Since You Left Me

by Allen Zadoff

  “Don’t lie to him,” the guru says.

  “Don’t tell me what to do,” Mom says.

  “Don’t lie to me, Mom,” I say.

  Mom gives the guru an angry look. The same kind she used to give Dad.

  “Fine. You want the truth?” Mom says. “I wanted you two to have a chance to get to know each other, so you would like each other.”

  “Why do we need to like each other?” I say.

  Mom and the guru share a look. Mom nods to him.

  “Your mother and I started a relationship as friends—” the guru says.

  “I don’t want to hear this,” I say.

  “—but something has happened between us,” he says. “Something beautiful.”

  Mom’s hand slides down his forearm to his fingers. They intertwine.

  I stand up and throw my napkin on the table.

  “You set me up,” I say to Mom.

  “Please, Sanskrit. We’re trying to share good news with you,” Mom says.

  “What’s good about it?” I say. I fling down my fork, and a chunk of tofu meat goes flying.

  I storm out to the sound of Mom apologizing—not to me—to the guru.

  I’m going away.

  That’s what I think as I walk around the neighborhood. I can handle this because I’m going away soon. One more year, really a year and a half, and then I’ll be at Brandeis. Away from this place, away from Brentwood, away from my crazy family.

  Away from Mom.

  The thought upsets me, and then I get angry at myself for being upset. What kind of a baby is afraid to leave his mother? Kids are supposed to want to leave home, especially homes like mine.

  I try to imagine myself all the way on the other side of the country at Brandeis. I wonder if Mom will miss me. I wonder if she’ll think of me at all.

  Out of sight, out of mind.

  Just like God.

  All of Judaism is based on remembering God, reaching out to him, asking for his help. Reminding ourselves of him at every moment.

  Why do we have to do all that work?

  Because God’s not here in the first place.

  If God were here, there would be no need for religion. We wouldn’t have to remember him or honor him. We’d come out of our houses in the morning, and God would be sitting on a cloud with a lightning bolt in one hand and a Starbucks in the other.

  You’d say, “Good morning, God. How did I do yesterday?”

  If you were good, you’d get the Starbucks. If you were bad—

  You’d get the guru.

  I walk a big circle in the neighborhood around the restaurant. By the time I head back, Mom’s car isn’t in the parking lot anymore. I’m thinking that maybe she left, when a horn beeps.

  Mom pulls up, her tire scraping the curb. The guru is sitting next to her in front.

  “We’re going home,” Mom says through her open window.

  “Who’s we?”

  “You and I. We’ll drop off Guru Bharat first.”

  “Good,” I say. And I get in the car.

  “You’re awfully quiet.”

  We’re sitting at a stoplight after dropping off the guru. I’m in the backseat, and I haven’t said a word.

  “I’m trying to communicate with you like Sweet Caroline’s psychologist said I should,” Mom says.

  The light turns green. There’s a beep behind us.

  “Sanskrit,” Mom says. “Nobody can plan for love. It’s mysterious.”

  Another beep.

  If I open my mouth, I’ll say something terrible, so I keep it closed. I feel the anger churning in my stomach, a cement mixer filled with fake beef products.

  “Sanskrit,” Mom says.

  A long horn blast.

  Mom steps on the gas, and we’re moving again.

  “I give up,” she says.

  Me, too, I think.

  When we get home, Mom pulls into the driveway but doesn’t open the garage door.

  “I’m taking a drive,” she says.

  Mom never takes drives. She’s too concerned with leaving a small carbon footprint. But tonight she leaves the car running and waits for me to get out. Then she pulls out of the driveway fast, narrowly missing our mailbox before disappearing into the night.

  “Where’s Mom going?”

  Sweet Caroline is standing inside the door when I get inside. I can tell she’s been watching through the front window.

  “How do I know?” I say.

  “She never drives at night.”

  For all Mom’s spiritual work, she’s scared of a lot of things. Night driving, sugar, cell phones, the laser scanner at the grocery store, which she thinks can cause blindness despite the fact we have yet to meet a blind cashier.

  “Did something happen at dinner?” Sweet Caroline says.

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  I storm past her, heading for my room.

  “Don’t blame me for your messed-up relationship,” she says.

  “Screw you, Caroline,” I shout behind me.

  “Sweet!” she shouts after me.

  I slam my bedroom door closed. Then I open and slam it again. The wood shivers in the frame.

