Mother Love

by L. R. Wright

  “Hi,” he said.

  “Hi, Raymond.”

  Dinner was good—spaghetti and meatballs and garlic bread from Earl’s—and afterward he lay on the sofa with his head in Belinda’s lap while she watched the television news. He had told her all about his trip while they ate. He had also asked what she’d been up to in his absence, but she hadn’t had much to say.

  When the news was over he sat up and looked at her. “What’s going on, Belinda?”

  “What?”

  “What’s on your mind? Something is.”

  Belinda rubbed her hands together. Raymond had never seen her do that before. “I’m just preoccupied, Raymond. Thinking about stuff.”

  “What stuff?”

  “Oh, I don’t know.”

  Raymond was aware of the evening sun shafting through the living room window. He felt charged with vigilance, as if he would at any moment be called upon to protect his family. Belinda. He put his hand gently on her thigh. She was wearing jeans, and he couldn’t feel the warmth of her body, but he felt its firmness. “What stuff, Belinda?” Finally she turned her head and looked directly into his eyes. He didn’t turn away. He groped for courage, found it, clung to it, and said again—because he had to: “What stuff, Belinda?”

  She picked up his hand and examined it. Raymond waited, helpless, wondering how to protect himself.

  “The future,” she said.

  She was his true happiness.

  Raymond, decisive, appropriated the moment. He said confidently, “In the future we will have kids.” He was watching Belinda, utterly concentrated on her, meticulous in his observations. “Not too many. But not just one, either.”

  Belinda’s shoulder lifted slightly in an expression of distaste. “That’s not the kind of future I’ve been thinking about.”

  She was still holding his hand. Raymond made himself keep that hand relaxed. He wanted to open it and turn it over and take harsh hold of hers—but he kept it still, a willing captive.

  “At times like Christmas, for instance, kids are good,” he said. “Did I ever tell you about when I got a bike for Christmas?”

  Belinda pushed his hand away and stood up. She knew that if she could just get it out, say it, he’d accept it. Men take you at your word, she thought. It’s women who assume that there’s a next step, which is negotiation.

  “I was about eight,” said Raymond. He was lying full length on the sofa now, his hands behind his head, looking up at the ceiling. “I had a room in the basement,” he went on. “Did I ever tell you about my room?”

  His voice was so full of tension, Belinda wanted to weep.

  “I had this big tall chest of drawers,” he said. “And an old moth-eaten bear rug.”

  Belinda sat on the end of the sofa, shoving his feet to one side. “Why are you doing this? What are you doing?”

  Raymond lifted his head to look at her. He’d invented a hurt expression to put on his face, but behind it something else was happening. Belinda, seeing this, wondered: Does he know?

  “I’m getting around to Christmas,” he said. “And the bike. Okay?” He reached out and with his fingertips stroked Belinda’s forearm, resting along the top of the sofa. “There I was, trying to get to sleep on Christmas Eve. My old dog Moe curled up fast asleep on the end of my bed.”

  “I never heard about your dog Moe,” said Belinda irritably.

  Raymond said, “There’s a lot you don’t know about me yet.”

  “Get to the damn bike,” she said, standing up again.

  “I’d been saving up for it,” said Raymond. “But it was gonna be about 1982 before I had enough money, and by then I’d be ready for a car. So I told my old man I was going to ask Santa Claus for the bike, and use the money I’d saved to buy accessories for it.”

  “Is that what you said? ‘Accessories’?” said Belinda.

  “I was a smart kid,” said Raymond. “I don’t know what I said. So here’s Christmas Eve and I’m in bed not sleeping.” He was wearing a short-sleeved blue cotton shirt and the moccasins Belinda had given him. His eyes were brown, with lashes longer than Belinda’s. She loved his eyes. And his mouth. She would never pretend that she didn’t find him attractive. That wasn’t why she was going to leave him.

  “And then I heard a noise,” said Raymond. “Feet, tiptoeing down the stairs. Jesus, I thought. It’s Santa Claus.”

  Belinda, with a sigh, sat down on the old brown rocking chair.

