Of course, the problem with earth mothers, I have since found out, is that they’re so good at handing out goodwill, they all but stop being three-dimensional human beings. They don’t volunteer what’s in their hearts, and few people bother to find out. After my father’s death and my departure from home, Mother buried herself for years in community activities until finally, one day, old and on walking sticks, she quit-totally.
She lived in a wheelchair now, her world restricted to the downstairs of the house. She was surrounded by books, magazines, crossword puzzles, a radio, a television set, and two cats. Outwardly, she remained pleasant and gooeasidth='1em' d-natured, but I always sensed a tiredness there, as if she’d been asked to smile for the camera just one shot beyond her tolerance. Leo always said I was full of it, and maybe I was. I had to believe, after all, that if anyone knew what really made her tick, he did-unless he was too close to see.
Gail stopped the car in front of the house but left the engine running. I stopped halfway out the door and looked back at her. “Not coming in?”
“I don’t think so, Joe. Despite all the reassurances I gave her on the phone, your Mom knows how close you came to dying. I think she’d like to see you alone. Tell her I love her, though, okay?”
I leaned back inside and kissed her. “Okay.”
“Give me a call when you want a ride back.”
I pulled my bag out of the backseat and waved goodbye, watching her car until it disappeared over the rise.
16
She was in the living room, surrounded by three small tables, her daily pastimes piled around her like the borders of a nest. But her hands were motionless in her lap. She was watching a soap opera, something I’d rarely seen happen before. She was an avid radio listener, but daytime TV was a sign of things amiss.
She caught my movement and turned suddenly toward me. For a split second, I saw the face of a woman with no reserves left-blank, hollow-eyed, sagging from the lack of life. It was gone so fast, it was more of an impression than a real image, but it left me shocked. In its place was an older version of what had welcomed me into this house as far back as I could recall.
She gathered me in for a hug. “What foolishness have you been up to?”
I kissed her warm wrinkled cheek. “I wish I knew.”
She held my face out at arm’s length. “And Frank?”
I could only shrug.
“Where’s Gail?”
“She went back. I think she felt awkward.”
“She’s a good girl.”
I straightened and glanced at the television. Mother hit the remote-control button by her side and killed the picture.
“Stories without end. Not like life at all.”
I had to smile. “I can’t argue with that.”
She was watching me closely, her eyes bright and sharp. She had one of those faces in which every line followed her mood. She smiled, and hundreds of wrinkles smiled; she frowned, and they were all sad. “How do you feel, Joe?”
“A little detached.” I walked over to the bay window and sat on the bench sill. This had been my favorite reading spot at night as a kid, surrounded by the cold wind on three sides, and yet warm and safe.
“It sounds like after Korea.”
“I suppose so. I hadn’t thought of that. God, you have a long memory.”
“A mother’s memory. For you, that was just a phase. For me, it was the death of my child-it robbed me of something special. It’s not a time I will ever forget.”
“I ended up going to college, at least for a while.”
She shook her head. “The price was too high.”
I smiled. She was right. I had been the one to break the cocoon holding this house and its inhabitants. That had changed things for ever, and no achievement of mine would ever justify it.
“How long are you going to stay?”
“Just a couple of days-until I get my legs back.”
“You were hit very hard, weren’t you?” The softness in her voice made the answer superfluous, but I didn’t want her to retreat to what I had seen when I’d entered.
“Not hard enough, I guess. I’ll be okay in a couple of days. But I’ve got to go back to wrap this thing up. I can’t leave it hanging.”
“Did you stop by to see Leo on the way up?”
“No, I came straight here.”
“Go down and see him. He’d like that.”
“What about you?”
She gestured at her piled-up pastimes. “I’ve got my projects. Go.”
I kissed her again and went outside. As I closed the door behind me, I heard the television start up. The stories without end had acquired a certain appeal, and I found that sad.
I crossed over the icy snow to the barn and swung back its big double doors. The blank, gray light fell on a semicircle of eight dusty, mummified cars, all looking like alien pods wrapped in canvas. This was Leo’s pleasure palace-his other obsession besides women. Under each tarp was an automobile loved for its own special virtue, whether it was looks, engine, popular appeal, or merely that it had been around for so long. None of them were in mint condition. Leo kept them covered, but only because the barn was so dusty. Their paint jobs were dull, and they were dented here and there; on the street they attracted attention for their quaintness, not their gleam.
But while their shells were weather-beaten, their innards were immaculate. Each car ran with the smoothness of its first mile.
I uncovered the one nearest me, hoping it wasn’t the pale green T-bird, and found the ’49 Cadillac-the first car he’d ever collected. I knew there was a Mustang somewhere, probably the most practical choice given the time of year, but I didn’t have the energy to dig it out. I got the key off the wall. The Cadillac would have to do.
It was only about three miles to Thetford Center and the grocery store where Leo worked-a nice walk if you were up to it. Not that the reasons for such a stroll were compelling. The town didn’t boast of much beyond the grocery and, at fifty miles an hour, it could be missed uldNotentirely during a good sneeze.
Leo was actually part-owner of the store, having tacked a full-fledged butcher shop onto its back to save it from bankruptcy. He had been operating in Hanover, New Hampshire, about twelve miles south and across the river, catering to the blue-blood barnacles attached to Dartmouth College. There, over the years, as head of the meat department at the town’s trendiest “food emporium,” he’d become the Walter Cronkite of viands-the area’s most trusted butcher. But he remained an employee. When he heard of the plight of the grocery store in Thetford Center, he took the chance that his clientele wouldn’t begrudge him the extra fifteen-minute commute. Apparently, they hadn’t-much to his, and the grocery store’s, profit.
But the thing that struck me wasn’t his uncanny marketing, but that he was now less than two minutes from our house. At this rate, in fifteen years he’d have his profession, his hobby, and his home all under one roof. I thought of our mother sitting in a single room surrounded by all her possessions. Maybe the two of them were more compatible than I’d thought.
He must have seen me from the window, because he came running out of the store in his blood-smeared apron and pounded me on the back, patting my chest with the other hand at the same time-a true meat lover. “Joey-Jesus, I’m glad to see you. You look lousy. How do you feel?” He looked over my shoulder. “The Caddy-good choice. How’s Mom?”
I muttered something to his back as he trotted ahead to open the door and usher me in.
He gave me a fleeting, sorrowful look. “I was sorry to hear about Frank, Joey. A lot of people felt the loss up here. He was a real favorite.” He closed the door and the subject with an expansive wave of his arm. “Look at this.
