out a pack of Pall Malls and lit one. “I’ll bring a meat loaf and some potatoes over tonight and some of the field peas you canned for us.”
She looked at me expectantly while Susie climbed down from her lap. But I just stood there stupidly. I shivered with the sudden understanding that I’d been so wrapped up in my own problems that I hadn’t seen the obvious: the surgeons hadn’t gotten all the cancer.
Bertie got up, tapped her cigarette ash into the sink, and stared at me.
Adam rubbed Susie’s back as she hugged his leg. “We’ll bring something by tomorrow for their dinner. Anything in particular bothering her stomach?” he asked.
Bertie directed her answer at me as she beckoned Susie. “Not that I’ve heard. Maybe if she has some decent food, she’ll be able to keep it down. She needed more time to rest after the surgery. Y’all can go on. I’ll stay with her till Daddy gets back.” Her voice was thick and soft as she began braiding her daughter’s hair.
Somehow, I got out to the car. We rode home in silence.
It had begun.
Momma seemed to give up once we started taking care of her every day. A few days later, Daddy rushed her to the emergency room. The word “cancer” invaded our vocabulary. “Inoperable” remained the whispered obscenity. Each day, one of us went by to stay with her and make dinner for them.
I went to Momma’s almost every day. But we were never alone. Once the neighbors heard she was sick again, they began bringing dishes of food.
Finally, one sunny afternoon, she and I were alone. Daddy was at work. I didn’t expect Adam to pick me up for another hour. Rita would be by then to bathe Momma and make dinner.
Rail-thin now, Momma chilled easily and preferred hot tea instead of iced tea. I heard her restless moans as I waited in the kitchen for her tea to steep. I set a glass and fresh pitcher of water on the tray with her cup of tea and carried it to her room. The doctors had recently upped the dosage on her pain medication and she asked for it every four hours on the dot.
Swallowing pills had become difficult for her; she was on liquid morphine. She opened her mouth like a child as I held the full tablespoon out and she took it hungrily. She scowled patiently, waiting for the morphine’s effects. The unhealthy prominence of her cheekbones seemed like a rebuke to my list of questions about my father.
I waited for the drug’s effects. Lately, it seemed to make her less drowsy, as if the pain now sopped up the morphine’s peripheral effects. After a few moments, her body relaxed, but her eyes retained a vigilant brightness, as if she anticipated the pain’s immediate return.
For weeks, I had questions ready for her, polished and clear, but suddenly they seemed a jumble caught between two simple sentiments: How could she have kept my father’s name from me for so long? What else had she not told me?
I settled the blanket up around her chest and startled at the sound of footsteps on the back porch.
Momma turned her head slowly and smiled weakly at Adam as he paused in the bedroom doorway. I stifled a disappointed moan. My opportunity was gone. I had not told Adam Momma’s news.
“I’m early, but I thought I’d . . .” he apologized.
Momma patted the bedspread beside her and Adam sat on Daddy’s side of the bed.
My thwarted questions filled my throat. Everything I did not understand about both Momma and Adam seemed to congeal into one spot in my chest.
I fought my tears and swallowed. Then my frustration gave way, surrendering to his presence. “Adam, go back out and check to make sure no one else is in the house. Check the driveway. The front door, too. Make sure there’s no one on the way.”
He glanced quickly at Momma. Her shoulder moved slightly, suggesting a shrug.
“Go on,” I said. “Then come back in here with us.”
Momma held my gaze while we listened to Adam’s footsteps echo the length of the silent house.
When he came back into the bedroom, I offered him my chair next to Momma’s side of the bed. Still puzzled, he sat and looked up at me.
I leaned over Adam’s shoulder, picked up Momma’s hand, and put it in his. “Go ahead.” I tapped him on the chest. “Show her.”
His eyes searched my face, not understanding.
“All she’s known