  “Then there was a lot of whispering out in the basement,” said Raymond. “And somebody swore. So I got up and went over to my door and opened it just a crack.”

  “What was the damn dog doing?”

  “Sitting on the bed, with his ears up. I peeked through the crack and there was my old man, trying to get a blue bike up the basement stairs. A pedal had got stuck underneath one of the steps.”

  Belinda wondered how long he would go on talking if she let him. He’d have to stop eventually. His voice would get hoarse. Or he’d tire himself out. Or he’d have to go to the bathroom.

  “He’d hidden it behind the furnace,” said Raymond. “It was the only place in the house I wouldn’t go. Do you want to know why?”

  “No.” Belinda got up from the rocking chair and sat next to him on the sofa. She kissed the side of his face until he turned to her, and then she kissed his mouth, opening it with her tongue.

  A reprieve, he thought, his hands slipping under her T-shirt. It’s only a reprieve.

  Chapter 6

  CALGARY

  The weather in southwestern Alberta defied accurate prediction. Alberg had once had another Member tell him that in his first tour of duty there it had snowed every month of the year. Not much in July and August, the guy had conceded. And it hadn’t stuck to the ground.

  But Chinooks happened, too, in southern Alberta: warm winds from the west that created a fleeting, midwinter spring.

  And so did Indian summer.

  Early Sunday afternoon Alberg and Cassandra drove east on Sixteenth Avenue, south on Deerfoot Trail until it ended, and then east again, beyond the city limits, along a two-lane highway straight and purposeful, and south once more, past bright yellow fields of fragrant canola and meadows where horses grazed. In the west, seventy-five miles away, the white crags of the Rocky Mountains paraded across the horizon like well-ordered sentries, shoulder to shoulder.

  Alberg eventually pulled into a long driveway that led up a slight rise to a large house made of cedar: this was the home of the groom’s parents. To the south, a row of poplars grew along the fence, their yellow leaves shuddering and sometimes relinquishing themselves to the breeze. The house was large, encircled by a wide deck that was crowded with people. Alberg groaned at the sight of them, and Cassandra, who was usually impatient with his lack of sociability, squeezed his hand sympathetically.

  They left the car in a field that had been turned into a temporary parking lot and made their way up the driveway toward the open front door of the house.

  Inside, the foyer was crowded with people holding glasses and talking animatedly. Alberg, uncomfortable in his tuxedo, looked through the foyer and the living room beyond, out to the deck, and there he saw Maura and the accountant she’d married. Cassandra was already moving through the crowd, and he followed her. In the living room they accepted glasses of champagne from a tray being ferried about by a smiling person in a waiter’s uniform.

  “Come on,” said Alberg, heading for the deck. He went through the sliding doors and waited for Cassandra to catch up. “There’s Maura,” he said.

  “Ah,” said Cassandra. She had discovered that there was nothing like having been abducted by a psychopathic librarian to firm up one’s perspective on life. Not only had she not been dreading this moment, she had actually been looking forward to it.

  She followed Alberg to the edge of the deck, where his ex-wife and her husband were leaning on the railing and looking out at the garden, the lawn, and the fields of pale green grain beyond—Cassandra
had no idea what kind of grain it was, but it seemed to be spreading all the way to the far-off mountains.

  “Maura,” said Alberg, with a heartiness that made Cassandra grin, and the woman turned, lifting a hand to hold back her hair, which the breeze wanted to blow across her face. She was taller than Cassandra and considerably thinner: an elegant woman, well dressed, stylishly coiffed, with green eyes that reminded Cassandra of the picture of his elder daughter—the bride—that Alberg kept on his dresser, along with one of Diana.

  “Karl,” said Maura warmly.

  Cassandra felt a gleaming in her heart. She had been reluctantly respectful of this marriage-that-was. Now she knew a wistful affection for it, too.

  “I’d like you to meet Cassandra Mitchell,” said Alberg. “Cassandra, this is Maura Sullivan, who is the mother of my children.”

