Shadows

Literary Review, Spring, 2004 by Brendan Short

"Were there cultural differences?" I asked. I thought of Derrick, his fiancee, and his family, and I felt that I had beaten them at something. I tried not to think of C.J.

"That's it," she said, relief in her voice. "That's exactly it. They would bring their children with them and talk on the phone, listen to their music. Three of them quit without warning us--like they had no obligation to Mom whatsoever. Once I had to postpone Europe when a girl didn't show up."

"Unfortunately, with what the agencies pay, they attract people you wouldn't want to care for your lawn, let alone an aging parent," I said. It was something I had rehearsed. "As a result, the family spends too much and gets too little--and in most cases ends up paying for an unreliable type of person or, at the very least, someone the aging parent would not be comfortable with."

I told her my fee: thirty dollars an hour--more than triple what I make now, ten dollars more than the woman would pay an agency. She hesitated and then said that she would have to talk to her family. When I thought of the money, I thought of C.J. and what I would need to keep him.

"I just know that Mom would love you," the woman said.

I walk the route Mrs. Waller and I took earlier and check the woods behind her apartment complex. I wander among the trees. Leaves are starting to appear on branches, and a robin swoops down to gather twigs for a nest. Mrs. Waller stands beside a spindled elm and stares at her arms, which she holds out in front of her.

When I call her name, she looks up and grins, then looks back down at her arms. I run to her. I want to take her in my arms, hold her to me, but instead I stop.

"Something has happened to my blouse," she says. "Would you look at that?"

I search for something on her sleeves--a stain or snag, perhaps--but find nothing.

"It's all over me," she says. "Even on my hands."

She rotates her hands, but I see nothing there except the shadows of blossoms and leaves and branches, darkening her skin and the fabric of her blouse. And when I see this, I realize that she is speaking of the shadows.

As I point up to the branches and then down at her arms, I explain shadows to her. She nods and thanks me. Between Mrs. Waller and C.J., I am often asked to make sense of the world and trusted to tell the truth. I tell myself that I do my best, though sometimes I don't believe it.

I have things to finish, things to straighten out, before I leave Mrs. Waller forever. I run bath water and help her undress. As she sits in the tub, I microwave macaroni and cheese, take out the garbage, sweep the floor. I wash her with a sponge, and when she is dried and dressed in her pajamas and robe, we sit down to dinner. She waits for me to take up my fork before she does the same.

We eat in silence. When we finish dinner, we sit in silence. Mrs. Waller waits for a cue from me, but I am unwilling to move. The wall clock ticks. The sun sinks outside the window and shadows obscure parts of the room. I am already late to pick up C.J.; each minute costs a dollar more, but still I cannot move. I don't want to leave this world of anonymity and gentility, where I am new each morning.