“I just feel like… I don’t want to talk to anybody, but I need to talk. You know what I mean?”
Clients always begged Pessie to come down to their houses, but Pessie refused. She had the right equipment in her house, a good space, a familiar environment. She didn’t like working elsewhere.
But sometimes she made exceptions.
Like when the client was her mother.
Yitty Hartstein was on the phone when Pessie arrived for their weekly session. Pessie’s stomach churned as she parked Motti’s stroller in the foyer. She was tempted to wake him up so it wouldn’t be just her and her mother. Stilted conversations on the phone were bad enough. Face-to-face awkwardness would be torture.
Her mother waved breezily, motioning her to wait a minute. When she hung up, Pessie followed her to the living room. Her mother slipped on her sneakers and powered the speaker on. A regular day, a regular session.
They continued playing regular for a good ten minutes, until they were halfway through the bicycle crunches. Then Pessie’s mother started talking, as though they were in middle of a conversation. “So it’s official? April 15 and goodbye?”
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