from loss, but from never having what she yearned for the most.
I felt Mama’s emptiness and heartache after years of infertility. I experienced the discomfort and disappointment of in vitro fertilization and four miscarriages. And then I felt her immense joy at holding me for the first time, a motherless newborn healing the heart of a childless mother.
I felt her love for Papa, her pride in his successes. But I also felt her pain at being so often overlooked and cast aside when those successes pulled Papa further and further away from her. When I came into the picture she hoped it would change things, but Papa spent more and more time away from home.
There were so many times she tried to protect me, like when she told me Papa missed my eighth birthday party because he was away on a business trip, when he was just working late again. I felt her anger at the fact that he couldn’t love me as much as she did.
I saw Mama last night drinking at the bar, coming home half asleep in the car, leaning against Papa and Jordan’s shoulders to get upstairs, and feeling the warm, enveloping comfort of sleep as her mind slipped into a dark and painless void.
I lie in my bed and let every bit of Mama occupy my mind. I push my own thoughts and feelings away to make room for her, knowing that once I fall asleep most of it will fade. In the morning all that will remain are vague images and a few scattered details—only remnants of the few moments when Mama and I were one.
A faint chiming penetrates my room from downstairs. It’s the grandfather clock again. An hour has already passed. The chimes call me back to my own mind, my own being. I leave Mama somewhere deep inside me.
I count the chimes. When I reach six, I remember.
David. I was supposed to meet David.
Outside my bedroom window, the rain is insistent. He wouldn’t have waited in the rain, I tell myself. And if he did…
But I can’t worry about that now. I don’t really care anyway.
I close my eyes again, abandoning David in the rain. I am with him there, standing in my blue bathrobe soaked through. I leave them both—David and me—and drift away deep into my mind where Mama waits.
B acon. I smell bacon.
My mouth starts to water before I’m even fully awake. Not fair. Helen’s playing dirty this morning.
With my eyes still closed, awareness seeps in. Mama’s been in the hospital almost a week. Papa has left me mercifully alone. Helen did manage to coax me to eat some fruit and yogurt on some days. The remains of other barely touched meals still sit on a tray beside my bed. But today is different. The sweet, oily fragrance of breakfast seeps into my room and tugs me out of my stupor.
As I sit up, the horrible details of that day drip into my consciousness one drop at a time—a leaky faucet of fear and pain. I realize once again that I’m alone. Mama has gone. All I have left is the hazy memory that, for a while at least, she was with me—in me.
I feel so empty.
I don’t even bother with my robe or slippers. I drag myself downstairs and into the dining room where a feast has been laid out on the table. Steam rises from a pile of fluffy scrambled eggs, and a tall, frosty glass of orange juice stands beside a glistening china plate. I lift a strip of bacon from a white ceramic platter and insert it into my mouth. Why does bacon have to taste so good?
I sit down. I eat. My stomach begs for more. I feel guilty.
Papa comes in, a ne wspaper folded beneath his arm. “Well, well. Morning, Mira. I see you’ve started without me. Good girl.”
He takes the chair across the table from me and fills his plate. He lifts his first forkful of eggs, but then pauses, setting it down again.
“Doesn’t seem right, does it?” he says. He stares at his fork for a while, then slowly lifts it again and deposits it into his mouth. He sets the paper on the table beside him, but he doesn’t even glance at it. I watch him as he eats.
“It’s
I felt Mama’s emptiness and heartache after years of infertility. I experienced the discomfort and disappointment of in vitro fertilization and four miscarriages. And then I felt her immense joy at holding me for the first time, a motherless newborn healing the heart of a childless mother.
I felt her love for Papa, her pride in his successes. But I also felt her pain at being so often overlooked and cast aside when those successes pulled Papa further and further away from her. When I came into the picture she hoped it would change things, but Papa spent more and more time away from home.
There were so many times she tried to protect me, like when she told me Papa missed my eighth birthday party because he was away on a business trip, when he was just working late again. I felt her anger at the fact that he couldn’t love me as much as she did.
I saw Mama last night drinking at the bar, coming home half asleep in the car, leaning against Papa and Jordan’s shoulders to get upstairs, and feeling the warm, enveloping comfort of sleep as her mind slipped into a dark and painless void.
I lie in my bed and let every bit of Mama occupy my mind. I push my own thoughts and feelings away to make room for her, knowing that once I fall asleep most of it will fade. In the morning all that will remain are vague images and a few scattered details—only remnants of the few moments when Mama and I were one.
A faint chiming penetrates my room from downstairs. It’s the grandfather clock again. An hour has already passed. The chimes call me back to my own mind, my own being. I leave Mama somewhere deep inside me.
I count the chimes. When I reach six, I remember.
David. I was supposed to meet David.
Outside my bedroom window, the rain is insistent. He wouldn’t have waited in the rain, I tell myself. And if he did…
But I can’t worry about that now. I don’t really care anyway.
I close my eyes again, abandoning David in the rain. I am with him there, standing in my blue bathrobe soaked through. I leave them both—David and me—and drift away deep into my mind where Mama waits.
B acon. I smell bacon.
My mouth starts to water before I’m even fully awake. Not fair. Helen’s playing dirty this morning.
With my eyes still closed, awareness seeps in. Mama’s been in the hospital almost a week. Papa has left me mercifully alone. Helen did manage to coax me to eat some fruit and yogurt on some days. The remains of other barely touched meals still sit on a tray beside my bed. But today is different. The sweet, oily fragrance of breakfast seeps into my room and tugs me out of my stupor.
As I sit up, the horrible details of that day drip into my consciousness one drop at a time—a leaky faucet of fear and pain. I realize once again that I’m alone. Mama has gone. All I have left is the hazy memory that, for a while at least, she was with me—in me.
I feel so empty.
I don’t even bother with my robe or slippers. I drag myself downstairs and into the dining room where a feast has been laid out on the table. Steam rises from a pile of fluffy scrambled eggs, and a tall, frosty glass of orange juice stands beside a glistening china plate. I lift a strip of bacon from a white ceramic platter and insert it into my mouth. Why does bacon have to taste so good?
I sit down. I eat. My stomach begs for more. I feel guilty.
Papa comes in, a ne wspaper folded beneath his arm. “Well, well. Morning, Mira. I see you’ve started without me. Good girl.”
He takes the chair across the table from me and fills his plate. He lifts his first forkful of eggs, but then pauses, setting it down again.
“Doesn’t seem right, does it?” he says. He stares at his fork for a while, then slowly lifts it again and deposits it into his mouth. He sets the paper on the table beside him, but he doesn’t even glance at it. I watch him as he eats.
“It’s
Similar Books
