Turn of Mind - Alice LaPlante [70]
Is my face at all familiar?
No. And I can’t tell you how boring it is to get asked that all the time.
Then you won’t hear it from me again, old friend.
Glad to hear that, stranger. So, why are you here?
He again looks uncomfortable. Shifts a little in his chair.
As an . . . emissary. From Mark. And as I look enquiringly at him, Your son, he says.
I have no son.
I know you’re angry with him. But let me make a case on his behalf.
You don’t understand. I have no recollection of any son. And I’m not inclined to play along. I used to, you know. Nod and pretend. No more.
He is silent.
Well, let’s talk hypothetically. Say you did have a son. And say that he had gotten himself into a bad situation. Made some mistakes. And imposed on you—or tried to.
Imposed in what way?
Borrowed money, repeatedly. Asked for more. Hassled your friends, as well. Even stolen, for example, your icon. He got a substantial sum for that.
I’d say, To hell with him.
Yes, but suppose he’s cleaned up his act. And wants to reconcile.
I’d want to know why.
Well, you’re his mother. Isn’t that enough?
Since I don’t know him, I don’t know why it would matter one way or another to him.
It’s just the idea of it. And the fact that he can’t get through to you. Either you’re furious at him, or you don’t remember him. Either way, he’s lost his mother.
How old is he?
Maybe twenty-nine, thirty.
In other words, old enough to survive without a mother.
That’s the person who doesn’t know she has a son talking.
In other words, a rational person. I’ve noticed that people with children do irrational things. Anything to protect their young.
As you have.
How is that?
It means that you yourself have protected your young on occasion. Even beyond what a rational person would do.
And how would you know that?
Jennifer, we’ve known each other for nearly forty years. Longer than most marriages survive. There’s little I don’t know about you. What you’ve done. Or what you’re capable of doing.
Sounds tedious. Like most marriages. Once you know everything there is to know about someone, it’s usually time to move on.
Well, there is affection.
Perhaps.
And that irrational thing that’s even stronger. Love. People do strange things in the name of love.
What exactly are we talking about here? We seem to have strayed from the subject.
Back to the subject, then. Will you forgive Mark, your hypothetical son? Under the circumstances I just described?
I give it some thought, try to conjure up an emotion beyond bemusement at being asked to forgive and forget when I’ve already forgotten.
No, I say, finally. You can ask me again when I know who we’re talking about.
But that may not happen. As you yourself said, today is a good day.
No, it may not happen.
At the very least, can you not do anything that will harm him in any way?
That implies I have power over him.
You do. More than you know at this moment.
As I’m unlikely to remember this conversation either, what’s the point?
Sometimes things stick. Promise?
Hypothetically I promise not to harm this person I don’t remember. Do no harm. If you’re really a doctor, you took that oath, too. So this is an easy promise to make.
A vision. My young mother, sporting a Peter Pan–like haircut. She who always wore her dark hair long, pulled back in a ponytail during the day, loose and flowing and beautiful at night, even throughout her long decline.
She has her hands cupped around something precious. She is not wearing her wedding ring. Perhaps she is not even old enough to be married yet, although she met and married my father when she was eighteen. He was twenty-seven, and both sets of parents complained but were powerless to stop them.
But this image is so much more vivid than anything in my present life. The colors vibrant, my mother’s rich chestnut hair, her milky clear complexion, the white softness of the skin on her arms, shoulders. I feel so calm looking at her. Hopeful. As if she held my future in her girlish hands and that the smile on her face was an assurance that my story would have a happy