Jeremy feels no need to pretend that this is funny. “You do realize that meant I never had a dad who was a role model in the business world. Good or bad. Somebody to emulate, somebody to rebel against.”
She shrugs. “You have me.”
“It’s not the same.”
His mother sits back, folding her hands on the napkin in her lap. She gets stronger, he knows, and grows calmer when she’s upset. “How’s your sister?”
“I don’t know. Why don’t you ask her? She isn’t talking to me.”
“Why?”
Jeremy just shrugs. An only child, his mother doesn’t understand the sibling thing.
“That wasn’t her just now texting you?”
“Mom. Texting isn’t talking.” He doesn’t mean to say it so sharply. His mother falls silent. The subject of Jenny always discomfits her. “It doesn’t matter. We’ll make up. We always do.” Then, back on point: “When was the last time you even got a raise? Or asked for one?”
“I’m paid well for what I do,” she insists.
“For all those long hours, the busted holidays and missed birthdays? Disney World, Grand Canyon. Texas and Grandpa, twice. Paid well for your incredible doglike dedication to the firm?”
She says, “Now you’re just being mean.”
Jeremy chews and nods. Part of him regrets playing this broken record again. He’s no longer interested in the salad. His phone chimes with another text message, probably from Jenny, but he doesn’t bother to look at it. “You’re not that old. Lots of experience. International sales. You could hire on with some K Street lobbying outfit selling almonds to the Chinese or Stingers to the Saudis. Pull down serious money; solid up your retirement.”
Frowning, his mother says, offhand, “Nobody should be selling the House of Saud anything.”
“Mom.”
“Joke.” But her unamused look suggests it wasn’t. “And ‘not that old’ sounds like damning with faint praise. Compared to what? Flight attendants?”
He puts down his spoon and wipes his mouth with his napkin, frustrated. “Never mind.”
“So”—she studies him for a moment—“would we even be having this conversation if your father had been the one who wasn’t always around when you wanted him?”
Now he feels like he’s nine years old, complaining about her missing his star turn as one of Fagin’s orphans in a local high school musical production of Oliver! But he can’t stop himself. “I’m just saying. Well paid? Mom, even an entry-level credit-swap trader’s half-year bonus last year on Wall Street was probably more than you’ve made in your whole fucking career.”
His mother stares at him, her eyes opaque, unreadable, but unspeakably sad, the way he remembers them looking down at him when, in the middle of the night, she was called away and woke him up to say goodbye. Suddenly he feels unsettled, his mouth dry, his hands tingling, the sounds of the restaurant rattling around them as if somebody turned up the treble. Sometimes, when he’s with her, the old anxiety and resentment just boil up and over.
“You wanted me to study philosophy, as an undergrad,” he mumbles, meaning it to be sarcastic, but she takes him literally.
“I was seventeen when you were born. I never got to go to college. I wanted you to have opportunities that I didn’t.”
Same old complaints, same old rationales, the broken record. Things that cannot be undone, words that cannot be unsaid.
“I know,” he mumbles.
For a moment, she doesn’t respond, and whatever emotion lurks behind his mother’s temperate, unwavering gaze is too well disguised for him to gauge it. “Why don’t you try this: whenever you look at me, tell yourself, I am not going to bend over every day, like my mom, and let the world kick my butt.”
Jeremy shakes his head, his face hot. “I would never say that.” He doesn’t want to meet her steady gaze.
“We did the best we could,” she insists. More than a flicker of hurt in her eyes. “I’d like to think I played a part.”
“I never said you didn’t.” It’s all he can think to say. He loves her, he resents her, he’s scared about what might be going on with her slips and misremembering, but right now he just wants to escape to the safe refuge of his campus apartment and clear his head.
“You don’t need to take care of me,” his mother says, still reading his mind. “Or worry.”
“I won’t. I don’t.”
“You’re lying,” she says. “It’s sweet. I’m sorry if I ruined your life.”
“That’s not what I said.”
“Okay.” Her smile of surrender lifts his mood like clouds clearing on a windy day. He can’t help it. The power of Mom. Making it okay when he dropped out of T-ball and his dad looked so disappointed; letting him pretend a cold was lingering long after it was gone so that he could stay home with her and the new baby Jenny until she had to go away on another months-long sales trip on the other side of the world. He’s nine years old, flustered, frustrated, self-conscious, wanting that mom all the other kids have, who bakes cookies and cries at the end of movies. But not willing to give up the mom he has.
“You still tutor downtown?” he asks her.
“The little kids, yeah. I’m glad you and Jenny talked me into it.”
“Once a week?”
“More or less. I’ve cut back.”
“And the other nights?”
“Busy.” Her eyes narrow; he can see that she’s probably gun shy about where he might be going with this. “Nap. Knit. Cook. You know. Reality TV.” Jeremy recalls that she and his father rarely watched television when he was growing up, and his mother was notorious for her calamities in the kitchen. “I unwind; is that okay?”
“Did you really see the doctor?”
She squares her shoulders and puts her knife and fork across her plate. “Why would I lie to you about it?”
He doesn’t know. That’s another thing that worries him, but he’s not willing to push it any further today. “Jenny and I think you should start dating.”
“What?”
He grins, enjoying putting her on her heels for once. “Swipe right on some desperate widower and, you know, have a social life, find some release.”
“Release?”
“You’re the one who brought the subject up. Dad’s been gone for, what, almost a decade? And now you’re geezing out. YOLO, Mom. Pop that female Viagra, and you go, girl.” Her spontaneous laugh is infectious. “Why not?”
“Tinder?” His mother approximates a scandalized grimace. “Be a sex fiend?” The latest of her sundry smiles spreads; this one he knows is genuine. “You’re funny.” She reaches out, touches his arm again, and leaves her small hand on it. “You want to go, don’t let me keep you.”
“No,” he lies, again. “All good.” He pushes his salad plate back, done. They can order coffee. No harm in his staying a little longer; the seminar starts at four.
“I love our lunches,” she says absently, looking around the restaurant with her restless curiosity.