The Real Thing

by Marina Simcoe

  “It will all work out, Mom,” I promised without having any clue if it actually would work out at all.

  “We can’t afford another rehab, Angela,” she said in a small voice that made me feel like hugging her and promising that everything would be okay, that I would take care of it all. Only it would be an empty promise, one I couldn’t keep. I didn’t know how to help her any more than I already was. There were only so many hours in the day, and there were only so many jobs I could work.

  “The bank wouldn’t re-mortgage our house again so soon. I asked,” Mom sobbed again.

  “You asked? Evan is not using, Mom. He doesn’t need another rehab right now. Why would you even ask?”

  “Well, you know, it doesn’t hurt to ask. We always have expenses… Money is tight…”

  “You don’t re-mortgage your house to pay for your everyday expenses. Even I know that, and I don’t even own a house.”

  And with the way the things are going, I never will, I thought.

  “Angela, I didn’t call to argue with you,” she said in a firmer voice.

  “I wasn’t arguing, either. I didn’t even raise my voice!”

  “See, you’re arguing. You are arguing with me right now,” she said in her no-nonsense mom’s voice. “I just called you to ask if you could come by the house once or twice next week. Dad and I are going to Cuba for a week, and we need somebody to pick up mail and shovel the snow off the driveway if needed. Evan obviously has to worry about other things right now, so I can’t ask him.”

  “You’re going to Cuba? Around Christmas time? Can you afford it?” I knew she hated to talk about money, but somebody needed to ask these questions, since it didn’t look like she’d asked them herself before booking the trip.

  “Angela, your father and I deserve a break,” she said with conviction. “Now more than ever. Don’t you think?”

  “It’s not about whether you deserve it. It’s about whether you can afford it!”

  “Your father could use some rest, and I just can’t deal with all of this here. I need to get away for a while. Our health and wellbeing are more important than anything, and they are worth any money. You know Dad’s blood pressure is not doing well? They may put him on a stronger medication soon. He wouldn’t be able to get a travel insurance for at least six months after that. If we don’t go now, we may not be able to have a vacation for another six months!”

  “I haven’t been on a vacation for the past two years.” In fact, I worked in the store on all of the vacation days that I got at the office last year, and I was planning to do the same with whatever vacation time I had left from my Vegas trip.

  “You went to New York and to Las Vegas this year,” Mom reminded. “And it’s wonderful, Angela! You really should travel more. You are in the perfect stage of life for it.”

  “I don’t have any money to spend on travelling,” I replied, breaking the taboo of not talking about personal finances with my family.

  “Well, money is always an issue for everyone, and it always will be. It doesn’t mean that you should stop living your life because of it. You’re young, you work hard, you deserve a vacation and you should have one, too.”

  Sometimes it felt like I was talking to an alien being from another planet when I talked to my mom. I loved her dearly, but I often had a hard time understanding her point of view. Very often it sounded like we both had two very different conversations going on at the same time — each of us talking about her own thing, without hearing what the other one was saying at all.

  I stood in the stairwell long after I had said goodbye to my mother, the hand with my cellphone tightly squeezed in it distractedly tapping the railing.

  The news of the Cuba trip left an unpleasant aftertaste in my mouth and an uncomfortable, scratchy feeling inside.

  Sure, my father could use a change of scenery and relax a little. But what good was in going on vacation if my parents were still faced with the same financial problems upon their return home?

  When I sent money to them, I didn’t expect a detailed report on how it was spent, but I did assume that it went mostly towards paying down their debt. I hoped I was helping them to dig themselves out of a hole. It gave me a purpose with an end goal in sight.

  Maybe, their situation was not as bad as I had assumed? Surely, they wouldn’t go on a vacation if they really couldn’t afford it, would they?

  But then, why didn’t my parents let me know that my help was no longer required? Why would my mother continue sending me emails, asking for help?

  True, I had never complained, never let them known directly that it was of any inconvenience to me. It appeared my silence didn’t do me any favours. If I wanted to know for sure what was going on, maybe I needed to overcome out family aversion to money talks and somehow make sure that we had one.

  Another thought entered my mind, filling me with excitement. If my parents really didn’t need my help any more, maybe I could reduce the hours I worked at the store or even quit my part-time job altogether.

  The thought of everything I could do having all my nights and weekends free made my head spin. The possibility of having suddenly so much time to myself felt incredible. The opportunity of spending more time with Marcus put a smile on my face. Wouldn’t it be absolutely wonderful to have at least one day with Marcus when neither of us had to keep an eye on the clock relentlessly counting down our time together?

  ***

  I didn’t make it to my parents’ house until Saturday morning to pick up the mail and to shovel the snow. I had to be at the store later in the afternoon that day. Marcus was at my apartment around 9:00 am, and he volunteered to go to my parents’ house with me. I was glad he did it for more reasons than one.

  As much as I enjoyed his company, I also appreciated that his taking me there would save me not only the cost of the train and bus tickets, but also a lot of time. Having a magical boyfriend had a lot of practical benefits!

