“In a sense, that is good news. It is an indication that she is returning to reality.”
“What is reality?”
“I suppose,” said the doctor thoughtfully, “you could not possibly know. Please go on. I shall explain.”
“I thought a change of scene, a change of surroundings would distract her and alleviate her pain and on my insistence, we came here to Geneva. In retrospect, a particularly inapt decision because it was a place of very happy but also very painful memories for her. And of course, not only the painful but also the happy memories cause grief when the person with which they are associated and whom one loved is dead. Unforgivable, too, because I had come to realize she loved her late husband though for two years she had me believe she hated him.”
“Oh, sometimes,” said Dr Menke and smiled, “love and hate are one and the same.”
“In any case, here in Geneva, I lost completely control of her. Not that I ever tried to rule her life. She was far too intelligent, independent and rich for that. No. I lost my influence over her. The chemistry that held us together was suddenly not there. She stopped considering me though she knows she needs and is dependent on me. However, she also knows that I shall never abandon her. My sexual inadequacy obviously played its part in this loosening of our ties. But here in Geneva, her abnormality became much more apparent and her depressions more frequent. Hallucinations and irrationality manifested themselves and they frightened me. One feels so utterly helpless when confronted by such symptoms. That, of course, is the main reason why I am in your office. I need your advice. I just cannot cope any more and I am concerned for her. I do love her. She is an extraordinary woman. More than that, she is a very gifted artist, not the insipid amateur. She is a talent of exceptional brilliance. She has the technique and the ability to put her soul into her work. Are you aware of that?”
“Of course I am, Mr. Markopoulos. In fact, I advised her to paint as much as possible. I think it is the perfect way to relieve her tensions and externalize her emotions. It is an ideal supplement to therapy even if it is not always adequate on its own. It is more of a palliative and a preventive of relapses. Has she been painting regularly?”
“She has not stopped.”
“Has the painting, in your estimation, been normal?”
“When she is in depression it becomes very strange indeed. One feels that the person who has painted the picture is not mentally sound.”
“I see. Well, it is to be expected.”
“Another thing Dr Menke that, perhaps, you should know. Lea is obsessed by sex. At my age, I would be hard put to keep up with a normal woman ten years younger than I am but Lea‟s needs are way beyond the normal. She has been sleeping around. Of that, I am practically certain and it is a constant worry to me. I am worried that the casual encounters she indulges in might bring her to harm. Personally, I am past feelings of jealousy and betrayal. The ridiculous concept of cuckoldry, at my age and in this particular situation, has very little meaning. I see myself as the protector and guardian of a very special human being, a person who is mentally disturbed but has so much to offer. An artist of her caliber is a treasure that must be preserved.” 53
“I must commend you on your attitude. Mrs. Menandros is very lucky to have you. Before my medical advice, perhaps, I should give you some facts about her past. I have a feeling you know very little of it and the little you know is incorrect. I first met Mr. Menandros when he came a few years back, just like you, to ask for my advice on his wife‟s condition. Had you ever met him?”
“No.”
“He was a formidable presence. Tall, corpulent, extremely intelligent with the self-assurance of the very successful businessman. He was brash, impatient, authoritative and tough. A person one cannot easily like. Admired, feared, yes, but not someone you would choose to meet socially over a drink and seek his company. He could not abide stupidity and procrastination and would not hesitate to speak his mind.
Yet, despite his forbidding exterior, he was human and compassionate. It was the only conclusion one could reach given the concern and anxiety he showed over his wife‟s condition. He seemed to love her dearly. He blamed himself and the lifestyle he imposed in their marriage for her troubles. The constant movement from city to city, from one country to another, the long hours he spent working and finally his neglect of her needs. It was, however, not the only cause of her derangement. Her mother suffered from schizophrenia for many years and her father was a rather indifferent and callous person. He was a womanizer and in the last years of his life took no interest in his wife.”
“Lea told me her mother suffered from the Alzheimer Syndrome.”
“That may or may not be true. I never examined the lady. The cause of schizophrenia has not yet been identified but we know it is an organic brain disorder similar to Alzheimer and there is a genetic link. If one parent suffers from it, the chances of the offspring contracting it are roughly 13 percent. Unfortunately, Mrs.
