Illuminated by Erica Orloff Page B

am tired of her being as . . . as much of a mystery to me as A. She was my mother. ”
    All my life, my curiosity about my mother was always squashed. I’d ask questions, and Harry or my grandmother or my father would carefully dart around them. Harry would show me beautiful pictures of her and tell me pretty, happy, shiny stories as bright as Christmas presents. They were stories that reminded me of fairy tales, of princesses and ribbons and bright stars. And my father told me nothing. Neither good, nor bad. It was as if she had never existed.
    Harry was quiet for a long while. “You’re right. You do deserve to know.”
    I tapped the arm of the love seat.
    “She . . . Your mother and your father never had what I would call a healthy relationship.” He exhaled. “Who am I kidding? They were relationship napalm.”
    I could believe it. Somehow, it felt as if I were finally hearing the truth.
    “Napalm. They were horrible for each other. But he fell madly in love with her. And to be honest, it hasn’t been like that with any of the women since. Sure, I’ve seen girlfriends come and go with your dad. But this was different. Your mother was so beautiful, and she really didn’t want to get married. She was a free spirit, and he’s . . . your father. I think he figured that he could tame her. That he could turn her into this perfect little lawyer’s wife, a beautiful bird in a gilded cage.”
    “That’s exactly like Miriam Rose.”
    “A bit. He swept her off her feet, you know. The full-court press. Rooms full of flowers. He once found out she liked lilies of the valley, and at the time, they could only be found—that season—in Hawaii. He special-ordered huge bouquets of them. It must have cost him a fortune. Candlelight dinners at Manhattan’s hottest restaurants, Broadway shows, yacht cruises. I guess after a while, she thought that he really loved her and that they could make it work.”
    “And?” I held my breath.
    “Marriage doesn’t change a person, Calliope. She was still the same free spirit. You could dress her up in a black Chanel dress . . . but she was your mother. She loved to go out dancing and she loved her artsy friends in Soho, and she hung with a bunch of crazy modern-art painters in Brooklyn who’d been squatting in an old building there, this loft where they made films and painted and . . . it was just a wild scene. Trust me, there are films of your mom painting naked somewhere.” He laughed. “She was unstoppable. This ball of energy and ideas. Singing with a band.”
    “Okay,” I said. “That doesn’t sound like anything my dad would be involved with. Not at all.”
    “Exactly. It was like everyone could see it—but them.”
    “Didn’t you try to talk some sense into her?”
    “I loved my sister, but no one could tell her anything. Just like no one can tell your father anything. They were totally alike in that way. Anyway, within . . . I don’t know, six months of the wedding, they were at each other’s throats. You know how your dad is. He came down hard on her. Always criticizing. She wanted to leave him, but she showed up on my doorstep pregnant. She felt trapped.”
    “She could have just had me . . . and left him. Raised me as a single mother.”
    “I think part of her loved him. She gave him one more chance. But the pregnancy didn’t help. They fought horribly. One time, they were screaming so loudly a neighbor called the police. Maybe someone else might have handled it differently, but your mom started getting very nervous, anxious, depressed. Your father accused her of being a bad mother.”
    I felt as if the world stopped. I heard Harry. I heard him say the words from somewhere far away, like hearing a voice above the storm at Miriam’s. “But she was a good mother. I remember her. I remember us painting together. Finger painting.”
    “Yes. On the walls . Stuff like that drove your father—in a word— insane . I thought . . . I really thought she was going