Around the Bend

by Shirley Jump

  “You went to school—”

  “We’re not having this conversation.” I jerked the Mustang into the right lane, which elicited a frown of displeasure from my mother. I wanted to tell her that I had a whole list prepared of things we were not going to discuss on the way to San Francisco but the list got lodged somewhere in my throat. For God’s sake, that was how a five-year-old felt.

  Nick’s words came back to me, but I pushed them away. No time for serious conversations. There was driving to be done.

  “Watch your driving,” my mother said, reading my mind. “I’d like to get there alive.”

  “If we’re dead, we won’t get there at all,” I pointed out.

  “Hilary.”

  Behind me, Reginald’s snores came in regular chainsaw riffs. The smiling face on the cardboard human beside him never changed.

  “Why couldn’t you have just asked Uncle Morty to send you your half of Grandma’s stuff?” I asked. Maybe there was still hope of turning around, of convincing my mother we didn’t need to go there in person.

  “I don’t trust him.”

  “He’s your brother.”

  “There’s an unresolved theft between us.”

  “Unresolved theft?” I zipped past a semi and down 90 West, ignoring my mother’s exhale. “Ma, you were ten and we’re talking change here, not a Chevy Malibu.”

  “He’s a thief. He took your grandfather’s coin collection.”

  “It was a roll of quarters, Ma. And Grandpa told me he only gave them to Uncle Morty because Morty was interested in coin collecting and you weren’t.”

  “Still, they were supposed to be mine. I’m the older one. And when I was three—”

  “When you were three, Grandpa said he’d give you the coins,” I finished. I had heard this before. “You liked how shiny they were, yada, yada, yada.”

  “A promise is a promise, Hilary.”

  “Do you collect coins now?”

  “That’s not the point.”

  “Ma, Uncle Morty grew up to become the most respected numismatist in the Bay Area. That quarter collection became the basis of his business. He’s like the cover model of Coins Monthly or whatever. Can’t you forgive him?”

  She raised her chin. “He manipulated your great-grandfather into giving those coins to him. Stole my inheritance right out from under me. I call that being a thief. If you can’t trust your own brother, who can you trust?”

  I rolled my eyes and bit my lip. I repeated my mantra again. I would not kill my mother. I would not kill myself…

  My mother’s poor circulation kept her from flying; her distrust of the cross-country rail system precluded a train trip, which left me and my Mustang. For years, she’d been asking me to make this trip to California, and I’d kept putting it off. Then, when Ernie had decided to shut down the Bar & Grille for a much-needed renovation, and handed me an instant paid vacation, I’d run out of excuses.

  So, here I was. If I started getting stressed now, I’d end up in prison orange before I got to Indiana.

  “Did you put in the good gas before we left?” my mother asked. “That cheap stuff is bad for your engine. I don’t want us breaking down in the middle of Nevada. Poor Reginald would be too tempting for the buzzards.”

  “I used the good gas, the good oil and the good driver,” I said, looking at her and grinning. I lifted my hands off the steering wheel and slipped my knees beneath the circle. “Look, Ma, no hands.”

  “Hilary! I swear, if you don’t drive right, I’ll—” Her voice cut off as she realized she didn’t have the joy of taking away my privileges anymore. I was a GROWN-UP, something I also tried to emphasize with capital letters on a regular basis, and wasn’t under anyone’s thumb. Not even my own, to be honest. “I’ll…start singing and I won’t stop until we get to Morty’s house.”

  That was enough to get me to put my hands back on the wheel. My mother may be talented in a lot of areas, but music wasn’t one of them and it was the only threat she’d used on me in childhood that worked, at least in public. I had a nightmarish childhood memory of my mother crooning “Time After Time” when I pitched a fit in the children’s department of JCPenney. I wasn’t even going to revisit the seventh grade spelling-bee debacle.

  Already, the trip seemed too long, the distance to the other side of the country as interminable as a stay on death row.

  “Or…” she began, a teasing light in her eyes, a light I knew meant nothing good, “we could talk instead.”

