19 The Shrink

"Hello, Betty." She comes around from behind a weird little desk and shakes my hand. I stare at her nails. They are the color of the inside of a watermelon, which might be the best tasting thing in the world, that cold, perfect watermelon...

"My name is Dr. Abbott." She shuts the door behind me and sits down in a chair. Looks like I'm supposed to sit in the other chair, so I do.

"How are you today?" she says. Everyone says that, but I don't think it's a real question. I never know what to answer.

"Okay," I finally say. She shuffles through some papers.

"I see you're staying at First Christian Church ." Yeah, so what? I'm thinking. "Do, you like it there?" What am I going to say? That I don't like it? She looks at me for a while.

"It's okay."

"Would you like some water or tea?" Great, twenty questions.

"Uh, no. Thanks." I notice that this is a real comfy chair. There's a picture of a dog on her desk. A very ugly dog, with a torn ear. And some kids. There are way too many books in this place. Reminds me of the library.

"How are you feeling about things, Betty?" I finally look at her, the shrink. I thought they had glasses and wore suits. What does she want from me? I don't answer, but then time goes by and I can't stand it.

"Okay," I say. "Everything's okay." Except I suddenly realize I don't know where my cart is. I look around and start to get up.

"Are you worried about your cart?" I glare at her. How do they know this? I head for the door and she follows me. I'm getting that tense feeling.

"Shall we lock your cart up so you don't have to worry about it?" she says. I am stunned. What a great idea. I cannot believe it when she pulls a lock and chain out of her pocket. I take the lock and stand there, frozen that way I do.

"Let me help you," she says. We loop the chain around a pole and through my cart, then click the lock shut.

"Here's the key." She hands it to me. To me.

"Now, how about that tea?" she says. We go back into her office and she gets me some tea. I put the key on the table by our chairs so I can see it. Nobody says anything. After forever I take a deep breath. I'm either going to cry or talk. I start talking.

So what do I talk about? My cart. I tell her about my cart. Not that she hasn't already seen it, but she doesn't know what's inside. And it turns out I don't know either, not completely. I start by telling about the dolls. This gets me talking about Tanya because Tanya reminds me of a doll. And I talk about my sister because we had dolls. Then our time is up. We go out and unlock my cart, then I give her the key and chain and lock.

"Betty, you can keep it," she says. But I don't want to. I will probably lose the key, or someone will steal the chain. No, definitely not. She gives me a new appointment paper. Dr. Abbott on Thursday at 3PM. I put the paper in my pocket and steer on down the street with my cart. Good thing Welfare is already on my map.