The Delilah Complex (7 page)

T
he following Monday was exhausting. I’d scheduled back-to-back patients, and even with fifteen minutes between appointments—to get a cup of coffee, inhale a container of yogurt or return a phone call—I was still reeling from the information and emotion I’d dealt with. The most critical reason for those breaks was so that I could get up, stretch my legs, walk to the large windows in my office, look down on the street and change my focus.

Too often, I keep hearing the voices of my patients describing frustration that love has turned to hate, anger at how jealousy corrupts, fear about fetishes, obsession over a need to inflict or receive pain, self-loathing at an inability to become intimate, questions about a hunger that will not abate or an appetite that nothing seems to arouse.

I go over and over the conversations my patients and I have had, looking for alternative solutions, questions I need to ask during the next session, dark corners that need more light.

What I do is fulfilling. I am grateful that I have the kind of career that allows me to interact with people who need my help and want to lead more satisfied lives. But there is
another side to my profession, even if I don’t spend much time thinking about it, that can eat at my soul and corrode my own ability to connect to people in my life.

It’s not that I am frightened of what can go wrong between lovers. I was married for a long time and, for most of those years, was content. I simply know too much. I’m too aware of how easily people break and how hard it is to make real, sustaining changes.

By six forty-five that night, I was so tired I regretted having agreed to fit the Scarlet Society into my schedule. In the fifteen minutes I had before they arrived, I got a fresh cup of coffee and called Dulcie.

She was just leaving rehearsal with her father, an independent film director. “Dad’s taking me out to dinner and then to the opening of
An Hour Before Dark
.” Breathless, she proceeded to tell me who had directed it and who the stars were.

As soon as I hung up, the receptionist buzzed to tell me she was sending the new group in.

I greeted Shelby, who started to introduce me to the other women with her.

“No, that’s okay,” I interrupted. “Let’s get everyone seated before we do the introductions.”

Everything that happens from the moment a patient walks into my office is potential information. I become a camera, watching and listening and trying to remember what I see, sense and hear.

During the day, when individual appointments are scheduled, my office feels spacious. I have a large desk in front of the bookshelves that line the east wall. In front of the desk is a chair. Against the west wall is a camel-colored leather couch, long enough for three people to sit, or for one tall man to lie down comfortably. Facing the couch
is my oversized chair. When I have a group, though, I set up a semicircle of eight to twelve folding chairs and I sit so that I can face them. The large room gets smaller, but not uncomfortable.

A woman in a red suit was the first to take a seat, and she chose the one closest to my chair. Her clothes looked expensive, cut so the fabric hugged her slim body. She wore high-heeled black alligator shoes and carried a leather bag, which I recognized as Chanel: the leather and gold chain were unmistakable.

Shelby Rush, in a black pantsuit and high-heeled black suede boots, put her tote on the chair on my other side and then stood, hostesslike, making sure that everyone found a seat.

There were too many faces for each of them to make a distinct impression, but I was very aware of two women. One wore blue jeans, a white man-tailored shirt and a brown suede blazer, and carried a briefcase as worn as the jacket. Her eyes never stopped moving. She looked at me, at each of the others, at the windows, at the floor, at the artwork on my walls. When it came time for her to take a seat, she sat at the center of the semicircle, where she would have the best view of everything going on around her. Her attentiveness didn’t appear to be nervous energy, but rather a need to observe. Her sexuality impressed me, too. She did nothing to hide it.

Like Shelby, there were several women dressed all in black—which is almost a uniform in Manhattan—but one woman was so blond, thin and pale that her black clothes overpowered her. She reminded me of a widow. Moving slowly, she appeared to have a hard time making a decision about where to go or which seat to take, and twice she stumbled over a chair leg. Her sunglasses probably weren’t
helping. Large black frames with very dark lenses, they completely obscured her eyes. Without having to ask, I knew that she was in hiding. I just didn’t know if it was from me, from the other women or from herself.

As the rest of the seats filled up, it turned out that six of the twelve women wore sunglasses. One also wore a baseball cap. Another wore a scarf over her hair, tied in a retro “Jackie O” style.

I was used to treating groups who were strangers until I brought them together, choosing them carefully so that their personalities would play off one another. Week after week, I watched them become acquainted, exhibit personality and psychological traits and form a unit. But this was a preformed group, their dynamics already firmly in place. From what Shelby had told me, many of these women had been together in the society for several years. There was a lot of interaction I’d miss seeing acted out, making my work more difficult.

