"Hello, Paul." "This is Adele Brouse." "I, uh..." "I just had an appointment open up... tomorrow actually, at 1:00... and I was wondering if you were interested in taking it." "We had sort of a truncated session last Friday and I had some lingering concerns." "Perhaps you did as well." "And so if you want the extra time to continue our talk, let me know." "You've got the number." "Um, okay, thanks." "Okay, bye." "It's okay." "What's okay?" "Well, I know I've told you not to tell me if I look tired or old, but you can say it." "I look exhausted." "I know." "Do you feel exhausted?" "Not so much but... although I am starving." "Do you have anything to eat?" "Nothing?" " This is your house, right?" " Yes, it is." "And you have a kitchen in your house?" "Yes, I do." "Okay, I get it." "It's against the rules." "I'm fine." "Would you like some water?" "No, I'll be fine, really." "Don't worry." "That's actually something that you say quite a lot..." ""I'll be fine." "It's okay."" "Is there some message that you want to communicate with me in that?" "So what happened last night?" "What didn't happen last night?" "Oh, did you hear that?" "That was my stomach." "See, you remind me of Izzy." "You have a certain implacability." "I told her about the results to my brca1." " You did?" " Yeah." "And how did she respond to that?" "You know, hearing that her mother was healthy, that she would be healthy?" "She accused me of being a narcissist." "Yeah, I thought I was giving her good news... a gift... and she called me a narcissist." "Why do you think she called you a narcissist?" "No, you tell me." "I mean, that's essentially what you were saying to me all last week." "That's really what you took away from our last session... that I think you're a narcissist?" "From what recall, I didn't say anything of the kind." "But I do remember strongly encouraging you to visit your sister." "How did you come to talk to Izzy last night?" "Wasn't it opening night?" "Yes yes, it was." " So did she..." " No, she did not come." "So she didn't go, but you talked to her afterwards?" "I told Izzy at the hospital." "Patricia's in the hospital." "She called me at the theater." "She said she thought she was dying, so I went straight over to her house." "And how was she?" "Eventually I did have to take her to the hospital at about 3:00 in the morning." "Russell and Izzy met me there." "The doctors stabilized her." "They got her comfortable." "I was waiting with Izzy and I told her about the results to my brca1." "And that's when she told me I was a narcissist." "Evidently she's just finished reading some book..." ""the gift of the dramatic child."" ""The drama of the gifted child."" " Oh, you know it?" " Yes, I do." "It's sort of seminal in this field." "Did Izzy say why she was reading that particular book?" "You know, Izzy thinks she had such a difficult childhood." "Izzy doesn't even know what a difficult childhood looks like, all right?" "Are you saying that you do?" "What I'm saying is she had it easy." "Gifted, huh?" "Actually I think the title is kind of misleading." "The book doesn't have anything to do with intellectual ability." "Well, she loved it." "She thinks it explains everything... me." "We were in the waiting room..." "Russell and Izzy and I." "She was sitting there in this big baggy sweatshirt with her pajama pants and her chin up on her knees." "I looked at her, I thought, "Jesus, she looks so... she's just a kid."" "And she was really scared when she saw tricia." "So I thought, "I gotta tell her something nice." "I gotta make her feel better." "I gotta reassure her."" "So I told her that the results of my test came back and that they were negative and that that meant that hers were too and that I wasn't gonna pass it on to her." "I mean..." "She gave me that look that she's just so very fond of." "I mean, why couldn't she just be grateful?" "I gave her good news and she looked as if... if she's gonna hate me, just let her hate me." "I don't know what to do anymore." "Frances, how is Patricia?" "Not good." "You said that when she called last night, she thought she was dying." "She did." "She left a message right before the end of the play." "She said..." ""I'm sorry, franny,"" "I think this is it." "I need help." She kept apologizing, saying she was sorry." "She knows I don't like dealing with illness." "So when you heard that message, what did you do?" "I left the theater." "I mean I just told Eddie that I had a family emergency." "I couldn't believe she was apologizing for being sick." "I told him I couldn't make the curtain call and I just walked out the stage door." "I was still wearing my costume." "And I just took a cab to Brooklyn." "I went straight to her place." "The door was open." "I found her... she was lying on the cold tile." "She was drenched in urine." "And I put her in the bath and... what kind of state