Face, The (16 page)

When the waitress has gone, my aunt asks if I can read the menu.

“Doesn’t matter. All I want is a McDonald’s hamburger.”

She laughs. “I’m sorry, honey, but you can only get one of those at a McDonald’s. They might have a regular hamburger, though.”

“Okay. That’s what I want.”

When the waitress returns, my aunt orders
dos consomes de pollo, dos ensaladas verdes, y dos hamburguesas.
I give my menu back to the waitress, content to play the role of non-speaking Muslim friend.

“So,” Renee says once the waitress has moved away. “What do you think of the city?”

“I—I don’t know. It’s a lot to take in at once. But it’s interesting.”

I say this to be kind, deliberately omitting any mention of the man who hit me with his car and then screamed at me…or the aunt who’s dragged me over the sidewalk at a breathless pace. I’m determined to remain optimistic.

“There’s a whole planet outside the convent, Sarah. And there’s no reason you can’t enjoy it.”

I nod because I’ve already heard this speech—and because I’ve been distracted by a lovely little girl at the table next to us. She can’t be more than three or four, and she is everything I’d imagine the perfect child to be—round-faced, chubby-cheeked, and rosebud lipped, with sparkling dark eyes and shiny curls. Her mother has tied red ribbons in her hair, and her father smiles every time he looks at her. The parents are trying to convince the child to drink her milk, but the little girl wants nothing to do with it—

I gasp when she deliberately tips her milk glass, then pushes out her lower lip.

My aunt chuckles from across the table. “Little minx,” she says, keeping her voice low. “Your dad was a lot like that as a child. Kevin would do anything for attention, even disobey. He kept Mother on her toes.”

I shift my gaze to my aunt. “What about your father?”

Renee looks down at her hands. “Your grandfather died a few months before Kevin did. Dad was a good man, but he was always working. He and Kevin did a lot of guy things together, but he wasn’t into girl things, so he wasn’t around much when I was growing up.” Her voice softens. “Or maybe I just don’t remember him being around.”

The waitress comes with two water glasses, and this time she glances at me as she sets them on the table. I wait until she leaves, then I begin to gather up the yards of cotton that envelop me. “What are ‘boy things’?”

“Baseball, football, camping, fishing—all the things boys like to do with their fathers.”

“And ‘girl things’?”

She smiles. “These days girls do pretty much whatever boys do. But they also like babies…and clothes.”

I pull several yards of blue fabric onto my lap, then cross my arms and pull the burka off in one swift move. After bundling the fabric and squeezing it between my side and the wall, I smooth my hair.

“That’s better.” Renee smiles again. “I’d rather talk to you than to a mesh square.”

I lift the glass and sip my water. My nerves feel electric, as if unfamiliar impulses are traveling up and down my limbs. Maybe this is how Judson and my father felt when they were sent on their first missions. Naked. Exposed.

“You know, you can tell a lot about a person by studying their face,” Renee says, sliding a straw into her glass. “Our expressions elicit reactions from others, and often what we say with our face is more important than what we say in words.”

I sip my water again, not sure why she’s talking about faces while she’s looking at mine. Isn’t it obvious that the only reaction my face elicits is disgust?

“You like movies, Sarah,” she continues. “Haven’t you noticed that the best movie stars speak volumes with their expressions?”

“I always thought that was because they’re trained actors.”

“They are, but on-screen they’re only doing what other people do naturally every day. With additional surgery and some training, you could learn how to use your face, too.”

I stir my water with my straw and wonder what she’s getting at.

“Once,” she says, smiling at her glass, “I had a patient with Mobius Syndrome. She couldn’t smile at all until she had surgery, and she couldn’t afford the surgery until she reached adulthood. Once she was able to smile, she had to learn all the ways she could use a smile to communicate with others.”

I stop stirring my water. “So if I had surgery, would I have to learn these things, too?”

“Some things. But you could do it, Sarah, because you’re bright and motivated. You can learn anything you want to learn.”

