Free Love in Mid Air by Kim Wright Page A

this free time.”
    “Jeff thinks—”
    “No, it’s fine,” I say. “Just have one of your office girls set it up and cc me on the schedule. I’m waiting for you with
     the steaks, you know.”
    Still frowning, he heads outside to fire up the grill. The phone rings. Kelly.
    “Turn on Channel 27,” she says. Kelly often begins conversations like this, without preamble, and sometimes she hangs up without
     telling you as well. There have been plenty of times I’ve been left talking to empty air before I realized she was gone.
    I hit the remote. An old movie is on. Elizabeth Taylor looking gorgeous and cracking up, Montgomery Clift trying to save her,
     Katharine Hepburn riding up and down the elevator in that creepy veiled hat with her creepy voice.
    “Yeah,” I say. “I love this one.”
    “Turn up the volume,” says Kelly. “They’re fixing to lobotomize that poor girl.”
    Elizabeth Taylor is in the asylum and it’s all a horrible mistake. Montgomery is going to figure this out, of course, and
     save her, but he hasn’t figured it out quite yet. Elizabeth has gotten out of her room and ended up in the section with the
     true lunatics. She’s walking on a bridge over a pit of people who look crazy, or handicapped, or maybe just unbathed. Can’t
     they see she isn’t one of them? She’s Elizabeth Taylor, for God’s sake. Her makeup is perfect and her waist is so small. The
     inmates are shrieking at her, leaping up to grab at her ankles, and I can’t seem to stop watching. There’s no telling what
     Phil has told Jeff.
    “Phil and I talked about it and decided to cancel the woman therapist,” I tell Kelly. “We’re going to see Jeff instead. We
     have our first session on Wednesday.”
    “Oh really?” says Kelly, “Wait a minute—here comes my favorite part.” I turn the volume up a little higher and walk toward
     the screen. Montgomery is telling another doctor that he’s done a professional diagnosis and concluded that Elizabeth is an
     erotomaniac.
    “I love that,” says Kelly. “Erotomaniac. This is a great damn movie.”
    “I know.”
    “Do you want to talk about the thing with Jeff?”
    “Not now. We’re grilling out.”
    “Oh, okay. What are you having?”
    “Phil thinks that Jeff will be fair.”
    “Well, yeah, absolutely. I mean, after all, Jeff is Phil’s best friend and everybody knows he’s just crazy about you.”
    “He wants me to see Jeff alone one week and then we see Jeff as a couple the next week.”
    “When does Phil see Jeff?”
    “You keep forgetting,” I say. “Phil doesn’t need counseling. There’s nothing wrong with him.”
    “I don’t like any of this. You should have your own therapist, Elyse.”
    “It’s too bad Montgomery Clift is dead. I think he was the only man in America who could truly save me.”
    “Do you want me to come over?”
    “No,” I say. “We’re cooking out. And I don’t really care, Kelly, who I talk to or what we talk about. It’s not like any of
     this is going to make any difference.”
    Phil comes in to get the tray of meat. He points at the phone and I mouth the word “Kelly,” even though she’s already hung
     up.
    “I’ve got a question,” I say.
    He continues to sprinkle salt and pepper on the steaks.
    “I’ve got a question.”
    “Oh.” He looks up, pushes his glasses back with his index finger. “I thought you were on the phone.”
    “You know how you’re always asking me why I’m unhappy? I’ve got a question for you. Why aren’t you unhappy?”
    “Do we have to do this now?”
    “Seriously.”
    “Look around you. We’ve got a good life. We’ve got—”
    “Yeah, I know. We’ve got Tory and the house and our friends and our health.”
    “And we’ve got each other.”
    “We don’t talk.”
    “It seems to me like we talk all the time.”
    “We don’t have fun.”
    “Well, there you’ve got me. But I don’t think you’re unhappy because we don’t have fun. I think we don’t