The airplane came down in San Francisco. He was the first to step out onto the steps, down, and across the asphalt pavement to where they stood: his sister Vava, her husband Sark, their son Joe. He walked slowly to the gate where they stood, not letting them know that long ago he had noticed their faces. He looked at each, said their names, walked with them to the waiting room, and out to where the baggage would be distributed. He handed Joe his baggage checks. They walked again and came to the car, his old Cadillac. After everybody had been seated he got in, taking his place behind the wheel.
“Rock,” his sister said. “It was yesterday morning. The night before we’d gone to an engagement party and Mama felt fine and had a wonderful time.”
“Wait,” he said.
When they were on the highway he said, “Vava, how’s Mama?”
“She’s better,” Sark said. “She’s much better.”
“How is she, Vava?” Rock said.
“I don’t know,” his sister said.
“She’s going to be all right,” Sark said. “Mama’s a strong woman. She’s much better, Rock.”
“Who spent the night with her?” Rock said.
“I did of course,” his sister said. “They put a cot in the room for me, but I didn’t sleep.”
“How is she, Vava?”
“I don’t know,” his sister said. “Sark came to the hospital a couple of hours ago to get me. She was sleeping then and Sark thinks she’s better. Dovey’s with her now. She sleeps most of the time, wakes up for a few minutes, says a few things, goes back to sleep.”
“She’s much better,” Sark said.
“Who’s the doctor?” Rock said.
“Lowell, Mama’s regular doctor.”
“What’s he say?”
“Well, he doesn’t have much to say, Rock.”
“Has he tapped her spine again?”
“Yes. This afternoon.”
“How was it this time?”
“Not as black maybe.”
“What’s the shortest way to the St. Francis, Sark?”
“Come to our house first,” Sark said. “Relax, take a shave and a shower, have a bite to eat, then we’ll go visit Mama.”
He turned to the boy beside him.
“What’s the shortest way, Joe?”
“Straight ahead to West Portal,” Joe said. “I’ll tell you after that.”
“Do you want me to drop you at your house, Sark?”
“No, but Mama’s much better,” Sark said. “Mama’s going to be home in eight or nine days.”
“Sure she is,” Rock said. “I want to see her. I want to talk to Doctor Lowell. Is he around now?”
“Well, it’s almost six,” his sister said. “He goes home at six. His office is across the street from the hospital. He visits Mama every hour or so. You know how he loves Mama. He had tears in his eyes this afternoon.”
“What’s Mama say?” Rock said.
“Well, Rock, I don’t think she knows what’s happened,” his sister said. “She’s got a tubful of dough that’s ready for baking, and every time we’ve talked she’s talked about it. Sometimes just a few words, sometimes all the time. She’s told me exactly what to do. Half the dough is for flat bread, half for small loaves. A bread-man for Haig, a bread-woman for Lula, a flower loaf for Ann, and a star loaf for you, Rock. Every time she makes bread she makes those, too. How are they?”
“They’re all well,” Rock said.
“You need a shave, Rock,” Sark said.
“I know.”
“You ought to stop and shave.”
Rock turned around, even though the car was traveling swiftly. He looked at his brother-in-law. There were tears in his sister’s eyes. It was his brother-in-law’s nature to hold fast to anything that he believed in, and he wanted to hold fast to the theory now that Rock should stop at his house before going to the hospital. This happened every time Rock and his brother-in-law met.
“Give me a cigarette, will you, Sark?” he said.
The man held out a package which Rock took. They were Camels, which he didn’t like, and he had Chesterfields, which he did like, in his coat pocket. He removed a cigarette, lighted it, and began to smoke. The boy beside him took one, too. They drove on in silence a minute or so.
“Mama’s only sixty-six,” Vava said. “Sixty-six is nothing any more, Rock.”
“What’s the nurse like?” Rock said.
“All three of them are very good,” Vava said, “but you know what nurses are. It’s a job for them. They talk about it that way.”
“Three of them?”
“One comes on, another goes off. Doctor Lowell did it. They keep the chart, and every time he visits Mama he examines it. One’s Irish, one’s Italian, one’s German. She’s the one who comes on at midnight. She’s deaf.”
“Does Mama like them?”
“They’re strangers, Rock, but they’re very nice, too, and they know what they’re doing. They move her in bed, and work with pans, and massage her forehead and her wrists, and they sit there and read.”
“What do they read?” Rock said.
“Movie magazines.”
“Every one of them?”
“Every one of them brings her own movie magazine and reads it,” his sister said. “There was a story about the breakup of your marriage in one of them, with pictures of you in some of your movies, and pictures of Ann in different places in New York before you got married, with different men, and pictures of the four of you together, and the nurse showed it to Mama.”
“Which one?” Rock said.
“The Italian one,” Vava said. “The one who comes on at eight in the morning.”
