I have my own life to live and I have Mark to raise. You could give me the money and keep Mama from being such a godawful burden to me.”
“Yes, I could, I suppose. But I won’t. I won’t have Mama in a home.
She needs us, not strangers in uniforms.” “It’s not your choice to ruin my life and Mark’s, too.” “It’s my money,” I answered, not adding that there wasn’t a lot of my money left. “I’m sorry you feel this way. You don’t have to help with Mama. I’ll move her into a place of my own and get daytime help while I’m at the library. You don’t have to have a damn thing to do with her.” “And let you have all that moral superiority? Let people here think I don’t care about Mama as much as you do? Forget it” Public opinion in Mirabeau still mattered to Sister. Left over from her cheerleader days, I’m sure. “Then quit complaining.” I spoke more sharply than I intended, but the strain of quarreling with her showed. “Dinner’ll be ready in about ten minutes.”
Sister went into her monotone. “Please set the table.” “All right.” I didn’t want to argue any more. I set the table quickly and haphazardly, flinging the silverware and plates down like I was dealing cards. Sister twitched at the noise, but didn’t look up from the cream gravy she stirred. “Would you please go find Mark?” I turned and went. I stumbled out the front door into the fading spring sunshine. The evening was still warm and hazy with moisture. Spring had been rainy. Mirabeau is the lush, dark, deep green that always surprises folks who’ve based their visions of Texas on John Wayne movies that were shot in dusty, brown Arizona. The oak trees, pregnant with leaves, shook in the twilight breeze above my head. The crepe myrtles were short explosions of pink, scattering their blossoms on the air. I leaned against my blue and gray Chevy Blazer and looked out down Lee Street, across front yards that were maintained like badges of honor. Yards-whether front or back-usually aren’t divided by fences in Mirabeau, and the residential streets don’t have curbs. The grass just goes straight into the neighbors’ yards and into the street. When I was little this whole neighborhood was my playground, but now I felt like I was trespassing. What was I doing here? I’d bolted at age eighteen, swearing to never come back. Twelve years later and here I was. I scanned the street My nephew Mark was down a few houses, talking with a neighbor’s kid. “Mark! Supper time!” He waved back, almost begrudgingly. Maybe Sister was right. Was I controlling her and Mark’s life by insisting that we take care of Mama at home? I didn’t feel in control; Mama’s disease was. It dictated and governed every aspect of our lives. I’d given up a life I’d loved, being a social sciences editor for a prestigious textbook publisher in Boston. I’d acquired authors, negotiated contracts, planned marketing campaigns to storm college campuses nationwide. It had been decent money and a lot of fun. Now, I was back at my life’s square one because I didn’t want my mother in a nursing home. Logical, aren’t I? I couldn’t blame Sister for being mad. If she blamed Mama’s condition for running her life, she thought I was making it worse. She’d wanted money to put Mama in a nursing home over in La Grange. She didn’t have the money, hadn’t had anything except Mark since her rodeo-smitten husband had abandoned her five years ago and headed to parts unknown. I had headed for parts unimaginable (New England), but Sister’d had my phone number. I stood in the carport, staring at the modest house I’d grown up in. It was built at the turn of the century and had belonged to my father’s uncle who died widowed and childless. Two stories, white, with plenty of blue-shuttered windows across the front to let in light and maybe neighbors’ peering eyes. The porch was wood and held two white wicker chairs that should’ve held Mama and Daddy. Sister and I sat there and moped these days. We hadn’t kept up the house as Daddy had; it had been his pride and joy, but we took the house for granted.
Mark trimmed the yard and tended the flower beds, but the house needed a paint job, especially across the front porch. I knew I should get it taken care of, but I was wary of spending money in front of Sister.