Even after they were all settled, they were oddly silent for people who knew one another well. Once, I had done grief counseling for a corporation where a tragedy had occurred. Even with that catastrophe overpowering them, there had been more conversation than there was with this group now.

As a therapist, I believe nothing is coincidental, no connection is unfounded. There was a reason that the members of the Scarlet Society reminded me of a bereavement group I’d had eight years before. I just had to be patient and discover what the correlation was.

“L
et’s go over the few rules that I ask everyone to follow when they’re here. You all have a right to talk and an obligation to listen. We don’t judge one another, but we do discuss how one another’s comments make us feel. Even if those reactions are negative. Especially if they are. My job is to help you explore how you deal with one another. And consider behavior that is detrimental to the group as a whole and to its members individually—but I’m not your mother, your friend or your teacher.”

I looked from one woman to the next as I explained how the group worked. There was an apprehensive energy in the room, which I was certain was not a reaction to my instructions. These women were scared of something and deeply disturbed; I could see it in the way they shifted in their seats, played with their hands or the straps of their bags, or looked around.

“When I ask you a question, there is no right or wrong answer. We’re here for you to talk about your feelings or your problems expressing those feelings. For those of you who have been in a group-therapy situation before, this is
probably familiar. For those of you who haven’t, please ask me to explain anything that’s unclear. Any questions so far?”

I waited, but no one spoke.

“Okay, why don’t we go around the room so you can introduce yourselves to me and tell me a little bit about why you, personally, are here and what you hope we will accomplish.” I turned to my right, knowing I would be frustrating the woman in the red suit to my left who, judging from her movements, wanted, expected and perhaps even needed to go first.

Before the woman on my right could speak, Shelby interrupted.

“Dr. Snow, I think we should just introduce ourselves and then I can tell you what the problem is. But first we need the confidentiality agreement I sent you with the videotape. You told me on the phone you would sign it.”

I watched for reactions to Shelby’s assertion of power: no one seemed surprised by her taking over. Responding to the group, rather than to Shelby, I said, “The entire relationship between us is predicated on trust. Just like any doctor, I am bound by doctor-patient confidentiality and will not disclose anything you say to anyone outside of this room. The only exception to that rule is if I have information that one of my patients might inflict harm upon herself. So if one of you talks about committing suicide and I feel you mean it, I will have to go to the authorities. The same holds true if one of you tells me that you intend to kill someone and gives me reason to believe you mean it, as opposed to just thinking or fantasizing about it. I should tell you, though, that in all the years that I have been practicing, I have never had to break a patient’s trust.”

Shelby nodded. “We all understand that, but I really have to insist.”

Nina had known I wanted to work with this group, almost desperately, even if I wasn’t sure I knew all of the reasons. Our talk had prepared me for Shelby’s ultimatum. But it still rankled me. I got up, walked over to my desk, pulled the signed sheet out of a folder and gave it to her. She took it, glanced at it, folded it and put it in her bag.

I sat down, turned to the woman on my right and said, “Let’s try the introductions again.” I smiled at her.

Louise M. introduced herself and added, “I’m glad you are working with us. We need help.”

One by one, we went around the circle. Ginny P., Shelby R., Martha G., Ellen S., Bethany W., Anne K., Liz B., Cara L., Aimee B., Gail S. and Davina C. I didn’t remember all their names right away, but after listening to them for an hour and a half, I would.

During that initial go-around, I’d discovered the blond, slightly ethereal woman in black, who seemed so sad, was Anne. Liz was the woman in the worn brown blazer who was so observant. Ellen was the red-suited woman who’d wanted to be the first to talk.

“Do you all keep your last names private in the society?” Even though Shelby had told me that they did, I wanted to get them talking.

“Damn straight,” Ellen said. I was not surprised that she answered. “We don’t use our last names and neither do the men who join us. Our privacy is as important to us as getting what we want,” she said, giving the last phrase an emphasis and energy that was slightly confrontational.

Shelby continued to explain: “Our entire organization— all of the chapters around the country—abides by the same rules. In fact, some of us don’t even use our real first names.
We know one another only in one way, in one environment. We aren’t friends outside of the society. It would be far too risky.”

I saw Anne lower her head.

“How would it be risky?”

“We have families, spouses, children. We have careers. Some of us have public lives,” Shelby said.

“But you are all a family, too, aren’t you? A certain kind of family?” I asked.

Anne’s shoulders heaved in a quiet sob. “Yes, we are,” she said softly.

“We are a group of women who believe in fulfilling our sexual potential beyond the ways that society deems acceptable. We have refused to be afraid of what we want.” Shelby said, taking back the reins.

