Down the Rabbit Hole

Shocked, she pressed her fingers to her lips. Did she say that? Out loud? The acerbic tone of her voice jarred her. The words were petty and spiteful. And while she did, on occasion—like now—think and feel exactly that way, not saying so kept it a secret. It allowed her to pretend she was above such socially unacceptable emotions as dejection, jealousy and resentment.


Moreover, the silence protected her from the disapproval of others—those who appeared to have the enviable ability of making the best out of everything; who never had a negative point of view or reaction . . . or at the very least had the talent of giving that impression.

No, prudent people didn’t leave their feelings hanging out; didn’t leave themselves vulnerable. She sighed, resigned to keeping her most unbecoming thoughts and emotions to herself.

“You don’t, you know.” The president spoke softly at her ear.

She tipped her head his way, still watching Molly and the interloper. “I don’t what?”

“Keep your thoughts and emotions to yourself.”

“Yes, I do.” Elise frowned. Her low Grumpy voice felt scratchy . . . and she hated him messing around in her mind. “’Course, I do—the not-so-nice ones, I do. I don’t scream at the little kids running wild at the grocery store—or club their mothers for blocking the aisle with their carts.”

The smile on his lips was soft; the perception in his eyes was hard to take.

“Okay, so . . . so I’m still steamed that Nick Basserman got promoted over me. Especially after I mustered the courage, and the pride, to go in and plead my case to that old pinhead Winston. Three years it’s been. I’m still crushed. I’ve had to act like a good sport, a team player, all along knowing I’m more qualified. Crushed. But I don’t talk about it. I keep it to myself. It still hurts, but I haven’t let anyone see none of that.”

“You do not talk about it, but that does not mean your disappointment goes unspoken. You are less enthusiastic about your work and withdrawn among your coworkers; you smile less and your posture has gone lax with disinterest. The way you are feeling is very much hanging out, as you say.”

She scowled, considering. “Well, what about the time my mother completely forgot my twenty-fourth birthday—the year she went back to Italy to visit my grandparents? My own mother. No card, no call, no T-shirt, nothing. I said nothing, and I didn’t let her see how much it hurt me.”

Abe nodded. “Your mother was remorseful—you saw it in her eyes. But you played indifference, you cut her off short and you did not give her a chance to apologize. Do you know why?”

If she didn’t at the time, she did now. To punish, to teach her mother a lesson, to have stowage to barter with, tit for tat, for any future transgression of her own. Her heart tipped. That wasn’t the way she was raised, it wasn’t the example her mother set for her. Everyone deserved a second chance—isn’t that what she’d said? Didn’t they also deserve the opportunity to ask forgiveness?

“And with no apology to sooth your wound it remains sore and unable to mend,” he said.

Elise shuffled her weight from foot to foot uncomfortably, searching for a good excuse or a reasonable explanation. A chronically overdrawn, cynical, judgmental hypocrite was not what she’d set out to become.

“Look,” he said, reclaiming her attention; his slim-fingered hands still resting on her shoulders. “Their food has arrived.”

“Oh! Good choice!” Elise smacked her lips. “Ferdinand’s Crab Louie never gets old.”

“Thank you for this, Molly,” said Liz Gurney, picking up her fork and knife to cut her salad into manageable pieces. A chink in her voice suggested her emotions were raw and near the surface. “I need . . . You’re a good friend.”