“Mom,” he said, “this is Mrs. Gutermann. She lives in our building, on the second floor. She needs help getting to the bank, so . . .” But he didn’t go on to finish his thought.
“I’m delighted to meet you,” Mrs. G said to fill the silence.
She held out her hand. But his mother hadn’t said anything yet, or made any noise. So the hand ended up about thirty degrees to the right of its intended target. Raymond took hold of it and steered it closer to his mother, who reached out her own hand to take it.
They didn’t shake hands, exactly. It was more a gesture in which Mrs. G squeezed his mother’s hand, and his mother allowed it.
“You must be very proud of your wonderful son,” Mrs. G said. Her voice was glowing, if such a thing were possible. “He has been such a good friend to me. He helps me to do so many things that I don’t know how I would do on my own. And always with such a gracious attitude. I don’t know exactly what would go into raising such a caring and thoughtful young man, but you’ve obviously done your job well.”
Raymond’s mother turned her eyes to his face. She had caught on now, and realized she could do so without Mrs. G observing. So she questioned him with her eyes. And as she opened her mouth to answer Mrs. G, she never took her eyes off Raymond’s face.
“That’s all very interesting. How long has he been so helpful to you?”
“Oh, many months now. Since October, I believe. We have become very good friends. Haven’t we, Raymond?”
“Definitely,” Raymond said, the skin of his face feeling hot under his mother’s unwavering stare.
Raymond’s mom mouthed the words “many months.” Then she reached out and pinged Raymond hard in the middle of his forehead with one snap of her index finger.
“Ow,” Raymond said.
“Are you all right, Raymond?” Mrs. G asked. “What happened?”
“Nothing. It was just . . . nothing.” Raymond shot his eyes up to the clock. “Mom. The bank closes in, like, two minutes. If you don’t get up there and cash that check right now you’ll have come down here for nothing.”
“Good point. We’ll talk at home. Nice meeting you, Mrs. . . .”
“Gutermann. But Millie is fine. It was lovely meeting you, too.”
Then Raymond’s mother walked around them and was gone. And Raymond could breathe deeply again. He led Mrs. G to the door, where another customer, this time a young woman, held it open for them.
They stepped out onto the street together. For a time, they didn’t talk.
The weather was cool spring, the traffic noisy with the end-of-the-day commute. People pushed past them, sometimes jostling Raymond’s shoulder in their hurry to get by.
“So I never told her about helping you,” he said after a time.
“I sensed that.”
“It’s kind of hard to explain why.”
“You don’t need to. It’s all right. I understand.”
“I don’t think you do.”
“It’s not a thing a boy brags about, having an old woman as a friend. It’s not exactly a point of pride.”
“I’m not ashamed of you. Not at all. It’s almost the opposite.”
They walked another half a block in silence. Another pedestrian nearly slammed into Raymond’s shoulder from behind in his hurry to get home.
“That you will have to explain to me, then,” she said. “Because I am not managing to imagine it on my own.”
“Oh. Wow. Hard. Okay. It’s more like I was ashamed of my family. Which I guess I shouldn’t be, but . . . I mean, my mother isn’t terrible. She takes care of us, and I guess she’s a good enough mother. But she gets mad real easily, and she never seems to let any new ideas in. Whatever she thinks is just what she thinks, and it’s always going to stay that way. And if I tell her it’s really important to me to do this, she’ll tell me she wants me to do that, and she won’t give an inch about it. I’m not sure what the word is for that.”
“Contrary?” Mrs. G offered.
“Yeah. Contrary. And I knew she wouldn’t understand our being friends. She doesn’t understand things. You understand. All kinds of things. You understand people.”
“I don’t understand people at all. I would even go so far as to say I feel more perplexed by them with every passing day.”
“Well, you understand them better than anybody else I know. You understand just about everything compared to everybody I’ve ever met. And my family . . . doesn’t. They just don’t. I guess I felt like being friends with you was this really nice thing and my family would only ruin it.”