20 Samantha
20
SAMANTHA
I WAS SITTING with Mom in her bathroom, swiping on her blush.
I leaned back and looked at my work. I was getting really good at this.
She looked more like her old self again. Tristan had dyed and cut her hair. He still wasn’t really speaking to me, six weeks later. It didn’t matter how many times I apologized—he was still pissed.
He kept putting chorizo in everything he cooked. I hated chorizo. It was the one thing I wouldn’t eat. He’d made chorizo ravioli last night. Had to hand make the pasta just to get it in there, that’s how committed he was.
I offered Mom the mirror. “What do you think?”
She turned her head this way and that. Then she smiled and said the same thing she said every morning when her makeup was done. “Got my face on for the day.”
It’s funny how ingrained certain phrases can be. Crutch words and mannerisms.
Mom liked to wave things off and say “That’s all right.” Or “We can’t have it all.”
It almost felt like she was all here when she did. But she wasn’t. It was just the echo. The remnants. Familiar words at familiar intervals in a conversation. Most of the time they worked in the context, but the truth was she didn’t follow most of our back-and-forth now. She could reply to short direct questions that required a yes or no, but she couldn’t converse. She couldn’t banter or retain anything or understand nuance. I could tell her in simple terms what we were doing. Brushing our hair, coming down for dinner, sitting to watch some TV—and she could comply most of the time. But I couldn’t tell her what we were doing later. She wouldn’t remember. I’d have to repeat it when it was happening. Sometimes over and over again.
Even though I knew she couldn’t remember or understand, I talked to her while I did her face anyway. I talked to her like I was leaving a voicemail. A message I didn’t expect a response to.
I told her about my day. About my job.
I told her about Xavier.
Not that there was much to tell. One date that had ended in a UFO and a two-day weekend that was seared into my brain forever. A very limited cache of memories that I could rehash to Mom as often as I wanted to because it would never get old for her.
It didn’t really get old for me either.
I hadn’t heard from him since he left.
I mean, that’s what I’d asked for.
There was something rebellious inside me, some callback to the romantic comedies I grew up on that wanted him to make some dramatic grand gesture and come back for me. Ridiculous, I know. It wouldn’t change anything—he was still in Minnesota.
I was a little proud of myself that I’d made such a mature decision and told him to move on.
Maybe I was the kind of person capable of difficult things now. I should be happy I’d sent away that handsome, smart, sexy, six-foot-something doctor.
I groaned to myself.
Dad came into the bathroom with his gym bag slung over his shoulder. “I’m leaving.”
“Okay. When will you be back?”
“At around eleven. I want to try out the pool.”
He stopped for a minute and looked at Mom. Something a little broken moved across his face.
“She looks great,” he said quietly.
“Thanks.” I smiled at her. “We’re getting good at this.”
He gazed at her another moment. She didn’t notice him or look back.
This had to be its own type of hell for him. She was here but she wasn’t. She hadn’t died so he couldn’t stop grieving her or move on. He just had to watch her forget their entire life together. Forget him and forget herself too. The snowball melting at the bottom of the hill.
When I looked back at the doorway, he was already gone.
Mom started asking for him almost right away.
Dad always took her down to breakfast. The gym thing was new. He’d gotten a nice deal on a membership at a place down the street. It was a good idea, he needed to get out of the house.
Dad’s life was as small as Mom’s. He went to the office on weekdays, but he always came right home. Then he became a caretaker. Bathing her, making sure she sat on the toilet at regular intervals, feeding her. We all helped and that took the edge off, I think. I think it also helped that all the people he loved were back in the same place. But he needed some time that was just for himself. He needed to sit in a steam room and get back to lifting weights and maybe even meet some friends at the gym. It was good for him.
After I did Mom’s makeup, I brought her downstairs for breakfast. We stopped to argue about her going to work, and I told her it was Presidents’ Day. She looked like she didn’t believe me, but she let me take her to the kitchen anyway. Grandma was waiting with food but Mom skidded to a halt in the doorway. “Where’s Dan?” she asked.
“He’s out for a bit,” Grandma said. “Come sit.”
Mom didn’t move.
Grandma put a hand on her hip. “Lisa, breakfast . I made your favorite.”
Mom was wringing her hands and peering around, but she couldn’t ever say no to her mother. She went to her seat.
Mom was sensitive to changes in her routine, especially ones that had to do with Dad. She was okay when he was at work because that was normal for her. Dad left at the same time every day and came home at the same time every day. But he was the one who took her down for breakfast, so I guess it was to be expected that she’d sense the shift.
Grandma poured her a coffee.
“I want Dan,” Mom said, again.
Grandma put the pot back. “He’ll be home soon, sweetie.”
“You’re lying!” She pushed the stack of napkins on the counter.
I jerked to look at her. “Mom…”
“He wouldn’t leave me,” she said. “You told him to go!”
“Nobody did that,” Grandma said, calmly pouring cream in Mom’s cup. “He’s coming.”
Mom was still breathing heavily, but she nodded, looking unsure. Grandma got her to take some eggs and she settled down.
Once Mom was eating, I opened my laptop. A few minutes later my siblings wandered in. Tristan ignored me and spooned chilaquiles onto his plate while Jeneva poured herself coffee. She leaned on the counter and nodded at my screen. “Why are you on LendingTree?”
“Just asking for a quote,” I said, typing in the email address I found.
“For what?” Grandma asked, running water over her pan.
“For an asshole who likes to drown puppies.”
Grandma made a disgusted sound and Tristan glanced at me.
“Are you serious?” my sister asked. “Who would do that?”
