Memoirs, Ink

My Permanent Condition 

...Once we entered the store and started down the long expanse of linoleum everything slowed down. I felt very small next to Jody, and I wanted to shrink even smaller so no one would see me with her. I wandered off the path into the racks of clothes, walking quickly trying to lose her. I weaved through round racks of overalls, skirts, and purses. I passed the shoe section with its sour smell of new plastic, then turned a corner and bumped into Jody again. She was breathing in short asthmatic breaths. Her nostrils were flaring and the inside of her eyebrows were drawn up like a baby about to bawl.

“There you are!” I said. At this, her eyebrows returned back to normal and her breathing sounded less like a bull’s. We continued to work our way toward the bra section. As we got closer, I stopped to examine something on every rack. Finally Jody grabbed my wrist and took me to a display of training bras and presented them to me.

“Here,” she said, with a flourish of her hand. “This is what you want.” I stiffened and looked quickly around. A woman in a K-Mart blue vest was upon us.

“Can I help you?”

“No,” I said.

“Yes,” Jody said at the same time. “She needs a training bra.” Jody fidgeted.

I glared at her, but was glad I was no longer left to her guidance.

“Oh,” said the middle-aged woman with brown fuzzy hair. She drew out the O and looked around. “Where is your mom?” she asked.

I had been bracing myself for this question, but somehow it still disarmed me. All of the muscles in my body tightened to hold back the wave of grief I felt rising. But this time a whole ocean inside of me let loose. Sudden tears began to leak out of my eyes. Sweat formed on my forehead. My skin burned. I choked when I spoke, trying to keep the water from shooting out and filling up the K-mart and drowning me. “She died,” I said, wiping my tears, holding up my chin.

It was at that moment, standing barely taller that the clothing racks with Grody Jody Jensen and a stranger, that I realized what my mother’s death meant. The flat-chested ease of childhood was gone. Everything was confining straps and lace now—and things that had to be hidden. But most of all, I realized that the future would have many more uncomfortable, pained, maybe even glorious moments, but for each of them, I would be utterly and unspeakably alone.