockings. “I’m sure you know the drill by now.” She squirted down the nozzle of a Lubriderm bottle and thick white lotion plopped into her hand. “But remember, you can’t take these things off for two weeks unless you’re lying down.” Her hands rubbed each other and attained an oily glisten in the office light. “Your veins gotta glue themselves together, see, so the blood is forced to find another path.” Karen nodded and blinked slowly.
*
What does it mean? she had been asked by a coworker one spring about twenty years ago when sweat had rubbed the usual Band-Aid off her ankle. Karen tugged at her earlobe. It means inner resolve and outer peace, a general levelheadedness and tranquility. The woman nodded, smiled politely, and turned back to her desk. I was nineteen, Karen said, almost sarcastically. She opened her mouth again but realized she had nothing to say. The question always bothered her. Made her hate herself more with each false explanation. But she kept at it, as if it might somehow compensate for having soybean etched permanently into her skin. Karen swung her chair left and stared into her computer screen. The case she was studying stared back, its importance suddenly mocking her.
*
“Oh.” The nurse paused. “I didn’t know you had a tattoo, miss.” She grinned slightly. “What does it mean?” Karen had expected it. In fact, she was surprised it had taken this long.
“It means inner resolve and outer peace, a general levelheadedness and tranquility.” She lied, she thought, for the same reason she was getting her varicose veins removed. The nurse exhaled and tucked her hair behind her ears.
“That’s nice. Very peaceful.” She began unbuckling Karen’s legs. “Did you get it in China?”
“No. I got it in Brooklyn. I was nineteen.” The nurse carefully lifted her calves and started pulling the beige compression stockings over her skin.
*
The edamame jeered at her. She was trying to enjoy herself, but this type of thing always seemed to happen at Chinese restaurants. If it hadn’t been her daughter’s choice, if she hadn’t just returned from college and if they hadn’t been meeting her really-serious-this-time boyfriend, she would have objected. But it was all of those things, so she kept her mouth shut.
So, Brian—Karen looked up at him—I hear you’re thinking about business school. Brian responded, but the answer sort of floated through her. She imagined the black lines on her ankle thickening with glee as she slowly filled her body with soybeans. Karen wondered if she was as pathetic as this thought suggested. If she was so preoccupied with her own sense of herself that basic conversation was beyond her. She looked up at Brian and nodded. I see. His hand was resting on her daughter’s next to the chopsticks.
It had been months, maybe years, since she had actually thought about it. It wasn’t something that entered her daily musings. Socks on during the day, socks off at night; dresses and skirts meant Band-Aids: an almost unconscious ritual in her routine. Karen glanced at the couple glancing at each other. She wondered if Brian could be put in the category of impulsive decisions. If he was her daughter’s version of not bothering to consult a language dictionary.
*
“There you are, all done.” The compression stockings were tight around her thighs now and the polyester recliner was humming as it tilted slowly upward. The room seemed slightly darker than when she had entered, and the lack of light peering through the edges of the blinds told her it was probably late afternoon. The nurse walked to the corner and began rinsing her hands.
Karen studied her legs. Her varicose veins no longer popped out like tributaries leading to her ankle, but she wasn’t pleased. The thin dark outlines could still be seen slightly beneath the lean nylon of the stockings. Images of her brother’s incense-hazed dorm, the coworker at her firm, and the evening when she first met her son-in-law drifted in her head. She gently placed her feet on the floor and lifted her weight down off the chair. Some things, Karen thought, couldn’t be flattened at the Sclerotherapy Clinic.
“Take care now, ma’am.” The nurse was drying her hands on a paper towel.
“My tattoo,” Karen said, pausing in the doorway before shutting it behind her, “actually means soybean.”