forgot I was in a new place, with different rules and people who don’t belong to me.
Eventually, I start a five-point turn, inching myself around, letting many cars pass, waiting for an opening in the traffic that poses no risk whatsoever. We drive home slowly, quietly, like we’re crossing a gorge on a wire.
John is smart not to rely on me. This isn’t some lark. I’m driving around, playing the music too loud, ignoring the signs and shushing the warnings, with a man’s last and best treasure in the backseat. The teetering height of this truth, its shadow with no end, gives me vertigo.
That evening, John returns from his travels. The kids give him a hero’s welcome, and for a moment anyway, the house feels lively. But once we sit down to dinner, the dialog track drops out and we eat to sounds, not words. Martin hums a made-up song as he chews, though not so loudly that we can’t hear Milly’s teeth breaking through her carrots. John cuts his meat all at once, like my mother told me never to do, his knife clicking and squeaking against the plate’s surface. Pop works through his meal methodically, as if it’s a lawn he’s mowing, while Evan stands at the kitchen counter eating what he can in the minutes he has left before work. The five of them are not so much a family as its components, like Evan’s Scirocco broken apart and spread out on the driveway. It’s a complex machine requiring a level of coordination between connection points that not everyone is capable of. Maybe it will run again. Maybe it won’t.
The lethargy around here is seeping into me. Since getting the kids off to school this morning, I’ve been drifting around, noting things that need attention without actually attending to them: crumbs on the counter from the morning’s toast, chairs askew around the kitchen table that would make the whole house feel better if only they were tucked in, Martin’s Ninja Turtles hat, the one he loved so intensely and then forgot existed, jammed in the cushions of the living room sofa. I should pull it out, reshape it, take it back to his room, hang it on a hook so it’s waiting for him on the day he remembers his
favorite
hat. Instead, I just stare at it, too tired to move.
I drink tea, each cup a chance at a new beginning.
I’ll have some chamomile, and then I’ll sort out the kids’ closet. After this cup, I’ll do the beds. One more pot, and I’ll take a shower
. Standing by the window, blowing, sipping, I stare out at the shady part of the lawn, still heavy with the night. It’ll take hours for the sun to reach that patch, dry the beads of water clinging to each blade, and free the grass to spring back to its usual posture. There’s no rushing some things.
By midday, I realize it’s not the sleepy collective heart rate around here that’s left me comatose. I’m sick.
My mom’s a pro with aches and ailments. Unlike funks and malaise, physical problems draw her near. The lure of the fix. Ifshe were here, she’d stick a thermometer under my tongue, check my swollen glands, jot down my temperature, give me two aspirin, and make me gargle warm salt water, all the while talking in the sugary lilt of a nursery school teacher. Before leaving me to rest, she’d spray Lysol around the room to kill every last germ, slather Vicks VapoRub under my chin, and wrap my neck in a piece of Egyptian cotton about the size of a tea towel that she keeps for just such occasions. I miss her, or I miss that part of her. I always do when I’m sick.
After I’ve spent a couple of hours wincing through every swallow, Evan sends me to an office in Beecroft, where Dr. Hannah takes a look at my throat and orders a culture. She says she’s 99 percent sure it’s strep and that I should call tomorrow to confirm.
The next morning, it’s official. The nurse asks how many times I’ve been on antibiotics in the past couple years, and I’m not sure. “You don’t know?” she asks, like,
How old are you?
Eventually, I start a five-point turn, inching myself around, letting many cars pass, waiting for an opening in the traffic that poses no risk whatsoever. We drive home slowly, quietly, like we’re crossing a gorge on a wire.
John is smart not to rely on me. This isn’t some lark. I’m driving around, playing the music too loud, ignoring the signs and shushing the warnings, with a man’s last and best treasure in the backseat. The teetering height of this truth, its shadow with no end, gives me vertigo.
That evening, John returns from his travels. The kids give him a hero’s welcome, and for a moment anyway, the house feels lively. But once we sit down to dinner, the dialog track drops out and we eat to sounds, not words. Martin hums a made-up song as he chews, though not so loudly that we can’t hear Milly’s teeth breaking through her carrots. John cuts his meat all at once, like my mother told me never to do, his knife clicking and squeaking against the plate’s surface. Pop works through his meal methodically, as if it’s a lawn he’s mowing, while Evan stands at the kitchen counter eating what he can in the minutes he has left before work. The five of them are not so much a family as its components, like Evan’s Scirocco broken apart and spread out on the driveway. It’s a complex machine requiring a level of coordination between connection points that not everyone is capable of. Maybe it will run again. Maybe it won’t.
The lethargy around here is seeping into me. Since getting the kids off to school this morning, I’ve been drifting around, noting things that need attention without actually attending to them: crumbs on the counter from the morning’s toast, chairs askew around the kitchen table that would make the whole house feel better if only they were tucked in, Martin’s Ninja Turtles hat, the one he loved so intensely and then forgot existed, jammed in the cushions of the living room sofa. I should pull it out, reshape it, take it back to his room, hang it on a hook so it’s waiting for him on the day he remembers his
favorite
hat. Instead, I just stare at it, too tired to move.
I drink tea, each cup a chance at a new beginning.
I’ll have some chamomile, and then I’ll sort out the kids’ closet. After this cup, I’ll do the beds. One more pot, and I’ll take a shower
. Standing by the window, blowing, sipping, I stare out at the shady part of the lawn, still heavy with the night. It’ll take hours for the sun to reach that patch, dry the beads of water clinging to each blade, and free the grass to spring back to its usual posture. There’s no rushing some things.
By midday, I realize it’s not the sleepy collective heart rate around here that’s left me comatose. I’m sick.
My mom’s a pro with aches and ailments. Unlike funks and malaise, physical problems draw her near. The lure of the fix. Ifshe were here, she’d stick a thermometer under my tongue, check my swollen glands, jot down my temperature, give me two aspirin, and make me gargle warm salt water, all the while talking in the sugary lilt of a nursery school teacher. Before leaving me to rest, she’d spray Lysol around the room to kill every last germ, slather Vicks VapoRub under my chin, and wrap my neck in a piece of Egyptian cotton about the size of a tea towel that she keeps for just such occasions. I miss her, or I miss that part of her. I always do when I’m sick.
After I’ve spent a couple of hours wincing through every swallow, Evan sends me to an office in Beecroft, where Dr. Hannah takes a look at my throat and orders a culture. She says she’s 99 percent sure it’s strep and that I should call tomorrow to confirm.
The next morning, it’s official. The nurse asks how many times I’ve been on antibiotics in the past couple years, and I’m not sure. “You don’t know?” she asks, like,
How old are you?
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