“Your mom doesn’t hate you, Brooke.”
“That’s what she said!”
“Take a breath, boy. Calm down. I ain’t the enemy in here.”
I let out a breath and shook my hands like I was shaking water off them. “Sorry.”
“’S okay.” She tried again. “She doesn’t hate you.”
“She acts like it.”
Maudra rested her hands on the countertop and leaned closer. “And jist who’re you ’spectin’ her ta act like?”
“What?” Irritation crept in again. Her voice made it sound like it was somehow my fault that my mom treated me like I had a flesh-eating virus.
“Well, Rose is Rose.”
I had never been short with Maudra before, but I’d never really had a reason to. “Well, thanks a lot, Maudra! As if I didn’t know Rose was Rose. I’d like to think there was a demon possessing her or something, but I know it’s just mywonderfulmother being my mother, no one else to blame.”
She nodded again in agreement and went back to preparing tortillas. “Exactly!”
“What?”
Her voice took on the soft, gentle tone again. “You’re smarter than this, boy. And, I’m willing to bet you’ve helped some a yer kids with the same issue.”
“Maudra, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, you do. You jist don’t wanna see it in yer own mamma.” Her gaze was hard and direct. “You keep ’spectin’ your mamma ta turn inta somebody else’s mamma. She ain’t Sue. She ain’t never gonna make ya cookies, er tell ya how sweet y’are, er tell ya she wants you and Jed ta adopt a bunch a babies so she kin be a grandma.” She actually raised a finger and shook it at me. “Rose ain’t a nice or a good woman. Never has been. She’s had a rough life, ’n’ that don’t excuse her none, but she is what she is, ’n’ the sooner you accept that, the sooner you kin git on with yer life.”
“Accept that my mom will always be a drunk and treat me badly?”
“Yes.” She smiled at me. “’Bout time, boy.”
“Why would I want to be with a mother like that?”
“Now who said you had ta be ’round her? That’s yer choice.”
I looked at her like she was crazy. “Then what do I do?”
“Ya ask God ta help you accept that yer mom is what she is and ask Him ta help ya get on with livin’. If ya can live with the fact that she’s always gonna be who she is, then great, keep visitin’ her. If not, say good-bye ’n’ be thankful fer the good people ya do have ’roundya.”
I relayedthe conversations with Rose and with Maudra to Jed when we went to bed. He could tell something was up at dinner but had waited until we were alone to ask about what was going on. As I talked, he didn’t say anything; he only made appropriate noises to let me know he was listening and wrapped both his arms around me and rubbed my stomach and chest. He had long ago figured out when my mood required advice and when it was dangerous to give more than a supportive listening ear.
It was an odd sensation to be angry with Maudra. It was an odd sensation to be angry with anyone on behalf of my relationship with Rose. Everyone knew how she was, and no one ever took up for her. It seemed like Maudra was telling me it was somehow my fault that our relationship was like it was.
It wasn’t until I started thinking about some of the kids I had worked with, like Maudra suggested, that I began to understand what she had been saying. So many of my kids had been desperate to change their parents, make them better, make them be kind and good to them. I had always told them to focus on finding other people who would be good to them, and to find a way to be good to themselves, because their parents weren’t ever going to change. I felt both stupid and shocked as I realized I had been one of my kids. I had never released my pain and anger in ways that got me into trouble like they had done, but the situation was the same.
I let it sink in that this was all my mother was ever going to be. I had to treasure the moments when she had shown glimpses of her love for me but let everything else go. I was surprised I didn’t feel more of anything. It seemed like I should be sad or depressed, as if my mother, the mother Iwanted her to be, was dead. That mother was gone, and this mother, the real mother, was all I had left. Shouldn’t that be upsetting or make me feel a loss?
It was more as if a light was turned on in a room, and I could see Rose sitting in her disgusting green recliner. She wasn’t my mom. She wasn’t anybody’s mom. She was just a woman. An old, decaying, miserable woman. My first thought wasScrew her. Who needs her?That quickly gave way to pity. For the little girl whose innocence was stolen long before she could give it away, for the gorgeous woman who could have been anything she wanted, for the sad old woman whose only pleasures were an obese sweaty man and alcohol. After a few moments, even that floated away, and she was once again just a woman in a recliner who happened to give birth to me a long time ago.
I wasn’t sad, nor was I happy. I just was. I snuggled back into Jed and pulled his arm tighter around me. I closed my eyes and breathed in the smell of him and felt safe covered in his warmth and drifted off.
Thirty
Donniehad come over the next morning to start preparing for the following week’s lesson but immediately asked if I wouldn’t mind going to the park.
“Are you crazy? It’s freezing out there.”
