Family
written by: Sheila Levin
It was perhaps predictable that David Palmer, who had made his first million in real estate by the time he was 30, would enter politics.
What was not so predictable was his stunning success with the voters. He had the kind of star quality, good looks, charm, and an honest appeal that resonated with a wide variety of constituencies.
For a time, his single status did not hurt, either. He made every Bachelor of the Year list. But he was no playboy. He worked hard, paying attention to the issues that affected his district: the upper east side of New York City. He was known for calling and writing constituents, for responding personally to their complaints and requests.
He surrounded himself with perfection, beauty. Everything he owned was original. He despised copies. His personal habits were impeccable. What he could not control was the draining of body fluids and those he attended to with dispatch. He did not smoke or spit, was repelled by stains and odors, showered at least twice a day, and washed his hands obsessively. He wore only natural fabrics close to his skin.
He was careful to keep his eccentricities secret: that he wore underwear only once and then disposed of it, that he found the sight of older people revolting, that he could not eat for hours after he smelled something sour, was terrified of bugs, would not hire anyone overweight, regarded a stained piece of clothing as permanently ruined. The list of what David Palmer found distasteful expanded yearly. He was rich enough to support his eccentricities and wise enough to conceal them.
David had a knack for winning people over. This was apparent in the Senate, where his abilities to persuade opponents to support a bill they really did not like were legendary. He kept his promises; he prided him- self on his good name, his reputation for integrity in a profession where that virtue was fast disappearing, was famed.
When David was a boy and afraid of the dark, his mother sat by his bed humming a sweet tune, stroking his forehead. He remembered how the light faded from the room as darkness seemed to seep in behind her. He was afraid it would engulf her as it crawled towards him. However, she was immune from the enveloping darkness. She diffused the darkness with her body; her eyes were beacons providing him with points of reference.
The song ended, and she rose to leave. “Don’t go, mother,” he pleaded. “I’m afraid.”
His mother smiled; he tried to count the soft creases in her face. She said, “You’re never alone, sweet boy. I’m always with you.” He pressed her hand to his cheek, closing his eyes so that he would not see her leave. Years later, he could recall at will her fingers splayed on his cheek.
They lived alone, mother and son. The father had gone years before. David did not remember him at all. While he was sometimes curious about his missing father, he did not yearn for him or wish for his return.
He wondered how his friends could stand having two parents. It seemed an awkward arrangement, two parents and more than one child. Far better, thought David, to have what he and his mother had.
While she lived, his mother’s breath was his center of gravity. When her eyes spilled over with translucent drops of tears, he was there with a tissue to remove the lash. He could not resist her planes. He yearned to touch her curves, arches, angles, her soft flesh.
Her arms extended, she invited him to drink, to sip some comfort and he sucked for dear life. Later she hid her breasts beneath a wrapper, safely tucked in a brassiere. Now all he had as she cradled him in her arms was the cardboard taste of commercial fiber.
She barred him from her flesh as all mothers do. He understood. He played the game. However, she could not secure his dreams; even she could not protect him there.
Did she know?
In the morning, her body encased in a plumed robe, barefoot, fixing breakfast, humming along with the radio, their eyes never met. He took his coffee black. She poured him a cup. Standing to her left, so close his head could have nestled in the forbidden place.
Did she know?
Was that why, although they passed the time of day, “Nice morning, fine weather, storms possible?” Their eyes never met.
Sitting across the oak table, she poured herself a cup, added some cream and a teaspoon of sugar. She lifted her arm, the wide sleeves of her robe fell back, and he sought refuge in the black ink of his cup.
Her legs were crossed; the odious wrapper covered one knee. He felt a momentary flash of anger as her naked leg kept time to the music. She shaved them close, her legs, until they were glass smooth, shimmering with reflected light.
Her hair was weaved into one long thick Indian plait falling halfway down her back. Blessed with a widow’s peak, her delicate face was framed in tendrils, and the line of her forehead was enhanced by the slight V of her widow’s peak.
He knew every freckle, every mole, every blemish. On the inside of her left arm, there was a line lying just beneath her elbow, a crease about one inch in size going nowhere, connecting nothing, just there, that crease. He looked for it when her arm was naked to him.
Everything was forbidden, of course. Touch, taste, smell, she denied him everything, smiling all the while.
He got her back by denying himself nothing in his dreams. Only some- times did they get too vivid, too real even for him. He would awaken with a dry mouth, his heart pounding, his body covered with sweat, his penis leaking more wetness. He sat bolt upright, unsure of which way to go, back into the terrifying sensuality of the dream or to the bathroom to relieve himself?
Did she know?
When David was 19, his mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. It was too late, the doctor said, for surgery. She refused radiation. The odds, she told David, were simply not worth the suffering.
“Only thing I ask you,” she said to him, “don’t let me suffer.”
He took to his post: son, doctor, friend, priest. A man manages such things and a university beside. He made her comfortable, relieved her of domestic duties, prescribed rest and a light diversion. His palliative words delivered in a soothing tone seemed to comfort her. For once, he held the power in his hands, he thought. That was all right. He was a kind man. He would not abuse his authority.
***
In his mother’s last year, David mimicked her symptoms. He kept up as best he could with her weight loss, her lack of appetite. He developed headaches and a permanently sour stomach. Sometimes when he felt her weakness envelop him, he stayed home from school, reading in a chair in her room.
Once he took a shot of Demerol to keep her company. Towards the end, the last weeks, he steeled himself to give her extra shots for the pain. He could see no reason she should wait the prescribed four-hour interval.
He filled the syringe, swiped from the nurse’s kit, and they laughed as he found a vein, swiped it with alcohol, and plunged in the needle that would bring her relief.
In her dying year, they were never apart. He was so glad to see her alive he hardly noticed she had lost her looks.
“Are you afraid?” he asked her.
“A little, but not so bad as I would have thought. I feel bad though to leave you alone.”
“I’ll never be alone,” he replied, “as long as memory serves.”
They celebrated with a feast on her good days, thick steaks charbroiled, baked potatoes with caviar, Boston lettuce with Roquefort cheese.
David made sure she had enough pain medication to relieve the pain. The doctor warned him to be careful, that she might, in a drugged state, overdose herself.
David did the best he could to brighten her last months. In the morning, he left her just enough pills for the day. He frequently came home be- tween classes, to see if she was all right, if she needed anything. He brought her treats, but she was too sick to eat, too weak to appreciate the flowers.
One morning, as he was putting her pills in the small saucer on her night table, she said to him, “The pain is worse these days. Leave the bottle.”
He held the bottle in his hand, shook out two more pills.
“I said leave the bottle,” his mother said, her voice weary with hopelessness. Still he hesitated.
“You can’t control everything, David,” she said gently. “Someday you’ll know that.”
He left the bottle. He sat down on the side of her bed and kissed her. “I love you so much,” he said.
“Yes, I know you do,” she said. “I know how much you love me.” When he returned home from school in the late afternoon, he found his mother comatose, on the floor.
He would never stop asking himself if he had known. He must have known, he thought, that she would take the bottle. An overwhelming odor of vomit pervaded the room; it would be years before he stopped smelling it. He called 911 and held her in his arms for the 23 minutes it took them to arrive. He snatched the blanket from the bed and wrapped her in it, cradling her, crooning to her, pleading, begging her to live. He would lose this last contest; his mother had finally outsmarted him.
NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR:
A chapter from the novel “Musical Chairs.”
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