Authors: S. Walden
“I’m not working tomorrow afternoon,” Ellen said tentatively. “We could all go together. It might be fun.”
Clara tensed. “I don’t think so.”
Ellen let out a sigh. Beatrice noted the tension between her mother and Clara and tried for a different topic.
“I’m a finalist for the regional spelling bee,” she offered.
Clara never took her eyes off her mother’s face as she responded. “Way to go, Bea.”
Beatrice thought it was a distracted reply, like Clara really wasn’t interested in her accomplishment.
“Clara, I wish you would let me go with you,” Ellen said seemingly unaware of Beatrice’s statement.
“Don’t you want to congratulate Bea, Mom? She’s a finalist for the regional spelling bee. That’s a big deal. A
very
big deal,” Clara added with emphasis.
Ellen’s anger intensified. “How much longer do you plan on punishing me?”
Beatrice slunk out of her chair and headed for her bedroom.
“Punishing you?” Clara asked. “Hmm, let’s see. How long have you been back? Around three months? And you left us alone for five. So I’d say you’ve got another two months to go.”
“Watch the way you talk to me,” Ellen warned. She dropped her fork on her plate.
“You’re acting like a child,” Clara spat. “You’re angry that you can’t have your way and come dress shopping with me. Why on earth would you ever think I’d want you to come with me?”
Ellen got up from the table and walked to the sink. She all but threw her dishes in and wheeled around to face her daughter.
“I’m trying, Clara!” she screamed. “I’m trying to be better! To be a good mother!”
Clara looked at her mother with disgust. She felt it everywhere inside her, coursing through her veins to replace her blood, pumping in her heart to make it contract with darkness, inflating her chest as she breathed, filling it with the black smoke of hate.
“Try harder,” she said, and left the table.
Clara hung around her mother’s bedroom door. It was open, and she watched Ellen sleeping. It was still early, but Clara was up because she hadn’t slept. She feared today, what she would learn, but she had to ask it. And not with Beatrice around. Ellen was going to tell Clara why she disappeared because Clara would make her.
She felt a surge of anger the longer she watched her mother sleeping peacefully.
You don’t get to come back into this house and take over like nothing happened and then sleep soundly at night when I’m going crazy with insomnia
, Clara thought bitterly.
“Mom!” she shouted at the top of her lungs, and Ellen jerked awake startled. She jumped out of the bed.
“What’s wrong?” she cried looking all around her.
Clara folded her arms over her chest and leaned against the doorway. “We need to talk.”
Ellen drew in a long breath. She exhaled slowly, fighting the urge to strike her daughter in the face. “Jesus Christ, Clara,” she said flatly. “You couldn’t get me up any other way?” She sank down on the bed and rubbed a shaky hand over her forehead.
“No, I couldn’t,” Clara replied pleased with herself.
Ellen grunted.
“Where did you go?” Clara demanded.
Ellen was silent.
“Where did you go, Mom?” Clara insisted. “I won’t tell Beatrice. She’ll never know. But you owe me an explanation. You know you do. All of the shit you left me to deal with! My birthday you missed! Christmas! You owe me! How about no heat? Or electricity? We had no money! No food! You left us with nothing!”
Ellen ran her hand through her hair and sighed. “Okay.”
Clara walked over to sit next to her mother.
“I suffer from severe depression,” Ellen began.
“Me too,” Clara said. “At least I think I do.”
Ellen looked at her eldest daughter and burst into tears. Clara was stunned. She simply let her mother cry, not touching her, not saying soothing words, just letting her cry. Ellen took deep breaths and tried to steady herself.
“I was so depressed, Clara. I felt overwhelmed. I missed your father. I missed my mother. I felt like I destroyed everything around me. I didn’t want to destroy you, too. You and Beatrice. I thought you would be better on your own.”
Clara blinked her disbelief. “Did you think about the bills, Mom? The responsibilities I’d have to take on? The possibility of being turned over to the state?”
“No, Clara,” Ellen replied. “I really didn’t. When you’re out of your mind, you don’t think about things like that. All I thought was that I needed to get far away from you. If I got far enough away, you would be safe from me. You would be happy. Remember how sad and angry I was? How I took it out on you girls?”
Clara nodded remembering the doors torn open and angry curse words flung at her for reasons she didn’t understand.
“I was broken,” Ellen whispered. Her face streamed with tears, but she didn’t wipe at them. She sat immobile except for the movement of her mouth as she told the story she hoped she would never have to. “I took up with a man. He was an asshole, but he gave me a place to stay. I had no self respect so it didn’t matter.
“I . . . I tried to kill myself,” she confessed. “I’m not proud of that. I overdosed on pain medication and the asshole took me to the emergency room. I’m surprised he did that. I thought afterwards that perhaps I had something to live for. Someone. Well, two someones,” she said smiling sadly.
Clara was silent. She studied her mother and saw a possible future for herself, the pain and anguish of a mental disease she could neither will away nor control. She thought she could hate her mother for doing that to her—giving her something so devastating that accounted for the voices, the sadness, her inability to cope with anything.
“When did you learn you had depression?” Clara asked suddenly.
“What?”
“You heard what I asked,” Clara snapped.
“I knew in my early twenties,” Ellen replied, confused.
“So before I was conceived?” Clara asked.
“Just before.”
“And you had me anyway?” Clara went on. Her skin went hot with the realization.
“What do you mean, Clara?” Ellen asked.
“Isn’t depression hereditary? Obviously it is if I think I have it,” Clara said.
“I suppose. It’s not a definite.”
“No, but a possibility?”
“Well, yes,” Ellen said softly.
“So if you knew you were so fucked up, why did you have children? Didn’t you know that you could pass that on? Did you think about that, or were you too busy being selfish?”