Every cent I wasted on other expenses was a cent that could help lift the burden of our mother from our shoulders. If only Daddy had been as thoughtful about insurance as he was about lawn care. The average yearly cost of nursing home care in this country is thirty thousand bucks. It tends to be one of those facts you don’t bother with till your mother’s walking in circles, drooling on her chin, and thinking you’re her long dead brother Walter. My investments and savings couldn’t bear that assault. Part of me didn’t want Mama in a home, and the other part of me didn’t want my savings flying away so quickly. I couldn’t tell Sister my financial woes. She thought my college education resulted in an instantly swollen bank account. She wouldn’t believe me if I told her I didn’t have the money to keep Mama in a home for years of Alzheimer’s. Contrary to popular belief, publishing is not a gold mine. Mark swaggered up to me like only a thirteen-year-old can. He doesn’t even have the grace to look like a Poteet-not that it’s his fault. He’s tall and rangy like us, but that’s about it. Where Sister and I are fair-haired and green-eyed like both our parents, Mark is dark and just looks like trouble. He’s the spitting image of his daddy, the aforementioned rider from responsibility. Even wearing silvery round glasses, he looks like a rebel. I never managed that in my youth. “I hate to interrupt your cramped social schedule, but supper’s on,” I said. Usually I tease Mark, but arguing with Sister had soured my mood. Mark surveyed me with eyes older than the rest of him. “You and Mom have been fighting over Mamaw again.” “What are you, psychic?” I put my arm around his shoulder and steered him toward the house. “I don’t know why you two just don’t accept Mamaw for how she is. She ain’t getting better.”
“Isn’t,” I automatically corrected. We walked into the living room, where Mama sat chatting chirpily with shadows. Mark waved his arms in front of her face. “No one’s here, Mamaw. Nobody but us.” She looked at him, hurt. Turning her face away, she pressed the back of her hand to her pinched mouth. I took Mark by the arm and shuffled him into the kitchen. “Must you argue with her?” He’s a good kid, but I wondered if the strain of our difficult domestic situation was wearing on him.
“Nothin’ to argue about with Mamaw. An argument takes two people armed with opinions or facts. Mamaw’s lacking both.” “Don’t be disrespectful, Mark.” Mark smacked his chewing gum in a most impertinent teenage fashion. I do wonder where he gets it. “You know, Uncle Jordy, I don’t see disrespect in facing up to Mamaw going out of her head.” I opened the fridge, got out a pitcher of iced tea, and slammed the door. “You’re too young to understand. Mama’s not exactly going out of her head.” Who was I kidding? I was mad at Mark for saying exactly what I thought. “I think there’s going to be a vacancy sign hung up real soon,” Mark muttered as Sister came back in.
Needless to say, the rest of the meal did not go well. Little family squabbles over the sanity of the clan matriarch do not make for carefree dinner conversation. Mark huffed off to his room to read; as I said, the boy is not entirely without redeeming features. Sister pouted again and left for The Near End and the company of Bubba. And I sat watching TV with Mama. I think the vapid sitcom made as much sense to her as it did to me. I started reading an old copy of Eudora Welty’s short stories, disturbed only by Mama’s occasional giggle-along with the laugh track, as automatic and sad as a last breath. It was ten o’clock and I was putting on the news from Channel 36 out of Austin when the phone rang and my life turned left. “Jordy.”
It was Sister. “How’s Mama?” “Fine,” I answered. Sister thinks she takes better care of Mama than I do. “Did you give her her Haldol?”
Sister asked, and I slapped my forehead. Crap! I’d gotten the prescription filled and my confrontation with Beta Harcher had driven the pills right out of my mind. I glanced over at Mama; she looked wide awake. Our family doctor prescribed Haldol for her restless nights, so common in Alzheimer’s patients. “Um, yeah, just about to give it to her,” I fibbed. I’d left the pills in my office at the library. Well, Sister didn’t need to know about my slight dereliction of duty. I could run down to the library and be back, with Sister none the wiser. “Okay. I’ll see you in the morning then.” There was the barest hint of reconciliation in her voice. “Fine. Bye.” I hung up.