What We Tell

By Holly W. Schwartztol

Friendship is a complicated experience, one filled with ups and downs, highs and lows, joy and sorrow. But true friendship, like true love, can withstand the tests of timeor can it?

For three women, each accomplished in life and facing the challenges and rewards of midlife, friendship is everything. Each has a thriving psychology practice, a family, and security. And each has invested decades of caring, love, laughter, and support into her best friends. Their future looks bright.

When secrets begin to mount and loyalties are betrayed, however, these mature friends struggle to find a balance between their loyalty to each other and their clients, as well as between their families and themselves. The women try to trust and support one another, just as they would advise their patients in similar circumstances.

But behind each brave face lies a festering secret that the owner is understandably reluctant to share with anyone. No one knows to what lengths they will go to protect that secret until the test appears. As each struggles to face her past, the more troublesome skeletons in the closet begin rattling for attention. How will each woman survive the scandal if her secret is betrayed?

Sometimes psychology is not enough to heal the wounds, and sometimes physician, heal thyself is easier said than done.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Nov 29, 2012
• ISBN: 9781475962734

Holly W. Schwartztol

HOLLY W. SCHWARTZTOL has a PhD from the University of Miami and has practiced psychology for thirty years. She is a past president of both the South Florida Writers Association and of the Dade County Psychological Association. Her novel Sherry and the Unseen World was published in 2005. Holly and her husband, Robert, have three children and two grandchildren.

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

What a perfect day for my swim. I love the turquoise ocean and the vast azure sky. Why, I could just stay here forever and a day! Everything is so peaceful and perfect only . . . what is that weird wave coming towards me. It’s so wide and powerful. Something about it is very scary . . . I know I’ve seen something like it before. It’s moving steadily in my direction. How can I ever get away from it? It is still pretty far away. What can it be? Oh, I just love the feeling of the water. I want to float and bask in the sunshine. But, that wave is coming closer now. It scares me . . . why is it so enormous? I know! It looks like a tsunami! I’ll have to start swimming very fast to get to the shore and warn everyone. Oh, no! The water is getting so deep!

Ruth swam as hard as she could toward the ever-vanishing beach. Spotting her friend Jocelyn, she shouted, Quick! Tell everyone! A tsunami is headed this way!

A tsunami? How can you tell?

Look at those cruise ships! The water is already dangerously flooding the lower decks… you can’t even see the portholes anymore… you have to help me… we have to get Bobbie and warn all the others!

Ruth turned her head and again saw the savage wave off in the distance, gaining momentum and she became more and more frantic. How could she ever get to shore fast enough to warn her friends and family? Why wasn’t Jocelyn as concerned as she was?

The water around her was getting rougher and rougher. Ruth gulped a large mouthful of salty water and felt her arms and legs weakening. The more she swam, the further the shore receded. Panic gripped Ruth and her strokes became weaker and weaker. She knew there was to be no escape from the tidal wave. How could this blissful afternoon turn so deadly so fast?

Is this how I am going to die?

And with that, her eyes opened and she saw that she was in her safe bed. However, the nightmare lingered in her thoughts and she had to consciously convince herself that the danger was not real.

Dr. Ruth Trotter blinked as she felt the morning sunlight throw a cast of warmth over her bed. She looked over to Joel’s side. The sheets were mussed and the pillow was squashed. Joel might have had the same dream that she had, from the looks of his bedclothes.

Ruth shivered slightly and took a deep breath. Somehow her dread from the dream wouldn’t fade. She felt haunted by the chaos the dream portended.

Maybe it’s my age . . . How did I ever get to be this old? I was a girl just a minute ago. No one I know can believe that we are in our fifties and sixties. It is almost a cliché to wonder about this, I know, but still it simply can’t be! Everyone says I look young for my age, only now they say I look like I’m in my early fifties and I’m supposed to be flattered. Funny, when I was a young girl of twelve or so, I always thought that older people should be proud of their accomplishments and their life experience. Well, whether I believe it or not, I’d better get myself up and onto the treadmill so I don’t truly start to feel my age!

Ruth sighed deeply as she contemplated the day. She looked around her room and noted the piles of papers and books on her night side table. All those periodicals and books and papers she’d brought home from the office. She meant to read them, but somehow she never really got around to most of the piles. And then she hated to throw anything away. After all, what if she threw away something important?

Now that is just foolish thinking. After all these years you’d think I’d realize that hardly anything is really so important. And, as Sylvia says, anything I really need I can get on the Internet.

Ruth loved to collect paperweights and rocks. Memorabilia cluttered her room. Funny thing was that she felt some comfort in the clutter. Sure, it was fine to have Pixie come and clean up after the weekend. Ruth did like the sense of order when it was someone else doing the cleaning. She’d always hated straightening things herself.

Then, she’d have a day when she lost something important because it was buried somewhere in the deep piles and when that happened, Ruth forever swore to herself that she’d reform and become a neatnik. She’d run out and buy colorful folders and organizing kits and busily group everything into special files, vowing to be like Jocelyn. Jocelyn’s wallet was so compact and orderly. Each credit card had its own special slot. Her money was crisp and tidy. Ruth’s wallet seemed to sprout miscellaneous papers and the money was usually wadded up. Cashiers would look askance at her as she fished in her wallet for her credit cards.

