New crisis.
So often, Mary came back to the lake in the heat of summer, but this time, she’d come to hibernate.To overwinter like the perennials in Dora’s sprawling gardens, shrouded in protective burlap as they lay dormant beneath the frost and snow, their hearts filled with raw longing for spring.
“She needs help,” Rachel said to Dora on the fourth night as she stood watching her grandmother grind chamomile and spearmint for a calming tea.
“That’s what I’m trying to do, little one,” Dora said, brow furrowed as she worked away with the pestle.
“No, Gran, I mean…” Rachel hesitated, not wanting to offend.“I meanrealhelp, like professional help.She needs a doctor.There’s something wrong.”
“Of course there’s something wrong,” Dora said, shaking her head.“There always has been.”
“No, but Gran, this is…” Rachel’s eyes were wide and imploring.“I’m really worried about her.”As she said it, she realized it was true, and was overcome with a confusing sense of achievement.It was often so difficult to understand or forgive Mary, but seeing her in such a vulnerable state was eye-opening.Her mother was, in many ways, the oblivious author of her own misfortunes.But how much of her poor judgment was dictated—or at least influenced—by her mental illness?Seeing her now, reduced to a child-like shell of a person who could barely feed herself, Rachel wondered how anyone could make the right choices from such a place of helplessness.It was all so complicated, but Rachel was doing her best to untangle it.All she knew was that she had never felt sorrier for her mother than she did now.
“I’m concerned, too,” Dora muttered, tapping the side of the mortar with aclinkto empty the herb blend into a jar.“I’ve never seen her quite like this.”She met Rachel’s eyes now.“She keeps asking for Reverend Holland.I suppose they made quite a connection the last time she was here.”
Rachel remembered a couple of summers ago, when her mother had spent most of her visit alternating between painting her nails and meeting with the reverend.She’d seemed better that time, though, and Rachel wondered if perhaps the ministerhadhad some positive impact on her.She knew Mary was always looking for answers anywhere she could find them.Rachel recalled with disdain the fortune-tellers, the televangelists and mediums Mary had touted over the years.Was the reverend really any better?
At Dora’s invitation, he arrived that evening, and sat with Mary for an hour as though she were on her deathbed.In a way, she sort of was: She’d given up all hope for her life and the images and voices had taken over any rational thought she possessed.She cried constantly.
Rachel stood outside her mother’s bedroom door, just out of sight, and eavesdropped.The reverend spoke of finding strength from God and from within.
“I want to be better, Reverend.I do.”Mary sobbed, blew her nose loudly.
“You have not had an easy life, Mary,” the reverend reassured her.“God has tested you with trials others have not been challenged with.It is a lot to bear.”
“And my mother, she just…she’ll never understand.She and Rachel hate me.I know they do.All they do is—”
“Your family does not hate you, Mary,” he interrupted gently.“You must—”
“But I hear the words,” she whispered.
“They tell you this?”
Silence.“No.In my head, I hear it.I hear that they hate me.”She paused.“Are they right?Do I need help?”
A pause.“No, I do not think you need any help that God cannot provide.”
Rachel had had enough.Fuming, she stepped into the room, and they both looked up at her in surprise.
“Rachel,” the reverend began, “I—”
“She doesn’t needGod,” Rachel snapped.“She needs adoctor.Medication.”
Mary’s face was blotchy and wet, her nose running.
“When someone is sick, you call a doctor,” Rachel pressed, her mouth dry.She’d never spoken to an adult like this before, but had to say it.
Reverend Holland looked at her with something close to pity, and Rachel felt a squirm of defeat.
“Yes.But there are also chapels in hospitals, aren’t there?”he said.
Rachel gnashed her teeth.
“They trust the care of doctors,” Reverend Holland said.“But still they pray.”
That night, Rachel stayed up late to catch up on her homework.It had been almost impossible to focus, with everything going on.At midnightshe stumbled, exhausted, into the bathroom.She always wished the house had more than one shower, because ever since that night with Mary years ago, she hated using this one.Every single time, she’d fight to shake off the lingering images of Mary, hands outstretched like Lady Macbeth, uttering accusations of witchcraft that could have gotten a woman hanged by the neck once upon a time.
The house was quiet now.Mary had finally stopped crying an hour ago and found her way into sleep.Rachel had finished her research, and could go to sleep now herself.
