Page 26 of The One You Chose

“I don’t know,” I grumbled.

Flopping down on the couch beside me, Zoya picked up my legs and draped them over her lap. “Neither do I, but you have a little over a week to decide.”

seventeen

What Are You Doing

Fitz

Onmymother’sfrontdoor hung the largest and most ornate wreath I had ever seen. Balancing the wreath that I bought for her in one hand, I closed the door to my car. Before I left town, my mother had asked me to get a wreath from Garden of Eden Nursery in Ridgewood. Apparently, it was consistently rated the best nursery in the area and made unique arrangements that had been featured in magazines and online. I couldn’t tell the difference, but I did as my mother asked, buying a wreath and some bulb plant called an amaryllis from a younger man ridiculously named, Thorne Eden.

Before I could get to the front door, my mother poured out onto the porch with her friends on her heels. “Baby! What took you so long? You were supposed to be here an hour ago. I’ve been cooking your Christmas favorites all day.”

“You have not, Suzette.” Her friend, Alvita shook her head. “You’ve been sitting at the table with a glass of wine and complaining about that neighbor of yours while I’ve been cooking.”

My mom shrugged. “Well, someone’s been cooking all day.” Taking the duffel bag from my shoulder she wrapped her arms around me, pulling me close to her body. The familiar scent of cherry blossom scented lotion on her skin. No matter how old I got, having a hug from my mother was one of the best feelings in the world. Pulling away she studied my face. “You look tired. How are you sleeping, have you been taking that melatonin? Because I told you, it’s only for a little while. I sent you that article didn’t I...”

As she kept on about the recommended dosage of herbal remedies for sleep, I trailed behind her into the house. A Christmas tree was set up in the corner of the living room with a few boxes underneath the tree. As a child we used to go out every year and pick out our own tree from a farm, my father would hold his hand over mine as we sawed through the trunk and my mother would take a photo of us, calling us her strapping men. This tree was smaller than the ones we used to get, but of course, she had no one to chop it down for her now.

“Oh that,” my mother came in following my eye line. “A neighbor brought that over, they had an extra.”

“Ma, I could have got you a tree.”

She raised a brow and made some noncommittal sound. Message received.

“Or I could have helped pay for it, at least.”

“Absolutely not. I am your mother and I take care of you. Now, go scoot upstairs and get changed, you can’t wear that dirty tee shirt for Christmas dinner.” I glanced down at my shirt, it was the same one I wore the night I met Lina, a screen print of one of artist Lisandre’s more popular works. I touched the red shirt, remembering the way she looked at me in it. The feel of her hand in mine as we walked away together. How badly I fucked everything up with her.

My mother pushed my back towards the stairs, and I feigned protest for a moment before relenting. She missed bossing me around, I could tell.

Making my way through the house, I was surprised to see a few changes since I had been there months earlier. After my father passed, the memories we had in our old house was too much for her. She bought a new place a decade before but still filled the house with mementos from my father. There were my father’s books on the shelf, lined up by dates of publication. Our family picture in the same spot on the staircase. My father standing awkwardly behind my mother with his hand placed on her shoulder, while I squirmed on her lap. A picture of me sitting on my grandfather’s lap, my father next to us. Three generations of Jeremiah Fitzgerald Deirs. Their wedding quilt still hung on the wall of the dining room. But the literary awards that used to line the study walls were replaced by oil paintings. The old recliner my father loved was replaced with a plush leather chair where my cat Hank was sleeping. He opened one disdainful gold eye then shut it. He must have missed me a lot.

My room was exactly the way it looked when I lived there. The wrestling trophies on the bookshelf next to James Baldwin, Gary Paulsen, and Jack London. The camouflage print comforter and a poster of my favorite rapper from my high school years. I tried to put up a poster of a scantily clad pop star once, but after an hour I found the poster was missing. My mother told me I was lucky all she did was throw it away.

Sitting on the twin bed, I imagined what Lina would think of the room. Of my mother. I could picture it so clearly, the way she would greet my mom. She would be nervous at first, then only minutes in she’d talk about her classroom and my mother would be charmed. My mother would have loved Lina.

After a long Christmas dinner of all my favorite foods, my mother’s friends left back to their houses. I called Alvita an uber since she had a few too many glasses of Cabernet. I walked my mother’s other friend, Trisha, the three blocks home. The area was relatively safe but it didn’t feel right for her to walk alone in the dark.

As I walked back to my mother’s house I stuffed my hands in my pockets to keep warm. The streets were ones I walked down many times as a child, but I never felt at home in the neighborhood. My mom was always busy with work. There were few kids my age on the street. Four years I lived at that house with my mom and it never felt the way my bungalow in Ridgewood felt.

When I returned from the blustery night, my mom had filled my wineglass with the rest of the bottle. “Now that those busybodies are gone, tell me about the girl.”

I tapped my thumb on the stem of the glass. “Who says there’s a girl?”

Pursed lips, my mom raised a single brow. “You think I don’t know my son? The way you’re mooning around here? Only a woman can do that to a man. You’re just like your father. Weeks and weeks I made him wait around before I went out with him. He had that same look on his face every time I saw him. So, stop bullshitting your Momma and tell me about her.”

Hesitating, I covered my mouth with a hand. My mother could see through me. It had been like this since I was a child. The few times I tried to misbehave my Ma knew before I got home. For so many years after my father passed it had only been the two of us.

“Her name is Lina. She’s a preschool teacher in Ridgewood.”

“And where is this Lina now? Why didn’t you bring her over here?”

I scrubbed a hand over my face, the two-day-old stubble rough on my palm. I should have shaved for my mom. “It didn’t, I mean we didn’t work out.”

“What did you do?” my mother sat back, crossing her arms over her chest.

“What makes you think I did anything?”

---