  He said this with such awkward solemnity that Cassandra knew he had given the moment a great deal of thought. She imagined him rehearsing in front of the bathroom mirror, moving his lips soundlessly so that she wouldn’t hear.

  “How do you do,” they murmured to each other, she and Maura, and shook hands firmly.

  “And this is my husband, Des,” said Maura. He had a stocky, athletic build and an open, friendly face and was probably younger than his wife.

  “Glad to meet you,” said Alberg, stretching out his hand. “This is quite a day,” said Des Sullivan. “Are you nervous?”

  Alberg had been so preoccupied with the inevitable meeting between Cassandra and his ex-wife that he hadn’t had time to worry about his role in the wedding. It was pretty straightforward, he thought, going through it in his mind. He just had to escort Janey up the aisle and stand there until—shit. He couldn’t remember his cue to back off.

  “You’re damn right I’m nervous,” he said fervently.

  Soon his daughter Diana came to get him, wearing pink, with pink flowers in her hair. On the way to the room where Janey was waiting, she reminded him of the sequence of events. “You’re not nervous, are you?” she asked, giving him a sideways glance.

  “Of course not,” said Alberg.

  The bride wore a silky-looking dress of pale yellow and a tiara of tiny yellow flowers. Alberg, looking at her, couldn’t speak. Janey put her arms around him, and he smelled an unfamiliar perfume. “Your gift is gorgeous, Daddy, absolutely gorgeous.” He nodded at her, trying to smile.

  From then on it was as if he were having an out-of-body experience.

  The ceremony took place outdoors, on a large patio, beneath a trellis. There were huge vases of flowers, despite the ones still blooming on the trellis, and chairs had been set up for eighty people.

  Alberg’s responsibility ended early. He stepped back and allowed himself to relax. He was pleased with himself for getting it right. He began to feel like a kind man—magnanimous, even; possessing an abundance of love, tenderness, and generosity of spirit.

  The sky arched gloriously blue above them, the benevolent sun lavished warmth upon them, and the music provided by four of the groom’s colleagues swelled while the couple kissed, with a chasteness Alberg approved.

  As Daniel Silverman escorted his new wife down the makeshift aisle, he caught Alberg’s eye, held it, and gave him a slow, expressionless wink.

  Chapter 7

  BELINDA WAS IN HER father’s living room Saturday afternoon, watching him sort through the box marked “chest of drawers” that sat on the coffee table. There was a curious excitement in the air, created by her father’s absorption in his task, an almost prurient excitement that Belinda found repellent. She was struggling to accept his bizarre behavior with detachment, but this was not possible: it endangered her. She had grown a skin over the hole torn in her life by her mother’s departure, but it was thin, fragile protection.

  He was sitting on the sofa, picking through her mother’s clothes, taking his time about it. On the floor another box awaited his ministrations: Belinda couldn’t see what was written on it.

  She took her coffee mug into the kitchen and refilled it.

  She still missed the china and cutlery familiar from her childhood. Even though this was not the house in which she had grown up, even though she had helped her father choose the contents of his kitchen, even though this had been accomplished years ago—still Belinda missed that everyday china, which had had some kinds of flowers splashed upon a white background. There were matching cream and sugar containers: the lid to the sugar bowl had a chip out of it, and two of the dinner plates were cracked.

  The everyday cutlery was stainless steel. One soup spoon and two salad forks had gone missing over the years.

  Then there was the best china, navy blue and gold, Royal Albert. It had remained intact and unbroken because it was used only on special occasions like Christmas and birthdays. The good silver was used then, too. Belinda had always loved cleaning the silver.

  Her father had gotten rid of all of it, one way or another, immediately after her mother left. Belinda had thought he’d gotten rid of the personal stuff then, too.

  Belinda was looking out the kitchen window, from which she could see her father’s front lawn, the gravel driveway, and the winding road that led down the hill to the isthmus and across to Sechelt. Rosebushes bordered the driveway. When she’d arrived a couple of hours earlier, she had found her father leaning on a shovel, contemplating the roses.

