Kareela
On a blessedly breezy Sunday morning, I step out of the apartment while Thomas is still sleeping. The air is cooler than I’ve felt in weeks, and as I walk up Summer Street, then turn into Camp Hill Cemetery, the sudden tree cover makes me shiver. Rather than cut through the center path to the other side, as most people do, I weave my way between the rows and rows of headstones, gravitating to the old and crumbling ones, with words so faded some are impossible to read.
I come here often. Knowing it’s silly. But it’s the closest I can get to Antony—walking among these people who, in some distant realm, may be walking along with him. After my talk with Jasmine, fresh fears dominate, and my throat tightens with thoughts I wish I could bury as deep as these lost souls. I stop before an unreadable headstone, then kneel and place my hand on the cold, moss-spotted granite, the way I used to place my hand on his. As the cold seeps into my skin, so does the memory of that polished tablet, how it seemed so impossible that this was all that was left of him. I think of the coming rally, trying to determine what Antony would tell me to do. Before the shooting, the answer would have been clear. But after…would he tell me it was worth the risk, that he’d be proud for me to follow in his footsteps no matter the cost? Or would he want me to be safe, above all, do everything I could to preserve my life? The way he didn’t.
I dismiss the thought, knowing another decision, right now, is so much more pressing. “I’m pregnant.” I whisper. “And I don’t—”
I jerk at the sudden blare of my phone in this hushed place.
“Hello, ?” My mother’s voice is loud, with an energy she reserves for salespeople, the kids at school, her boss. “How are you?”
I swallow as the tight, pulsing tension that so often appears at the sound of her voice spreads over me.
“Fine, Mom. Good. How are you?”
“Oh, you know.”
And I do know. She hasn’t been fine in eighteen years.
“And Gran?”
“Well.” The word is firm, decisive, full of something that makes me want to slam the phone on one of those headstones, watch it shatter. “You know”—the attempt at light and loud and falsely cheery has faded, as if that little burst of energy was all she could muster—“I need to talk to you about that. So I thought I’d drive to town, we can have lunch, and I’ll tell you all about it?” She’s trying again, and her school voice is back. “When’s the last time we did that?”
I lick my lips, place a hand on my bent knee, and raise myself to standing. “A while.” Except the true answer is, as far as I can remember, we’ve never gone for lunch just the two of us. “Gran, is she—” My voice catches. “Is she okay?”
She hesitates. “We’ll talk about all that at lunch.”
“Are you bringing her? It’d be great to see—”
“How about that café you’ve shot some grams of? Dolly’s or Dahlila’s or—”
“Dilly Dally?”
“Yes, that’s it!” She lets out a tinny, self-conscious laugh.
I hesitate, surprised and slightly thrilled that she’s paid that much attention to my life. “You see my Instagram posts? You’ve never—”
“Well, who wants their mom liking their posts? I’ll see you there. Twelve o’clock.”
She hangs up before I can answer, and a sense of disorientation and fear flows through me.
Mom sits in a back corner of the café, as she does in any public place, wanting the spot where she can see the most people, where no one can sneak up behind her. She holds a teacup. Not a mug, but an actual teacup, which she always asks for—something about her mother, about life needing some sense of refinery. It shakes, slightly.
I stand in the entry to the shop, between the two glass doors, watching her through the glass wall separating them. If I stay here, watching this woman who birthed me sip tea as if nothing is wrong, maybe it won’t be. Maybe I can back out, slip through the door, and pretend she didn’t avoid my question about Gran. One devastation at a time, please , I’d say to life, and it would listen. Maybe.
I open and step through the second door, take a breath, and try to put on a natural, easy-looking smile. “Hi.”
“.” Mom speaks my name as if I’ve shocked her, as if those eyes that were cast in my direction, dark hollows around them that the makeup can’t fully hide, didn’t see me approach.
I hesitate, waiting for her to rise, put her arms around me, though I know she won’t. After an awkward beat, I sit. I come to Dilly Dally often, a world with scents meant to tantalize, to encourage its patrons to sit, stay awhile, order more than they intended. A fear flares. If the news is bad, if Gran is sick, or worse, dead, will I ever be able to come here again?
A steaming mug sits on the table in front of me.
“I saw you post about the London Fog latte,” says Mom, in a tone and with an expression that seems almost normal. Motherly. “That it’s your favorite.”
I nod. Beside the tea is a morning glory muffin, complete with a knife, plate, and generous pat of butter. I’d posted about how much I loved that, too. Moisture settles behind my eyes at the hope that maybe she does love me. Does care, at least a little. Yet in addition to talking about Gran, this is supposed to be lunch, a visit, and no food sits in front of her.
She leans forward. “How’s that boyfriend of yours? Tom?”
“Thomas.”
“He seems like a keeper.” She hesitates. “Though, really, you’re too young to think of keeping.”
“You were already married when you were my age,” I say, without saying the rest… You already had Antony .
Though she’s right. I am too young. Too young for marriage, too young for a child. I resist placing a hand on my belly. Hope my flouncy shirt will hide my swollen breasts.
She nods, sucks and probably bites the inside of her lip. I lift the tea, wrap my hands around the ceramic. This is the benefit of a mug. Warmth. Something to hold firmly. I take a sip, preparing myself for whatever has prompted this show of interest in my life—a tactic to either soften or distract from why we’re really here. “Is Gran okay?”
Mom looks away, gaze focused across the room. She wants to delay it. To not speak the words.
She’d been brave once. The day I was surrounded. At least ten boys, smoking in the high school courtyard. Yelling. Cursing. Laughing. Saying the word I imagined had been spoken about me many times, but never to my face.
“Mom.” I make my voice soft, nonthreatening. “Tell me about Gran, please.”
She presses her lips, preparing.
That day she stood tall. That day she fought. For me.
“Mom.”
“She’s blind.”
“What?”
“Or nearly.” Something resembling exasperation seeps from my mother’s voice. “Apparently, she’s been going blind for years and decided to do nothing about it. To go on, day by day, as if nothing was happening.”
I lean back, the force of realization slamming into me. Layers of dust coating the shelves and trinkets during recent visits. Crumbs on the kitchen counter. Dust bunnies on the floor and a slight ring around the tub. I’d thought Gran was tired, old, grieving Dad too much to care about dust and dirt—not that she couldn’t see.
I take another sip of tea, swallowing back the sadness. The fear. Gran—sweet Gran, who rises from work in her garden to watch the sunset, who examines fruit or her beloved vegetables as if she were an art dealer assessing a rare find. I sip again, distracting myself with the taste of vanilla, lavender, steamed milk.
“Okay.” My voice is clear, strong, the way I want it to be. “So she’s going blind. She’s not blind yet. Is there anything the doctors can do to stop it?” I slice my muffin in two, spread the butter, focusing on the ease of it sliding across each side, watching it melt, willing the fear to not consume me.
“No.”
I nod, take in the information. Nothing can be done. Gran, who spoke of the curl of her newborn baby’s hair, the sun glinting over the trees, the way, when cooking, the nose was important, the fingers, but the eyes, only second to the tongue, were pivotal—noting the sheen of the dough when it was ready for shaping, the brown glaze that meant a dish should be freed from the oven.
Mom holds her tea in one hand, fingers delicately grasping the handle. “I’m putting her into a home,” she says. “I’ve decided.”