  Marcus quickly dressed himself in an army-green parka and a pair of arctic winter boots that appeared from nowhere.

  “Let’s go, my ice queen!” he swept me in his arms. “Your chariot awaits!”

  I giggled and hugged his neck, ready for the warm breeze to take us to my childhood home in a fraction of a second.

  There wasn’t that much snow to shovel there. Despite it being late December, we hardly had any snow yet. The one that did fall had almost melted already. By the time I got the shovel from the garage to clear the rest of it off, Marcus had gotten rid of every single snowflake for me already.

  “Why did I even bother?” I laughed, gesturing with the shovel at the perfectly clean driveway.

  “Really, why did you?” he smiled then took the shovel from me and made it disappear back into the garage.

  “This was supposed to be my only exercise for the week!”

  “You get enough exercise each week, running up and down the ladders in the store.” He came closer and wrapped his arms around me. “Besides,” he said, cupping my backside through my winter coat. “I couldn’t risk your losing this.”

  “Oh, don’t you worry!” I laughed. “This is not going anywhere! Trust me, I’ve tried everything to get rid of it! My ass is here to stay!”

  “Good,” he whispered and covered my mouth with his in a most delicious kiss.

  “Are we done here now? Can we go somewhere more private than your parents’ driveway?” he whispered in my ear when we both came up for air.

  “Just a minute,” I said, catching my breath and collecting my thoughts that had been scattered by his kiss. “I need to get their mail.”

  “Done.” He held up several envelopes and flyers that weren’t in his hand just a moment ago. “Let’s go. Your place or mine? There are way too many coats between us for my liking right now. Winter clothes are irritating.”

  “Oh, stop complaining. When was the last time you had to wear a winter jacket? I’m sure it’s been a while…” I looked at the envelopes I took from his hands and
went quiet.

  All of the envelopes, without exceptions, had a big red stamp with words Overdue or Final Notice on the front. I shuffled through them. There were about half a dozen of white and brown envelopes; most were from different financial institutions, and one was from a utility company. My parents were “taking a break” in Cuba — meanwhile the power at their house was under the threat of being cut off for unpaid bills!

  “Give me a minute, please,” I said to Marcus and ran back into the house, leaving him standing on the driveway.

  The blue recycling box was in the laundry room. I dropped to my knees in front of it and rummaged through the old newspapers and last week’s grocery flyers. Sure enough, there was a bunch of other envelopes with angry-red Overdue and Final Notice printed on them. All of them unopened.

  This was the typical way my mom dealt with problems! She buried them in the trash and pretended they didn’t exist.

  I wondered if Dad knew about it, or if he preferred not to know anything.

  Frozen over the recycling box, with the doomed envelopes in my hands, I didn’t hear his footsteps and didn’t realize that Marcus followed me into the house until I heard his voice behind me.

  “Is this news for you?”

  “What?” I had trouble processing anything at the moment.

  “Did you know they are having money problems?” He sat on the floor next to me.

  “Yes. Um… No. I mean I knew that they were struggling financially. A little. I just had no idea it was this bad.”

  “You guys don’t talk about it?”

  I shook my head and sighed heavily.

  “Do you think your mom wanted you to find out when she asked you to get the mail?”

  I shook my head again.

  “No. I don’t think she even considered it. She just ignores the problem. Obviously!” I tossed the envelopes back into the blue box. “She thinks if she pretends it never happened, then it will eventually go away! She’s always been like that.”

  My shoulders slumped.

  “How about your dad?” Marcus asked.

  “Dad thinks that personal finance matters are boring and talking about money is vulgar, a sign of extremely bad manners. He lets her do whatever she wants as far as money is concerned because she ‘deserves’ to have what she wants. The problem is that Mom always wants a little more than they can afford.”

  It was not his business. None of it concerned Marcus in any way, and he didn’t need to hear it, but I needed to say it. After years of carefully not mentioning it to anyone, I wanted to finally tell somebody everything.

  “It doesn’t look extreme, and that’s what makes it more dangerous, because it’s hard to spot the problem right away. It’s not like they make any extravagant purchases that would raise red flags. No, they just live a little above their means every day. They buy a house that is just a little too big for their wallet. Mom goes shopping just a little too often. They take vacations just one trip too many.” I clasped my hands in my lap, unable to stop talking now. “My mom only worked low-paying retail and clerical jobs all her life, most of them part-time. So there aren’t any benefits or company pensions from that. She only gets a government pension now. My dad has a good pension from his teaching job, but it’s not enough, obviously. They are going to lose the house. This is the house I grew up in…” I sensed my voice was about to break and went quiet before I ended up having a full-on meltdown in front of Marcus.

  “Is that why you need to work two jobs? Have you been giving them money?” His voice was firm. It felt invasive, uncomfortable but necessary, like a syringe with life-saving medicine inserted in my vein.

  I nodded, keeping my eyes on my hands.

