Aquarium

~ ~ ~

I woke in darkness, my arm shaken.

Take me to the bathroom, Sheri.

What? I didn’t remember at first, disoriented.

Take me now or the sheets will need changing. And actually, you should experience that.

Experience what?

I could smell her piss then, acidic and thick.

Oops, she said.

I yanked the comforter and top sheet back. What are you doing?

Change the sheets, Sheri. And clean me. How could you let this happen?

You did this. You wet the bed.

Letting your own mother die in her bed pissing herself. Do you hate me so much?

I got up and turned on the light. My mother naked on the bed with a yellowish spot on the sheet, spreading. I’m cold, Sheri. Curling as if she were weak.

You’re not sick. You’re not your mother. I’m not Sheri.

I’m cold, Sheri. And if you don’t take care of me, I will leave. Maybe you don’t believe that. But it’s true. I will leave. You will understand your mother and care about her life or you don’t deserve to have a mother.

She looked the same as my mother from before. Nothing had changed, except that nothing made sense now. Lying in her own urine.

I’m cold, Sheri! she screamed. I looked at her bedside clock, and it was after three a.m. I’ll get a towel, I said, and I ran to the bathroom, grabbed a small towel and soaked it in warm water, wrung it out.

I grabbed her legs carefully at the knees and pulled her to the side, away from the spot. And then I wiped her with the warm wet towel, wiped everywhere carefully, all the way to her lower back and down her thighs.

I’m cold!

I arranged the top sheet carefully over her, not letting it touch the urine, and then I arranged the comforter. Then it was time to strip the sheet from under her.

I started at the head of the bed, pulled off the corners and lifted her gently.

You’re hurting me, she said.

I’m doing my best.

This isn’t about you.

I kept pulling that sheet and lifting each part of her body, as if I were a priestess and she were some god made of flesh. No prayers or sacrifice except caring for the body, and all must be kept quiet. All our movements meant only not to anger. You had to do everything perfectly, I said. And she was still angry.

Yes. That’s right. You’re learning.

You were afraid the whole time.

Yes. But not afraid of her yelling at me or slapping me or any of that. What was I afraid of?

That she would die.

And what else?

That it would be your fault.

Yes.

My mother sat up then, and she hugged me. This is good, Caitlin. You’re good. I think you really understand something of what it was like.

But he’s still my grandpa, and I get to see him.

My mother let go of me and lay back down. Clean that spot. Use a little bit of bleach and water. Then dry it with a hair dryer. And let me sleep, Sheri. Why can’t you let me sleep? I’m tired.

I did what you wanted. I understood your life.

My mother smiled. Yeah. You understand everything. Let’s talk again tomorrow night, in another twenty-four hours, after you’ve worked and had almost no sleep. You haven’t been broken yet. I’m going to break you, and then we’ll find out who you are.

I pulled the rest of the sheet free and bunched it up and carried it to the washer. I didn’t turn it on because of the neighbors. Then I found the bottle of bleach and poured a little bit in a bucket with some warm water and grabbed a sponge.

The mattress had other stains, old. And it seemed it might soak up a lot of water, so I was sparing. I wondered whether my grandfather was awake, too. Where was his house, and what was it like? I was almost like Cinderella dreaming of the prince, except he was an old man, not a prince, and his house would be small, no castle, and this was my real mother, not my stepmother, and she had already destroyed the carriage. But the idea was the same, to leave the old life and have a new and better one.

I’m Cinderella, I said. You were Cinderella.

No I wasn’t.

You had to work. You didn’t get to have your life. You had to take care of someone else.

That’s true. But there was no prince waiting, no one to take me away. You don’t see me in a castle now, do you?

What about a house, and not having to work? What if I could get him to agree that you don’t have to work anymore? He could be a mechanic again. He would do that. I know he would. And you can spend time with Steve as your prince.

It’s a fairy tale, Caitlin. That means it’s not real. There’s a real life and there’s a fantasy life.

And Cinderella gets to have the fantasy. That becomes her real life.

Yeah. You’re right. But that doesn’t happen for us. We don’t get to cross over. Whatever road you’re on, that goes all the way to the grave.

I put the bucket down on the floor, and I didn’t know how to convince her. I sniffed the spot on the mattress, and it was mostly bleach now. I couldn’t tell whether the urine was still there or not.

I used the hair dryer on low to not disturb the neighbors. This gentle hot wind drying the urine spot, such a strange thing in the middle of the night. I was so exhausted my eyes kept closing.

What if you could go back to school? I asked. If you can’t just be given a new life, how about the chance to make a new life? He would work, and we’d live at his house, and you would go to school.

It’s not the same. I’d be about fifteen years late, too old. And where’s his punishment? It’s not enough that he has to work again. He needs to die alone. You’re forgetting that part.

You’re just mean.

Yes. Yes I am. But I want to be a thousand times meaner. I can’t possibly say anything bad enough. I’d have to pull my guts out through my mouth to be saying enough. And maybe not even then. You have a goodness, a generosity, and I don’t want you to lose that. But I lost it almost twenty years ago.

I felt the spot with my hand. The mattress hot now, and only barely damp. It seemed fine. So I went to the closet for a new fitted sheet and did my side of the bed first, pulled the sheet all the way over and then rolled her gently and attached her side. All better, I said, but she didn’t answer.

I noticed then that both our dinner plates were empty on the floor beside her. She had eaten both dinners while I was sleeping, and I was starving now. So I went to the kitchen and fixed a bowl of cereal. Almost four a.m. on the kitchen clock. At least we weren’t going to work and school and I could sleep in. Sound only of the refrigerator, and light only from the hallway. I sat in shadow in a quiet world waiting.

When I returned to bed, she spoke. I need medicine. You have to go out now.