Page 54 of What It's Like in Words
Enola, is that you?
I…What?Mum, you called me.
Yes, she said tartly, but I’m calling you from a different number. I told her that if that were the case, she would still know whoIwas. She sighed and then spoke as if she were the bigger person.
How are you, Enola?
Okay. It’s Amy’s wedding this weekend.
Are you going?
Yes. How are you?
Oh, you know.
I did know. She grew vegetables. She painted. Paul’s children visited with their children. But she got a weekly phone call with the daughter she never wanted. The detour she took on the way to France. The role she was miscast in: motherhood.
When Mum moved to France, she told me that I could come up during the holidays, and I stayed for a whole summer once before my A levels. I wanted to stay with Ruth in London, but my grandparents put me on a plane. I cycled down country lanes. Walked through fields. Everything existed in subtext, in the dark corners of the vineyard that Mum was painting in the corner of the living room where the light was best.
That’s good, I replied, as if she had actually answered the question.
And how is work?
She wouldn’t say “writing,” because she didn’t view that as work. She wasn’t wrong. No one was paying me to do it. After Amy’s book launch, I had considered telling her about Diana, but I had imagined how that conversation would go:You have a book deal? No, Mum, an agent isn’t a book deal. But you have an agent? No, Mum, an agent just wants to read my book. And how much money will you get for that?So I replied that work was fine and asked her about her garden. Mum liked to talk about her garden.
Well, the roses aren’t looking great but they’re so tricky and we’ve had bizarre weather. The green around the arch is looking good, though, and we just dug up a lovely lot of potatoes, she said.
I walked to the bedroom and took another painkiller.
I asked her to remind me what she grew, and she said: The usual. I paused, expecting her to clarify, but she didn’t, so I suggested carrots. She repeated the word like it was offensive, so I chose another vegetable: Cabbages? She said yes; she grew cabbages and lettuce and some leeks. She also had a load of gooseberries and was going to make rhubarb crumble.
With gooseberries?
No, Enola. With rhubarb.
I checked the time. It had only been two minutes. I thought about him. If he was coming from the bar he would smell like muddled strawberries and whiskey and I would run him a shower. If he had been writing then he would be excitable or stressed and I would stroke his hair.
I went back to the living room and turned on the side lights.
How is Milton, Mum?
Milton? She repeated his name as if she had never heard it before.
Yes, Mum… Milton.
Milton died, Enola.
What? I exclaimed. When?
She made a noise and said: Oh, I don’t know. A few weeks ago? I squeezed a sofa cushion and the sequins dug into my palm. Mum was always offended when I didn’t have the information that she hadn’t provided. I said that she had never told me about Milton. She told me to calm down: You never even met Milton, Enola. I returned that Ihadmet Milton.
Well, now he’s dead. Turtles don’t live very long, Enola.
They do, Mum.
Mum never sugarcoated things. It’s how she dealt with everything, like she was just finishing up paperwork. I heard a deep voice in the background: something about pears? Mum shouted to put thekettle on. Grey. Yes. EarlGrey. No, not that one. It’s in the tub at the top of the cupboard. Yes, that’s it, the one with the badger on it!
Mum?