  I hear an answering slam from down the hall. Then another. Then a third.

  Jewish Morse code.

  I pace around my room, making small, angry circles. I get angrier and angrier until I’m ready to explode. I pull out my journal.

  I flip through it until I find my last entry.

  I have to change my life.

  That’s what it says.

  I can check that one off the list. It’s changed for the worse.

  I turn to a blank page. I write:

  G-D

  Then I cross it out. I write:

  HASHEM

  “You can always talk to HaShem,” Herschel once said. “He’s omnipresent.”

  I said, “That’s like those reality shows where they have cameras everywhere, even in the bathroom. The ACLU should object to an omnipresent God.”

  “Omnipresent means we have a constant companion. We’re never really alone because we have God beside us.”

  I look at the word HaShem written on the page in front of me. I imagine him here with me in the room. I don’t believe it. I cross out his name. I write:

  DEAR MOM,

  I HATE YOU.

  I tear that out of the journal and crunch it up. I toss it in the trash. Then I take it out and rip it into tiny pieces and throw those out.

  I start a new page in the journal.

  DEAR MOM,

  I HAVE A LOT OF THINGS I WANT TO SAY TO YOU.

  I HATE YOU.

  THIS IS THE TRUTH.

  I HATE YOU MORE THAN ANYTHING. I HOPE YOU GET INTO A CAR ACCIDENT TONIGHT WHILE YOU’RE DRIVING WHEREVER YOU’RE DRIVING. IF YOU EVER READ THIS, YOU’RE PROBABLY GOING TO SAY, OH, HE JUST SAID THAT BECAUSE HE WAS ANGRY.

  BUT IT’S NOT BECAUSE I’M ANGRY. IT’S BECAUSE IT’S TRUE.

  I DON’T CARE IF YOU NEVER COME HOME AGAIN.

  IT WOULD BE EASIER ON ME. BECAUSE IF YOU GOT INTO AN ACCIDENT, I WOULD KNOW I’D LOST YOU AND I WOULDN’T EXPECT ANYTHING FROM YOU. IT’S NOT LIKE YOU CAN WANT STUFF FROM DEAD PEOPLE. AND EVERYONE AT SCHOOL WILL MOURN WITH ME FOR REAL, AND I WON’T HAVE TO ADMIT I’M A LIAR.

  BUT UNFORTUNATELY YOU’RE ALIVE, AND ALL YOU DO IS HURT ME.

  YOU INVITED ME TO DINNER TONIGHT. I THOUGHT IT WAS ABOUT YOU AND ME, AND IT TURNS OUT IT WAS ALL A SETUP. IT WAS REALLY JUST A DINNER FOR YOU TO BE CLOSER TO YOUR GURU. OR FOR YOU TO TRY TO MAKE ME LOVE YOUR GURU LIKE YOU DO, AND THAT’S BULLSHIT. YOU CAN’T TRICK PEOPLE LIKE THAT. YOU CAN’T TRICK YOUR SON.

  I’m so angry as I write this, I want to break the pen and stab it into something.

  I bend the pen until it’s on the brink of snapping, but I stop before it does. I go back to the page.

  I DON’T WANT YOU TO BE MY MOTHER ANYMORE. YOU’RE NOT GOOD AT IT. YOU’RE GOOD AT OTHER THINGS, BUT NOT AT THIS. YOU’RE A GOOD YOGA TEACH
ER, FOR INSTANCE. I GIVE YOU THAT MUCH. YOU’RE GOOD AT TEACHING YOGA, AND I’M SORRY I’M NOT GOOD AT LEARNING IT BECAUSE YOU’VE TRIED TO HELP ME AND I KNOW I’VE LET YOU DOWN. BUT I DON’T WANT YOU TO THINK YOU’RE A BAD TEACHER BECAUSE I’M NOT ABLE TO DO ADVANCED MOVES.

  I’M JUST SAYING THERE ARE THINGS THAT WE EXCEL AT AND THINGS THAT WE DON’T.

  YOU DON’T EXCEL AT BEING MY MOTHER.

  I’m afraid to write this. It’s hard to tell the truth about how I feel, even when it’s just on paper. I decide I’m going to write the letter, then throw it out. I’m never giving it to Mom. I’ll write it and destroy it. That’s what a journal is, right? It’s a private place for me to have my feelings. So I’m going to say what I have to say. I’m going to let it all out.

  I go back to the page, write a few more words, and the pen runs out of ink.