“This guy Xavier told me about. I found his email address online. Took me a few weeks because I had to make sure it was him. He’s about to get a million lender quotes in his inbox for the rest of his life.” I hit send. “He will never know peace again.”
“Gross,” she said. “Give me his info.”
“Why?”
“I’ll sign him up for political texts.”
“Ohhhh, I like that,” I said.
“Send it to me too,” Tristan said, his tone bored. “I’ll get him audited by the IRS.”
I pulled my face back. “How?”
“Don’t worry about it. Do you want him audited or not?”
“Yeah…”
He tore the top off the French bread Grandma had sitting on the counter, hollowed out the middle with his bare hand, stuffed the whole thing with chilaquiles, gave me the finger, and left.
I rolled my eyes and turned back to my sister.
“How long is he going to be like this?” I asked.
“Life?”
The kids ran through the kitchen chasing each other and careened around the corner into the den. “Boys! Slow down!” she shouted.
They ignored her. Jeneva looked wearily at the direction they went.
I needed to help get them out of the house more. She was another one who didn’t get a break. Maybe I’d take them to the aquarium this time, though it wouldn’t be as fun without Xavier.
The boys had been asking about him. He’d made an impression.
He’d made an impression on me too.
I heard a sniffle and I glanced over. Mom had started crying.
I dipped my head. “Hey, what’s wrong?”
“I want Dan,” she said pitifully.
I put a hand on her arm. “Awwww. He’s just at the gym. He’ll be home soon.”
She shook her head. “No. I want Dan!”
“Mom, he’ll be back—”
“NO!” She swatted my hand off her. “You told him to leave! You ran him off!”
“Mom…”
She swiped her plate and mug off the counter.
The room collectively gasped.
“Lisa!” Grandma said. “What is going on?”
Mom clawed at her bib. “Dan! DAN!!!!”
She stood up and started clotheslining everything she could reach. The plate of eggs, the coffee maker, the bowl of fruit, salt and pepper shakers, the hot sauce. I sprang into action before she got to the knives.
“Mom!”
I went behind her and bear-hugged her like Xavier did the night in the yard. She struggled against me, sobbing.
“Get her something!” I shouted. “Don’t we have medication for this?”
Tristan ran up the stairs. “What the—”
“HELP!” I said.
Grandma was already digging in the cabinet.
My brother and sister helped me wrestle Mom back into her chair as Grandma put a crushed Ativan into a shot glass and poured orange juice over it.
“Here. Come on, baby, take it,” Grandma pleaded.
Mom shook her head, thrashing.
The boys were huddled in the doorway, terrified.
I couldn’t believe how strong she was. I was getting tired and I had two other people helping me. She wasn’t stopping, just getting more frantic.
I tried to calm her like Xavier did. I whispered in her ear and held her as tight as I could. She was inconsolable. She wouldn’t take the pill, and she was screaming for my dad. We tried for almost ten minutes.
Grandma was panting, Mom was hysterical, the boys were sobbing, my arms were shaking.
“What do we do?” Grandma said.
I looked her in the eye. “You call 911.”
By the time we got home from the hospital it was almost two. Dad met us at the ER and we all drove home together.
Mom was staying overnight for observation to make sure she hadn’t sprained or hurt anything when she was having her meltdown. Mostly we’d opted to have her stay so we could recover too. Every one of us had been crying. Grandma was so shaken she took the orange juice shot of Ativan she’d poured for Mom and went upstairs to lay down. Dad hadn’t spoken one word since the emergency room.
They said this was normal. To be expected even. These emotional outbursts and violent tantrums were just part of the progression.
The progression was terrifying.
I was sore. I think I pulled something in my arm. I had a fat lip. Mom had thrown her head back into my mouth at some point. My adrenaline was so high I hadn’t even realized I was hurt until a nurse pointed out that I was bleeding.
I dragged myself to the medicine cabinet in the bathroom and took two Advil. I cleaned up my lip and then tipped my head to look at my earlobe, the one Mom yanked an earring out of that night in the yard. It was mostly healed, but I still couldn’t get an earring in there.
I was collecting injuries. Physical ones and ones of the heart.
I came out and stared at the aftermath. The kitchen was destroyed. Shattered glass and food everywhere. Eggs on the walls.
We started cleaning the mess without a word to each other. Even Tristan was quiet.
Dad was on his hands and knees cleaning dried hot sauce from the footboard of the bar. He sat back on his heels and stared blankly at the spatter.
The hospital said we had to give her stronger sedatives. We had to be proactive and dose her when we saw her getting agitated before she was so distraught she was past the point of no return.
And the reason why she was distraught was because Dad had dared to leave for two hours to do something for himself.
My father was trapped in my mother’s illness. He was her person.
Every day she woke up and fell in love with him all over again. Every day he woke up living a nightmare. And this is what he got for leaving it, even for an hour.
Dad stared for another long moment at the floor. Then he grabbed one of the buckled corners of the linoleum and started yanking it up.
“What… what are you doing?” I asked.
“Fuck it. Why not?” he said. “It’s old, it’s ugly, and I don’t want to clean it.”
Jeneva and Tristan glanced at me.
We’d never started the remodel. We’d gotten the loan but we couldn’t agree on the right time to disrupt Mom’s environment.
I’d say her environment was good and disrupted already.
“Okay…” I said. “But then we do the countertops too.”
“And the stove,” Tristan said. “The stove sucks.”
“Anything avocado green goes,” Jeneva said.
We made eye contact with each other. Dad smiled. Then we demolished the rest of the kitchen.