What We Keep - Elizabeth Berg [73]
Even after we could make our own clothes, Georgia still made the harder things: coats, prom dresses. And now she makes wonderful things for our children. Lately, it’s quilts. My kids always open her presents first at Christmastime, and they always love what they get. They call her Grandma. I want them to. They know she’s not my real mother, but they don’t care. She does everything right. When my father died last year, it was Georgia who brought all of us peace. As she always had. In direct opposition to you-know-who.
The week after our mother moved back, we met her at a restaurant downtown, at her request. It was a small Italian place, dimly lit, red-and-white-checked tablecloths. Our father dropped us off, and we found our mother at a corner table. She stood, embraced us briefly, then sat down, her face grim.
“What’s wrong with you?” Sharla asked.
“Nothing. What do you mean?”
“You look mad.”
“I’m not mad.”
Silence.
She picked up the menu, her voice high and pleasant. “So! What kind of pizza would you like?”
“I want spaghetti and meatballs,” Sharla said.
“Well, I’m sorry, but you’ll have to agree on a pizza. I can’t afford three entrées. I thought we could just share a pizza.”
Sharla put down the menu. “I don’t care then, you pick. I don’t really like pizza.”
My mother looked up, surprised. “Since when?”
Sharla shrugged, turned her head away, studied the wall.
My mother leaned back in her chair, sighed. Then she sat up and moved in close to Sharla, spoke quietly. “You know, I have had just about enough from you.”
“What?” Sharla said. “What did I do?”
“Your saying you don’t like pizza, for starters, that’s just deliberately—”
“I DON’T like pizza!” Sharla yelled. The few other patrons turned to look at us, then away.
“Don’t you raise your voice,” my mother said. “You show some respect for the other people trying to have a nice dinner here, if you can’t show respect to me.”
“She really doesn’t like pizza anymore,” I said. “She said that last week.”
“Shut up,” Sharla told me.
I sat back in my chair, hurt. Then, “You shut up,” I said.
My mother put her coat on, picked up her purse. “Suppose we just not do this,” she said. “Suppose you two just go home. I know you’d rather be there, anyway. I don’t have to do this. I do not have to do this. I have feelings, too. I have limits.”
I looked at Sharla, incredulous at my mother’s behavior. Sharla was smiling, the smirk variety. But I saw that she was afraid.
My mother called my father from the restaurant’s pay phone. He had just gotten home, but he came right back. When we got into the car, I saw him staring out the window at my mother with an expression full of only pity. He drove off in such a way as to make me think he was trying to be gentle. My mother got smaller in the distance, then disappeared.
“I told you she was crazy,” Sharla said, when we were in bed that night, the lights out.
“I think she just got mad.”
“Why? Who would yell at their kids because they don’t like pizza anymore?”
“She didn’t yell.”
“Same thing,” Sharla said.
I turned my pillow over, shut my eyes. Lately, when I went to sleep, I made a fist and laid it over my heart. I did this now, then bent down to suck at my knuckle.
“What are you doing over there?” Sharla asked.
“Nothing.”
“Well, do it quieter.”
On Christmas Eve, our father pulled up in front of our mother’s house. I got out of the car and waited for Sharla, who did not budge. “Hurry up!” I said. “It’s cold!”
She did not move.
“Sharla?” my father said.
She closed her eyes, leaned her head back against the seat.
“Come on!” I said, and then watched, amazed, as she lay down on the seat and began sobbing.
My father sat dumbstruck for a moment, then called to me to get back in the car. I climbed into the backseat, slammed the door behind me.
I had never heard Sharla cry this way. It sounded like fake laughter. My father pulled the car closer to the curb, turned off the engine, put his hand on Sharla’s back.
“Sharla? What is it?”
“I can’t,” she