IMPETUS

Schizophrenic miscellanea

"Ma?"

It had been a few weeks since he'd dropped in to see her, but he finally got around to going home again after she failed to pick up her phone all goddamn morning.

Mikey knocked on the door a good five minutes before venturing inside. Her car wasn't in the driveway, which was strange to begin with, for, so far as he knew, the woman had no place to go before noon.

"Ma, you here?" he called up the stairs, heading straight for the kitchen.

No sign of her anywhere. What was more, he could see now why he couldn't get through to her. The phone was off the hook. Mikey hung it back in its cradle.

"Michael?"

Her voice could be heard at last, sounding alarmingly weak and ineffectual.

"Ma?" he called out again, heading back the way he came, when––

"Michael, is that you?" She poked through the kitchen door, hair a mess, wearing that faded pink housecoat he hadn't seen since he was a kid. "You scared me half to death."

"Just returning the favor," he said, scrutinizing her shabby appearance. "Where've you been? Why's the phone off the hook?"

"Sometimes I leave it like that when I color my hair." She veered toward the refrigerator, swinging the door between them. Mikey scanned the scitzophrenic miscellanea decorating every square inch of magnet space. There were calenders, clippings, appointments long past, yellowing polaroids of people he didn't recognize; even colorful masterpieces from her grandchildren - Mikey's niece and nephew, whom he scarcely saw due to a falling out years ago with his older sister, Magdalena.

But perhaps the most startling, were the multi-layers of scratch cards and post-draw Lotto tickets going back half the decade spread out fan-style like some postmodern fridge-based origami.   

"Ma, that doesn't make sense." He pressed her flimsy excuse as she reemmerged with a frozen tub of gelato. Her hair was still kind of wet, he observed, but not nearly enough to have been treated recently. Also she looked flustered. The lines in her face more pronounced, practically jumping right out at him as she dug through the drawer for two spoons.

"Oh it's just my routine." She dismissed him again. "Now how bout some gelato?"

He could tell she was hiding something. "No thanks," he said, studying her. "Everything okay, Ma? You look..."
.
"I told you." She snapped, chipping away at the chocolate-flavored ice like it was hiding a wooly mammoth. "You sure you don't want some? I bet you haven't eaten a thing today."

"I'd still have to be starving to death to eat that shit."

"Michael." She scolded him with a look that made him suppress a boyish grin.

"So where's the car then?" He inquired casually. "Did someone borrow it? Could it be the person you're obviously covering for? New boyfriend perhaps?"

This time she scoffed. "What kind of a person do you take me for?"

Naively, he thought somehow he knew.

"Have it your way." He capitulated, trying hard to stick to his new habit of letting other people live their own lives.

"What difference does it make to you anyway?" The words took on a resentful tone under her icy breath. "I didn't think you cared whether I lived or died."

"Ma, don't start with me," Mikey squirmed. "I was worried about you, okay? I worry about you a lot these days. Especially when you don't answer your phone."

"I guess that's nice to know."

He tried lightening the mood. "Guess who's going to be on TV Saturday?" He challenged.

But rather than play along, she replied flatly: "How nice for you, dear." And went straight back to being preoccupied.

So much for the reception he'd hoped for.