was she in?" "She kept saying that she didn't want to die." "She was scared of dying." "And I just needed her to stop." "I needed her to let me help her." "And I shook her..." "Kind of hard." "I just wanted her to cut it out." "I wanted her to stop talking about dying right then." " Did that scare you?" " Yes, it scared me." "Did it make you angry?" "I guess so." "Jesus." "What?" "No, my sister is dying and I'm angry at her." "A lot of the time fear makes people shut down." "It seems to have spurred you to action." "Maybe it did." "D does that surprise you?" "Well, it hasn't exactly been my pattern." "Yes." "I don't know where it all came from." "I wasn't thinking about anything." "I wasn't thinking about anything at all." "What?" "I just remembered this director... when I first came to New York, in a play." "He said, you know, "franny, stop worrying about what you're feeling so much and just think about what you're doing."" " That's what you did with tricia." " Yeah." "What am I doing?" "Treat her symptoms." "Bring the fever down." "Hydrate her." "You know, she..." "she was in the bath, so I got her out of the bath and into the bed." "And then she was cold." "There was this short little period of time though... 40 minutes maybe..." "I don't know." "It seemed almost peaceful, like everything was gonna be okay." "She was cold, so I got her into bed, covered her with a blanket." "She started to fall asleep, but she wanted me to talk to her." "So I sat next to her, talking to her." "And what did you talk about?" "Just nonsense, I guess... gossip." "I told her about Laurie Littman... our fifth-grade teacher who left her husband for a woman." "And then I told her about the theater and what had happened to me and how I left before the curtain call and the look on Eddie's face when I told him." "That made her smile." "I ran out of things to talk about, I guess, so I reached up on the shelf for a book." "I thought I'd read to her..." ""Jane eyre" of all things." "I was reading to her." "I thought she'd fallen asleep." "All of a sudden she just gripped my hand." "It really frightened me." "She said, "I love you." "Love you."" "That must have felt very good." "It didn't?" "No, it did." "Of course it did." "That's... that's a pretty powerful moment you've just described... to have that kind of connection with tricia." "It didn't last." "Yeah." "We fell asleep..." "I don't know how long it was, maybe 15 minutes... then she woke up with a stabbing pain in her stomach, worse than before." "And she started hallucinating." "She thought I was our mother." "Her neighbor helped me get her down into the car." "I called Russell on the way to the hospital." "What?" "What?" "What is that look?" " What are you looking at me like that for?" " Like what?" "No, you're scrutinizing me." "There's something skeptical." "Skeptical?" "Why would I be skeptical, frances?" "Why... why?" "If anything, I've been impressed with the way you've handled yourself." "You've had some distance in the past with Patricia, and now her illness..." "the gravity of it... has become very real." "And you've experienced... you've experienced that face to face." "But I guess I'm a little confused as to why you're throwing it back on me." "I'm trying to gauge what's going on with you." "I feel sad." "I feel incredibly scared for tricia." "I feel tired." "I feel hungry." "I feel..." "What?" "I don't fucking know, okay?" "Isn't that enough?" "Yes." "When we got to the emergency room, this whole crowd descended on me... doctors, nurses, e." "M.T.S..." "I don't know." "They just literally pushed me out of the away." "And then this one enormous nurse starts bombarding me with questions, you know..." ""how long has she been like this?"" "When was the last time she had food and water?" ""Why didn't you bring her in sooner?"" "Can you believe that?" "It was like she slapped me in the face." "I definitely felt like slapping her back." "Did you feel like she was accusing you?" "I was trying to help tricia." "I..." "I thought I was doing pretty well, but she made it sound like I kept her home on purpose, you know, like I had some sick pleasure taking care of her." "Do you really think that's what she thought?" "She all but said it." "Did she?" "It just sounds to me like the nurse made... she made an insensitive comment." "But it doesn't sound like she was questioning your motives here." "Perhaps..." "I was doing the best I could." "I'm not a doctor." "No one..." "I mean, nobody expects you to be." "I guess I'm just wondering if your reaction came from your conflicted feelings." "Oh, there there." "Here we go, right." "No, come on." "No, you were the one who brought up her comment, frances." "You said that you felt pushed aside when you got to the hospital." "So you're accusing me too?" "No, you think that some part of me got off on taking care of tricia." "I'm not