Her words give me confidence, but I’m still not sure what she’s proposing. Our conversation is interrupted when the waitress approaches with a tray in her arms.

“Dos ensaladas verdes,”
she says, placing two small salads on the table.
“¿Quiere algo mas?”
She has spoken to Renee, but her gaze cuts to me as she asks her question. And her face, which had been set in straight, regular lines, twists as her eyes widen and a frightened squeak cuts through the clink of silverware and the chatter of customers.

The guests at the nearest table turn in our direction. The parents frown and the toddler screams. The mother, after casting a disapproving look in my direction, tries to comfort the child, but the little girl is wailing in earnest.

I have terrified her.

I turn my face to the wall and bring up a hand to shield my face. “Perhaps we should go.”

“Sarah, you have every right to be here.”

“I don’t want to cause a problem.”

“This isn’t your fault.
You’re
not the problem, they are. They shouldn’t be so judgmental.”

“You can’t tell me—” my voice quavers “—that the
child
is being judgmental.”

Renee closes her eyes and pulls her purse onto her lap. “If you want to go, we will.”

“I want to go.”

Before she can protest again, I dive back into the burka and slink out of the booth, a silent blue shadow intent on retreat. I make it as far as the restaurant entrance, then I trip on the hem of my concealing tent and fall headlong into the bustling crowd.

And as my aunt and the host help me to my feet, I realize that Dr. Mewton is right. I am a monster and the world is not a safe place for monsters.

Like Frankenstein and Quasimodo, I’ll be safer if I’m hidden away.

Renee

O
n the bumpy ride back to the convent—in a different boat, and with a different driver—I breathe in the scent of sea salt and search for comforting words to offer Sarah. I had wanted this excursion to be a joyful and intoxicating taste of life, and I had hoped to broach the subject of further surgeries to encourage her to make plans for a life outside the CIA. But our experience in the restaurant ruined my strategy, and the little girl’s regrettable reaction damaged Sarah’s confidence.

Yet how can I prevent such things? Short of forewarning people of Sarah’s condition—an act that would result in a life as phony as the one at Convent of the Lost Lambs—I can do nothing.

We live in a society where nonconformity upsets people and misfortune is frequently mocked. Beauty wins praise and approval, ugliness invites ostracism and derision. I would love to help Sarah improve her life, but I can’t change the world.

Five years ago, on a chilly Friday in April, I couldn’t even change one man’s mind.

I should have known something was wrong in the weeks before that night. Charlie had begun to grow distant, but I attributed his silence to problems at work. I understood career pressure, and as the head of an architectural firm, he had several big projects under development.

But even when I came home to find Charlie’s suitcases standing in the foyer, I didn’t consider the obvious explanation. I saw him sitting in his overcoat in the dining room with his keys on the table. “You have a trip?” I asked, dropping my purse to the carpet. “Did I forget to put it on the calendar?”

“Renee.” His faint smile held a touch of sadness. “I’m leaving.”

“Do you need a ride to the airport?”

As I pulled my scarf from my collar, he reached up to catch my hand. “I’m not going on a trip. I’m leaving
you.
”

The emphasis on that last word was like a dagger to the heart. Quick, sharp, sudden. No drawn-out fights or probationary period for us, no undignified arguments or public brawls. Our marriage would die not gradually, but in a single night.

Unless…

“Charlie—” I clung to the hand he had offered “—I’m sorry. We seem to have neglected each other lately, but we can turn that around. We can take a few days off, make time for each other, do the things we used to enjoy doing together—”

His eyes were damp and filled with pain as he pulled his hand from my grasp. “Too late for all that, Dr. Carey. Time and again over the last five years I’ve asked you to do one thing or another, but you were always occupied with your work. You’ve taught me to live without you, and I’ve learned my lessons well.”

My stomach churned in a moment of pure panic—for the first time in months, an aspect of my well-ordered life was slipping out of my control. I hadn’t expected this, hadn’t planned for it. Charlie and a baby and family time were part of my future, items at the top of the list for next year or the year after.

