“What psychic forces?” I asked dumbly, like I didn’t get that kind of lingo after listening to her for three years, and she said:

“Grief, guilt, sexual sadness, all those things we’ve been talking about. We’re going round in circles because you’re expecting me to sort things out for you. You’ve led me to believe you have some writing aptitude, Randall. Now I’d like you to use it on your own behalf.”

“But, doc,” I replied helplessly, knowing that June bristles at any reference to her academic credentials, “where would I start?”

“Start with sex,” she said so directly that I flinched. “In fact,” she continued with growing certainty, “let’s start with your sexual history, going all the way back, as early as you can remember having any sexual feeling or perception. You’re carrying a lot of sexual anxiety that you need to sort out. You need to know what’s past and what’s present, for one thing, and you don’t know that right now. It’s all happening at once in your head. So . . . Good. Let’s try that, all right?”

Instead of answering right away I looked at the top of June’s head, where her hair is both caramel and gray, and wondered why I felt like a twelve-year-old told to wash a heaping mountain of dishes from the grownups’ dinner party. I wanted to say, “That’s not fair!” Instead I whispered quizzically, “Let’s?”