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“I know what weed is. I may be eighty-four, but I’m not senile.”Not to mention, I might have indulged a few times in my youth,she thinks, but considers it wise not to say.
“And I’m pretty sure he’s been taking money out of my purse,” Poppy volunteers.
“You’repretty sure?” Julia repeats. “You’re not positive?”
“I’m pretty positive,” Poppy says, as if this settles the matter. “I mean, there was about forty dollars missing from my wallet the other day, and he’s the only one who could have taken it.”
“Did you ask him about it?”
“I did. He denied it.”
“Maybe he didn’t take it.”
“Anyway, we got into a whole big fight about it,” Poppy says, brushing aside the question of Mark’s possible innocence with a wave of her long, manicured fingernails, “and he called me the C-word….”
“A cunt?” Julia asks with more relish than she’d intended.
“Mother, really…”
“How can you even say that word?” Poppy asks, squirming.
Julia shrugs. She’s always rather liked the sound of it.
“Anyway, he stormed out of the house,” Norman says. “We haven’t seen him in two days.”
“I mean, we’re sure he’s okay,” Poppy says. “It’s not like this is the first time he’s pulled something like this.”
“But it will be the last,” Norman insists. “There are limits to what we’ll tolerate. He dropped out of college; he can’t keep a job for more than a couple of weeks. If he doesn’t straighten up and fly right, we’ll be forced to kick him out for good.”
Julia is about to say something, but the fact that she has produced a son who says things like “straighten up and fly right” renders her temporarily speechless.
“Anyway, I know you two have a special relationship,” Norman says, managing to make the word “special” sound vaguely distasteful. “So if he should happen to come by, I’d appreciate it if you’d call us immediately. And whatever you do, don’t give him any money.”
“Let him see what it’s like out there without Norman paying all the bills,” Poppy adds.
I’m sure you’ll be able to tell him yourself in a few years,Julia thinks, and has to bite down on her tongue to keep from voicing it out loud. She looks toward her son. “What else? You said there were a couple of things….”
“We’ve been through this before,” Norman says. “It’s this house.”
“Oh, dear. Not again.”
“Look,” Norman says, speaking over her. “I understood your desire to hang on to the place after Dad died. I mean, all the experts agree that you shouldn’t make any major changes for the first year after someone dies, but it’s been almost two years now, and you’re not getting any younger. You shouldn’t be going up and down all these stairs, you could fall and break a hip—”
“Actually,” Julia interrupts, “they say your hip breaks first….”
“What?”
“The hip breaks first,” Julia repeats. “And that’s why you fall. Not the other way around.”
“Okay, fine. Whatever,” Norman says dismissively. “The fact is that this house is getting harder and harder for you to look after. There are too many stairs, too many rooms to clean. Besides, it’s dangerous, a woman your age, living alone. Someone could break in…”
“Nobody’s going to break in.”
“…and here you’d be, all alone, at the mercy of some predator….”
“Nonsense,” Julia states firmly, seeking to put an end to the discussion. “Besides, I have a gun.”
“What?! Since when do you have a gun?”
