The A-Game (new version)

Chapter 11.

"Uncle Matt phoned in from Big Lake," my mother said as she dipped a spoon into the crock pot to taste the chili.

"Really?" I asked. I was sitting on the couch trying to disengage the extension cord from the mass of tangled cords, and plugs. Extracting the orange cord was proving to be more difficult than I had originally planned. Pausing for a moment to sweep the tangled mass of blood red hair from my face, I regarded the spaghetti bowl of cables with a growing apprehension.

"Yep," she said. I could hear the clink of the spoon as it slid clean from her mouth onto the marble counter-top.

"What did he say?" I looped various ends of the cables through each other in an attempt to detangle them.

"Well, we can all thank God in heaven that your Uncle wasn't hurt. A patient came in, hopelessly intoxicated and very violent. They had to restrain and sedate her, but from the looks of things, or so your uncle says, the woman was getting ready to just about kill someone. She'd already bitten a few of the check-in ladies when they tried to calm her."

"Wow," I said. "Did he say how hard the woman bit?"

"No. But from the tone of his voice it sounds serious, so she had to have drawn a fair amount of blood at least. No, all he told me was that-," Mom paused to lick another spoonful of chilli. "-the woman was brought there. The ladies tried to calm her. The intoxicated woman then looked them both square in the eye, took a hold of their hands, lifted them to her mouth, and clamped down hard on their wrists. That's when they sedated her and had her restrained."

"Well I'm glad Uncle Matt is okay," I said. All that could be heard for a moment was the clink of the spoon against the crock pot.

"I hope so. He's as strong as an ox physically, but sometimes I worry for his mental health. He sounded tired from the other end. That lady must've been built like an ox too. My poor baby brother. Anyway, he said he plans on visiting in a month or so. Isn't that exciting?"

"Yes. Very. Do you think those ladies who got their arms bitten will be alright?"

"Oh, I'm sure. I can tell you one thing, I am incredibly thankful that my wrist was only bitten by a mosquito."

"Yeah, speaking of that, how is your wrist?" I asked her. Almost all day, my mom had been scratching at her wrist, with such desperacy that it had been decided she would visit the doctor the next day. For the time being, my dad had secured a bandage over it to stop her from itching. Even from the living room, I could hear my mom kneading her palm against the bandage, trying to ease the uncomfortable sensation resting over her dermis.

"It's almost unbearably itchy, but after talking to your Uncle Matt, knowing someone else has it worse makes me relax a little."

I sighed and let my hands, which were twisted in with the knotted wires, relax.

"You don't think it's serious, do you?" There was a long pause, and I finally managed to get the extension cord free from the jumble of other cords.

"Don't be ridiculous. It's only a mosquito bite. I strongly suspect that its an allergic reaction of sorts. I really don't want to go to the doctor if it means him telling me what I'm pretty sure I already know. However, your father insisted. I'll be fine, Misty."

"Okay good." I relaxed a little. If anything were to happen with my mother I would be heart broken.

"So, what are you doing with the extension cord?" she accused. I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

"Oh-this? Dad asked me to get it for him," I stuttered.

"He did, huh? What does he need it for?" Mom's tone of voice was disfigured its tone into one that was clipped. I felt my stomach roll over in dread. By now, I knew what this meant. Over the littlest things, it started; random things. I'd press a button on the microwave, and her tone would convert to a suspicious, clipped, impatient one. One that would cause cold wires of tension to slip through my nerves. In the five times it had happened, all of which were today, this tone always preceded an angry outburst. I took a deep breath. If I tread light enough, I could probably avoid the onslaught of emotional blows that her just recent outbursts usually rained down.

"He can't move the truck out from the garage and out of the way of the plug-in, so he has to use the extension cord to plug his phone in. He's expecting a phone call."

That, apparently, was the wrong thing to say. Despite the fact that the cupboards stood as a barricade to separate my mother from me, I could still feel heat searing the air like a laser connecting the beads of anger in her eye-sockets to mine. I felt the footsteps before I saw her walking toward me, a vision of flaring nostrils, and eyes dead set on her target: me. The spoon clattered and clanged as she slammed it down on the table. It deflected from the cheap, scratched, wooden table, not peculiar to its nature, but this, this wasn't within my mother's nature. I thought this as I watched her eyes flare to an anger I had never before seen in my mother before today. They were the self-same gray eyes that I had known to reflect disappointment, but never anger. Her eyes never changed color, but they had the ability to harden in a way that expressed subtle, quiet and calm disappointment, a much more terrifying strategy when it came to small mistakes like getting bad marks in school every now and then. And then, once again, they could soften just as easily, into eyes that expanded to the world around her. They opened into a merry and kind warmth that instantly corroded the very icy nature of her sharp, gray eyes. This, however, was even scarier than the cold look of stern disappointment. It was a look that seeped into the very nature of her mother. Her complexion become red. I felt like I knew no other color to touch my mother's skin. All I had ever known about my mother was unraveling as her lividity ravaged the very beauty of her once-soft features. She became a woman barred from no other emotion than mad fury. What I feared as my mother came angrily upon me, was what the woman before me was capable of. So far no physical violence had come from her recent symptoms of anger, but that didn't stop me from fearing beyond anything else, what her capabilities were. My mother stepped toward me, and I flinched, but just like all of the other times, as quickly as the anger had appeared, it disappeared.

     My mother stood before me, eyes wide in bewilderment and confusion. She had no recollection of the searing anger that had blistered her features only seconds before. I had trouble in believing it myself. She looked so innocent. She seemed completely blameless for anything I could possibly accuse her of. It remained a psychological anomaly to me that she somehow came up with a reason as easy and real as if it were truly real. She passed the memory loss off at first, as having to have forgotten in that normal way people forget every now and again, when they walk into a room and forget why. So, excusing it, she stood there still with no worry as she subconsciously invented a story for her brain to take in. At last she just smoothed out her hair and said "Oh of course, I was going to ask you if you wanted cheese or sour cream in your chili."

     My tongue felt cemented to the floor of my mouth. Unable to detangle the jumbled knot of words and thoughts in my mouth, I silently shook my head in reply. I could feel the saliva gather at the edge of my throat, choking me. However, I dismissed it. There was a voice there, in the back of my head, telling me that, for some reason, denying her dismissal of the truth would lead to an impending doom of sorts. Perhaps it would unleash another terrifying tantrum of fury, or turn my mother in on herself. Both events didn't sound entertaining, and so I bit hard down on my tongue. The words that had been on my tongue only moments before, reverberated up my clenched teeth, to the roof of my mouth, and back down my throat again. I swallowed the knot that had formed with a single gulp. Mimicking my mother in the way I smoothed my hair, my fingers fumbled for the loops of orange cord that my fingers still gripped. With the deliberation of a jewel thief, I tiptoed to the door of the garage to give Dad his extension cord.