First Session

"So you're an unemployed superhero."

She charged into the waiting room clutching the summary I had filled out a few minutes before. Her body was vibrating in a manner that gave off a faintly unhealthy glow in the ultraviolet spectrum. It wouldn't have looked that bad if she hadn't been wearing a tailored black suit and didn't have a complexion the color of café crème. Maybe if she'd been more of a spring or a summer.

It seemed pretty clear to me that she had already decided that I was her ticket to an article in the next issue of Nutball Quarterly. After that, maybe an assistant professorship at the local college and then a fellowship at Harvard. She was intelligent enough to see the nervousness in my face, though, even if the dark glasses hid my eyes. She tucked a lock of her long hair behind her ear and made an effort to control her excitement.

She stopped before me with an apologetic smile.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Mason. That was extraordinarily unprofessional, wasn't it? I'm Vanessa McDowell."

I stood and shook the hand she extended.

"Isaac Mason, Doctor McDowell."

"It's nice to meet you. Please come back to my office. Would you like to take my arm?"

"I'll just follow you," I said.

She gave me a brief, puzzled nod and led the way down the hallway. When she stood in front me I had admired her face and its beautiful admixture of Caucasian and African-American genes. From behind I enjoyed the way that her two-inch heels emphasized the well-toned muscles of her calves.

Her office was tastefully appointed in earth tones designed to put the therapied — nutballs like myself — at ease. Dark wooden bookcases were filled with tomes by various Ph.D.'s and M.Ed.'s. Her desk occupied the far wall, devoid of anything by which the therapist might expose her own personality, God forbid. There was a couch on the right hand wall with a chair beside it. The left hand wall had two wing chairs.

As she turned to me, I realized that her face had never lost the puzzled expression it had gained in the waiting room.

"I like to encourage my patients to sit wherever they feel most comfortable, Mr. Mason. There is a couch on your right and two chairs on your left."

I was tempted to choose the chair by the couch just to see where she would sit. Instead I selected one of the wing chairs. She took the other, crossing one of her lovely brown legs over the other. She seemed at a loss to know how to begin.

I smiled.

"I understood that I was supposed to be completely honest with you, Doctor."

"Well, naturally. Of course."

"And you thought I was blind."

"You're not?"

"No."

She looked at my dark glasses and glanced down at the form again.

"But you are an unemployed superhero?"

"Yes."

"And your superhero identity?"

I raised an eyebrow to mirror hers. We sat there for a while, looking at each other like two birds in a frozen mating dance.