The sad thing was that Ruth was perfectly able to help her clients organize themselves. Too bad I don’t apply all that good advice to myself! Ruth addressed Miss Marple, her large orange cat. Miss Marple’s large green eyes just gazed serenely back at Ruth.

Oh, you big old cat. You are so fastidious, always washing yourself and prancing daintily around. But, how I do love you so, Miss Marple.

Ruth pulled out her appointment book and smiled as she noted that her three appointments for the day were after lunch.

So, Miss Marple, I will have plenty of time to enjoy my lunch with Jocelyn and still get to the office in time to prepare for my clients. Now, don’t turn away from me; you are going to sleep, are you? Not such a hard day for you. What? Now you want me to rub your ears, do you? Yes, you’re a good cat and I love you.

The phone rang.

Hello? Well, you certainly left early enough today, Joel. Oh, I forgot that you had an early meeting. I hate when you leave before I get up. I miss you too. I don’t get home until after six tonight. Yes, OK, I will meet you at Morton’s. I love you too. Bye.

Oh, no!

Miss Marple jumped as Ruth banged into the breakfast table, nearly overturning her coffee cup.

CHAPTER 2

Gosh, Ruth. It really is true that women our age are invisible. People look right through us. I was in a restaurant by myself and no one came near me. Waiters just walked by without even a glance in my direction…

Ruth and Jocelyn were ensconced at Villagio, sitting in the bar area, hoping to escape the raucous din of the lunchtime crowd at the popular Merrick Park restaurant.

I know what you mean, Jocelyn. And it just doesn’t seem one bit fair. I mean, we are the same people we were twenty years ago. It’s like you want to shake people and get them to notice you. Remember how sexy we used to be? Guys would try and pick us up all the time. Now it’s as if we had died and were coming back as ghosts that no one can see.

Isn’t that the truth? Even our husbands hardly notice us that way anymore. It’s not that they don’t love us, but, honestly, Ruth. When did your husband last come home and grab you and pull off your clothes?

Ruth twirled a strand of her long brown hair. Of course, the color had darkened over the years, with the help of Ruth’s hairdresser.

Ruth said, All those books that say people have sex up into their eighties. Who are those people? I sure don’t know any.

Ruth smiled wanly at her good old friend. Jocelyn’s equally assisted blond hair framed her face. When Ruth and Jocelyn met, they were both slim. Now, the years had rounded both women out, giving them the ample bosoms that they had both longed for in their teens, but also added padding to their hips and tummies. The two women had been meeting for lunch for nearly twenty years every Monday. They never invited anyone to join them and they never missed a Monday together except for funerals and vacations.

Maybe when we get to be seventy we’ll be valued for our bodies again, continued Ruth.

Yeah, right. We’ll just turn into sex kittens… after all, it was our generation that demanded we be appreciated for our minds, Jocelyn smiled ruefully, and before we know it, those will glide away too. I don’t get it, Ruth! I think you are still really pretty.

Thank God someone does. I swear I could prance around naked in the street and the only thing that would happen is that someone would call the cops and have me locked up in the loony bin. And anyway, my libido sure isn’t what it used to be. How could this happen to me? I mean it, Jocelyn. Where did it all go?

I’ll bet if you had a romance with someone new, you’d feel sexy again.

So, what are you recommending? I don’t think anyone would even consider me for adultery anymore; it’s as if something just shut down and that whole world disappeared.

Ruth thought back to the psych conventions in the seventies. Those lusty psychologists assumed that what happened at their meetings stayed at the meetings. She smiled, imagining Dr. Glen Holden and their tete-a-tetes that led to furtive trysts. She could see Glen in his tan corduroy jacket, grinning at her over the froth of his Heineken. The smell of his Aramis cologne filling her nostrils as she sipped her gin and tonic…

Well, Ruth, I’m sure that our kids would be glad to know that we are out of the running. They don’t even believe we ever had sex to begin with.

Kids. They think they’re the first people to ever enjoy sex. I wonder why it has to be that way, that kids have to see their parents as asexual. You’d think that as they matured they’d begin to view us as human.

I think they have to get way more mature than they are for that, Ruth. And do you think of your mother as a sexual being?

Hardly. Well, Joc, I guess we are at that age where we are supposed to sublimate with doing good works and all that.

Ruth grabbed a third piece of luscious bread. She’d ordered the light Riviera salad to fool herself into thinking she was having a dietetic lunch. She knew she should have asked the waiter to remove the irresistible bread, but, as usual, she’d given into temptation.

Guess I’ll just drown my sorrows in food. No wonder I can’t lose weight…

Yeah, sighed Jocelyn. And what should we lose weight for anyway?

Will you ladies be wanting anything else? The waiter was tall and blond. He reminded Ruth of a young Robert Redford.

