"Evening Meditations"

It is night time and Jack’s breathing is slow and even under his Star War’s cover. Mom’s elixir of orange incense seeps through our adjoining bathroom door. There is only one thing to do.


I gingerly pull myself out of bed and tiptoe into our bathroom. Even through the closed door to her bedroom, I can clearly hear mom panting. It is a primitive sound. This is one of her loony meditations. It leaves me thinking about birth and death and the meat of life. It is just shy of a cry that can break mirrors. I wonder if it is a different sound for the person making it.


Blood beats through my ears as I open her door. Mom sits cross-legged on the center of her bed with closed eyes. She is not really here. I can tell by the way her fine dark brows merge together, and the strange stillness of those china doll hands. I want the mother with the quiet hands. Maybe there is something to these chants. Either way it doesn’t matter: I’m on a mission.


“I just want to know one thing,” I say.


Mom’s eyes pop open and she coughs out the last pant. “You scared the death out of me!” She is laughing but underneath it is fear.


“Are you dating Vinny?”


“Well, Amelia honey, I told you, we’re just friends.” She is flushed the color of beets.


“You mean, you don’t kiss or anything?” I sit on the bed and scrutinize her beautifully carved face for a nerve twitch of truth.


“No.” She rolls her eyes.


“You are such a liar!” I slam my hands on the mattress and watch her delicate body tilt.


“Amelia, would you please. Jack is sleeping.” She puts a finger to her lips and lets it linger there. She is itching to bite.


“I saw you both with my own eyes! G-d damn it—why can’t you ever tell the truth??”


Mom grabs my balled hands with a strength I didn’t know she had. “What don’t I tell you?”


There is a flame of fear in her eyes or maybe it is my own reflecting back at me. I will not go there. She knows what she did after the accident. It stands between us like an uprooted flower you can never plant the same way again. And what’s worse, she doesn’t even try. Our relationship is one giant weed.