“You’re asking me why I gave birth to you?” Ellen asked, bewildered.
“Yes. You had a choice. And you made the wrong one. And guess what? Now I have to deal with it. I have to deal with your fucking selfish choice to have a child when you knew you could pass on your fucked up depression and—”
The slap was swift and biting. Clara put her hand to her cheek and stared at her mother in disbelief.
“Never talk to me like that again,” Ellen said. “I had you because I loved you!”
Clara sprang from the bed. “That’s rich, Mom! Love? You loved me? Did you love me when you left me with all of your debt? How about when you missed my birthday? Beatrice can forgive you because she’s young. Her heart isn’t a fucking stone in her chest like mine is. But I can’t forgive you. The hell you caused us. You’ve never even thanked me for taking care of Bea! I don’t care if you were feeling sad! I don’t care if you tried to kill yourself! I don’t care!” Clara screamed.
She wheeled around and stomped to the doorway. She heard Ellen sniffle behind her and turned around.
“I thought I could stop hating you. I thought it could go away. But then you slapped me and reminded me why it never will.” Her words were calm, like she was working them out as she spoke, discovering her feelings for the first time. “I think I’ll always hate you.”
Ellen let out a stifled cry. “Clara,” she whispered, but her daughter was already walking out of the room.
***
Clara was determined to go alone. Her mother pleaded over and over, but Clara was unrelenting. She thought Ellen hadn’t earned it—the privilege of spending time with her—and she wanted to punish her mother, believing she could hurt Ellen even more than when she said she hated her. And she was right. She heard Ellen crying that night in her room after Clara told her for the final time that she couldn’t go.
She watched the women talk behind the counter. They were speaking in low voices, trading jokes about their husbands and giggling softly. She wanted to approach them but was scared. She didn’t understand why she was scared. All she was doing was shopping for a dress.
“Can I help you?” she heard from behind her. She spun around and was greeted by a tall, slender woman. The woman looked nice enough—she smiled sweetly at Clara—and Clara relaxed a bit.
“Well, I’ve been asked to the prom,” Clara said. There was a note of uncertainty in her voice like she didn’t believe it. “His name is Evan.” She felt the need to say his name out loud. If she said his name out loud, it made it true.
The tall lady smiled. “Well, I think that’s wonderful.”
Clara smiled nervously. “I’ve never been to a prom before. I’ve never dressed up.”
“It’s no problem at all,” the woman said reassuringly. “We’ll get you all fixed up. Come with me.”
Clara hesitated for only a moment before following the woman to the back of the store. She was led to a section of racks with an assortment of evening dresses of all shapes, sizes, and colors. She watched as the woman hunted through the dresses, pulling out several and handing them to her.
“I’m Jesse, by the way,” the woman said.
“Nice to meet you,” Clara replied. “I’m Clara.”
“What a pretty name. You don’t hear that name too often,” Jesse responded as she continued her search through the racks. She pulled out several more dresses and threw them over the arms of a nearby club chair.
“My grandmother’s,” Clara explained.
“Well, it’s really pretty,” Jesse said. She stopped hunting and looked down at her client. “Do you like any of these?”
“I do,” Clara replied, feeling overwhelmed. “Do I try on all of them?”
Jesse smiled. “Well, isn’t that the fun part?”
Clara shrugged.
Jesse stood considering her for a moment. “Are you a senior?”
“No, a junior,” Clara said. “The boy who’s taking me is a senior.”
Jesse smirked. “Are you nervous about it?”
Clara nodded. She hung her face to hide her flushed cheeks. They burned with embarrassment. “I still don’t know why he’s dating me,” she said softly.
“I do,” Jesse said.
Clara looked up then and furrowed her brow.
“I know exactly what you need,” Jesse said. “Wait here.”
She hurried off as Clara stood holding the dresses. She felt awkward and out of place among the beautiful satin and chiffon fabrics and designer brands. She told herself not to look, but her eyes were already roving over her outfit: jeans that were slightly too short and a T-shirt that sported a few light stains. Thankfully the shirt was a dark gray, so the stains were almost imperceptible. She looked up and caught sight of herself in a mirror. She hadn’t noticed it was there. She bit her lip as she took an inventory of herself: uncertain hazel eyes, plump lips, long wavy brown hair that she used to shield her face in most of her classes. She wouldn’t have to look at her classmates, and they wouldn’t have to look at her.
The old insecurities were resurfacing, but then she remembered Evan’s sweet words to her, the way he held her hand walking down the hallway, the way he twisted his fingers in her hair when he kissed her hungrily. The way he told her time and again how beautiful she was. She told herself to snap out of it, to find a dress that would make her proud to be with him and one that would make him proud to have her on his arm.
Jesse returned holding a tray with two champagne flutes and a bottle of sparkling grape juice. Beside the bottle was a tin of chocolates wrapped in a red velvet ribbon.
“This is a celebration,” she said. “Your first prom.”
Jesse beckoned Clara to follow her to the dressing rooms. She placed the tray on a nearby table and popped the cork of the bottle. It flew out and bounced off the opposite wall, the girls ducking to protect their faces. Jesse laughed and apologized. She poured the juice and handed a glass to Clara.
“Cheers!” she said tapping her glass with Clara’s.
Clara grinned and took a sip. She’d never tasted sparkling grape juice before, and the carbonation hit her nose hard making her eyes tear up involuntarily.
“Now, Clara,” Jesse said. “I’ve got to figure out what you like best. We’ll put the dresses in order that way. No sense in having you try on the dresses you like least first. Know what I mean?”
“Sure,” Clara said.
Jesse placed her glass on the table and started sorting through the dresses, asking Clara to rate them on a scale of one to ten. Once all of the dresses were sorted, Jesse shoved five in Clara’s hands and pushed her gently into a dressing room.