Read Online What We Keep by Elizabeth Berg - Free Book Online

edge of the tub and looked at
Reader’s Digest
. I liked the jokes and the true-life stories that made you cry a little. I understood the attraction to a certain type of grief.
    After I read for a while, I turned off the water. The tub looked perfectly clean, as it always did. My mother came in to inspect Sharla’s and my work and nodded her approval. I had a moment of feeling guilty, but then reasoned that if the tub ever really did need cleaning, I would do it. There was no point in scrubbing away at something you couldn’t even see. I longed for streaks ofmud, for soap stuck in a sticky puddle at the bottom of the tub, even for the sickening thrill of blood, courtesy of my mother’s injuring herself while shaving her legs. I wanted the satisfaction of seeing something change before my eyes, not the humdrum necessity of maintaining the status quo.
    Now, boredom settling around me like dusk, I rose and went to our bedroom window, lifted my blouse to let the fan blow on me. Nothing doing outside, either. Not even a breeze. “Well, that’s it, I’m going to get her,” I said.
    “You can’t.”
    “Why not?”
    “Because. She probably doesn’t want to get interrupted. Just like when she goes to coffee klatch.” Coffee klatch was the weekly gathering of the neighborhood ladies on the block, held in a different kitchen each week. I was excited about it being in our house until I heard what the women talked about: Detergent. Children. Their husbands’ jobs. The coupons they exchanged with each other. No secrets were revealed; no one even laughed. Frankly, I saw no point in those meetings, except for perhaps the food. Mrs. Gooch brought a blueberry coffee cake to our house that was outstanding—Sharla and I fought over the buttery crumbs. The good thing about coffee klatch was that it lasted only an hour, and therefore we were not driven to feelings of desperation. But this!
    “She’s been there all
day!
” I told Sharla.
    “Oh, stop whining. You don’t know how long she’s been there.”
    “More than two hours. Way more than that.”
    “That’s not all day.”
    “Well, I’m going.”
    “Wait,” Sharla said. “I’m coming.”
    Just as we were about to knock, Jasmine’s door opened, and my mother came out, smiling. “Oh,” she said. “Are you up?”
    “It’s
late,
” I said.
    “What time is it?”
    “Almost
two.
”
    Jasmine appeared behind my mother. “It’s one-fifteen,” she said, looking at her watch. “Well. What are you two doing today?”
    “Nothing,” I said, moodily.
    “I was just going over to Monroe’s,” Jasmine said. “Would you like to come?”
    I looked at Sharla, who was nodding, then at my mother.
    “You can go,” she said.
    The day had just flipped. A ride in Jasmine’s red-and-white Chevy convertible to an air-conditioned store. Possibly a stop for an A&W on the way home; I’d never met anyone yet who didn’t like A&W, and I intended to suggest it in an irresistibly casual way.
    “You want to come, Marion?” Jasmine asked.
    “No, thanks,” my mother said. “It’s much later than I thought. I’ve got to think about what to make for dinner.”
    “Oh, just have sandwiches,” Jasmine said. “They don’t take long to make.”
    Boy, I thought. She doesn’t know my mother. She had to make a big dinner every night, even in the summer. ButI waited with some uneasiness until I heard my mother sigh and say that very thing.
    Now, sitting here on this airplane, I stare at the seat pocket in front of me. There are the magazines I bought for the trip.
Bon Appétit. Gourmet. Cooks Illustrated
. And
The Atlantic Monthly
, of course, proving that I am nothing like her.
    “Hot, huh?” Jasmine asked, as we backed slowly out of her driveway. I was watching her in the rearview mirror. She had on black wraparound sunglasses that were serious about their job—you couldn’t see her eyes at all. She wore a silky leopard-print scarf over her hair and tied at the back of