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“My soul is fine. It doesn’t need rest, and it doesn’t need fixing.” I studied her face, trying to determine if this had been her plan all along. To lure me home with promises of acceptance. Doling out words likeunconditionalwhen she’d really meantconversion.“If you think that’s what this is—that I’m going to change—I’ll leave. I’m not changing.”
Her eyebrows bunched together and she drew her lips into a straight line. “If I think this is what?” It took her a moment to realize what I’d meant, and as soon as it dawned on her, she looked like she wanted to slap me. “That’s not what I was saying at all. Have I ever given you a reason to think that I’m ashamed of you?”
“That church of yours isn’t particularly fond of my kind.”
“That church of minehasn’t beenthat church of minein years. Not since you left. Not since I lost you. There’s not a thing I want to change about you. You’re just as He made you.” Mom pointed at the miniature rainbow flag that hung beside her Christian flag on the mantle. “It took me a while to find my voice, but I did, and I’ll never lose it again.” She was right, of course. It wasn’t like I was the only person who lost anything. She’d lost me, but she’d also lost a year of her life. When my mother left the church, my father moved out of the family home. He spent ten months shacked up with Mrs. Knox, the church’s secretary. When she skipped town without so much as a Dear John letter, Joel Fox returned home with his tail tucked between his legs.
It’s funny how some sins are easily forgiven, while others hold a twenty-year sentence.
Without missing a beat, she was on her feet, heading toward the door. “Let’s get your things and get you settled into your room.”
Remembering the discarded bottle of lube left in the wake of Hurricane Caterina, I lunged past her and through the front door. Leaping from the porch, I scurried across the lawn. I managed to grab the bottle before she caught sight of it. When I turned around, my mother was standing on the porch with a look of absolute bewilderment on her face. With a shrug and a sigh, she trailed behind, following me to the car.
When we reached the trunk, she stared at the three suitcases in front of us. “This is it?”
“That’s it.”
“It can’t be. I’ve been to your condo. It was littered with tchotchkes and trinkets.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever owned a tchotchke in my life,” I said, refusing to allow my name to be associated with the wordskeeper of tchotchkes.
“Baby, what happened to all of your things?”
I stared at my feet. How could I tell her just how long I’d been struggling? That I’d spent the last seven months living off of scrambled eggs, selling my possessions one by one to cover rent and utilities. Hell, I didn’t even have the luxury of living out of my car anymore. I sold it two months back just to keep myself afloat. Her home had been an absolute last resort, and I knew if I detailed the depths of my downward spiral, it would only insult her. In the end, I didn’t need to say a word because my mother reached into the trunk, pulled out two of the bags, and handed them to me.
She cupped my cheek and nodded. “You’re home now. That’s all that matters. You’re home, and you’re safe.”
When we reached my bedroom, she set the bag she was carrying beside my door. “I’ll leave you to it. Going to get us some supper going. Meatloaf, your favorite.”
“No crackers,” I said, forcing a smile as I glanced down at my waist. “They’re just empty carbs.”
She rolled her eyes. “We’ll be talking about that soon enough. I know you’re worried about gaining it back, but I’ve been looking into this little diet of yours, and I’m not a fan. For heaven’s sake, honey, you’re already stick-thin.”
Before I could mutter the words,it’s preventative,she had already turned around and was walking down the stairs.
I could have stayed in that hallway forever. Turning the doorknob would make everything real. As long as the door stayed closed, I could pretend. I could still tell myself this was just a visit. That I was simply a lonely man coming home for a little well-earned TLC. The second I opened it, I would be a man without purpose. Someone reliant on his aging mother for asylum. I wanted to leave the door shut. I wanted to run to the shed in the backyard, grab every nail, hammer, and board that I could find, and nail it shut so tightly that it never opened again.
I turned the knob.
Standing in the hallway, I watched as my childhood home’s unleveled structuring sent the door creaking open slowly on its own.
The room was the same as the day I left. A queen-size bed sat near the closet door on the left side of the room. There was a blue blanket on top, decorated with baseballs and catcher mitts. My father’s choice.
There wasn’t a single speck of dust on any of the surfaces. I knew my mother had kept it tidy while I was “away,” as she called it, but it was like walking around in a museum. Relics of my youth, pristinely preserved under her watchful eye.
I walked toward the bed, meaning to sit and take in my surroundings, but something on the nightstand caught my eye. A small, framed photograph of two boys. A hefty kid with a mop of unstyled curls splicing out in every direction stood next to a gangly boy with a familiar face. A face emblazoned in my memory. Scorched into my subconscious. Eyes that had once been full of fear as his brother pulled me off of him and out of his life for twenty years.
In the photograph, Gray and I couldn’t have been older than fourteen. My mother had taken the picture at a church revival one summer. They had held the service on Gray’s grandparents’ farm, just north of West Clark. In front of an old red barn, the white tent stood proudly. Almost as proud as I appeared in the picture. We were wearing our Sunday best, and Gray had his arm wrapped around my shoulder. His mouth hung open, that ridiculous grin of his stretched ear to ear.
“Abide with me,” I sang in an off-key whisper.
My voice didn’t hold a candle to Gray’s.
I opened the drawer and set the picture inside. Out of sight, out of mind. The same way he’d done with me.
***
The next morning, I walked down the stairs with a bit of a spring in my step, happy to catch the scent of bacon wafting in from the kitchen. Mom was at the table. She’d already set a place for me at the other end.