Yes, we will have two decaffeinated coffees and the check, Ruth said.

Sure I can’t get you anything else? Some dessert maybe? The key lime pie is fresh and we have delectable chocolate mousse… Ruth remembered that he’d said his name was Jeremy. She also noticed his muscular arms and the dimple in his left cheek.

I don’t think we need any of that, do you Jocelyn?

Well, we could share one if you want…

No, just the decafs and the check, Ruth said as the tall, thin young man moved away from the table.

I wouldn’t mind sharing some of him, Jocelyn said when the waiter left.

Ha, that’d be the day. Imagine if we had said that to him. He’d have thought we were really nutty. He can’t be much over twenty-five or so…

Exactly, Ruth! Wouldn’t it be fun to be with a young man again? Just supposing that he was into older women… I have a childhood friend who married someone thirty years younger than she and I hear she’s having a wonderful time.

I think the chocolate mousse would have been sinful enough for today.

Doesn’t hurt to dream a little, Ruth. God knows men are always eyeing the waitresses and those little darlings by the swimming pool.

Ruth secretly resented how Joel’s eyes wandered toward all the skimpily clad young girls. She sometimes wondered why the girls even bothered dressing at all, what with the thongs that lingered between their shapely legs. Joel openly ogled the twenty-somethings with their unconscionably flat tummies and perky breasts.

I just can’t get over how quickly life seems to have snuck up on us, Joc. Where were we all these years?

Bringing up our children is where. Seeing our clients. Going to meetings. Life. Remember how we couldn’t wait to get married and stop dating, Ruth?

Ruth stared at the retreating waiter. She could just imagine how exciting it would be to be to watch him undress.

Yes, that’s true. It isn’t being single that I miss exactly…

I know… it’s being desired that we miss, isn’t it? That’s why a little fling with the waiter is so appealing. No fuss, no muss. Just a little fun for the afternoon…

Now you are really dreaming, Jocelyn Woodberg…

Yes, that is exactly what I am doing. Here he comes with our decafs.

Sure I can’t get you anything else?

Ruth and Jocelyn burst into hysterical laughter.

No, you’ve done enough for us for one day! Ruth said. He retreated.

Why you were positively batting your little eyelashes at him…

You would comment on my little eyelashes, Ruth said as her large green eyes widened.

Well, Ruth, you never wear eye make-up and you do have tiny little lashes. They would look so much bigger if…

Oh, Jocelyn. Don’t you remember, way back in my forties when I went through a phase of wearing make-up all the time? The pancake and the eye-liner and mascara. Yuck. I’m perfectly content with just a little lipstick. And Joel prefers me without even that.

You do have lovely skin, Ruth. You don’t look a day over—

Stop! Don’t even go there. I don’t want to hear that I don’t look a day over fifty-five, but, seriously, Jocelyn, I am blessed with unlined skin. Got that from my mother. So, what do you think? Should we call the waiter back and invite him home with us?

Right. The only thing I have to do is finish up and get back to the office. How many clients do you have today?

Three this afternoon. You been busy lately? My practice is so unpredictable… one week I’m so busy I hardly have time to pee and another week, I could just go shopping all afternoon. Managed care has certainly taken a huge bite out of my caseload. More like mangled care, if you ask me…

Ruth had always presumed that by the time she reached her late fifties, she’d never have to hunt for new clients. These days one had to constantly re-invent oneself. Nothing was really easy.

Don’t you like being a little less busy, Ruth? Seems we put in years of long days and nights. It’s kind of nice to have some breathing time. Those days when I have large gaps of time, I’m just glad to be able to read a book or go for a walk.

Ruth and Jocelyn met back in graduate school in a clinical psychology program in the late sixties. Graduate school. Ruth had feared that she would never get her Ph.D. Her thoughts scanned all those ways they had had to prove to the faculty that they were worthy of obtaining that degree.

Nearly ten years after she had successfully defended her dissertation, Ruth had worried that somehow somewhere she had not dotted an i or crossed a t and that some Dean or other would swoop down and snatch the coveted doctorate back.

Remember when we were in school together and we wondered if there was really ‘life after PhD’?

You’re not still worrying that someone will take your degree back are you, Ruth?

No, silly. But, remember how we thought that those professors were so important? They held our professional careers in their hands way back then. You know, of course, as we always say, that our profession is filled with people shooting themselves in the foot, Ruth said dryly.

That is so true. You know, Ruth, I always thought that psych professors should be more understanding…

What a misguided notion that is. Maybe it really is true that those who can do and those that can’t teach.

Ruth’s thoughts wandered back to the worries of graduate school and all those hoops they’d all had to jump through. It seemed so absurd now all these years later, and she felt that if she’d only had more perspective during those years, she could have enjoyed herself much more. At least, she and Jocelyn had had each other. Each one had encouraged the other to stay with the program during those times when dropping it all had been tempting.

Anyway, we better pay and get ready to go back to our offices. Want to meet here again next week?

Sounds like a plan. Ruth enjoyed the easy repartee she and Jocelyn shared. The years had turned into decades of