There Once Lived a Mother Who Loved Her Children, Until They Moved Back In Read Online Free PDF Page A

own father she compares to this . . . this father of her bastard!)
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    He flew around the apartment, picking up every crumb, every little hair, all while telling me to write to his PO box. Then he changed the sheets and rolled around on the clean ones, to give the impression of deep, solitary sleep. He packed the used, stained sheets and gave them to me. “Here, have them washed,” he said. “And then?” He paused. “As the situation dictates,” he pronounced finally.
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    (Why not just let her keep the damn sheets? So this is what she washed, boiled, and ironed! And then—get this!—she actually returned them. And she was right: such men can’t bear the smallest expense.)
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    When we were ready to leave, he glanced with longing at his marital bed, then at me, and it was clear that all he wanted was an excuse to undress me again. But then he simply pulled down my tights. After that he told me to walk up one flight and only then to call the elevator. When I walked outside he was already gone. Only on the subway did I remember that I’d left my wet panties on the shower curtain!
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    (Probably knew what she was doing, ha-ha. The wife comes back, hop, a homecoming gift drops on her head—to slap her dear hubby with! And him—he had to use her again, already dressed, since she was there for the taking, gratis. Where’s your pride, Alena? Why don’t you say no?)
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    Imagining his wife with my wet panties, I felt my hair stand on end. It’s nighttime, and I’m choking with shame. How I betrayed him! I’ll never forget how he looked at me in the cafeteria, how he pressed down on my foot and then put his hand on my knee, but I pushed it off. How he and his buddy walked me to the door and suddenly he said he needed to discuss a few things with me and then scribbled a time and the address. I went there the same night. How happy I felt! On my way there I felt so happy! And what a sad, shameful ending!
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    But that wasn’t the ending; it was the beginning. The ending came later. Soon after the described events, Tima and I lost sight of our young mother, who was taking final exams, finishing her internship under this same deputy director at the research institute, where she was also defending her thesis, ostensibly, but really spending all her time with this much older man. When she finally came home she announced she wanted to talk.
    “Good. Me too.”
    “I’m getting married.”
    “How so? Is he a polygamist? One can’t be married to everyone at once.”
    “You don’t understand.”
    “What don’t I understand? Has he divorced his wife?”
    “That’s not the point, Mama!”
    “It’s not? So do you intend to be the mistress of a married man?”
    “We are going to have a baby. He’s renting an apartment for us.”
    “Who’s us? What about him? Where’s he going to live?”
    “I can’t bring him here, can I? And I’m not taking you with me,” she said with familiar hatred. “Tima, yes, but not you!”
    She didn’t take me, but she took Tima’s child support. Not right away—later, when it became clear that her so-called husband wasn’t going to spend a dime on her. Such men’s love is always platonic, immaterial. They always need their money for themselves. They’ll starve to save a penny! They are always saving for some major purchase—computer, video camera, car—and they love to get married for free, flattering themselves that their sperm represents some kind of investment. So this is whom we were feeding. My poor deceived daughter, where are you?
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    The time is night. The little one’s asleep. I continue to defend the gates against Alena’s occasional onslaughts. Last New Year—I’ll never forget—she showed up with a present for Tima: the ugliest blue plastic monster on the planet. But Tima covered it with kisses, played with it all night, and