accu... but if it were to be true, it would be completely understandable." "I guess what I'm saying is that I want to explore these feelings with you if that's what you want." "All right." "Okay." "We were waiting." "And the attending doctor came out and told us that tricia had to stay for a few days, but then we could take her home, and that it was time" "to start hospice." "And is that what tricia wants?" "Did he... did he tell you how long?" "He said it could be two weeks, but six at the very most." "Christ." "Yeah." "I think I'm gonna quit the play." "Why... why are you gonna quit the play?" "I'd rather stay home and take care of Trish." "I mean," "I don't even really like doing theater." "You have that look again." "I... but doesn't the hospice mean that tricia would have professional care?" "Yes, Paul." "She'll have a nurse during the day and she'll have a number to call at night." "But I want to be there in addition, and not just as a visitor." "I want to move in with her." "Into Patricia's home?" "Yep, the hospice nurse takes care of her physical needs, but who's gonna take care of her emotional needs?" "She doesn't have any children, a husband or a mother." "I'm all she's got." "And have you talked to Patricia about this?" "No." "Izzy and I were in the cab." "We were not talking." "We were just processing the news." "She was looking out the window and she started to cry." "And then this bus pulled up right next to us with a big ad for my play." "That's when I told her I was quitting." "So was that the moment when it first occurred to you?" "No, but that was when it made perfect sense to me though." "What?" "What?" "I think..." "I think it's a wonderful impulse, but I... do you think that it might be possible that you are reacting to Izzy's attitude towards you, her comments?" "No, I'm reacting to the fact that my sister needs me." "I understand." "But by announcing that you're leaving the job, do you think that you might be making a statement?" "Oh, I get it." "Wait, you're telling me" "I'm trying to prove Izzy wrong, yeah, trying to prove I'm not a narcissist." " I mean, not just prove it to Izzy." " No, really." "No, you really think the world of me, Paul." "I don't mean just trying to prove it to Izzy." "Well, if that's what it was, it sure as hell backfired." "She started to rant." "She told me" "I've been gone for months and months." "Now I'm just gonna make this big entrance and, you know, pretend to take care of everything." "She said I was doing it just for me." "She even told me that the nurse was right, that I should have brought Trish in sooner and that I should do the fucking play." "Now I'm guessing that you think she's right." "No, I don't." "No, go ahead, say it, Paul." "I don't care." "I don't." "You took your sister to the hospital when she needed it." "You also had the chance to spend that time with her and to show her..." "and yourself... that you were up to this task of seeing her though to the end." "You should feel good about what you did for tricia." "At the same time, maybe you should think a little more about what quitting the play means and consider what might be driving your decision here." "She called me last night, Paul." "I know she wants me there." "And you will be there for her... that's clear to me... whether you quit the play or whether you don't." "I'm just perhaps concerned about where this choice might lead you in the long term." "You came to me with real concerns about your career." "And since then you've expressed to me a sense of personal loneliness... a deep loneliness." "Your sister's gonna die, and these things that you feel are gonna come back more powerfully when she's gone." "I can see how moving in with her may seem like it's the real answer." "You'd get to feel more of what you felt last night... this connection between you both." "And also you... you get to walk away from the play." "So you think I'm running from the play?" "I don't know." "What do you think?" "A month ago you thought I was running away from tricia." "You thought I took the play to escape." "God, you are so much like Izzy." "There's no winning with either one of you." "You know what she said to me in the taxi before?" "She said she felt sorry for you, that it was a joke I was even in therapy, that true narcissists can never really change, that there's nothing you could do to help me." "Did she get that from that book, Paul?" "She might have, yeah." "So do you agree with her?" "Well, I think that it's..." "Can you excuse me for a moment?" " Mom." " Izzy?" "I'm sorry." "Why aren't you answering your phone?" "What are you doing here?" "Dad called." "She's back in the I.C.U." "She had a seizure or something." "Oh God." " All right, I gotta go." "Paul, Izzy." " Come on." " Hi." " Hi." "So you're the famous Paul weston." "Isabelle, not now." "Come on." "So how has it been going in here?"