  I throw it across the room. I search through my backpack, but I can only find a red pen.

  SORRY THE COLOR OF INK JUST CHANGED, BUT MY PEN RAN OUT AND I HAVE TO USE A DIFFERENT PEN. THAT’S ANOTHER THING I HATE ABOUT YOU, MOM. I SHOULD HAVE A COOL LAPTOP LIKE OTHER KIDS. I SHOULDN’T BE USING A PEN AT ALL. THAT’S TECHNOLOGY FROM HUNDREDS OF YEARS AGO. DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY KIDS HAVE THEIR OWN LAPTOPS IN SCHOOL NOW? ALL OF THEM. THEY DON’T HAVE ONE STUPID NETBOOK THEY HAVE TO SHARE WITH THEIR WHOLE FAMILY.

  That’s why I haven’t seen our netbook for so long. It’s been in Mom’s room so she can use it to chat with the guru. That thought makes me angry all over again.

  I’M TIRED OF THINKING ABOUT THIS, MOM.

  I’M TIRED OF TRYING WITH YOU.

  I GIVE UP.

  I’M DONE.

  I’M NOT YOUR SON ANYMORE.

  THAT’S THE TRUTH.

  MAYBE YOU’LL BE RELIEVED WHEN YOU READ THIS, OR MAYBE YOU’LL BE UPSET, OR MAYBE YOU’LL BE NOTHING AT ALL. IF YOU READ IT AND YOU WANT TO TALK TO ME ABOUT IT, I MIGHT BE WILLING TO DO THAT. JUST READ THIS AND THINK ABOUT IT. OKAY?

  I close the journal. My hand is shaking and I’m sweating.

  I lie back in bed and put the journal on my stomach.

  I think about dinner, about the guru walking in, about Mom’s happy mask.

  I think about the guru in our kitchen the other morning.

  I think about how it made me feel.

  That’s when I decide I’m going to give Mom the letter.

  She needs to know the truth.

  I carefully tear it out of the journal and fold it up. I don’t have any envelopes in my room, but I know Mom keeps some in the kitchen drawer for when she has to send bills.

  I sneak out of my room and head for the kitchen.

  “You can’t eat anything,” Sweet Caroline calls from her bedroom.

  “I’m not eating,” I say from the hall.

  Sweet Caroline is being a bitch because I yelled at her before.

  I swear to God, I would kill for a house with real walls. The Jews might have been slaves in Egypt, but I’ll bet the walls were thick. Those Egyptian stones were heavy. I wouldn’t mind being a slave if it got Sweet Caroline off my back.

  “It’s after eight and you’re heading for the kitchen,” Sweet Caroline says through her door. “You know the rules. If you eat, I’ll tell Mom.”

  “Good luck finding her.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “It means she left home and I doubt she’s coming back.”

  There’s a pause and then Sweet Caroline’s door opens.

  She steps out in pink sweats and a T-shirt. The sweats have a picture of Hello Kitty on the butt. One of Mom’s yoga ladies gives her old clothes to Sweet Caroline. That’s Brentwood. A forty-year-old woman and a twelve-year-old girl are roughly the same size.

  “You said she was taking a drive,” Sweet Caroline says.

  “Since when does she take drives? She’s got the carbon footprint of a Brussels sprout.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “Did you notice a man in sheets at breakfast the other day? Do you think it’s strange that Mom is nowhere to be found at ten o’clock at night?”

  “So?” she says.

  “You’re blind.”

  “I’m not blind.”

  “We went to dinner tonight, and he was there. Mom invited him without telling me.”

  “Why?”

  “They wanted to break the news to me. It’s bad, Sweet Caroline. Much worse than we thought.”

  Sweet Caroline pulls at her eyebrow. She plucks one of the hairs out and rubs it between her fingers.

  “Mom’s had other creepy boyfriends. Why do you hate this one so much?” she says.

  “I don’t like how Mom is around him.”

  “Happy?”

  “Brainwashed.”

  She goes to the kitchen trash and drops the hair into it. She claps her hands together like she’s completed an important mission.

  “He’s going back to India, Sanskrit.”

  Sweet Caroline reaches into a gift basket for some caramel walnut clusters. She tears the package with her teeth.

  “That’s how I know we’re going to be okay,” she says. “He doesn’t live in this country.”

  “You might be right.”

  “See? I’m not blind.”

  “Maybe not,” I say.

