Alice
I don’t breathe until after I drop the car back at Hammer’s auto shop. He’s there waiting for me, feet propped up on a desk and reading a copy of a hunting magazine. This is just another day for him. For me? It’s a nightmare that I’m pushing myself through because, no matter what, I need the money. There’s too much riding on my shoulders for me to even think about failure.
Hammer gives me a sideways look when he sees the broken mirror, but I just tell him that some stupid kids in some rundown neighborhood back in Los Angeles were throwing rocks. The shakiness in my voice gives credence to my lie and he seems to buy it.
I give him the keys, I get paid, I get back into my car, and I grip the steering wheel so tight my knuckles pop. I turn the knob for the radio, crank the volume up as loud as I can stand, hunting for some kind of distraction, but the songs hardly register in my ears.
I’m wound up, nervous, feeling like I’m teetering on the razor’s edge and about to fall into something more dangerous than I anticipated.
Who was that man?
A million questions about him swirl through my head as I think about him and his cocky smirk, his swagger, and the way his green eyes looked like they wanted to drink me up.
Who would mess with Hammer?
Why was he so set on getting that car?
And why didn’t I tell Hammer about him?
My mind spins relentlessly around these questions and I get absolutely nowhere over the course of my drive to my mom’s home.
My mom’s home is in a quiet neighborhood on the outer edges of Crescent Falls. It’s a small neighborhood, with plenty of space and greenery between each house.
I park in the driveway next to the home care nurse’s car and step out. Gravel crunches underneath my feet and crickets chirp cheerily from the underbrush.
I’m thankful for the chill in the air and the fresh green smell of Lodgepole and Ponderosa pine trees, it’s like a balm for my nerves. I can’t count the number of times over the last half-year that I’ve done this little ritual — step outside my mother’s home and breathe in the heady air until the anxiety or the anger inside me simmers down.
I do the same thing right now, trying to find some steady center inside myself.
It’s a minute or two of standing there, eyes closed, lungs working, before I summon up the good mood I was feeling earlier and feel strong enough that I can head in the front door.
Home isn’t easy, lately.
Jeopardy is on the TV when I come in. My mom is on the couch, under a blanket, wearing a sweater and stretched out half-asleep. Eleanor Ramirez, the nurse I hired just a couple days ago once I landed the job at the Smiling Skull Saloon and was sure of a steady paycheck, is sitting next to the couch in a recliner. Half her attention is on the TV, the other half is on my mom.
Eleanor is the first to see me come through the door and, without disturbing my mom from her half-sleep, she gets up and comes over to me.
“You’re home earlier than usual, Alice,” she says. “Problem at work?”
I shake my head, smiling. It might’ve been an unusual day, but I am determined not to let it get me down. I’ve got money in my pocket and my first bit of financial breathing room in a long time.
“No problem. I wasn’t tending bar today, just running some errands for my boss,” I say, then I fish some of the wad of cash out of my purse. I separate out nearly half of it and hand it over to her. “This should cover what I owe for the last couple days, and cover a couple more, besides.”
She raises an eyebrow. “This will cover for a good while, Alice. But you don’t need to pay all at once. I told you that when you hired me. This is too much.”
I smile — Eleanor is one of the kindest women I’ve met and I half think that she does nursing just because she likes caring for others — but when she tries to return some of the cash, I gently cover her hand with mine and shake my head
“Take it. Please, you’ve earned it.”
It feels so good to pay her and know that, even after doing so, I’ve still got money left in my pocket.
I haven’t felt this way in a while.
“If you insist. Thank you.”
“How is she today?” I say, looking over at my mom dozing on the couch.
“Good. Very tired, but good. One of her treatments was today, you know. I took her by the hospital, and after, once she rested, we went out for a bite to eat. She had a whole flan and an orange juice.”
“Her treatment was today?” I say, disappointed. I feel like shit. I scheduled the damn thing and I forgot about it because I was so excited about having a new job. I haven’t missed a single one, until today.
Eleanor senses how I’m feeling and she puts a hand on my shoulder.
“It’s ok, Alice. Margaret did great today. The doctors say she’s coming along nicely and her prognosis for a recovery is very good. It’s a long road, sure, but they said that every time they see her, she seems a little bit further along. Have hope.”
I head into the kitchen and Eleanor comes along with me. I should feel elated by the news — it’s been a long six months of treatment and chemo and every bit of good news feels like another weight off my shoulders — but I can’t see it that way.
I came home to take care of my mom, I gave up so much because I love her, and, on a day when she is due to go something that’s arduous and painful, I wasn’t there for her.
“I should’ve been there,” I say, pouring myself a glass of Pinot Grigio from a bottle in the fridge. Inside me, pride at a successful day at work wars with disappointment at missing my mother’s treatment. “When’s the next one?”
Eleanor squeezes my hand. “I wrote it in the calendar. And don’t be so hard on yourself. She needs you to stay positive.”
I finish the glass and pour myself another. This whole scenario feels so alien — being the one in the kitchen having the ‘adult’ conversation while my mom is in the other room, watching television.
“Thanks, Eleanor. For everything.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow. Same time, yes?”
“Yes. Come on over the usual time. I should be working my normal schedule tomorrow, just bartending, but I will let you know if anything changes.”
