The plate of stuffed mushrooms was nearly gone. Stephanie Pearce had eaten most of them and started on the mozzarella sticks. She chewed them slowly after dipping them in the heated marinara sauce. The social worker had been there for fifteen minutes and hadn’t opened her dossier yet. The food had been meant to placate her, and it appeared to work.
Eleanor sat on the armrest of her mother’s chair, and they held hands in a tableau of contented domesticity.
“These are really good,” said Stephanie. “Are they homemade?”
“The mushrooms are,” said Tabitha. “The mozzarella sticks are from the store.”
“Aren’t you eating?” she asked.
Eleanor took a mushroom and nibbled it.
“The house looks good,” she said. “I like all the light.”
“Springtime,” said Tabitha. “We’re going to put tomatoes in.”
“You always have tomatoes.”
“This year we think we can put a row or to in the ground. We’ve been doing pots up until now.”
The small talk went on too long. Either the civil servant was stretching the visit to eat more food, or she was gathering the courage to do something unpleasant.
She sipped her pink lemonade and wiped her mouth on a paper napkin.
“How are you feeling, Tabitha?” she asked finally. She clutched her papers and pushed herself back on the sofa. The springs moaned.
“I’m fine,” she said.
“You don’t look fine,” she said without looking up.
It was true. She didn’t. After the renaissance, Tabitha had declined swiftly and surely. Since Eleanor had found her on the bathroom floor ten days before, she’d hardly eaten a thing. Her already-thin features had turned skeletal and no amount of makeup could conceal her sunken set eyes, hollow cheeks, or pale gums. Though cheerful, she looked ghastly.
“I’ve had a cold,” she said.
“Uh-huh,” Pearce said again to her papers.
“I had it, too,” said Eleanor.
“I got a report from Riverton,” she said to a faxed document. “You’ve gone hospice?”
“No,” said Tabitha. “I’ve been taken off the poisons they were giving me, but not hospice.”
“The doctors say you won’t recover,” she said, finally meeting Tabitha’s eyes. The social worker’s eyes were dark, cold, and certain. They frightened Eleanor.
“No one ever recovers,” Tabitha said. “The angel of death hovers over us all, Miss Pearce.”
Stephanie glanced at Eleanor. “Maybe we should discuss this alone,” she said.
“This concerns my daughter, Miss Pearce. I’ll have her here.”
“Okay,” she said. “The report predicts you don’t have much time. Maybe this summer. Probably not.”
Eleanor tried to hide the surprise, but the bluntness had caught her off guard. She didn’t know this. Summer? It was already April.
“And that’s optimistic,” she went on. “June probably. He prescribed hospice care and, according to his report, you agreed to it.”
“I agreed to consider it,” Tabitha said. “I never said I’d leave my house.”
“Can you stand?” Pearce asked. “Can I see you walk around the room?”
“This is outrageous,” shouted Eleanor. “Who do you think you are?”
“I can,” said Tabitha and stood up. She moved slowly and cautiously but got to her feet unaided. She pulled herself erect and pranced around the room, imitating a runway model. Eleanor could sense the pain each step caused her, smell the cancer on her breath, hear it in her bones. Tabitha sat back down and glared at their guest.
“Satisfied?” she asked. Eleanor saw the beads of sweat form under her mother’s wig and looked away.
“I’m not the bad guy here,” Pearce said. “I’m trying to help.”
“I’m fine. Eleanor’s fine. Thanks for the visit. See you next month.”
The big woman sighed.
“Tabitha, you’ve lost so much weight,” she said.
“You could stand to lose some yourself,” Eleanor said, unable to help herself.
“This must be some of that disrespect your English teacher told me about.”
“I think you’ll find things are fine with Mrs. Hart now,” said Tabitha.
Pearce sighed. “It’s time to face this,” she said. “I’m going to recommend that you be admitted into a top-rate hospice facility. There’s a very nice one in Riverton, Willow Canyon Care. It’s very nice. Top rate.”
Stunned and speechless, they stared at the woman on their sofa. Eleanor felt sick.
“Eleanor would naturally have to be moved to a foster family. Luckily, we have some in Riverton. There are people there who’d love to have her.”
“Love to have the money for taking in a foster child, you mean,” said Eleanor.
Pearce ignored her. “She could visit all the time.”
“I don’t want to live in Riverton,” Eleanor said. “I don’t want to leave my mother. Mom, say something. Tell her this is crap.”
“We’re doing fine, Miss Pearce. You’ve no cause to break up our family.”
“Tabitha, you’re ill. Very ill. Your house looks nice, the snacks are nice, but we both know this is all a façade. You need more care than your daughter can give you. You need full-time care. Even in this little house, I can see that it’s a trial for you to move around.”
“We’re doing fine,” said Eleanor. “Didn’t you hear her?”
“No, dear, you’re not. Tabitha needs care.”
“I can give her that,” Eleanor cried.
“No, you can’t. She needs medical help and she needs a full-time custodian, and you can’t leave school to do that, even if you were qualified.”
Before Eleanor could protest again, her mother silenced her with a squeeze of her hand.