  He didn’t own any casual clothes. In the garden, going for walks, he wore dress pants and shirts that had grown old or become worn, and narrow gray suspenders. And tennis shoes.

  He had turned swiftly, startled, when he heard her sneakers crunching on the gravel. And then smiled, at Belinda in her khaki pants and red sweater. “Hi, sunshine,” he said, and returned his attention to the garden. “I think I’m going to dig up the damn roses.”

  “Why?”

  “Look at them. They’ve got black spot, they’ve got powdery mildew, they’ve got aphids.”

  “They’ve got a lot of flowers, though,” said Belinda. “Aren’t you supposed to spray them or something?”

  “I’ve sprayed them every week since March,” he said, and tossed the shovel to the ground.

  Maybe I’ll take some roses home, thought Belinda.

  She returned to the living room.

  Her father folded nightgowns. Handkerchiefs. Scarves. He worked in silence, deftly, adding to the neat piles he had created, one for the Salvation Army, one for the garbage.

  “Dad.”

  “What?”

  “I want to leave Raymond.”

  He looked up at her quickly. “Don’t be silly. You’re pregnant.”

  “For the moment, I’m pregnant.”

  Her father’s face flushed so red that Belinda became alarmed. “I don’t want to hear that,” he said. “This is a human life you’re talking about.”

  “Not yet, Dad. You can’t call it a life yet.”

  “A human life. And it may be your child, but it’s my grandchild.” He struck his chest. Belinda felt embarrassed for him; and for herself, too.

  The piles of clothing sat to his left and right, on the cushions of the sofa, which was upholstered in large red-and-white checks. Belinda, when she first saw the sofa, had thought it revolting. But now she admitted that her father had been right: it was a splotch of cheer that welcomed casual sprawling.

  He picked up the pile to his left—panties, bras, slips, half slips, teddies, and panty hose in various colors—and dropped it into a plastic garbage bag. Belinda had recognized nothing so far. When he started going through stuff she recognized, that was when she’d be out of there.

  Now she saw him pull from the box a pair of socks. He glanced at Belinda, and she knew he was going to ask her advice, but he changed his mind. He put the socks into the garbage bag and several more pairs as well. Then he turned the box over and shook it. A sachet fell upon the coffee table.

  “What’s that?” said Belinda’s father.

  She picked it up, sniffed but smelled nothing. “I made i
t for her. It was lavender.” She tossed it into the garbage bag.

  “Maybe there’s a genetic defect operating here,” said her father, studying her face.

  “It isn’t the same thing at all,” Belinda said.

  “No, it isn’t. Instead of deserting your child, like your mother did, you plan to kill yours.”

  “That’s not fair,” said Belinda, steeling herself. Her father was not a person who became less articulate with anger. It was important not to quail before him.

  But his anger passed, this time, as quickly as it had flared, leaving him pale and defenseless. He smoothed his bald head and tenderly stroked the fringe of hair that had been left him.

  “It’s made me sick to hear you talk this way,” he said quietly. “I don’t think what’s going on here has anything to do with Raymond, with your marriage.”

  Belinda went to the big window and pressed her cheek against the glass. Tears leaked from her closed eyes. She concentrated on suppressing them—did the visualization thing, imagined two little taps, one in each eye; imagined turning them off. Then she opened her eyes and wiped her cheeks dry.

  Through the window Belinda watched the long grass move in the breeze and saw a few golden leaves flutter to the ground from the birch trees that marked the edge of her father’s property, and down at the bottom of the hill the sun flashed from the rough blue waters of Porpoise Bay.

  ***

  A man climbed out of his car at Porpoise Bay, near where the seaplanes landed. He was of average height, with gray hair; middle-aged, but slim and athletic. He had a look on his face of total concentration as he crossed the parking lot and turned up the road that paralleled the inlet. The woman he had followed here was perhaps fifty yards ahead.

  The man kept close to the brush at the side of the road, which consisted almost entirely of blackberry vines. He flinched the first time the thorns scraped his flesh but stayed where he was, only raising his arms to protect his face: he was wearing jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, and sneakers.