I had to get the other women talking.

“What does it feel like to set the rules and the terms you want?” I asked, looking from Bethany to Liz to Davina, hoping to engage them.

Davina smiled. She was tall and shapely, with coffeebrown hair cut short to show off her heart-shaped face. Everything about her was lovely, except for fingernails bitten down so low there was dried blood on some of the cuticles. “It feels limitless,” she said.

“Anyone else?” I asked.

Martha, who appeared to be the youngest member of the group, smiled at me. “It feels right to me.”

No one else volunteered. It was becoming clear that I was going to have to work to find out what was bothering these women. “Can one of you describe the mission of the society?”

Shelby and Ellen both began to speak. They exchanged a glance. With a nod, Ellen acquiesced and Shelby began.
“Since its inception, the society’s purpose has been to create an environment for women who want to be in power, where they can act out their sexual fantasies with men who are willing to be their sex partners.”

“Why aren’t any of the men here?” I asked.

“They don’t belong to the society. It’s our club and they are invited guests. We don’t have relationships with them. We don’t become their friends, or fall in love with them. They are just there to please us. Do you understand?”

I nodded, wondering why she was being so emphatic. I would have preferred she talk less so that the others could talk more, but it was also instructive to observe how the group deferred to her.

“What kind of men do you invite?”

“For the most part they are successful, highly respected and often powerful men, each of whom has gone through an extensive screening process. Sexually, the one thing they have in common is their preference to be submissive. Usually, we have about twice as many men on our roster as women—so we have about thirty now. All of them are invited to our weekly soirées. As long as a man accepts three out of every five invitations he remains active.”

It appeared that she could go on talking indefinitely, but Cara, another of the women in sunglasses, interrupted. Her dirty blond hair was pulled back off her face, her olive skin stretched tight over prominent bones. Her voice was low and soft, and I had to lean forward a little to hear her.

“Last week we found out that one of the men who has been with us the longest had been reported missing by the partners at his company.” She hesitated. “People wondered if he’d been kidnapped. None of us even knew his name until the article ran in the paper, with his picture.”

Anne lowered her head once more and a tear fell into her lap. Martha covered her mouth with her hand as if to stop herself from talking. Shelby focused on Cara, watching her intently. Ginny, who hadn’t yet spoken, took off her large silver-and-onyx ring and then put it back on, as if this action in some way centered her.

Cara had stopped mid-sentence but clearly had something else she wanted to say.

“Go on,” I encouraged.

“His name was Philip Maur. It was bad enough that he was missing. Then last Friday the
New York Times
reported that he’d been killed.”

I was shocked and hoped it didn’t show on my face.

Davina, who had started to cry, asked me, “Did you see the article?”

“I did,” I said, and clearly remembered that moment in the greenroom at the
Today
show when I’d read the story and seen the letters at the bottom of the page that spelled out Detective Noah Jordain’s name.

“The problem is, how do we cope with this?” Finally, Ellen got to the point of why they were in my office. “Nothing like this has ever happened before. Men have left, but of their own volition. A few guys have gotten sick, but Christ, no one has died. What do we do? How do we cope with this?” she asked again, her voice tight and agitated.

Now that someone had exposed the problem, they all spoke at once, and I had to stop them and explain that they needed to go one at a time.

“A lot of us knew Philip really well. He’d been with the society for the past eight years.” Davina said.

“We’ve all been with him, haven’t we?” Martha asked, looking around the room.

Everyone nodded.

“We don’t know what to do,” Anne said. Her voice was musical and studied. I recognized its cadence and wondered if she was an actress.

Louise, who also wore sunglasses that covered more than a third of her face, and who had a faint Boston accent, said, “We can’t talk about this with anyone outside of the society. It’s driving us crazy. We don’t know what to tell our friends or families about our melancholy. I burst into tears at the office this morning and my boss, whom I am incredibly close to, asked me what was wrong. I couldn’t tell her. What am I supposed to do with all this grief?”

Around the room, with nods or murmurs, they all acknowledged that this was what they wanted me to help them with.

“There’s something else,” Ellen said. She looked angry, and tucked her hair behind her ears as if she was getting ready for a fight. I noticed the large ruby studs in her earlobes. “From the story in the paper, it doesn’t sound like the police have any leads. What if his death has some connection to the society? What if one of us has something to do with it?”

“Don’t you see? Any one of us could be involved with his murder,” Martha whispered. “What if it’s because he’s part of the society that Philip’s dead?”