“It’s going to get worse, much worse,” Pearce said. “You know this Tabitha. You’ll be unable to feed yourself, or dress yourself. Or clean yourself. Do you want to put Eleanor through that?”
“I can help her,” Eleanor said softly. “I don’t mind.”
“Eleanor, I think you can, but it’s affecting you. Your grades have steadied, but your school life is tumultuous, to say the least. I have to think that your life in this house has contributed to it.”
“Mom, say something,” Eleanor pleaded.
“We’re doing alright,” Tabitha said. “Don’t break up our family.”
“Is it fair to Eleanor, Tabitha? For as long as you’ve been here, Eleanor has been caring for you. Don’t you think it’s time for her to get some of that herself? Don’t you think she deserves a chance to be a kid and not a nurse? You can spare her the worst of it now and make things easier for yourself as well. Your insurance and pension will cover the costs. A new start in another town might be just what Eleanor needs. It’s time, Tabitha.”
“No,” whimpered Eleanor. “No. No, no.”
After the last syllable trailed away, the three sat in silence a long time. Silent tears left thin trails of black mascara down Tabitha’s cheeks.
“My report is due after Easter,” Pearce said. “Take the week and discuss it.”
“What can we do to change your mind?” Eleanor pleaded. “How can you make us do this?”
The woman sighed, lifted herself up, and collected her things. “Child endangerment,” she said. “If we think a household is unfit or damaging for a child, the state can step in and take action.”
“Police?”
“Police,” she said.
No one walked her to the door.
“Thanks for the snacks,” she said. “They were really good.”
The silence stretched out long after the little Volkswagen drove away. Tabitha and Eleanor sat together holding hands as if it were the only thing keeping them from dissolving. The sunny room grew bleak and unforgiving to Eleanor. The smell of spices and death mingled into a stench of despair, and when it weighed too heavy, she threw herself into her mother’s lap and sobbed.
“You know, cupcake, when I met you, you never cried. You had to learn to do it, remember? You practiced in front of a mirror. It was cute and sad. The first time I saw you really cry was when David missed school that day. It broke my heart. Still does to see it. Please don’t cry now, Eleanor. I don’t think I can take it.”
“What are we going to do?” she said, wiping her face.
“If I were stronger, we’d move away. We’d find a new place with even fewer people to grow up with. But we can’t do that. I’ve failed you, daughter. Stephanie’s right. It’s going to get bad now, and there’s no need to make it worse than it has to be. I should have done more to prepare.”
“No, Momma.”
“It’s happening just as the doctor said. I got better for a while, then I got worse. It’s happening fast, faster than he said it would. In truth, darling, I can barely stand. I hurt all the time. The pills don’t work like they used to. I’d get better drugs if I were in a hospital.”
“Is that what you want?”
“No. I don’t mind the pain. I’d rather be with you. You’re the only thing that’s kept me alive for years. You save my life every morning. I could have died at the lake, but you saved me.”
“You saved me,” Eleanor howled.
“Okay, we saved each other, but I was always on borrowed time. I’ve lived six years longer than I was promised. You know the doctor in Riverton wrote an article about my miraculous longevity last year? He did. He called me a miracle survivor. But the miracle was you. You gave me the strength.”
“How can I give you more?”
“You can’t. My body betrays me. We gotta face this, cupcake. It’s coming.”
“I don’t want to go to Riverton,” she said. “David’s here. Don’t make me.”
“I don’t want to go to Riverton either, but maybe it’s what’s best.”
“Do I have to lose both you and David?” she cried.
Tabitha sighed and stroked her daughter’s head.
“Honey, I am a foster mother. We did alright.”
“Don’t make me,” Eleanor whimpered. “Please don’t make me.”
“Okay, sweetie. Nothing’s decided yet.”
“Pearce said it was.”
“Since when do we live as others tell us?”
That made Eleanor feel better. “I could become Midge, maybe. Or Alexi. She’s rich,” said Eleanor.
“They have people who love them,” Tabitha said warily.
“They’d love me,” Eleanor said softly.
“No. Please no. Promise me you won’t do that,” said Tabitha. “Promise me. Promise me, girl.” She lifted Eleanor’s face up to look in her eyes. “Promise me!”
“I won’t,” Eleanor said. “I didn’t mean it. I’m sorry.”
Tabitha pulled her close and hugged her. She rocked her back and forth like she used to when Eleanor was little.
“Okay, cupcake,” she said. “Okay.”
They rocked together a long while. It comforted both of them, but Eleanor had lied. She knew her promise was only as good as her ability to deny her nature. Survival would trump everything. It always had. She’d fall into the Old Ways. She was what she was, regardless of what Tabitha had taught her, wanted to be, or thought she was. It was simple instinct.
“Go see Celeste again,” Tabitha said. “She’s far away. Give yourself some time.”
“Okay,” Eleanor said.
“And if it happens, cupcake, go to Riverton. Survive.”
“I will, Momma.”
Tabitha’s arms released her only when she fell asleep. Eleanor stayed on her lap, still as a lizard watching a hawk. She knew she would not let herself be taken to Riverton. She wouldn’t lose both her mother and her friend. She’d lied to her mother, but that was the least of her troubles.