Eighteen missed calls.
She picked it up and listened to her voice mail. “Alice, it’s Angela Dawson here. Please give me a call at 650-555-4102 as soon as you get this message. Zoe’s been taken to the hospital.”
Alice didn’t remember how she’d got to the hospital, whether she’d driven Mrs. Stephens home first or if she’d just run out of the waiting room. What she did remember was the bizarre report when she got there.
“The tests were all clear.” The doctor smiled at Alice.
“But … Zoe’s teacher said Zoe was having chest pains,” Alice said. “She hyperventilated. She couldn’t breathe.”
“We tested her for several things and everything came back clean. This is good news, Mrs. Stanhope.”
“But … her teacher called an ambulance! It was very dramatic.”
“In any case, I’m just glad she’s feeling better now.” The doctor closed the manila folder in front of him, then lifted it and tapped the edge against the desk. Alice’s cue to leave.
Alice leaned back in her chair, her stance saying I’m not going anywhere.
“I’m not trying to downplay it, Mrs. Stanhope.” He gave her a patronizing smile. “What happened to Zoe must have been very scary.”
“It was. And I’m not leaving until I find out why it happened.” Alice meant it. Mrs. Dawson had successfully bulldozed her out of Zoe’s classroom when Alice’s instincts had been telling her to stay. She wasn’t going to ignore her instincts again when it came to Zoe.
The doctor’s smile faded. “Look, sometimes these things just happen. We never know why. The good news is that Zoe isn’t suffering from asthma, her heart and chest look fine, her blood pressure is good. Your daughter is perfectly healthy.”
So Zoe went back to school a week later. And, despite Mrs. Dawson’s no-parent policy, Alice had brought a chair and sat at the back of the room. If her daughter was going to have another attack of whatever it was, she was going to be there. But Zoe was fine. She followed instructions—sat on the mat for story time, did her cutting and pasting as she was supposed to. She was shier in this environment, not as likely to put up her hand or volunteer to help the teacher as Alice expected, but she was coping quite well. So the following week Alice decided to leave her to it.
Alice’s phone was already ringing by the time she got to the car.
“Mrs. Stanhope, can you please come back? Zoe’s hyperventilating again.”
Back at the hospital, the doctor told Alice she had a perfectly healthy five-year-old girl. Which, of course, was positively unacceptable. “So you’re telling me you have no idea what is wrong with my daughter?”
“Physically speaking, nothing is wrong with her—”
“But this is the second time she’s had an attack,” Alice interrupted. “I can’t keep spending my days wondering if I’m going to get a phone call telling me that my daughter can’t breathe.”
Any form of cool that Alice had hoped to exhibit was gone. Her voice was full of emotion and, unfortunately, tears.
“Has Zoe been under any stress lately?”
“Stress?” Alice exploded. “She’s five!”
“Any changes in the home? A divorce, a death?”
“No divorce. My great-grandmother died when she was two, I doubt she’d remember it.” These questions didn’t make any sense to Alice. What did any of this have to do with Zoe hyperventilating? “Please. Please. Help her.”
The doctor sat forward. His movements were slow and deliberate, even the pushing of his glasses back against his face. It rankled Alice. Why was he so calm? Why was no one worried?
“Actually Alice, the clinical diagnosis of Zoe is likely to be anxiety.”
Relief nearly bowled Alice over. “Anxiety?”
Anxiety was all right, wasn’t it? Didn’t Alice get anxious all the time? When she wasn’t sure if she’d get the bills paid, when she thought she’d left the oven on after leaving for work?
“I think it’s the most logical conclusion,” the doctor said.
“But the hyperventilating—”
“A panic attack, most likely.”
Alice stared at the doctor. A panic attack? She’d never had a panic attack over the bills.
“But … Zoe’s happy. I mean, she was until she started school.”
“Typically social anxiety does have a sudden onset. Many people report happy toddlers suddenly changing in childhood. Starting school is a common time for symptoms to start.”
“Social anxiety?”
“It’s similar to generalized anxiety disorder, but is characterized by excessive fears being linked to social situations—school, church, outdoor events, large spaces, that kind of thing.”
“Is this my fault?” Alice asked. “For not taking her out more when she was younger?”
“We believe people develop social anxiety regardless of how they are socialized.”
“Oh.” Alice struggled to take it in. “So … how long will it last?”
“We don’t know. If symptoms do continue, people see the best results with a combination of medication—usually SSRIs and/or benzodiazepines—and psychotherapy such as cognitive behavioral therapy. Alice?”
The doctor looked at her, standing now. She hadn’t even felt herself get out of her seat.
“Benzodiazepines? Like Xanax? For my five-year-old?”
“We’re getting ahead of ourselves. But they can be helpful. Depending on the severity of Zoe’s anxiety. For some people this is a lifelong condition that needs to be managed.”
Alice sat back down. Okay. They were getting ahead of themselves. That was what she wanted to hear. In a minute the doctor would tell her that drugs and therapy were only required in a small percentage of cases—that in most cases kids would snap out of it in a couple of weeks. Zoe would definitely snap out of it. Alice waited for him to say that.
He didn’t.
19
Whoever was knocking on the door would have to go away.
In her apartment, with Kenny the cat on her lap, Zoe was trying to read The Outsiders. She had never been so grateful for locks. She wanted to stay behind the locked door and never go back to school again. Maybe she wouldn’t go back for a few days. How could she, after the way Emily had looked at her? After the way she’d run out of there like a crazy woman?