Lavender Haze

Chapter 8

The holidays are perfect. A dream, really. When we see mom on Christmas day, she is Mom, the woman from five years ago, before any sign of dementia started creeping in, obliterating everything that made my awesome mother awesome.

When I get her from the nursing home to take her to Dan and Rafael's Brooklyn brownstone on Christmas morning, she is alert, talkative, cheerful. She remembers about my haircut, about Dan's thirty-fourth birthday, Rafael's twenty-ninth, what she had for dinner yesterday and what happened in our favourite soap opera. Most importantly, she remembers Clark and I have broken up, so I don't have to play plan-your-pretend-wedding for the billionth time.

Because my brother can't even boil water without risking setting the house on fire and Rafael is a spoiled little brat who's never learnt how to make himself a sandwich, let's forget preparing a Christmas meal, we have Chinese and Thai takeout, eat on their sofa, grabbing California rolls with our bare hands and slathering sesame oil on the wrapping paper of our gifts as we eat and tear open our presents.

I got Rafael and Daniel cooking classes, because I'm positive their cholesterol could battle Donald Trump's, and matching woollen scarves, and bought mom a cashmere sweater that she insists on wearing on the day. Then, when she unwraps Dan and Rafael's silk scarf and slippers, she coils that around her neck and slides her socked feet in the woollen slippers. Because Rafael and Dan are funny guys (at least according to them) I get a framed picture of Katherine Meowgle in a photoshopped Santa costume. I also receive a beautiful pair of burgundy suede heeled boots to replace the ones that I had to throw away.

Mom is stable throughout the entire day, so much we let her convince us to go carolling. The only one who doesn't deserve a dirty sock in his mouth is Rafael, who took singing lessons since he was still in diapers and is an incredibly skilled musician for someone who's stopped practicing his piano lessons when he was eleven.

When later in the evening I have to drop mom back to the nursing home, I'm close to tears. This has been the best day she's had in ages, almost like she was never sick to begin with, and it pains me to abandon her at Sunset View in her room.

She must read that on my face because she promises, "I'll be fine. It was a good day. The best." She kisses my forehead and lets Carla usher her to her bedroom. Instead of going home like planned, I drive back to Dan and Rafael's. I should have returned their car tomorrow anyway, so I was bound to be back in any case, but I suddenly don't want to be alone.

So we snuggle on their couch, watch Nightmare Before Christmas three times, back-to-back, before Dan dismisses himself for the night. My brother may be thirty-four on the outside, but he's ninety-one on the inside. Last time I saw him going to bed past eleven, he was a senior in high school, and even then, he was pulling an all-nighter for an AP lit test. Let's just say, no one ever accused my brother of being the life of the party before, but I love him for that. Mostly because it means I get to have time alone with my best friend once Dan has kissed us both goodnight (me on the head, Raf on the tip of his nose).

A little tipsy on mulled wine, Raf lets Nightmare Before Christmas replay for the fourth time as we decide to entertain ourselves with some light internet stalking. Because I've learned a long time ago that I have the thumb coordination of a squirrel suddenly finding itself in a human body after an incantation gone wrong, Rafael and I use a fake Instagram profile to stalk River and Mila's feeds (after liking a seven-year-old picture on Clark's profile after we'd broken up, Raf decided it wasn't safe for me to be Astrid_ClarkeNYC on social media anymore and instead needed an alter ego I could use to stalk anyone my heart desired without embarrassing myself when my thumb inevitably slipped and liked something ancient that would have betrayed my problematic snooping). So here we are, cocooned in fleece blankets on Raf and Dan's sectional, posing as DemetriaVonSchberg89 (yes, we were drunk when we came up with the name; duh!), mother of two, yoga enthusiast, vegan (because meat is murder!) divorcee in search of her true love (preferably, someone taller than 5"6', with a love for alpacas and Nigerian Dwarf goats and a healthy diet, just like Demetria) and totally loving her job as a realtor. Yep. Raf and I had a lot of fun with Demetria's profile. If I'm ever down, I look at the photos of her adorable twins (in reality, Julia Roberts' twins) and tell myself that at least I didn't have to get an episiotomy to push two small humans out of my genitals (Demetria is very vocal about her gruesome story of childbirth). In case anyone's wondering, yes, we're exclusively tipsy (real drunk) when Raf and I post as Demetria.