“It’s no problem either way, Alice. I like the work. You and your mom are my only clients, I’d be retired otherwise. Though I think my husband is happy to have the house to himself. Football season is around the corner, after all.”
I hug her. The woman is a saint; I know she means what she said about being retired otherwise. She was a friend of my mom’s before my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer. They were in the same book club and both loved and hated the same novels. Her taking this job is as much a favor to a good friend as it anything else.
“Thanks, Eleanor.”
She smiles. “No problem. Now go sit down and take a rest. The Final Jeopardy round is coming on, and your mom could use a challenger. I’ll see myself out,” she says. Then, she stops. “By the way, Alice, I hate to bring you down a little bit, but the mail came today. I put it on the kitchen counter in a pile. Some of it was certified mail — I signed for it. There’s a lot of red ink.”
I frown. The only mail we get lately are bills, and if they’re sending it certified mail, then it’s not going to be long before it goes to collections.
Thank God for this new job.
“Have a good night, Eleanor,” I say and I resolve that I’m not going to think about those bills anymore tonight. I’m just going to enjoy the feeling of money in my pocket — however fleeting — and having a nice night in with my mom.
I take my glass of wine into the living room and sit down on the couch next to my mom. “Hey, mom.”
She gives me a sharp look; Alex Trebek is in the middle of reading the Final Jeopardy answer. I wait him out and look at my mom while he talks. She looks so fragile. I know she’s in recovery — the doctors caught the cancer early and they’re confident that she’ll be her vivacious self somewhere down the line — but right now, she looks like just a shell. Her cheeks are hollow, her eyes are glassy, and underneath that handkerchief wrapped around her head is the palest bald head I’ve ever seen.
Alex finishes.
My mom chimes in right away.
“Who is Steve McQueen?”
I look over at the TV. She’s right.
I stay quiet — I’ve missed my chance at giving my own answer and lord help me if I interrupt my mom’s Jeopardy time. I’m happy to sit there and let her enjoy her victory.
When the show ends, she looks over at me with rheumy eyes, as if seeing me for the first time.
“Oh, hi honey, when did you get home?”
I smile and scoot a little closer to her on the couch. “Just a bit ago, mom. How was your day?”
“Tiring,” she says with a sigh. “Did you drive down from San Francisco just to see me?”
It’s my turn to sigh. “No, mom, I’m living here, remember?”
She squints. “Living here? But what about your job at that internet thing?”
I hold in the sigh this time. When they started treating her, the doctors warned me about Chemo brain and the memory issues that would come along with it. Still, it’s never easy when your mother’s brain is so foggy that big parts of her daily life and recent past are obscured in the haze.
“I came here to help take care of you, mom.”
She blinks. “So you’re not working for the internet anymore?”
“No, I left that place,” I say. Well, fired is the more correct term. Once my short leave of absence turned into a very long leave of absence, they cut their ties and hired some fresh-out-of-college kid for two-thirds of what I was making.
Thank God for emergency funds. If I hadn’t had money saved, I wouldn’t have made it to this point.
“But what are you doing for work, honey? You liked that job, didn’t you?”
“I liked it a lot, mom. But I like you more. It wasn’t a hard choice. I’m working at the Smiling Skull Saloon, now. I’m tending bar and working as the owner’s executive assistant,” I say. That last bit of title is one I made up myself. But it feels right, and it makes me more comfortable with the fact that, just a year ago, I was wearing multiple managerial hats at an up-and-coming tech company in San Francisco and now… I’m working at a biker bar.
“Executive assistant? Wow, that sounds nice, honey. I’m very proud of you.”
“Thanks, mom,” I say. I put my arm over her shoulder and she leans into me. She’s cold a lot, lately — a side effect of the treatment. Still, however I can get it, it feels good to get extra-tight hugs from my mom. “Oh, look, your show is coming on.”
She leans towards the TV screen a little. “With that handsome Navy man?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh, I like him. He’s gruff, and he doesn’t follow the rules, but I’ll bet he really knows how to kiss. And do all the other stuff to keep a woman happy.”
“Mom!”
She’s probably right, but I don’t feel like talking about that with my mother right now. I don’t think I’ll ever feel like talking about that with her.
“Oh, please, honey. Get that stick out of your butt,” she says, with a lively grin on her face. “Eleanor and I both agree on it.”
“You talk to Eleanor about this?”
“All the time. Half of our book club meetings were about that man. He’s such a studmuffin.”
“Ok, mom, that’s enough.”
“No promises. Now, shh, let me watch my show. And no talking while he’s on screen,” she says, admonishing me in a partly-serious, partly-joking way. “I don’t give a damn about the rest of the show, but I will not have my time with Special Agent Gibson interrupted.”
I laugh and pull her back closer to me. It feels good to see glimpses of my mom being lively again. Even if it involves her being openly thirsty for a man old enough to be my dad.
This is why I’m working so hard, I remind myself. This is all worth it. Even if I’m working a job way below my qualifications, and even if there are random scary men trying to interrupt my work, she makes it all worth it.
I’m doing this for her.
And I’ll keep doing this, no matter what obstacles come up.
No leather-wearing biker is going to stop me.