Galen, his mother called.
He thought of not answering. If he just never answered again, what would happen then?
Galen, she repeated. She’d come out the back door onto the lawn, carrying a tray of finger sandwiches.
Not the finger sandwiches, he said.
There you are, she said, but it didn’t sound the way it usually did. No delight in her voice, as there’d been only a few days ago, before the cabin. It sounded more now like she’d located a target.
I’m having figs for lunch, he said.
I have something to tell you.
Well I can hear from up here.
She set the tray down on the wrought-iron table. Galen could see the table’s leaf pattern, and it seemed lovely to him for the first time. Heavy and old, but lovely.
I’ve made a decision, she said.
I can’t wait to hear.
You were all my world once upon a time, she said. You really were. I wanted a baby. I don’t know why. And if I could go back now and make it never have happened, I certainly would. But for a time there, having a baby was a magical thing.
Thanks, he said. For that part about wanting to go back.
Shut up and listen. I’m giving you a gift right now. I’m letting you know the whole thing.
Galen wanted to scream, but he felt a little afraid, too, so he only readjusted lower on the limb, found a more comfortable position in a vee with one of the main trunks. Holding the two figs in one hand.
I saw the world opening. I’m not sure what I saw, exactly, or how I could have believed any of it, but maybe it was something like imagining how we’d play in the walnut orchard, playing tag through the trees. Yellow mustard and wildflowers, and laughter. Maybe something like that, from the best moments of my own childhood in the orchard.
She wasn’t looking at him. She was gazing off into the orchard, and she had her teacup held in both hands, but just floating there, not drinking from it.
This is sounding like an after-school special, he said.
You want to make everything small. That’s what you’ve done. You’ve tried to make everything small. But I’m going to continue on anyway, because this is important to me. It’s important to me to let you know, just this once.
Fine, he said.
There was some feeling about it, some feeling about you. It was that Christmas-morning feeling, something really as innocent and pure as that. What I imagined was joy. And I think what I wanted, really, was to remake my own childhood. I wanted to go back and fix everything and live it the way it should have been.
His mother still hadn’t looked at him. It was disconcerting.
There was supposed to be a man. And I thought I had found that man, but when I told him I was pregnant, I watched everything just fade and die. It was less than a minute. It really was that fast. Everything he had felt for me just went away.
Who was he?
He lost that chance. He doesn’t get to be named or have anything told about him except the one part that matters, that he let everything just die in less than a minute. That’s all you need to know about him.
That’s real helpful. The daddy-minute. It explains so much.
It explains everything. It explains the truth about men, the truth that they care only about themselves. And you’re no different. I thought maybe you’d be different. That’s what I hoped.
This is all such self-serving crap. You should fucking listen to yourself.
That’s right. Straight to the fuck words. All violence. That’s who men are.
Fuck you.
Yeah. Fuck your mother. A favorite insult. But I’m not letting you take this away from me. I’m here to tell you a story.
Once upon a time.
That’s right. Once upon a time. Because it was a fairy tale. I believed you could be good.
Galen hated this conversation so much.
I spent all my time with you. All my time, for years. I helped you learn each word. Just think about that for a minute. I helped you learn every single word that you know.
Galen tried to focus on his exhales, tried to calm.
I helped you learn every sound. How an s sounds, how a z sounds. How a p is different from a b.
Well thanks, Galen said. If that’s what you’re looking for, thanks for all the instruction.
Shut up. You need to listen. Today you only listen.
Fuck that.
You’re going to listen today, because I’ve made a decision, and you need to know what this decision is. And I want you to really understand it. I want you to know why I made it.
Well let’s just get to it, then. What’s the decision?
No. I want you to understand first.
Fuck me.
That’s right. Look at it however you need to. But shut up and let me finish.
Fine. Do tell.
Where was I? She put her teacup down, put her palms flat on the table, looking at her hands. Okay. I watched how every expression developed. How you laughed and forgot to laugh, how you smiled and how that smile twisted up and changed, how your temper and crying became your anger, although I have to admit, I don’t really understand your anger. Your anger is something foreign, something I can’t see coming. Your anger is part of how you’re no longer mine.
So you’re only claiming the good parts?
No. I’m just tracing things. And there’s a gap there. And it’s the gaps that make you someone I can’t be with anymore.
Is that the decision?
No. It’s related. Maybe it is the decision, actually. Maybe that’s the fundamental thing, that I just don’t want you in my life anymore, but it’s not the decision I need to tell you about now.
Well about fucking time.
There’s more I need to explain. I haven’t even started, really. Because you’re going to be angry, and you’re going to feel betrayed, and you’re going to believe it’s unfair, and you’re going to think it’s about me and not about you. But I want you to understand. And I need you to know that it really is about you.
This is driving me crazy. You really are crazy.
No I’m not. And you won’t call me crazy again.
Crazyland, Galen said. That’s where you’ve lived for a while now. Look at you with your fucking afternoon tea and sandwiches. Think for a second about who else plays make-believe all day. Who is it who plays make-believe all day?
I’m not going to let you distract me.
Think about it. Children play make-believe all day, but who else does that? What adults do that, and where do they all live together?
Galen’s mother looked up at him finally. That’s been your gift to me, she said. To call me crazy.
The nut farm. You grew up on one kind of nut farm, but now you’re ready to live in a different kind of nut farm. Galen liked this idea, but he stopped, because he didn’t really like to see his mother hurt. That was always the problem. She deserved to be treated worse, but he could never do it.
I’m going to live right here, she said. But you’re not.
Is that the decision?
No.
Throwing me out on the street, like you were threatening at the cabin? Even though you’ve been taken care of your whole life?
Let me continue, she said. I’m trying to tell you that I loved you. I loved you your whole life, and I tried.
You were my mother. That’s what you were supposed to do.
You don’t understand anything.
No one made you have me.
She shook her head. I’m not going to let you do this to me.
Yeah, because I’m doing such awful things to you right now. I’m the one making threats, saying I’ve made some kind of life-changing decision.