Menandros, at some point, slid into that group. It may have been due, as her husband suspected, to the fast, unsettled, ever-changing lifestyle of their married life. She was constantly complaining that she had not time for her painting, that she had no friends, that just as she was getting comfortable in one place they would rush off to another to set up a household anew. In addition, as you have pointed out, Mrs. Menandros was a sensual woman. I suspect most artists usually are. The fact that she hardly saw her husband and their married life consisted of a half dozen daily telephone calls and a few cocktail parties must have weighed heavily on her. With no money problems, no occupation, with time on her hands but not enough to let her live normally and get on with her painting, life must have been intolerable.
“She started having delusions. What we in our terminology call overt or psychotic symptoms. She believed her husband no longer loved her; that he was having affairs; that the people she met knew about these affairs, ridiculed her behind her back and were plotting to separate them. She probably identified him with her father for whom she had very little affection. Aesthetically, she hated the weight he put on. He could no longer drive a car. Of course, he did not need to. He was whisked around in stretch limousines. She told me that in the end she could not bear to look at him. And on, and on, and on. She suffered from the classic symptoms of schizophrenia. An inability to sort out and interpret incoming sensations, and an inability therefore to respond appropriately. Their relationship deteriorated and quarrels became the order of the day. Mainly over the telephone, I should add.”
“The fact remains that Lea did love him. That was crystal clear by the way she grieved at his death.”
“Oh yes. The marriage held for years despite everything. Despite the quarrels and the infidelities that followed, on both sides. I do not think either one wanted to 54
sever the ties that held them together. According to Mr. Menandros, his wife started having casual extra-marital liaisons and eventually he followed suit. It could not have been very difficult for him to do so because even with his obesity and his abrasive manner he must have seemed very handsome, charming and seductive to the vast majority of women given his great wealth and power. It is, of course, the one thing, for it is a unity, which women find irresistible. The reason for their subsequent divorce appears to be their involvement with drugs. Mr. Menandros became diabetic and as you probably know this incurable condition reduces sexual potency in a man. He must have already been using cocaine socially, which is the drug of the rich and is casually and widely in use in the circles he moved in. He then moved on to harder stuff to shore up his sexual drives and Mrs. Menandros at some point started using them as well. This complicated her schizophrenia and she alternated between the overt and the so-called negative symptoms of the illness. Negative symptoms include depressions, emotional flatness and a lack of pleasure or interest in life.
“Three or four years ago, I cannot pinpoint the exact date just now; she left him, returned to Geneva and filed for divorce. She also came to us for help though she had previously refused to do so. She must have realized how serious her condition was becoming. I was entrusted with her case and I am happy to say, we managed to rehabilitate her almost totally. I say, almost totally, because we have no cure for schizophrenia since we do not know its cause. Recent research suggests that it is linked to abnormalities of brain chemistry and brain structure. It is however, a highly treatable disorder and there are drugs that help people avoid or reduce frequent relapses. She was hospitalized with us for about six months and then she left for Greece. No need to tell you, she was one of my more interesting and fascinating patients.”
“And Mr. Menandros?”
“I was coming to that. Throughout that period when their lawyers were working out the divorce and while Mrs. Menandros was in our hospital, her husband showed a concern and a distress that was remarkable and very touching. He was in constant telephone contact with us and never failed to visit our institute whenever he was in Europe. He repeatedly asked to see her but she always refused to meet him. She used to get frantic and called him, the monster, the mammoth. Regardless of her attitude, he continued to take a very close interest in her recovery. I have no doubt he loved her and I am sure he felt guilt and believed he had contributed considerably to her condition.”
“Your story certainly provides a new perspective and answers some questions that puzzled me,” said Stratos. “The question is: do you see a way out?”
“A complete cure, as I told you before, is not feasible. Nevertheless, we can suppress the more distressing symptoms. One thing I need to know. Has she been using drugs?”
“I do not think so. When we arrived in Geneva and after her condition deteriorated, I searched the house and found a cache of drugs. But she did not touch them for a long while and eventually I got rid of them.”
