When My Heart Joins the Thousand(61)

I call to her. I knock on the door. At first, she doesn’t respond. Then I hear her feet shuffling across the carpet, and she whispers in a weak, hoarse voice, “I’m not feeling well, honey. I need some time alone.”

For the rest of the night, she doesn’t come out, not even to eat. She doesn’t come out the next morning, either. I start to get scared. I knock on the door. “Mama. Are you okay.” After a few minutes, I knock again. “Mama.”

I hear her voice at last, scratchy and almost inaudible through the door: “I have the flu. I just need to rest.”

Another day goes by, and Mama is still locked in her bedroom. I don’t know how to cook, so I eat cereal out of the box.

Just a little longer, I think. She’ll be better soon.

Except I know it’s not the flu.

The phone calls keep coming, shrill rings echoing through the house, until finally she comes out. Her expression is blank, her eyes puffy, her hair in a disarray. She shuffles over to the phone, unplugs it from the wall, then goes back into her bedroom and shuts the door again.

When Mama finally comes out of her room, I find her sitting at the kitchen table, head cradled in her hands.

“Mama . . .”

Very slowly she raises her head. “How long has it been?”

I hesitate. “Three days.”

“God.” She closes her eyes and presses the heels of her hands against them. I wait. “I’m sorry. It’s just . . . I don’t know what to do anymore.” There’s a long pause. “I lost my job.”

I approach cautiously, as if she were a wounded animal, and I sit down in the chair next to hers. “It’s okay. You can get another job.”

“It’s not that easy.”

I place my hand over hers, because I don’t know what else to do.

“I left you alone,” she whispers. Her hand trembles beneath mine. “I left my baby alone.”

“It’s all right. I’m fine.” My stomach is a hard, tight ball.

A tear drips to the table. “I’m so sorry, Alvie.”

I tug my braid over and over.

Her eyes focus on my hand, and she watches me. Then her head drops into her hands again.

When she finally speaks, her voice is soft and hoarse. “I’m a failure as a mother. I can’t take care of you the way you need. I’ve never been able to do it. And now, I can’t even pay for your medication. Things were just starting to get better, and now it’s all over.” She hangs her head, long red hair swinging like a curtain in front of her face. Her thin shoulders hunch. “There’s nothing left. I don’t even know how I’m going to pay the electric bill this month. The air conditioner is broken. Everything is broken.”

I tug harder on my braid, rocking back and forth in my chair.

“Please don’t,” she whispers.

I catch my wrist and force myself to stop.

Then she shakes her head. “No, no. You can’t help it. I’m sorry. It’s just . . . I don’t know what to do. Without that job, we have no health insurance, and I don’t know what you’re going to do without those pills.”

But, Mama, I haven’t taken them for weeks and I’m fine, see?

I don’t say this out loud, because I don’t know what will happen if I tell her what I’ve been doing. It might make things worse. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with me,” I say instead, cautiously.

She smiles bleakly. “Your father always said the same thing.”

I don’t know how to respond to this. So I start to fill a teapot with water for chamomile tea. Sometimes tea makes Mama feel better, but it doesn’t always work. I have a feeling it won’t work this time.

“I don’t know what to do,” she whispers.

I put the teapot on the stove. “I’m making tea,” I say.

Mama stares straight ahead. Her face is limp, mouth slightly open, like she’s forgotten how to move the muscles. “I can’t keep going like this. I just can’t. But I can’t leave you alone.”

I stop. A chill runs down my back. “Are you going away.”

She’s silent.

“Please don’t leave me,” I say.

She looks up, a strange expression on her face. Her eyes lose focus. Then she smiles. “Don’t worry, honey. I’m not going anywhere.”





CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE


A twitch has developed at the corner of my left eye. I note the involuntary fluttering of the muscle beneath my skin. It happens in fits, twitching for several minutes at a time, then subsiding for a half hour or so before it starts up again. I wonder if this is an early sign of an approaching mental breakdown.

Chance is perched atop the back of my armchair; the upholstery is now peppered with talon punctures. I sit on my couch, eating dry Cocoa Puffs from the box with one hand and watching an old episode of Cosmos. Usually the show is effective at reducing anxiety—remembering the vastness of the universe helps me put my own problems in perspective—but today, it’s not working.

A week has passed since I lost my job. I’ve turned in over a hundred applications, and so far, no one has called me. I’m down to my last few boxes of cereal, my checking account is empty, and despite my cleaning efforts, my apartment is always covered in mouse blood, feathers, and bird shit. By now, it’s probably not an exaggeration to say that I’m living in the midst of a biohazard. I douse the apartment with pine-scented aerosol spray to mask the smell.