He stood and slipped his hands into his gloves. “I’ll have my lawyer send over the papers next week—everything’s been arranged. I think you’ll find I’ve been more than fair.”

I sank onto a dining room chair as Charlie crossed into the foyer, picked up his suitcases, and opened the front door, sending a blast of frigid air into the house.

I didn’t cry, not then. My sense of loss went beyond tears, and my wounds had not yet begun to bleed. One thing, however, made sense to my mind: we do teach by example, and Charlie was right…by my neglect, I had taught him to live without me.

What has years of loneliness and isolation taught Sarah?

My niece and I do not speak as the boat takes its loud journey back to the island. By the time we pull into the cavern, my heart is so filled with regrets that I can’t remain silent.

“During my residency,” I say after the driver cuts the engine, “I once met an adult patient with cherubism—a condition that causes the lower jaw and cheeks to grow to outsize proportions. The patient frequently found herself being stared at—and, yes, some people were shockingly rude to her. But she came to terms with her condition and came to accept it. When I met her, she told me that she considered her uniqueness a gift.”

“Is that—” the voice coming from beneath the burka is icy “—because all of mankind’s problems can be solved with psychology?”

I meet her cool gaze. “No. My patient’s attitude was the product of unusual strength and courage. You have those same qualities, Sarah.”

“How would you know that?”

“Because I knew your father. I see him in you. And I know he would not want you to let real opportunities for change slip through your fingers.”

Sarah falls silent, not speaking even when the driver offers his hand and helps her onto the dock. She hesitates when one of the guards calls out a greeting, then she strides toward the elevator, leaving me to clamber out of the boat alone.

I can’t blame her for being upset. As I thank the driver and make my way across the dock, I realize that I’m failing in all I came her to do. Since learning about Sarah, all I’ve wanted is to help her find a new life, but all I’ve done is demonstrate how painful life can be. Why should she choose to endure suffering when she can remain content in confinement?

I’m afraid she will slip away and go to bed before I can speak to her again, but she waits for me in the elevator. I nod a greeting to the guard. “You don’t have to escort us upstairs. I know which buttons to push.”

“Sorry, ma’am, but it’s protocol.”

“Thank you, but we’ve had a rough night. Please, let us have this elevator to ourselves.”

The young man bites his lip and glances up at the security camera, then steps out of the car. When the sliding door has closed, Sarah says, “He’s going to be in so much trouble.”

“An elevator guard—I’ve never heard of anything so silly.” I pull the confining burka from Sarah’s head. “Look,” I tell her, grasping at my last hope, “I don’t blame you for not wanting to enter a world that can be cruel to anyone who doesn’t measure up to whatever’s considered normal. But they are doing amazing things in reconstructive surgery today. I’m almost positive you would be a great candidate for a face transplant.”

Her expression doesn’t change, but her eyes glitter with something that might be interest…or cynicism. “A face transplant…like that Nicolas Cage movie,
Face/Off?
Complete science fiction.”

“The movie, yes, but French surgeons performed a successful partial transplant in 2005. The technology is available. If you’re willing, Dr. Mewton and I could investigate the possibilities. We could make some calls and get your name on a donor list.”

She hugs the crumpled burka to her chest. “It can’t happen.”

“Why couldn’t it? I know you’ve had your fill of surgery, but the pain would be relatively brief. The result would improve the rest of your life.”

She leans against the wall and closes her eyes. The car comes to a halt at the first floor and the door opens.

I step forward, convinced that I’ve lost her, but her whispered response halts me on the threshold. “I’d like to look different, but leaving here wouldn’t be easy. I felt…
lost
out there.”

“I could help. I could prepare you for the changes you’ll encounter once you leave this place.”

She exhales softly and blinks, inadvertently drawing my attention to a trace of wetness on her cheek. “I’ll think about it. Good night.”