“Will she be there when we get there?”
“No, the Irish one will be there. She’s the best.”
“There wasn’t anything like that in her movie magazine, was there?”
“She didn’t mention it. Don’t you think, Rock, you ought to go back with Ann and the kids? Live in California where you belong?”
“No,” Rock said. “I’ve lost them.”
“You haven’t lost the kids,” Sark said. “Those kids are your kids, Rock. They’ll always be your kids.”
“I’ve lost them,” Rock said.
“Just Ann,” Sark said.
“How is she?” his sister said. “Is she all right?”
“We haven’t spoken in a month,” Rock said. “She’s all right, I guess.”
“Don’t you think it’s because she’s young and wants to be seen all the time by a lot of people, Rock?” his sister said. “Don’t you think it’s something that doesn’t mean very much, and you ought to go back?”
“No,” Rock said, “but if you want me to tell Mama we’re going back, if you think I ought to tell her that, if you think it’ll mean something to Mama—”
“She loves Ann, Rock,” his sister said. “Old Lula loved her, too. To tell you the truth, Rock, I love Ann, too. She’s a very difficult girl, I know, because she and I had a lot of long talks, but even so, I love her.”
“I love her, too, Vava.”
“Then why did you have to divorce her?” his sister said quickly, with a speed of speech that tells the person spoken to that he has been a fool.
“She lied to me, Vava,” he said. “I can’t live with a liar. I can love her, but I can’t live with her.”
“Ah,” his sister said. “What’s lying? Who cares?”
“I care,” Rock said. “I didn’t divorce her. I gave her the divorce because she wanted it—she wouldn’t have lied if she hadn’t wanted it. I gave it to her because I always gave her whatever she wanted. I spent six weeks in Nevada, so she could stay home with the kids. It was her divorce. If you think I ought to tell Mama Ann and I are going back, I’ll tell her, though.”
“I don’t know, Rock,” his sister said. “Mama loves Ann. She loves Ann because Ann told her so many times how much she loved you. Mama wants to know what’s happened to you. You haven’t done anything for so lo
ng.”
“I was about to go to work in New York,” Rock said.
“In a movie?”
“In a play,” Rock said. “I’ll be going back to work just as soon as Mama’s on her feet again.”
“You should. Rock,” his sister said. “Work is life, Rock. If I didn’t work every day in my house, in my garden, I’d die. Work is life. I don’t think Mama should have spent so much time these past ten years reading The Asbarez and all the other Armenian papers and magazines and books that come to her.”
“No,” Rock said. “Reading The Asbarez is all right. Mama works all the time, too.”
“Not the way she used to,” his sister said. “Her house is the easiest in the world to keep. Nobody but herself to take care of and cook for. Triola fools around in the garden every Saturday for three hours. Once a month Mama has a big baking, and once a week a little one. The dough that’s ready now is for a big one. I’m coming over sometime tomorrow to bake the bread and take some of it to her. Just to see, of course. She can’t eat. If she eats, she vomits. Your apartment downstairs is in order. All your junk is there, and I gave the place a thorough cleaning. There’s logs in the garage, and I’ve got everything set in the fireplace for a fire. Have you got your keys to the house?”
“I’ve got them,” Rock said.
They came to the hospital. Rock parked the car, got out, and looked around.
“Is that the building where Doctor Lowell’s office is?” he said.
“Yes,” his sister said.
“Joe,” he said, “will you please go up and see if he’s in. If he is, will you ask him to please wait a moment, as I want to talk to him. Then come to Mama’s room.”
“O.K.,” the boy said, and bolted across the street.
They went into the place, rang for the elevator, got in, went up to the third floor, and walked softly down the long corridor to the last room.
“I’ll peek in first,” his sister said. She pushed the door open, looked in, then nodded to Rock that it was all right.
The room was no place to be of course, but there wasn’t anything anybody could do about that. The nurse was sitting beside the bed, reading a magazine that probably was a movie one. His mother had turned away from the nurse, but perhaps not intentionally, just to be comfortable. She hadn’t heard him. He moved along the bed and saw her an instant before she saw him, the woman in whose kitchen he had danced thirty-five years ago when she had been baking bread. Her hair was gray now, and very dry, hair that he had never thought of as having been anything but black. There was still a good deal of black in it, but not the black that he remembered. Her face seemed larger, hot and swollen. When she saw who it was she was astonished. She sat up, and instantly the nurse was out of her chair, to help hold her up. Her eyes were still the same, but everything else was changed. He took her in his arms very slowly, kissed one cheek and then the other. He took her hands and kissed them, then held them tightly, looking into her eyes, for she was his girl, she was the first of his girls, and he didn’t like to see them go.
“Where you come from so quick, Rock?” she said in English, for she tried not to speak Armenian when there were those nearby who could not understand the language.