  “It was supposed to be temporarily,” I whispered. “I offered to help when I finished school and got a full-time job. Then my brother went to rehab. My parents paid for it, but I felt like I needed to help too. It was a family matter. It was supposed to be a shared responsibility… Now they rely on monthly checks from me to make ends meet…”

  “Is your brother helping too?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

  “Then why do you?”

  It was not idle curiosity on Marcus’s part, I reminded myself. He cared about me; he had genuine concern. Still, my irritation rose at his questions because he was the one who finally made me face the uncomfortable truth.

  “I don’t know. Why do people do things they do? Because I’m the oldest, because I’m strong, because I have to be the responsible one.”

  “They are your parents. They’re twice your age, they should know how to manage their own finances,” he pointed out.

  “They are my family. We are a family. We’re supposed to help each other out,” I argued.

  “Do they give you money too?”

  “They used to. When I was in school. When things were better for them.”

  “Is that why you’re doing it now? You feel you have a debt to pay back? Or do you like to be the victim? You thrive on sacrifice?”

  He just wouldn’t let it go.

  “No! Of course not!” I hardly ever thought about my reasons. Every time I sent money to my mom, I didn’t think about why. For the past two years, my main focus was on how. If I figured out how to come up with money for my parents, then I had another month of peace in my mind until the next email from my mom arrived.

  His eyes burrowed into mine, searching for an answer, some kind of explanation, anything.

  “Why?” I yelled, unnerved by the intensity of his gaze. “Because it’s the right thing to do! Aren’t we supposed to help our family and support our parents?”

  “Yeah, when they are old and fragile and can’t take care of themselves, not when they go away to Cuba at your expense —” he cut himself short, realizing he crossed the line, and added, “No offence.”

  I didn’t reply. The unexpected feeling of hot, deep anger and resentment was rising inside me. I was angry with my parents for putting all of us in this situation. I was angry with Marcus for bringing it all out in the open and making me face it. But most of all, I was angry with myself for letting it go so far.

  The absolute truth was that I liked the feeling of being the responsible daughter. I loved doing what I thought was right. It gave me a purpose, a common goal with my family. We were sharing the burden, going through tough times together.

  Except that somewhere along the way it had changed, it wasn’t us anymore. Now it was just me, shouldering it all alone. It wasn’t temporary either, it wasn’t just a rough patch, tough times to weather through until the better times come. And it wasn’t going to get better unless I did something about it.

  “Can I help?” Marcus asked unexpectedly, and I shrank from his words, as if he had physically struck me. It felt like my very soul shriveled and died. Please don’t offer me money! Please don’t insult me any further! I begged in my mind.

  “You are helping, Marcus.” I played dumb and pretended that I didn’t understand what he meant. “You are the first person I ever talked to about it. Thank you for listening. It is an enormous help.”

  To my relief, he sensed how I felt and didn’t go ahead with his unspoken offer.

  “Sorry, it’s not my business.” He took my hand from my lap. “I’m a stranger to the situation, and I can’t tell you what to do. It’s just that sometimes it’s hard to see the big picture if you’re personally involved, the way you are right now. It helps to get another opinion, to look at things from a different perspective, so to say. What you’re doing looks too much like enabling to me. Your parents have a problem. Or at least your mom clearly does,” he gestured at the red-marked envelopes, “and you’re not doing anyone any favours by giving her money. Would you give a bottle of booze to an alcoholic?”

  What he said was not news to me. Deep inside, I knew it all already; I just hoped I would never have to deal with it.

  “What can I do? I can’t stop giving them money just like that — they’d go bankrupt!” My che
st felt too tight, and I inhaled a lungful of air. “My dad’s health is getting worse. My brother’s problems gave them a lot of grief. I need to be strong for them! But I’m scared.” I grappled for the right words to explain it to him.

  “You don’t ever get scared, Angela. You’re fearless!” he said with confidence.

  “Oh, I do get scared, Marcus. I’m just very good at hiding it, because more than anything in the world, I’m scared to be weak.”

  22. Evan.

  Marcus was right, of course. The only thing I was accomplishing by giving my parents money was enabling them to ignore their problems for longer, meanwhile sinking further into debt.

  However, I was still looking for a way to postpone my talk with them and, if possible, to find another solution to the situation, without having to confront them. This was one of the reasons why I called Evan and asked him to meet me for lunch outside of my office. Another reason was that I wanted to get an update on his life from him directly rather than waiting for another one of my mom’s hysterical reports.

  Evan met me in a parkette near my office. I had the sandwich I brought from home for lunch, and Evan bought a hotdog from the food truck parked on the side of the street. He brushed the light dusting of snow from a bench with his glove, and we both sat down.

  “Mom said you lost your job. Sorry, I didn’t call you earlier,” I started.

  “Yeah. It was a perfect timing. I was going to quit anyway,” he shrugged.

  “I know that you were planning to look for something else…”

  “Yep. I’d been thinking about changing it for a while. But you know how it is? You have a job, you get your paycheck — you get lazy. It’s good that they fired me. Now I have to look for something for sure.” He took a huge bite of the hotdog in his hand.