I thought back to all the times I’d felt that same suffocating cloud of despair. Was it right that they took no responsibility, that they acted as though I had arrived from another place entirely, another world? Wasn’t it my father who had felt so overcome by…something, when I’d simply tried to hug him, that he’d smacked me?

“I’d like to talk about the time—about the time—” But I couldn’t bring the words out of my throat. You spanked me, I thought. Why did you spank me, when all I wanted was your love? Would I ever really say this—could I dare? And what if I did? Did I think this would make him reconsider, did I think this would make him fold himself inside out for me, did I think he would let either of us see what was buried there? What would he say? Yes, I spanked you. Everyone did it. Is that so bad? Did I think he would ever tell me why he had become a psychologist, what he was trying to understand, or fix, or control? I couldn’t imagine it, and this refusal was more than I could bear. This refusal; this incapacity. I thought back to the bar, to lying on the couch, and my yearning for Freud was so intense I could hardly stand it.

“About the time…” my father prompted, and I saw that his hands were tight around his knees. What did he fear I was going to say?

“About the time you spanked me,” I said in a rush.

My words hung in the air.

“I don’t remember that,” he said finally.

I was stunned. He didn’t remember. It was as though he had disowned me.

“It was after the opera,” I said, “after Werther—”

But he only shook his head. “I don’t remember ever doing that to you,” he said.

In a panic, I searched his face for any sign that he knew what I was talking about. But I couldn’t find one. It seemed that he genuinely could not recall, that the incident had vanished from his mind. Blinking rapidly, I looked toward my mother. “Mom,” I said, but I realized she hadn’t been there, and I had never told her a thing about it.

“I can’t imagine your father would do that,” she said, her words an abandonment. But I knew, I knew, I had not imagined this. And when I looked at my mother’s hands I saw that her pointer finger had gained speed, it was stroking her other hand in a rapid circle.

“Have you ever cheated on Mom?” I blurted out, and as soon as I’d said it I was filled with regret.