"She's just pulling your leg," Delia told her. "We both want tea. Extra lemon."

On the outside, I smiled at Tara. Cheshire cat smile, not a full-toothed Goldie-Hawn-with-stardust-eyeballs' smile. She could be a lesbian, and I didn't want to give her false hope.

Inside I was Dr. Kathleen Caisson, psychiatrist. "Dr. K. Caisson" the tag would read on my white jacket, only doctors didn't wear white jackets normally. Dr. Dave at the hospital never even wore a jacket. And the night we all watched the dirty movies and placed our hands on the naked and hairy-fuzzy knees of total strangers, he didn't even wear a shirt. The hairs on his chest were brown with some graying ones blending in--was this a male mental health fashion statement?

"I'll be back," the waitress warned. She made a hr-umphing sound that rose from her chest and thundered and rattled in her throat. Like I couldn't hear it if she kept her mouth shut. Kinda like the internal belches Lou and Delia and I used to do on the back porch of Uncle Dill's farmhouse.

"What brings you downtown?" Delia's eyes did the smiling this time.

I wondered if she was just testing me, seeing if I'd remembered this time. "You called and invited me to lunch," I said, enunciating each word carefully.

She laughed and looked toward the window. "That's right. How forgetful of me."

I nuzzled back against the cushioned seat. Better restaurants always gave better places for your ass to rest. Good thing. The service was usually so slow and snooty that sitting lasted longer than at Denny's. And the portions were smaller. And they always gave me an uppity look when I asked for syrup for my fried potatoes. And they didn't like coins left for tips.

A young man in a crisp, white jacket brought two long-stemmed glasses, each clanking with ice cubes. His eyes told me that Pert-butt and Mole-face had clued him in.

"Thank you, sir," I said and smiled graciously, thankfully, sanely. I wanted to give them all more to talk about later as they spread their whispers in a tip bowl.

"Be careful of that one," Pert-butt would hocker right smack dab in the middle of the odd change some idiot housewife left. "I could feel her watching my ass as I walked."

"She wants my mole," the waitress would spew. "After she eats the piece of raisin bread, I'll go back and say, 'Is there anything else?' And the black dot just above my lip will be gone, and she'll wonder if it fell off and is resting in the dungeon of her acidic stomach."

"Hey, she was decent," Mr. White-jacket would offer. He was a man of few words, I could see that right off. He was cute, and I wondered if he could walk across the room in front of me and let me watch his ass move. I'd like to put my hand on his bare leg and watch Bo Derek wrestle with the chimp at the end of that Tarzan film. In the dark.

Delia cleared her throat. "Lou's coming in on Thursday, and I thought we could get together. You know... to talk. We could make a party of it with everybody staying over at my place. What do you say, Kassie?"

My heart stopped dead cold. "Lou?"

"Yeah, he's between assignments, and he called. He wants to see you." But she didn't say those words with a smile. I saw the caution in her eyes. It dripped like the honey from the comb that Uncle Dill would lift from the huge container where he collected the puke from his bees. He'd drizzle it in little glass jars while he chewed Mail Pouch or Red Man. Then he'd screw on the lids and slap on some paper labels that said simply "Honey." "Caution," her look spoke.

Lou.

She leaned over the table and touched my fingers. The ones with the nails I've bitten for thirty-four years, even when Mama slathered them with a bitter paint. "He wants to see you, Kassie. It's time."

I wished I could begin breathing again.

"Do you love your father?"

Jack Miller seemed too ordinary a name for a doctor, so I imagined his real name was Dr. Jakob Sigmund Shimmueller. He'd been a Jew who'd escaped the Nazi terror, but the atrocities he'd witnessed never left his embattled soul, ghastly things too horrible to ever speak out loud. Never mind that he had been born two years after the war ended. That was all part of the dread the Germans had foisted upon the world as they left their tattooed survivors to tell the tales.

"Kassie."

Some days I couldn't tell who was calling my name, or why, but I dressed anyway. Each day was the same. Had to be the same. Alarm goes off at five-fifteen. Stumble in to take my pills. One white Mellaril and the B2 with milk. Can't wait for breakfast. Need to be sure.

"Kassie?"

Then I shower. Water, water, everywhere. Not a drop to drink.

"He's brought Olivia with him." Delia's eyes had passed the caution zone and blinked with large red lights hurling them and me into danger. I started to stand as I felt all the air being sucked out of room, but Delia held onto my hand tightly, squeezing it. "Remember where you are, Kassie. A restaurant. 'The Ivy Post.' Get a grip."

I sat back down. My legs had died, and my frenetic stomach was melting down them. Dripping, like Uncle Dill's thick honey.

"She wants to see you. They both want to see you." Delia's eyebrows were nearly touching in the middle. When had her face grown lines that crossed her forehead? She was just a child. Just a little girl. My little sister. Yellow chin. Likes butter.

"Lou's dead," I exhaled. There, I said it. All public. I admitted my sin, so where was the absolution?