DANIEL HERON: BECOMING

1 - Shut up! I don't want to listen to this anymore!

"If you walk out that door now, don't ever bother coming back!" yelled Mrs. Heron.

Her son stopped for a moment. With one hand on the door knob, he turned to her.

"Then this is goodbye," he snapped, opened the door and left. He didn't bother closing it gently. Instead, he slammed it so hard that the window on the opposite wall clanged.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It was their worst fight yet.

Daniel would never characterize his relationship with his mother as a particularly good one. Moreover, if he had to use a single word to describe it, he would use the word bad. There wasn't any warmth between the two nor closeness. One couldn't say that they loved each other. The most accurate thing to say would be that they tolerated each other.

Mrs. Irma Heron wasn't a motherly type and Daniel learnt very early that it wasn't worth fooling himself by thinking that she would take an active role in his life. As long as you have a roof over your head, food on the table and aren't walking around naked and barefoot, you have no right to complain, was her moto.

On that day, Daniel got up around noon. Gloomy and cloudy, the day seemed as if it were made for lazing around in a warm bed. His mother did not share his opinion. She persistently tried to make as much noise as possible. Finally, Daniel got out of bed and, still half-awake, came into the kitchen.

He walked up to the tall, mustard colored fridge that was no longer able to fight the corrosion, and yawned. He ran his fingers through his uncombed black hair while his dark eyes circled the scene before him.

About fifteen years ago, back in the mid-1960s, when their kitchen was still new, it might have been appealing, but the time hadn't been kind to it. Sink full of dirty dishes, stains on the yellow laminated cabinet doors, scratched checkered gray and white linoleum flooring, wrinkled tablecloth on the kitchen table; Daniel hated all of it.

Sitting at the table, with a coffee mug in front of her, was his mother. Dressed in a floral house dress, with a cigarette in her hand, she gave him a look of disapproval. He wished her a good morning, and in return got a portion of scolding.

"It's neither good, nor morning!" Mrs. Heron said harshly. Decades of smoking gave her voice an ever-present hoarseness. "Do you see what time it is? It's almost noon! Noon!! And this is when you decide to get up? You're twenty-seven years old, for God's sake! You're not a child, even though you act like one!"

Daniel listened quietly; he knew his mother had been preparing that speech the whole morning. It wasn't the first time she lectured him in that manner. If he just let her say what she had in mind, maybe he would avoid one of those headaches brought on by her nagging.

Bringing the cigarette to her lips, she inhaled deeply, held her breath for a couple of seconds and exhaled, cloaking herself by a milky-white smoke. Then she resumed, "Till when do you plan to continue living aimlessly like this? And on my expense, for that matter! You haven't been working for three months now. You're not looking for a job, you're just gallivanting with that scum you call friends, and all on my account! Do you think money grows on trees?!"

There it is, Daniel thought to himself. The ever-present subject of money surfaced once again.

"You could have finished college by now! You could have had a diploma in your hands! But no! Not Daniel Heron! Student life just wasn't for him. The minute he had to put in some effort, he gave up. Not once, but twice!" She motioned the hand that was holding a cigarette to emphasize her words, causing a small amount of ash to fall on the tablecloth, revealing the reason why it had several burn marks.

Once again, the topic of his education turned out to be unavoidable. Mrs. Heron played that card quite often. Just be quiet and let her blow off some steam, thought Daniel. In the end, the part about him giving up college was true. Hence, he just leaned against the fridge, hands crossed over his chest and head bowed. He was avoiding eye contact with his mother, trying not to add fuel to the fire.

"Giving up is the only thing you're good at." His mother's hoarse voice was piercing through his ears. "That's why you're unemployed. Do you have any idea how many of them can't wait to get an opportunity to get a job? And you? You got that chance, but couldn't handle it. Getting up at dawn was too difficult! It's far more pleasant to sleep until noon! Having one responsibility was too much for you! It's much better to lay around all day, listening to the radio!"

As his mother went on and on about his failures, Daniel's nails sank deeper into the skin of his clenched fists. He closed his eyes, refusing to look up, feeling the heat in his cheeks, grateful that the table stood between his mother and him. He knew he wouldn't be able to hold back if Mrs. Heron continued disparaging him.

"And poor mother should finance your aimless life all by herself." Mrs. Heron, unaware of the boiling anger inside of her son, still had a need to emphasize her role in his life. "It doesn't matter that she can barely make ends meet, as long as her son has a lunch ready on the table when he gets up... at noon!"

"Enough!!" Daniel shouted. His fist bashed the counter top next to the fridge, making the stacked-up cups clink. "You're no martyr! When have I asked money from you? I've been earning by myself since high school! Those aren't vast sums you're hoping for, but it's enough for me! And this lunch you're talking about... heated can is not lunch! I've cooked more meals in this kitchen over the past three years than you've cooked in your entire life!"

The cigarette in Mrs. Heron's hand trembled, but it didn't stop her from taking in another puff of smoke. "So what?!" she replied. "It still doesn't mean that you're anything other than a jobless layabout!!"

"Yes, I'm jobless! Sorry for not wanting to spend my life loading boxes into the trucks eight hours a day! And if there's a layabout in this apartment, then it's you!"

"How dare you?! I'm your mother!"

A brittle smile escaped him. "And how many days of your life have you spent working?" he asked. "When did you have a proper job?"

"I took care of my children!!" The cigarette her fingers were squeezing burnt down to the filter.

In a voice laced with sarcasm, Daniel said, "Oh, yes, that's why they all live happily ever after and come to visit you every holiday."

"Shut up! I don't want to listen to this anymore!" Mrs. Heron discarded the cigarette bud in an ash tray on the table and lit another one, despite the shaky hands.

"Why? Because I touched the truth? Admit it, the only thing we were good for was welfare you received on account of us."

"I told you to shut up!!"

Slowly, Daniel walked up to the table, leaned his palms against it and looked deep into his mother's eyes. "It's true," he said in a completely calm voice that sent shivers down Mrs. Heron's spine. "We all knew it. Do you remember how Barbara spent her eighteenth birthday? I do. I was only six, but I remember. I'm sure you remember as well."

He remained standing like that, leaned over the table, staring deeply into his mother's eyes. for the first time he forced her to face the truth. For the first time he didn't give up and let her have her victory.

For the first time, there was dread in her eyes.

To everyone who read the first chapter of my new story - THANK YOU!

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