“I can walk, sir,” I said, getting to my feet. I began to inch around him. I noticed my shoe was untied, but that would have to wait.
“I don’t think your parents want you walking home in the dark,” he said. He put his hand on my shoulder and led me to the edge of the park, where his patrol car was parked. He ushered me through the passenger side door, got in behind the wheel, and pulled away from the curb.
I bent down and tied my shoe. The police car reached the end of Main. The radio quietly squawked and spat.
“Left or right?”
“Right, sir.” I hesitated before adding, “Please don’t do the lights and siren.”
He hazarded a sideways glance. “I wasn’t going to.”
“Thank you, sir.”
When my house was still a block away, I asked him to stop. He reached across me to open the door of the car, and I stepped out.
“Anything you want to tell me, son?” the policeman asked.
“No, sir.”
“Sure about that?”
“Yes.”
I stood on the sidewalk as he turned around and drove slowly back toward downtown. When the car was out of sight, I hurried the last block to my house, climbed the unlit front steps, and silently opened the front door.
The house was dark, save for the cold glow coming from the kitchen. I could hear water running. The clock on the mantel said it was a quarter to ten, past my bedtime by more than an hour. I was uncertain how aware they would have been of my absence — it was possible that, in the heat of their argument, they would have assumed I had merely gone up to bed and stayed there. But then again, my mother might be worried about me, and would want to know I was home safe.
I decided that, on balance, it was best to sneak up to my room. If my mother thought I was out, she would have had the porch light on, and would have been looking for me through the front window. I crept down the hall and hurried past the archway that led to the dining room.
There, however, I stopped. It was possible to see through the archway, across the dining room, and through a second archway to the kitchen, and I had caught a glimpse of my mother in her familiar position in front of the sink. She didn’t turn — the sound of the running water had obscured my footsteps. But something about the scene didn’t appear right, and I leaned back for another look.
The dining room table still had not been cleared, though the candles were out, and several glasses had been knocked over, staining the tablecloth. In addition, the tablecloth was crooked, hanging almost to the ground at one corner, and some dishes and silverware had fallen, spattering the floor with food and shards of porcelain. This was unusual, of course. But it was
my mother’s appearance that was most strange. I was accustomed to seeing her bent over in a laborer’s stance, her head hung, her shoulders rolling, arms working at the dishes. She had been, of all things, a golf prodigy in high school — in fact, had dropped out in order to join the tournament circuit, in the hope of becoming a professional — but, according to family lore, had chosen my father over the greens, and put away her clubs for good. I had always been impressed by my mother’s athleticism, and her willingness to have abandoned her ambitions for the smaller accomplishments of home. But now I was given to doubt, for the first time, whether this life was what she really had wanted. She stood motionless at the sink, her head high, as though she were staring out the window. The window, however, was curtained. The honey-colored chignon into which she had arranged her hair was half-undone across one shoulder, and she was leaning slightly to one side.
I watched for a good minute, expecting her to break out of her reverie and return to work. But nothing happened. The water was running at full blast, making quite a racket in the otherwise silent house, and I began to grow nervous.
“Mother?” I said.
There was no response. I walked into the dining room and made my slow way around the table, warning her of my presence. “I’m home,” I called out. “I’m sorry I’m so late.”
I peered into the kitchen. Up close, her stillness seemed even stranger. I could see now that her dress hung crookedly across her shoulders, and the heel of one of her shoes was missing. That accounted for the lean.
“Mother?”
I entered the kitchen, treading heavily, so as not to shock her when I tapped her shoulder. Soon I was standing beside her, looking up.
“Mother!” Her right hand was hanging beside her, and I took it in mine. It was cold. She didn’t look at me.
Her left hand was in the sink, under the water. It alarmed me at first to notice that only the hot was turned on — I thought she must be burning. A few plates and forks were stacked under the flow, and her hand lay on top, the water cascading over it. I reached out and moved the faucet over to the opposite sink. It, too, was ice cold. I turned off the water and pulled my mother’s hand out.
She had begun to tremble. I ran my hands up her arms — she was freezing!
“Here, Mother.” I pulled the wooden stool out from under the small table the telephone sat on, and placed it behind her. I told her to sit. She didn’t seem to hear me. I pushed her gently, reached up and pushed her shoulders, and she sank slowly, trembling, until she landed on the stool. “Stay there,” I said. I ran to the living room, turned up the thermostat, and removed the knitted afghan from the sofa. Back in the kitchen, I wrapped it around her shoulders. Then I took the box of matches from the drawer, turned on the oven, and lit the pilot light. I left the door open — she was sitting right beside it. I heard the furnace clank on beneath us and roar to life.
She was blinking now, and seemed to have noticed me.
“Are you okay?” I asked. “You had your hand under cold water.”
Her face was shaking now, too, and her shoulders. Her eyes were full of tears.
“Stay here, Mother,” I said. “I’ll clean up for you.”
I left her there, and went into the dining room. I picked up the debris from the floor, and collected all the plates, glasses, and silverware. I removed the tablecloth and took it downstairs and put it in the washing machine. Then I came back and cleaned up the fallen food, including a bit that had somehow gotten stuck on the wall. Perhaps that had been my doing. I turned the water back on in the sink, and washed the dishes, taking periodic breaks to warm my hands over the oven door.
All the while, my mother watched me in silence. She stopped crying after a few minutes and just watched, her eyes following me around the room. I tried to smile at her every now and then. She seemed to appreciate the work I was doing, or trying to do — I was not yet fully adept at housework, as I am now — but there was something in her gaze that was unfriendly. I couldn’t put my finger on it. When the dishes were finished, I went downstairs again and transferred the tablecloth to the dryer, then I returned to the kitchen and took the broom out of the closet.
“Stop it,” my mother said.
She was no longer shivering. The afghan had slipped off one of her shoulders, revealing a mark I hadn’t noticed before: a livid bruise on her neck, just above the clavicle.
“I’m almost finished,” I said.
“Stop it, Eric, please.”
I didn’t understand. I waited for further instruction, but when none came, I put the broom away and turned off the oven. My mother was still watching me with that slightly hostile, perhaps fearful expression. I tried to think of what I had done to displease her, but came up with nothing. So I went to her and embraced her.
I felt her entire body wince underneath the afghan. She patted me, perfunctorily.
“Go to bed, Eric. It’s very late.” Her voice was terribly dry and faint.