My mother was unpacking her bathroom essentials when I finally arrived at the house. Her massive collection of lotions, her brushes, her cotton swabs, her perfumes. She held one up to me. Chanel 5, encased delicately in a tiny black and white box. Inside, an even tinier bottle of the perfume.
“Your father gave this to me. He got it in France.” She took a whiff of the open case and smiled slightly. “I should throw it in his face, the son of a bitch.” Her smile vanished, replaced with a grimace. Still, she handed the box to me and told me to put it in her room for safe keeping.
After twenty-seven years of semi-blissful marriage, my parents were finally separating. It had been a long time coming.
I had driven 500 miles home to help my mother move. My aunt and uncle had offered their place. They were very welcoming and understanding of my mother’s circumstances. I knew they were relieved that they could finally spew out all the shit they had been holding in about my father. He was not a well-liked man on my mother’s side of the family, or really, in most circles.
He’s the kind of guy that viewed the world through a very narrow spectrum. Never mind his way being the “right” way. His way was the only way.
I used to think he was just misunderstood, that people just didn’t get him the way I did. And maybe for a period of time that was true, but then something happened. Slowly, but surely, he became what I can only describe as a curmudgeon. A word I never fathomed using until this period of my life.
My father seemed to have lost sight of the rest of the world around him and became so socially awkward that I couldn’t bear going out into public with him. Strangers aggravated him to no end, and no matter what they did, whether it be walking too slow, or driving too fast, he would find a reason to cuss them out.
All of this was dismissible, at first. Things that can be overlooked because your father is still your father. But then one day, while talking to me, he severely damaged my piety to him.
He was telling me how I needed to take over managing the family’s finances, because, and I quote: “your mother is stupid.” I think he meant for it to be a compliment to me. I should have felt honored that he would want to give me such responsibility. But I only felt the harsh reality of my father’s real persona coming into light. He was mean and everyone else had seen it before I did. I felt, well, stupid.
“Mom, why do you have so many of these?” I held up a box of multi-colored scrunches. “Also, you should never wear these in public.”
“Why? What’s wrong? They hold up my hair.” She took the box from me and shuffled around some more bathroom essentials to make room for them. “Besies, I like them. They remind me of you.”
“How? Why?”
“You used to wear them all the time. You always wanted to wear the same color as me.”
My dear mother. She had a habit of clinging to images of me as a child so tightly that it was difficult to breathe sometimes, for fear that the way I inhaled and exhaled would be too unrecognizable by my mother’s standards. I must have been the perfect kid, because my mother won’t let me forget what I used to be like.
“How’s work?” My mother’s voice echoed down the hallway as I stood in her new bedroom.
I hesitated to answer, pretending that I just couldn’t hear her. It was such a simple question, but I only had a handful of lies with which to answer. The truth had escaped me, because I hadn’t yet faced up to it.
Besides, how does one talk about sexual exploits, that may have gotten one fired from their job, to their parents?