  She scrapes chocolate from the roof of her mouth with a finger. Then she goes down the hall to her bedroom.

  As much as I hate her, I have to admit she’s a pretty brilliant kid. But she’s still just a kid.

  I know better. I have to protect us. I have to wake Mom up.

  I open the drawer where Mom keeps the envelopes. Of course she’s out of envelopes.

  I see a stack of bills on the counter. I pick out one that Mom hasn’t opened yet. Her philosophy is that you don’t open bills until they turn red. Before that, it’s like eating fruit that’s not ripe.

  This bill is still black, so I know she’s not going to miss it.

  I take a steak knife from the drawer and slit the envelope open on the side. Then I slip the bill out and throw it away. I write:

  TO: MOM

  FROM: YOUR SON

  I slide the letter into the envelope so the writing fits into the transparent square.

  I go back down the hall, open Mom’s door, and slip inside.

  I remember when I was a little kid and I’d go into her room in the middle of the night, only then it was their room, my parents’ room. They tried to send me back to bed, but sometimes I would beg enough that they’d let me stay. I’d snuggle in next to Mom, feel her softness against my back. Mom wasn’t skinny and yoga-body hard back then. She had a human body that could give you comfort. Now she’s all angles and muscles.

  I sit on the edge of her bed, arrange her pillows so they’re not a mess, and I lay the envelope on top.

  I catch a scent of Mom’s shampoo on the pillow. It smells good to be close to her. Not a whiff of her passing by, but pure Mom, concentrated. It makes me feel like a child being carried, my face buried in her neck.

  Suddenly, I feel exhausted.

  It’s like everything that’s been happening over the last week fills my body until I can’t move. I lie down on Mom’s bed and close my eyes. Maybe I fall asleep for a minute, but my eyes snap open again.

  I can’t be in here when Mom gets home.

  I drag myself up from the bed, make sure the envelope is still there, and I go back to my bedroom and wait for Mom to come home.

  “Wake up.”

  I don’t even remember falling asleep. I was up nearly the entire night, waiting for the front door to open, for Mom’s footsteps in the hall, waiting for her to see the letter, waiting for what might come after.

  “Sanskrit?” The voice says.

  It’s not Mom. It’s Sweet Caroline.

  “Get up,” she says.

  She’s standing in the half-open doorway.

  “What do you want?” I say.

  “It’s Mom.”

  “What about her?”

  “She didn’t come
home last night.”

  “The letter—” I start to say, but I stop myself. It’s none of Sweet Caroline’s business.

  “Mom wrote a letter?” Sweet Caroline says.

  “No.”

  “You said a letter—”

  “I was dreaming it,” I say.

  I sit up fast in bed. It’s six on Tuesday morning.

  I rub my eyes, trying to wake up.

  “How do you know Mom didn’t come home?” I say. “Maybe she had an early class.”

  “Her bed is still made. I’m worried, Sanskrit.”

  I’m worried, too. Mom has done a lot of irresponsible things, but staying out all night isn’t one of them.

  “I think we should call the police,” Sweet Caroline says.

  “You have to calm down,” I say. “I am calm. That’s why I think we should call the police.”

  “Bad idea. They’ve already got the Child Protective Services report because of you.”

  “That was a long time ago. And it got discredited, remember?”

  “My point is if the police find out Mom didn’t come home, things could get complicated.”

  Sweet Caroline thinks about it, biting at a nail. Mom clicks her nails on her teeth when she’s worried, but Sweet Caroline bites until she bleeds.

  “This is a crisis. We need to call Dad,” she says.

  “That’s the worst time to call Dad.”

  Dad’s idea of a crisis is having to make dinner on a weeknight.

  “Why don’t you call the yoga studio just to make sure she’s not there,” I say.

  “What will you do?”

  “I’ll check the house.”

  “Don’t leave, Sanskrit.”

  “I’m not leaving. I’m going down the hall.”

  “I’ll come with you.”

  “Stay here and call the yoga studio. I swear I’ll be right back.”

  Sweet Caroline stretches out her arms like she’s going to reach for me, but she doesn’t. It’s funny how she’s so tough and so vulnerable at the same time. She gets scared and suddenly she wants a big brother.

  I wait for Sweet Caroline to get on her phone, and I head down the hall.

  I slip into Mom’s room.

  It’s dark. I crack open the blinds, and light floods in. I look at her pillow. The letter is gone.