Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 142866 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142866 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
“When? You didn’t tell me that.” I hear the accusation in my own voice and regret it immediately.
“Hendrix, now listen. I know you gotta be in Atlanta and your mama refuses to leave this house, so this is where we are for now.” Aunt Geneva bends one of those looks on me that, when I was a kid, seemed to see down to my very soul. Still does. “But I can’t waste time and energy I need to deal with all this making sure you know everything all the time.”
“I know. I’m sorry. It’s just hard not being here.”
“And it’s hard being here. Baby, it’s just hard.”
This constant state of vigilance is a lot for my aunt, and not for the first time, I wonder how sustainable this setup is, how long before we have to change things. Change is rarely easy. Now for Mama, it can be her worst nightmare, which also makes it mine.
“It’s gon’ be all right, though, Hen. God got us,” Aunt Geneva says with the ease of someone whose faith stands strong like the Rock of Gibraltar. She rifles through her purse. “You seen my keys?”
“I saw ’em on the bathroom sink,” Mama says from the kitchen doorway. “You going somewhere?”
How long has she been standing there and what did she hear?
“Just to make grocery,” Aunt Geneva says evenly, as if we weren’t just discussing Mama before she appeared. “I’ll be back. You need anything?”
“Salt-and-vinegar potato chips,” Mama replies and takes a seat at the kitchen table beside me.
“Now you know that ain’t good for you,” Aunt Geneva says. “How about some rice cakes?”
“Soon I won’t even know who I am,” Mama snaps with a rare flash of bitterness. “At least let me eat these potato chips while I still remember that I like them.”
It’s quiet in the small kitchen, save the whir of the refrigerator motor. My aunt seems at a loss for words, and I certainly don’t know what to say to that.
“I’mma pick up some of that kiwi you like,” Aunt Geneva replies after a few seconds. “Lemme go grab these keys so I can come back and make dinner.”
She exits the kitchen, leaving Mama and me alone. I arrived last night and in some ways, it feels like we don’t know each other well anymore. Of course, so much is changing for her and for me, too, but it seems more fundamental than that. Like we’re strangers who’ve been told we’re to act like family. We’ve never had trouble finding things to talk and laugh about, but this new reality is proving even more complex than I’d anticipated.
I peer through the kitchen window to the badly neglected garden, which used to be Mama’s pride and joy. Maybe getting back out there would give her something to focus on.
“What do you say we get out in the garden, Mama?” I turn to her with a smile. “Plant some of your favorite flowers. That might be fun.”
“Sounds like work,” Mama grumbles. “And it’s hot. Like I want to get out in the fucking garden in July and work on some damn flowers.”
Shock ripples over me. My mother never curses. I’ve never held back who I really am. I told her I lost my virginity in tenth grade and have not looked back. She knows that I pretty much only attend church when I come home for Christmas. Out of respect, I’ve never, as she would put it, “laid up with some man” in her house, and I check my expletives at the door. So to hear those words from her completely throws me off.
“Maybe later when it’s cooler, Betty,” Aunt Geneva says, watching us with one shoulder propped against the doorjamb.
“Fat bitch,” Mama snarls at her sister, her eyes lit with sudden fury. “I told you to leave me alone.”
“All right, now,” Aunt Geneva says, folding steel into her soft words. “We talked about this. You not gon’ cuss at me.”
“I’ll cuss at you if I want to.” Mama stands abruptly and walks over to her sister, flicking her head to the side. “You blocking the door. Get out my way.”
Aunt Geneva blinks rapidly and gulps, sure signs that she’s on the verge of losing the tenuous hold on her temper. After a few seconds, though, she steps aside and allows Mama to leave the kitchen.
“What was that?” I ask when Mama’s bedroom door snicks closed behind her. “Mama never—”
“You know folks with Alzheimer’s can experience personality changes and mood swings,” Aunt Geneva says. “It’s not all the time, but it is sometimes. Your mama would never…”
She looks up at me, and the fatigue and the sadness lay a thin patina over the acceptance I’ve seen in her ever since she learned of her younger sister’s diagnosis. I walk over to her. I’m not sure if she takes me into her arms or I take her into mine, but our quiet sorrow wraps around us. Holds us both. There is a slow onslaught of terrible things ahead for us, for Mama. And on the good days, the days when she’s lucid and barely changed, it’s easy to forget. This condition metes out tragedy in small doses.