Chapter 22
Superfluous
“One of the things I most envy are creative people who can pour all their emotions into what they do. Write about what they feel, paint, sling a camera over their shoulder and walk aimlessly, sew a black tulle skirt for sad days. Those of us who lack artistic talent have to try other ways to untie the knots inside us. And so much remains stuck there. I’ve been that way, I think, ever since Lucy died.
I think about it sometimes, about the fact that I’ll never see her again, and it feels somehow absurd, and I find myself thinking nothing’s real and it’s like I’m trapped inside a cartoon.
But then there are times when it’s the very opposite, and the thought of her hurts me physically, and I might as well be drowning or getting run through by a thousand tiny needles. ”
The group is sitting there frozen as I finish speaking. I’m holding Mom’s hand in my lap. She’s sitting next to me.
“I don’t understand what you mean about the cartoons,” Jane says.
“It was a metaphor, right?” Adrian scratches his chin, a little confused.
“It’s time,” Donna says, looking at her watch.
I feel grateful when everyone stands up to leave. There’s not much worse than having to explain what you feel when it’s so obvious, picking apart your emotions into bite-size portions even a child could get down.
My mother throws an arm over my shoulders as we walk out.
She hasn’t changed too much since she started coming to the meetings, but she has taken little steps forward.
Yesterday, she went grocery shopping, and when I opened the fridge, I found it full of premade food from the deli counter.
And when we get in the car, she takes the time to tell me, “I think I understand what you were saying in there.”
I feel a pleasant tickle in my stomach as I turn the key to start the car. I turn on the radio. The music seems to wrap around us, and filling up the empty spaces with something is satisfying. When we get to Ink Lake, I slow down and lower the volume.
“Do you mind if I stop by the place of one of the people I work for? I left my wallet behind when I took the dog out.”
“Sure.”
I park in front of Anne Rogers’s home. I don’t know if Mom doesn’t remember where exactly she lives or if she just doesn’t care and never pays attention to anything, but when she looks at the house, it’s with a kind of distant admiration.
“That’s a pretty place,” she says.
“It sure is. You want to come inside and have a look?”
She hesitates and nods and takes off her seat belt. We walk the path to the door together, and I ring the bell in case someone’s inside. When there’s no response, I start digging around for the keys. Then the door opens.
Anne is radiant in a cashmere sweater, with a red-and-gold kerchief knotted around her thin neck.
She looks first at me, then at my mother.
Though she pretends otherwise, I can tell she needed a few minutes to recognize Mom.
That’s forgivable. The woman she remembers doesn’t have much to do with the one next to me now, in one of Dad’s old, baggy T-shirts and a pair of black tights that have seen better days.
Her hair, which used to be a dark mahogany brown, is grayish now.
It could be nice if she’d comb it and wash it and bring out its sheen, so it wouldn’t look dead.
“Rosie! What a surprise! Come in, please.”
“Thanks, Anne.” I’m certain Mom had no idea who she was until then. She probably didn’t even remember that I’d told her one day Anne had said hello and that I had a job walking her dog.
We enter the spotless living room with the designer furniture, the dark velvet curtains, the two marble columns, the freshly cut roses on the table, and Mr. Fluff greets us, running over.
“Would you all like to have something? Coffee, tea, a soda?”
“I could go for a coffee. With milk,” Mom says.
I say no and sit on the bottle-green sofa and rub the dog’s head.
Anne’s in the kitchen while my mother stands there admiring the living room.
I wonder what she’s thinking. Maybe how, if things had been different, this could be her home?
Or that instead of wasting her afternoons watching TV, she could have been a successful businesswoman, maybe even with her own agency?
If there’s anyone with the talent, the passion, and the initiative, it’s her.
I mean, it was her. Grandpa used to talk to me about what Mom was like before everything crumbled.
It didn’t happen overnight. She was strong, serene, during the first years of Lucy’s illness, but then she started to shrink with all the blows that befell her.
“Here you go.” Anne leaves my mother’s coffee on the table in the middle of the room. Noticing my mother looking out one of the windows, she says, “Mahogany frames, double glazed, soundproof.”
Rosie nods and sits on the sofa. “You’ve got a wonderful place, Anne. Very elegant.”
“Thanks. When I heard it was going on the market, I put in an offer right away. Perks of being a professional.” She smiles and stirs her tea. “What’s going on with you, Rosie? You looking to get back into the biz?”
“The biz?” She doesn’t seem to grasp what Anne means.
“Real estate, you know.”
“Oh, sure. I don’t think so…”
“Anything else on the horizon?”
“No.”
I see the compassion in Anne’s eyes and I ask myself if my mother notices it too.
I like that—I never associated compassion with weakness.
I know it just means a person’s empathetic.
Mr. Fluff and I play together while they talk about old acquaintances I don’t know and the imported furniture in the house.
Mom soon gets up and says thanks for the coffee. I grab my wallet, which I forgot this morning, and we walk to the door, saying a quick goodbye.
“Hey, Rosie,” Anne shouts when we’re some distance away. “I need to ask you about something. Could you maybe come by here Monday afternoon?”
Mom hesitates, sinks her head a bit.
“Monday’s a bad day for me.”
“Tuesday then. Or Wednesday. I don’t care.” Anne is a resolute woman, tenacious, the way my mother used to be. They were cut from the same cloth. “It would be a huge help.”
“Sure. Okay.”
“Tuesday then?”
“Tuesday,” she confirms.
When we get in the car, Mom expels the breath she’s been holding inside her. Going in that house and seeing Anne seems to have really meant something to her. I’d like to ask her what she’s feeling, but I can see the brick wall she’s built up around herself, so I decide it’s better to keep silent.
Superfluous, that’s the word that keeps pounding in my head. That and all the other words that mean something’s not necessary, not important, not vital. Like vain, a word that reminds me of Swiss chocolate. Or trivial, which sounds like the way you swat away flies with your hand.
The old map I took from my father’s study covers half my bedroom floor.
I look at it almost dead in the middle. Nebraska.
There I am, in the very heart of the country.
It shares a border with South Dakota, Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming, and the Mississippi, which runs between Iowa and Missouri.
So the possibilities are basically endless.
I slide my finger up and down, up and down, wondering if Olivia will stay in Colorado for the summer or come back to town.
“What are you doing?”
Dad’s leaning on the doorframe. He must have thought it was weird, me grabbing his old map. I stay on my knees on the ground.
“I’m trying to decide where to go. That’s the next step in the game.” Speaking more softly, I tell him, “I’m supposed to visit another state. You got any ideas?”
“I do.” He comes in and closes the door behind him.
Grabbing a pencil off the messy desk, he kneels next to me and draws a circle to the northwest. Then he looks at me with a grin.
“Go big. Here in this corner, you’ve got three states that meet: Nebraska, Colorado, and Wyoming. Your mother and I passed through there once, I think the border was on private property, but the owner was nice and he was used to getting visitors.” He stands. “I could come along if you like.”
“Thanks, but the note said I was supposed to do it with Will.”
Pensively, he murmurs, “Where’d that guy come from?”
“No idea. They were friends. I think.”
Dad nods and walks to the door. “If you need anything, just tell me.”
He disappears down the stairs, and a minute later, I hear his and Mom’s voices in the kitchen.
Has he noticed how she’s changed, even if it’s not much yet?
Does he think it matters as much as I do?
Could there be another woman in his life?
Or is he just waiting for the Rosie he knew to come back some day?
Superfluous, superfluous.
In the end, what isn’t?