  “I liked the ‘Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star’ option better.”

  My mother let out the heavy sigh she’d perfected through my teen years. Behind me, Reginald started his mushroom hunt again, backing his buttocks into the poster of my father and making it bounce up and down on the seat.

  “So,” my mother said, ignoring my song request. “Why haven’t you married Nick yet?”

  four

  We had just crossed over the Massachusetts border and entered New York when I pulled into a rest area and shut off the car.

  “What are you doing?” my mother asked, her purse still in the same position, her posture clearly ready for a little more car time. Reginald had settled down again in the back, apparently done with his French-fry foray.

  “I need coffee.” I needed more than that, preferably something that came in a bottle and burned on its way down my throat, but I wasn’t about to drive after having a fifth of vodka.

  My mother wagged a finger at me. “Too much caffeine, Hilary, will—”

  I’d already exited the car and shut the door. I leaned against the car and drew in several deep breaths, but they didn’t cleanse an ounce of frustration out of me. All they did was make me wonder how well my lungs would hold up if I started running.

  Probably not so well, considering I’d quit smoking six months ago. Lung cancer risk notwithstanding, I should have kept up the Marlboro habit. If I had known then what I’d be going through today, I’d never have quit.

  I inhaled again. A lot of dangerous things might be hovering in the smoggy air of New England, but nicotine didn’t seem to be one of them. Caffeine would have to do instead. I thought of calling Nick again, but then remembered the question he’d asked me, and decided no. I already missed him like crazy, and hated that I did because that made him right—

  And made me vulnerable, not a position I liked.

  I started toward the restaurant plaza, when I heard the click-clack of sensible pumps behind me. I closed my eyes, drew in another breath, then turned around. “Do you want me to bring you back a cup of decaf?” I gave her a hopeful smile.

  “No, I want to go with you,” my mother said, her steps measured and slow as she drew up alongside me. “It’ll be fun. And, I, ah, want to stretch my legs for a bit.”

  I murmured something that sounded like agreement, but wasn’t a binding vocalization. Inside, we found a real coffee spot, not a fast-food joint handing out burned-tasting grounds that had sat in the pot since breakfast.

  My mother slipped into place beside me in line, scanned the list of offerings, then smiled at the barista. “Grande mocha with a double shot of caramel.”

  He turned to me, finger poised over the cash register. “Are you sure that’s what you want, Ma?” I asked her.

  “It’s what I always get, Hilary.”

  I started to ask her since when, then realized I’d never visited a coffee shop with my mother, nor had the topic of Kenyan roast versus Arabica come up between us. Once again, the feeling that I didn’t know her as well as I’d thought returned.

  Could Nick be right? Could this trip be an opportunity for us to actually bond? To make up for more than three decades of distance? Or was I putting a little too much into a cross-country road trip in a Mustang, with a stowaway pig?

  And reading way too much into a shared taste for mocha?

  “I’ll have the same,” I told the guy, then turned back to my mother. “That’s what I always order, too.”

  My mother smiled. �
�I’d call that common grounds.”

  I laughed, surprised more by the commonality we’d found in a coffee shop than by the fact that my dour mother had made a joke. A wave of something—sentimentality, residual childhood angst—swept over me and for a second, I wanted to hug my mother. Hug her tight, like I had when I’d been four and trying so hard to crack the tough shell around the woman who may have given birth to me but who’d never let me see inside her, not really.

  I shook off the feeling, paid the barista, who hadn’t even cracked a grin, waving off my mother’s offer to cover the bill. “I work, Ma, I can afford to pay for your coffee.”

  I saw her open her mouth to argue, then shut it again. Maybe she didn’t want to ruin the moment of détente, either. A smile winged its way between us, as fleeting as the steam coming from the cappuccino machine.

  As we waited for the barista to finish making the mochas, my mother turned away and reached for the back of one of the chairs that ringed the tables in the shop. A sound escaped her—a moan, a grunt, I wasn’t sure. She stood still for a second, holding on to the maple arch of the chair back.

