Page 295 of What We Brave
Also genetic. I reorganized my entire tea collection the week after Blake left for Afghanistan. Twice.
"I'll help," I say.
"You don't have to?—"
"Mom." I'm already standing. Already reaching for Dad's plate. "Let me help."
She looks at me. That flicker again — the warmth, the caution, the careful recalibration. Then she nods.
We stand side by side at the tiny sink. She washes. I dry. The water's lukewarm at best and she's using a bar of soap that's meant for hands, not dishes, and the whole thing is inefficient and familiar and it makes my throat ache.
How many sinks have we stood at like this? Honduras. The Philippines. That church basement in rural Haiti where we washed dishes with water we'd boiled on a camp stove. My whole childhood is a series of kitchens in other people's houses, my mother's hands in soapy water, her voice filling the space with plans and prayers and whatevershe was thinking about — because the woman has never once had an unspoken thought.
She's quiet now. That's how I know it's bad.
"Mom."
"Hmm?"
"We leave tomorrow."
"I know." She scrubs a plate that's already clean. "I packed some snacks for the flight. Those granola bars Reid likes."
Granola bars. She's doing the granola bar thing right now. Taking care of me. Being kind. Showing love through snacks and clean dishes and everything except what really matters.
"I don't want to talk about granola bars."
Her hands slow in the water. She doesn't look at me.
"I know," she says again. Quieter.
"Mom, it's been five days and we haven't—" My voice catches. I breathe through it. "You've been so kind. You've been — the lunches and the tamales and you corrected Reid when he called you Mrs. Mitchell and you let Blake call you ma'am even though you hate it?—"
"I don'thateit?—"
"You've been perfect. And I'm terrified."
She stops washing. Her hands go still in the water. Suds climbing her wrists.
"Because this is what it looks like." I set the dish towel down. My hands are shaking a little and I don't want her to see, which is stupid, because the whole point of this conversation is to stop hiding. "This is exactly what I said I was afraid of. You're loving me. You are. But you're doing it fromhere." I hold my hand out. Arm's length. "And if I get on that plane tomorrow without saying this, it becomes the pattern. It becomes how we are. And I can't?—"
Don't cry. Not yet. You haven't even said the thing.
"I can't lose you to politeness, Mom." The words come out louder than I mean them to. "I'd rather you yell at me. Tell me I'm wrong, tell me you're angry, tell me I'm making a huge mistake. I can fight that. I can work with that. I don't know how to fight yournice."
Mom pulls her hands out of the water. Dries them on her shirt — not the towel, hershirt, which is such a Mom thing to do — and turnsto face me. Her eyes are red. Not crying, not yet, but that raw, held-back look that means she's been doing this for days. Holding it in. Being strong. BeingMary.
"I don't think you're wrong," she says.
That stops me. "What?"
"I don't — Laine, I don't think you'rewrong." She presses her fingers against her mouth. The prayer posture. Then she drops her hand, deliberately, like she caught herself doing it. "I think I'm scared. I've been scared since you told us and I don't know what to do with it, so I've been doing what I always do."
"Being competent."
"Being useful." A shaky breath. "Making sandwiches, and cooking food nobody can eat and packing granola bars and — keeping busy so I don't have to sit with the?—"
She stops. Presses her hand flat against her sternum.
