Page 42 - WTP Vol. XI #2

Mother, Other (continued from preceding page)
has been nothing but kind to her, even when the HOA tacked a red slip to her front door that abruptly end- ed the slew of “good morning”s from other neighbors. Joanna had explained to her that the transgression was the loose brick in her driveway.
“But I just noticed it yesterday, and Paul’s the only one who really uses the driveway—”
“I know, dear, but the HOA has a one-week grace period for these kinds of things. You’ve probably
had it much longer without realizing. And it’s really for all of our sakes; last week, Maureen’s son tripped over an uneven sidewalk in front of the Polks’ house. Poor boy’s been sprained and sick in bed for two weeks now.”
If it had been her in bed for two weeks, she would have long been ushered out the door. “You need to learn how to take care of yourself,” her mother used to repeat over the sound of her daughter’s sniffles, gesturing towards the school bus parked at the end of the block. The scowling driver had made an exception for her on its frantically circuitous route to school, cowed by the middle-aged woman in pearls who had screamed it down. “No one is going to stop for you.”
She thinks of Paul again as she detours through the toiletries. Her husband has just bought a new tub of aftershave which will last him exactly seven weeks. It used to be four weeks, but he’s gotten lazier. She tests the weight of a gray razor between her thumb and forefinger. Her own razor is nothing like this; it’s pink and light, three blades crusted in blood.
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Paul’s shaving habits had slowly tapered off after his promotion: “My boss shows up two hours late every day.”
“Isn’t that bad for the company?”
“Nah. What he does has absolutely no effect on the rest of us. Everyone is too scared of him to point it out. Could you imagine telling someone hey, the boss looks sloppy today?” Paul barked out a laugh as he dragged his toothbrush from his molars to his inci- sors. “That’s basically career suicide. You didn’t work that long anyway, babe, and you were what, an intern at your last job? It’s okay. I wouldn’t expect you to know about all this office politics stuff.”
“Cubicle life. It’s like an episode of Game of Thrones.” He paused. She flushed the toilet.
“I know.”
He rinsed off his toothbrush and placed it on the counter beside the two-holed cup that held hers before exiting the bathroom.
Autofill well wishes from high school friends, a re- flexive outpouring responding to her NYU law ac- ceptance, had dotted her Facebook page a year after undergrad. Her high school best friend, now a gyne- cologist with an office in Chicago but a broke first- year med student then, wrote, OMG NOTHING CAN STOP YOU NOW!!
It had taken two days of relentless Facebook stalking to deflate her ego. And to realize that her period, carefully prophesied on a pocket calendar, had never come.
She knew what was supposed to happen. Daytime hosts frozen behind porcelain veneers had already sermonized it all: time would stop, she would see colors she’d had never, she would make her mother burst into tears of joy.
But she can’t remember any of that month besides waking up every morning to clack out words on
her computer: adoption. Abortion. Planned Parent- hood of New England. Short-term healthcare loans. Miscarriage. Post-traumatic stress disorders among children in the foster care system by Macpherson
et al. Rates of maternal death in the United States of America. She thought about calling her mother and then always thought better of it.
When she finally told Paul, it was because she had reasons to stay: baby-blue baby bibs, celestial- themed mobiles, annual Build-A-Bear trips, Nancy Drew and Encyclopedia Brown, sliding-door mini- vans invulnerable to fender benders, jittery lawn
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