14
Bea
Time can offer the illusion that we are successfully putting our problems behind us and, even if the illusion isn’t convincing, it is often convenient to pretend it is authentic anyway. Such was the case with me as a few days passed, during which I exercised my own gullibility toward my own imagination. I was no stranger to such a way of enduring life, though it helped that a significant portion of my time was devoted to work and study.
What free time I might otherwise have had to fill my mind with regret was also being taken up by my father’s campaign. The two of us hadn’t exchanged any meaningful or private words since our last altercation and, as far as appearances were concerned, I was very much acting like the ‘good girl’ my father had always wanted me to be—even if a little patronizingly—as I explained to Claire when she called to see how I was doing. Unusually she had chosen to call in the morning, just as I was getting ready to leave for college. Maybe she thought it would be easier for me to talk then, while everyone else was preparing for their own days, but I’d already stopped worrying about what the Secret Service agents might overhear.
“I’m fine,” I insisted, after Claire asked if I was managing to stay sane. “All I have to do is look presentable and smile for the cameras; it’s the Presidential candidate who has to do all the talking. And he likes the sound of his own voice, anyway.”
“I’ve been having visions of you tearing your hair out,” Claire replied.
I laughed. “No! There are worse fathers out there than mine. I’ve even stopped being annoyed with finding a man in a suit everywhere I turn—in fact, I’ve kind of gotten used to treating them as a nice cab service.”
She laughed. “Glad to hear it,” she said. Her voice suddenly took on a more serious tone. “Truthfully, I didn’t know how to ask about…well, you know what.”
“Nothing’s happened there, predictably. He never even replied to my message, so I guess you were right—he got over it right away. So I guess it’s over with, but at least things didn’t get too deep or complicated before I called it off.”
Claire told me to take it easy and made me promise to call if I became upset over it at all, and then we had to cut the catch-up short as it was time to be chauffeured to college. However, I found my momentum interrupted by the unusual sight of Mom sitting alone and staring out the kitchen window. Something about the stillness of her, especially with it being first thing in the morning, seemed completely out of character and although I’d been annoyed with her lately, I couldn’t leave without asking what was going on.
“Mom, are you okay?” I asked, tentatively stepping towards her.
My mother, who hadn’t seen me approach, turned round slowly and took a few moments to respond, as if coming out of a dream.
“I…I never had much freedom when I was growing up in Cuba, Beatrice. You know that,” she said, the sadness in her eyes matched by the tone of her voice.
I was unsure how to respond, instead waiting for her to get to the point in her own time.
“Calvin’s ambition….” she then continued, swaying her head from side to side for a moment as if she was going to shake her head in disapproval but then thought better of it. “I had hard-working parents too,” she went on, “and I always dreamed of moving to America, where I could live…freely. Now I’m not sure that I haven’t just been keeping the same story going. Being a good American housewife was something I thought I should be to fit in, but being the wife of a Governor, or of a President—well, that’s a different thing completely.”
“Mom, I…” I began, still not knowing what to say. I was unsure how to show compassion when I felt it wasn’t exactly reciprocated in the same way. It wasn’t like Mom was offering an apology for cutting off all of my freedoms. Instead she was transfixed on her own, unless the idea was that we were supposed to have a like mind on this subject.
“But then again,” she continued, changing her tone as if searching for faith, “this is the best we know. This might be the best way for everyone.”
“The best way for one of us,” I replied with a hint of bitterness.
I might have went on and made a stronger point about how my father was the only one who got to have a say in our futures, but knowing whether my Mom wanted to hear the truth or a distorted version of it was impossible to say. On too many occasions, my perspective had fallen on unsympathetic ears, even when Mom was making an act of showing compassion. It still all came back to my father apparently knowing best, so I was less inclined to offer more thoughts and perspectives for fear of them proving worthless to the ears that heard them.
“Sorry, Mom, I have to go,” I said instead, then made my way out to the black car I was now used to seeing idling about in front of the house. That was my Secret Service ride to college, and I jumped in before opening my bag to double check all the right papers for today’s classes were present. Because of the unusual exchange with my mother, however, I found I could only look absentmindedly, as my thoughts remained inside the house. Maybe I’d missed an opportunity to go further and spill my heart out; make my mother more of an ally, if she was indeed mourning some of the strange restrictions to her daily lifestyle as well.
Lost in contemplation, I remained stooped for a while, looking into the contents of my bag even though I knew there were no answers to my particular problems in there. Because I was so distracted, it took me a while to realize that the vehicle wasn’t actually going anywhere.
I looked up to find out what the delay was. “Excuse me,” I said. “Is there…”
My words died on my lips as I saw who the agent driving me was, and my heart began to thump like mad.
Damon.