  “You okay, Ma?”

  She nodded, then straightened, but it seemed as if she had to put a bit of effort into the movement. “Yes.”

  My mother had always been the stoic type. Went to work, rain or shine, cold or flu. She wouldn’t let me stay home from school unless I had a temperature in the triple digits or had deposited my breakfast into the toilet. Anything other than that—stomachache, headache, nausea—wasn’t enough to merit missing a day of school. She didn’t hold much faith in doctors, and was one of those people who put off her annual physical for years, only going when she absolutely had to because my father insisted she needed a checkup at least once a decade.

  After my father died, she’d done two things—she’d quit smoking, giving up a lifetime habit in one afternoon, and avoided doctors altogether for four years, as if they might diagnose something fatal in her, too.

  But last month something had sent her into the hospital. She’d never told me what it was and hadn’t even, in fact, told me she’d been at Mass General. I learned it secondhand from Mrs. Whittaker, her next door neighbor, when I’d stopped by for Easter dinner and run into her on the sidewalk. Mrs. Whittaker lived alone with seven little dogs of mixed breeds and varying bowel issues. Incurably nosy and given to long-winded speeches about the Medicare system, Mrs. Whittaker liked to make herself useful by tattling on every incident up and down the street.

  “I just need to walk around.” Ma circled the room, returning to my side when the barista called out our orders and handed us two paper cups. Happy dancing coffee cups with skinny, Rockette legs ringed the paper sleeve.

  “We’ll take our time then,” I said, hovering close to her as we left the coffee shop, insisting on holding both coffees, my arms wide like I might catch her, but not touching her, because I knew she’d only shrug off any attempt at assistance.

  The bright sunshine hit us square in the eyes when we exited the building, blinding us for a moment to the parking lot. A second later, my eyes adjusted. I walked at a slower pace than usual, waiting for my mother to catch up, her breathing more labored than usual. Clearly, she was having difficulty, trouble she was keeping from me. “Ma, when are you going to tell me why you were in the hospital last month?”

  “It was nothing.”

  “That’s what you said the last three times I asked. I’m your daughter, I have a right to know, HIPAA or not.”

  “Really, Hilary, it was nothing much. I got nervous, was all. I live alone and every little bump on your nose gets blown out of proportion.”

  “What do you mean, every little thing? Did you fall? Have chest pains? Find a lump? Tell me, Ma. Don’t—” But I couldn’t finish that sentence. I didn’t want her to surprise me, the way my father had. Didn’t want her to shut me out, like he had. But for some reason, actually saying it was harder than thinking it.

  “Don’t worry. If there was something I thought you should know, I’d—” She cut off her sentence. “Hilary, where is the car?”

  “Right there, Ma. In the spot next to the—”

  Before the words “white van” escaped me, I saw the empty space. My mind rewound quickly, slipping in the mental tape of when we’d parked. What had been near us, where we’d entered the building. Had we come out of the rear exit by accident? Gotten turned around? Been sidetracked by a second white van?

  I spun around, my wrist shading my eyes, looking for my little red Mustang.

  And seeing nothing but a sea of primary colors, the shiny finishes of America’s rental car industry.

  “The car was right there, I swear.” I left my mother on the sidewalk with the coffees, then ran down the length of the sidewalk, weaving in and out of travelers heading inside for a comfort break. Back again, around to the back of the building, up to the gas station, down to the trucks lined up domino-style. No Mustang anywhere.

  “It’s gone,” I said, my pitch high with disbelief as I returned to my mother’s side. “Who would steal my car?”

  “Oh, God.” Ma pressed a hand to her heart. “Who would steal Reginald? And your father?”

  Two hours later, we finished filing the police report and going over the meager evidence. The parking lot surveillance tape revealed that my car had, indeed, been jacked by a redheaded guy wearing a blue bandana and a backpack. He’d jimmied the lock, slipped inside, his head disappearing beneath the dash for a moment, before he had the car running and gone. All in all, it took exactly sixteen seconds for my car, my father’s picture and my mother’s pig to disappear.