“Good. I shall prescribe the same two drugs that seemed to help her best in the past. Many new drugs have come out in recent years but since she will not be under my constant care, we shall stick to what we know. Another thing: I suggest you go back to Athens. Associations with her sad and troubled past will be much less at hand in Greece.”
“I suggested it to her repeatedly, Dr Menke, and she has always refused.”
“You must find a way. It will be a great help. The way I see it is this. Mrs.
Menandros has definitely made a detour to reality. It is a major step in the right direction. The grieving of her husband shows she finally realized he was not the 55
monster of her hallucinations. He was not the devil trying to exterminate her. He was a man who loved her and she was by no means an innocent party to the breakup of her marriage. Illness or not, it takes two to quarrel and the blame is hardly ever on one side alone. I think she realizes now that he cared for her and that was evident to the very last moment. Even during the process of divorcing. She realizes she was completely unfair in assigning blame for the failure of their marriage exclusively on him and unjust in the subsequent loathing and revulsion she felt and, now, there is no way to make it up or to apologize. Leaving Geneva will, in a sense, be going away from the scene of the crime.
Away from the concrete setting of these memories. Moreover, we do have a great ally.
Time. Time the great healer. Eventually, this torment will fade away and one major reason for her depressions will disappear.”
Dr Menke pulled out a pad and wrote down the prescription. He handed it to Stratos.
“Hopefully,” he said, “with these two drugs you shall soon see an improvement.
However, she must use them systematically. If you go to Greece and have any problems, do not hesitate to call me on the phone. I shall always be more than happy to help Mrs. Menandros.”
“Will the medicine and an eventual return to normality affect Lea‟s talent, Dr Menke? Or at least her desire to paint?”
“I doubt it. She did paint during the time you met her, when she was well, did she not? Moreover, even if it did affect her art, would you have left her helpless for the sake of art? Which, finally, is more important, the art that is produced or the person that produces it?”
Stratos considered the question for a moment silently.
“Another puzzle of life,” he said.
“I see you have a philosophical bend. What do you do in life Mr Markopoulos?”
“I am a retired architect turned amateur writer. Over and above everything else, however, I am the keeper of Lea Sevdalis, ex-Menandros.” The doctor smiled and got up. He offered his hand to Stratos.
“I am very happy we met,” he said. “I am at your service.” Lea refused to return to Athens but she did agree to take the medicine.
“You are a little sneak,” she told Stratos with a smile. “Going behind my back to see Dr Menke. How is he? He is a nice man. I made his life impossible in those days but he was always patient and understanding with me. What little sanity I have I owe it to him.”
“Don‟t talk nonsense,” said Stratos.
Lea did improve. She did not change her lifestyle but her black moods were fewer though they did not disappear. She did not stop painting and did not stop vanishing for days now and then. She kept her studio in Montreux and Stratos visited her there every few months to see her work. The extreme psychosis and kinkiness of the past was not apparent but much of her work continued to have a sexual content. There were new models, men and women, and Stratos wondered if they were sexual partners as well. He did not doubt she had affairs and was thankful they did not last long. She always returned to him. He was her protector and shelter, her adviser and father figure.
Also her occasional sexual partner. It was a strange situation but he had come to accept it. Her welfare, whatever it involved, was his mission in life.
56
Almost five years had gone by since their arrival in Geneva when Lea‟s mother died and they returned to Athens for the funeral. Lea mourned her and felt guilty she had neglected her for so long but her mother‟s condition had deteriorated to the point where she could neither recognize Lea on the telephone nor talk coherently and Lea talked only to the nurses taking care of her. After the funeral, they stayed on in Athens and partly resumed their previous activities. Partly, that is, because Lea, even if to a lesser extent, stuck to the independent way of life she had followed in Geneva. The circle in a sense had been completed.
Normality and peace became the norm of their lives. Stratos continued with his writing; published some short stories and a second novel and the literary press often cited his work. Lea continued with her painting but as the years went by, slowed down considerably from her original, frenetic pace. Slowed down, too, from her immoderate need for sexual gratification and as a result, the couple drew closer together. They resumed their summers in Limnos and spent a few months every year in Geneva but Athens was henceforth their base, their favorite city, their home.
