Most of the time, I tried to just feel grateful for the time I’d had with her.
I knew I’d been so lucky.
Every Sunday, she bought a bouquet of flowers at the grocery store. Then every morning, she’d snip one of the flowers out of the bouquet and wear it behind her ear. I don’t have a memory of my mom without a flower behind her ear.
Even on the day we buried her.
Back at my hovel, sitting on my little love-seat sofa, I felt a longing for my mom so intense, it felt like it was filling up my lungs. If she’d been here, I would’ve rested my head on her shoulder and she’d have stroked my hair. I would’ve pressed my ear against her chest, shushed by the rhythm of her breathing. And then she’d have tightened her arms around me so I’d know for sure I wasn’t alone.
Because that was the most essential thing about my mom. She couldn’t always fix things for me, but she was always there.
Until the day she wasn’t.
* * *
I WAS JUST wondering if this was the most alone I’d ever felt in my life when I got a text from my father.
I never got texts from my father.
I didn’t even know he had my contact info.
But the phone pinged, and there it was on the screen: This is Dad. I’m at your building. Which apartment are you? I’m coming up.
Wait—at my building? Coming up? Wasn’t he in Singapore?
You’re not in Singapore? I texted.
I’m back.
Oh, no. He wasn’t coming up. I’d been pretending to be successful in front of him for years. No way was I letting him see the truth of my life.
I’ll come down, I texted.
I need to talk to you. Privately.
Wait right there.
Before he could argue, I leapt into action. He was not coming up here.
I was already ready for bed. It had been that kind of a day. But I swung on my favorite batik-print cotton robe—once my mom’s—kicked on some fuzzy slippers, and then headed toward the top-floor hallway looking, shall we say, not exactly ready for prime time.
I slipped into the elevator just before the doors closed and only noticed when I turned around that there was someone else in there with me.
I could see nothing but his back and the back of his baseball cap, but that was enough.
He slouched against the front corner, facing away, leaning hard into that corner, like it was the only thing holding him up. He was wearing a vintage 1950s-style bowling jacket like hipsters love to find when they’re thrifting. But he didn’t seem like a hipster. And the jacket didn’t seem all that vintage, either. More like a new version of an old jacket?
Who did that?
I was about to ask him to press Lobby for me when I realized that one, he’d already pressed it, and two, he was busy talking on the phone.
“Oh, my god, she’s so fat,” he said then to his phone, with a definite vibe like he had no idea I was there. “I thought she had to be pregnant, but no. She’s just unbelievably obese.”
I felt my face make an Umm—what? frown.
“Seriously,” he went on, “her whole side of the bed was sagging. Fifty-fifty she broke the springs. Belly fat for the Guinness book, I swear. And she does that thing where she breathes like she’s choking. It’s hilarious.”
Hilarious? What the hell kind of conversation was this?
He went on. “Another one-night stand. Big mistake. Huge mistake. She shredded the sheets. Those nails. Not even kidding—I might really need stitches. But what was I supposed to do? She threw up in my entryway.”
Okay. Now he really had my attention.
“I know,” he went on, voice still at full volume. “But then five minutes later, she’s dry-humping me again—just like in the parking garage. I think I pulled a hamstring.” He tapped his head against the elevator wall. “I tried to kick her out of bed,” he said next, “but she just kept coming back. And oh god, she’s a moaner.”
This must be the worst conversation I’d ever overheard. Who talked like this? I hate admitting to being this naive, but it had never even occurred to me that conversations this awful even happened.
Who was this guy? What a weasel.
I looked him up and down for identifying details. But there wasn’t much to go on with him facing away, slumped in the corner like that. His hair was brownish. His height was tallish. The only distinctive thing about him was that bowling jacket. Red and white with cursive stitching.
He was still talking. “Yeah, I got home from work and she’s still in the bed. So now it’s a two-night stand. And last night, she did that thing where she planted her fat ass right in the middle of the mattress and then she rolled on top of my face. I almost suffocated, I swear—under a mountain of blubber.”