  “We’ll keep an eye out, ma’am,” said the cop, who didn’t look old enough to shave, never mind pin a badge on his chest, “but a car like that, in a state this size…” He shrugged, then left the room, not leaving so much as a shred of hope behind.

  “Goddamn it!” I shouted at the cold cement block walls of the New York State Police building. “Who the hell would do this?”

  “Watch your language, dear,” my mother said, but her words sounded robotic, dull.

  “My car has just been stolen. I think it’s a good time to swear.”

  She considered that. “You may be right. When we catch the monster who did this, I’m going to sue him for everything he has, right down to his goddamned underwear.”

  We shared a laugh. A second thread of connection extended between us and I wondered if it was possible to stitch a connection, one thread at a time, and build a bridge over that glacier between us, rather than trying to thaw it. Had I been going about this all wrong for years? Or was I just reading too much into a few hours spent together in a plain gray police station room?

  My mother rose and paced for a moment, muttering about lawsuits and car thieves before returning to her seat, seeming winded. Or maybe just overcome by the whole grueling experience. Either way, I had no doubt she’d go after the guy who did this. People didn’t mess with Rosemary Delaney because she wasn’t the type to forgive and forget, even when the judge found in the other party’s favor.

  That, she said, was why God created appeals court.

  Even after sitting for a bit, Ma’s face was red with exertion, her breath coming a little too hard, too fast. “You okay?” I asked.

  “Fine. Upset. That’s all.”

  “Listen, we should rent a car and go back home. I’m sure the police will find mine. And if not, there’s always insurance.”

  “No,” my mother said, the word quiet and final, in her no-argument voice. “We will not go home.”

  “Ma, we have no car. No luggage—”

  “And no Reginald. I will not leave here and trust these—” she leaned closer to me and lowered her voice while she gestured toward the door the troopers had just exited “—these buffoons to find the car. They didn’t even care about my pig.”

  “Well, he is a pig, Ma. It’s not like he’s a dog.”

  As soon as I said the words, I regretted them. Her entire bo
dy seemed to tighten up, anger knotting her features. “You are under a great deal of stress because your car was just stolen, so I will forget you said that about Reginald.” She drew in a breath. “I cannot believe you let this happen.”

  “I didn’t let anything happen, Ma. I locked the doors, I kept the keys with me. I know I’m a screwup and a disappointment in many other ways, but you’re not going to blame me for some drug addict who decided to go on a joy ride.” I drained the diet soda I’d gotten from the vending machine, crumpled the can and made a two-pointer into the trash, then reached for the door handle. “Now, let’s accept the offer of the nice officers for a ride over to the nearest rental place, get a car and go home.”

  This was a prime opportunity to talk her into giving up this insane idea of a cross-country trip. Get me out of this torture chamber and back to Nick, where I could straighten out our relationship and get things back to where they were before.

  But my mother wouldn’t budge. “You can go home. I’m going after Reginald.”

  THAT PIG again. There were days I wondered if she loved him more than me. “Ma, he could be halfway to Mexico by now.”

  “Technically, because we’re only in New York, he couldn’t have—”

  “It’s a phrase!” I shouted, frustrated and angered by the car, the hassle and the whole trip and her love for Reginald. What about me? I wanted to scream. Had she ever loved me that much? What if I’d been carjacked? Would she have been so hell-bent on tracking me down? “I didn’t mean it literally. Besides, it’d take a miracle to find the car. You heard the cops.”

  She held her tongue for a minute, then turned her no-nonsense face on me. “I am going after Reginald and when I have him back, I’m going to Uncle Morty’s. You are welcome to come along.”

  In other words, I could be a passenger in her mission. The pilot. Disappointment settled in my stomach with the acidic soda.

  There was simply no arguing with my mother when she got like this. Behind her back, the other lawyers had called her a bulldog. I knew why.

  I sighed, then held the door for her. “We’ll drive for one more day and if we don’t find Reginald, then we’re going to the nearest airport and flying to Uncle Morty’s.”