They quarreled often. Long ago, Panos thought this was something that occurred in other marriages only. Even though he saw it all around him, somehow he believed they would be exempt. There was so much love between him and Helen, so much passion, that he could not envisage the unsettling intrusion of small annoyances and petty bickering in their married life. He could not envisage days of mutual brooding and sulking that resulted from trifling misunderstandings and raised voices. Lately however, it had almost become a habit and if it were not for the continuing physical attraction between them, they would have separated long ago despite their two children. Sometimes, they did not talk for days and Helen went in and out of the house without a word.
He often wondered if she was faithful to him and it depressed him to think that his marriage had reached the point where such questions troubled him. He habitually put such thoughts aside for he could not imagine what a sexually satisfied woman would look for outside marriage. A soul brother? An emotional balance her husband could no longer provide? The fact was that after nearly twenty years of marriage the only thing that held them together, apart from Anna and Maria, was their complete sexual compatibility. The passion that was still alive and the joy they derived from lovemaking. Their breathless, breathtaking orgasms brought respite and temporary tenderness. The bed remained their last arena of intimacy. On it, they not only quenched their longing but also managed to talk intimately like the first days of their love. It seemed to him a miracle that after so many years, at their age, in an otherwise troubled relationship, they still yearned for each other‟s body. That even after a quarrel, in bed their bodies drew each other like magnets. He wondered how much longer this would last. Their alienation was becoming sclerotic; a permanent feature of their married life. Had they reached the point of no return?
“Oh, snap out of it, Panos.”
He was sitting comfortably on an armchair reading a book. He looked up at Helen.
“What now?” he asked.
“How long will it last?”
“What are you talking about?”
“That sad and sorrowful look you have been carrying around for weeks.” He looked at her for a moment, expressionless, and turned to his book.
57
“Oh, how I hate it when you ignore me. Listen, she is gone that ugly bitch and all the mournful looks in the world will not bring her back. But there is a mystery in this I cannot understand. It cannot be just this immense admiration you had for an artist; there must be more to it than that.”
He looked up again with a tight smile.
“Can‟t you ever be civil? Do you have to be nasty about a person I loved and respected? She was like a mother and a sister to me.”
“Is that all?”
He went back to his book.
“The truth is,” Helen went on, “she was ugly and unpleasant. I cannot imagine anyone wanting to make love to her. I despise myself for feeling jealous of an old hag.
But you seemed to care more for her than you did for me.” The ping-pong game was starting.
“She was over seventy, for heaven‟s sake,” he said.
“Twenty years ago she was fifty. Ten years ago she was sixty and I must admit, she kept pretty well for her age.”
“Do we have to delve into ancient history in search of a quarrel?”
“When ancient history has a way of intruding into the present do you expect me to be happy?”
“I shall try to smile more often.”
“Oh cut out the irony.”
“Am I supposed to ask permission to feel sad or happy? Must I toe the line of your likes and dislikes?”
“No, but this exaggeration of yours is very irritating. How much longer will this long face of yours last? A couple of years?”
“Perhaps. In any case, nothing I ever do seems to please you.”
“Don‟t kill yourself trying.”
“Speaking of irony!”
“My dear Panos, where do you see the irony? Your coldness and indifference towards me is disheartening.”
“Need I say it is mutual?”
“That may be so, but who started it off?”
“That is the million dollar question.”
They made love and fell asleep in each other‟s arms. He woke up and saw her lovely smile; her lovely face and disheveled blond hair. He kissed her tenderly. He remembered that after he had made love to Lea, an eternity ago, he felt the guilt of betrayal towards Stratos. She told him, nothing had changed, meaning that the basic emotional equation of their lives was unchanged. He, now, felt exactly the same way.
Nothing had changed. The love he thought was lost was simply buried, suppressed temporarily in God knows what recesses of the mind. For two and a half decades with love affairs and marriages in between, a mutual grudge kept them avoiding each other despite their son‟s pleas that they meet. Iason‟s minor operation brought them face to face in the hospital.
The mutual discomposure and upheaval lasted a few minutes. They had not seen each other for so long they could not take their eyes off each other. Iason was all but forgotten. Twenty-five years and nothing had changed. The little weight they had put on suited them. Ceres in her early fifties was blooming. She was no longer a girl but a mature, desirable woman and Panos, with graying hair was handsome and debonair.