“I came from New York, Mama.”
“Why you come all the way from New York, Rock?”
“I came to see my girl,” he said.
His mother laughed as a girl laughs, then turned to the nurse.
“Miss Gillen,” she said, “you know who this is? This is my son. Rock Wagram.”
“Yes,” the nurse said softly. “I recognized him, Mrs. Vagramian.”
“Is it all right for her to sit up a moment?” he asked the nurse.
“Yes,” she said.
The nurse placed two pillows behind his mother, so that she needn’t make an effort to stay up.
“How is your wife, Rock?” his mother said.
“She’s fine, Mama.”
“How is your son, Rock?”
“He’s fine, Mama.”
“How is your daughter, Rock?”
“She’s fine, Mama.”
He saw her eyes fill with concern, as they searched through his eyes and along the lines and outline of his face and head.
“You excuse me, Miss Gillen,” she said, “I going to talk in Armenian.”
“Oh, Mrs. Vagramian,” the nurse said. “Please.”
“Arak,” his mother said in Armenian, “how are you? You, yourself.”
“Araxi,” he said, “do not worry about me. I am well.”
“You are tired, Arak?”
“No.”
“You are finished with the lawyers?”
“Yes.”
“In family affairs it is no good to have lawyers, Arak.”
“I know,” he said. “I got angry.”
“It is no good to get angry,” his mother said.
“I know.”
“I’ve got a tubful of dough at home for bread,” she said. “Vava will make you some fresh bread tomorrow. You sit down quietly at your table, and you eat fresh bread with butter and honey and tea.”
“Yes, Mama.”
“You be a good boy and send your beautiful wife money.” She looked at him severely and then said, “Let Ann do anything she wants to do. What do you care? You be a good boy, let your children love their mother, let their mother enjoy herself, let her be beautiful, let her put on the clothes she loves so much and go out and have fun and laugh and talk and be happy. Ann is that kind of girl, Arak. You just be a good boy. You do your work and send her money. Is there something else honorable a man can do? You do not do this because you must do it, you do it because you want to do it. You do it with love, not with anger and hatred. You love Ann, no matter what she does. Ann is the mother of Haig and Lula, Arak. She is always the mother of your children. You love her.”
“All right, Mama.”
He laughed inwardly because he believed she must be all right if she could give him instructions.
He had something important to tell her when Sark came in and stood behind him. His mother and Sark greeted one another and then the nurse said, “I think she’d better lie back and rest now, Mr. Wagram.”
“Yes,” he said.
The nurse took away the two pillows and eased his mother down. Rock kissed her hands again and then said in Armenian, “Just rest, Mama. Don’t think about anything. I’ll be here tonight with Vava.”
He left the room feeling deeply glad, for he did not know that he would never speak to her again. His sister and her husband and their son and daughter were in the hall.
“She seems all right,” Rock said. “But I want to have a talk with Doctor Lowell. Let’s none of us go back in there for a while. Let her rest.”
“He’s waiting in his office,” Joe said.
They walked down the hall, took the elevator, and left the building. He visited the doctor alone.
“How about it?” he said. “I just left her. She seemed all right, but please tell me exactly what it is.”
“Anything can happen, Rock,” the doctor said.
“You mean she’s not recovering?” Rock said. “We talked a minute or two and she seemed fine.”
“I’m delighted, Rock,” Dr. Lowell said. “The next twenty-hour hours will tell. It’s one of those things. We can only wait and hope. Will you ask the family not to go in there from now on?”
“Shouldn’t I have gone in?” Rock said.
“Yes, of course,” the doctor said, “but she must rest and stay calm, Rock. Please let’s all of us let her rest during the next twenty-four hours.”
“My sister wants to spend the night on the couch,” Rock said.
“I want her to,” Dr. Lowell said. “That’s important. Your mother speaks in Armenian frequently and it’s important for the nurse or myself to know what she says, and your mother needs to know that Vava’s there.”
He talked with the doctor a half hour, asking every kind of question the answer of which he be
lieved might be helpful, but there were no answers. Something had happened. They would know in twenty-four hours the meaning of what had happened. They would have to wait.
It had happened inside her skull, without warning, something that might not have happened, something that had not happened to her own mother. It was a secret thing, and it could have a swift and terrible meaning, but she was still breathing. She could still see and talk and touch and remember and think and tell her son the things she believed to be the truth. Another secret thing, a hundred thousand more secret things would be happening to her in the next twenty-four hours, and after they had all happened, he would know if she would go on breathing ten or twenty years longer. His mother was still herself, still his mother, still Araxi, still his girl, and she was still breathing. He believed she would get up from her hospital bed and go home and mix flour and warm water and salt and yeast and melted butter into a dough and bake bread, and he would sit at the table and eat the bread. She was still breathing, and he believed she would go on breathing.
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