58
Their love was intact, resurrected, destined to flare up at first sight again, after twenty-five years.
They left together. It was late afternoon. They had not talked much at the hospital. They just looked at each other and smiled and now, on the street, with shackled hearts, a thousand memories retrieved, a reinstated love weighing on their souls they felt diffident and unsure of their path; of each other. He suggested they go to a movie. She smiled. Was history repeating itself? Was it a new beginning? He led her to the last row of seats where people would not see two middle-aged people kiss. They dined at the Chanterelle on Old Brompton Road and slowly walked, arm in arm, across Kensington Gardens to her flat in Notting Hill.
She kissed him back and caressed him. She stretched and squeezed her body on his. She loved the warmth of his nakedness. She had slept with many men in her life and had never felt as comfortable and lascivious with anyone else. His lovemaking combined adventure and innovation with delicacy; passion with gentleness and a surprising lack of inhibitions for so shy a person.
She kissed him again and again. Her energetic tongue searched his mouth, stretched for his throat. Her body was in thrall to his, to his masculinity, her movements inviting his love, inviting their union the penetration of body and soul.
“I love you, Panos,” she told him. “I never did get over you. Every time I knew you were in England I dreamed about you at night and my loneliness and longing made me want to cry and scream, I love you Panos, I need you. But in the morning, that pretentious human failing called pride kept me from seeing you. It was not easy to forgive you for abandoning me.”
“Oh, Ceres, don‟t blame it all on me. The refusal to compromise was reciprocal and what a terrible gap that created in our lives. All of a sudden, I realize our folly. I never stopped loving you, too. Isn‟t it strange the way life and circumstances shape our lives? Finally, we are not masters of our destiny. We are like bits of paper blown left and right by the wind. How can one not become fatalistic?”
“But it was us that made our choices. We took the decisions.”
“To circumstances we could not alter. They shaped our decisions and our lives.
And is it not fate that I have you now, so unexpectedly, in my arms? I think it is. Let's not waste this second chance.”
“Oh Panos, please don‟t put ideas in my head. I am very lonely and terribly susceptible to dreams of a better, a happier life.”
“So am I, my love, but I think we are at a crossroads. After wasting twenty-five years, we do not have much time left. The past, undoubtedly, had its happy moments.
With you, too, I am sure. I have two lovely girls to show for it. But we must put it behind us.”
“Did you settle the girls?”
“Yes. We found and rented a cozy little flat in Knightsbridge. The girls are terribly excited about living on their own. I know Iason will take good care of them. The bonding of an elder half-brother is sometimes stronger than that of a brother. They are practically in love with our handsome Iason. Did you know that they visit him every day?”
“Of course. They are discovering each other. Iason keeps talking about them.”
“Yes. Well, at least, their path has been mapped out for the next few years.
Anna, the eldest is going to Queen‟s College to study mathematics like her old man.
Like her mother, too. Helen is a mathematician. She was my colleague at the faculty before I left it. Maria is eighteen, a year younger than Anna, and was accepted at the Royal College of Art. She has talent and I am particularly thrilled that she has chosen 59
to be an artist. I do not expect that she will be another Lea but she will be doing something she loves and fulfills her. It is our life that has to be settled.”
“What about Helen?”
“When the glass cracks it cannot be glued together again. I loved Helen just as you must have loved your husband at one time. However, there is no comparison. We are neither better nor worse than they are. We were simply made for each other. Our physical and psychic needs match like the bits of a jigsaw puzzle. What do you say?
Shall we try it once more? Will you be my Thimitra again?”
“Yes, my darling. Oh, yes.”
They kissed and slid into a long, passionate love session to quench a longing wedged firmly and painfully in their subconscious for many long years. At least, where their love was concerned, nothing had changed. Except for the new sense of hope, optimism and a determination that nothing, but nothing, was ever going to separate them again.
Ceres was silent.
“Second thoughts?” asked Panos.
“No. It‟s just that I feel I am stealing you from Helen.”
“How unlike a woman to have such misgivings.