A Mother's Love by Ruth Wind

Author:Ruth Wind
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin Enterprises
Published: 2008-09-15T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SEVEN

MARK FROWNED AT THE Mariners game on TV. He held a beer in one hand and the telephone, loosely, in the other. Truth was, he couldn’t have said who’d just gotten the base hit. Instead he bounced the phone in his hand and thought, Okay, big guy. At the sound of a gunshot and a woman’s scream, you’ll break down a door and go in without hesitation, but you don’t have the guts to ask your own mother a straight question.

He’d asked before. She wouldn’t be any more open this time.

Yeah, but had he ever said, Mom, this is important to me?

Crap. He set down the beer, grabbed the TV remote control and muted the game, then dialed.

“Mark!” she exclaimed in pleasure. “How nice to hear your voice!”

Now he felt guilty to have an agenda. He couldn’t call his own mother just to chat? Maybe he should put off asking about Dad….

Coward.

Yeah, so?

She chatted about the cruise she was thinking of taking that winter with a group of other women from work. He made appropriate noises and waited for his chance.

When it came, he said bluntly, “Mom, I actually called to ask you about Dad’s depression.”

“Oh, Mark! Let’s not talk about ancient history. For goodness’ sake, what difference does it make now?” It was as if he’d asked a question about whether Jimmy had really pushed him down the time he skinned his knee in second grade. As if the subject of his father’s life and death was also trivial.

Mark thought about the fear curled tight in his belly, like a tumor that could swell silently at any time, and said, “Mental illness can be hereditary. Rachel and I should know what kind of problem we might be carrying.”

“She’s never worried.”

“Yeah? You ever ask her?”

“Why would I? You’re the one who’s obsessed with your father. I doubt she’s thought of him in years.”

“She and I talk about him. We know you don’t like to and usually we respect that.”

Her wounded silence was one of her principal weapons. He’d never been able to take it. Damn it, she was a fellow victim of the tragedy, not a perpetrator. He invariably felt cruel dredging up the painful times. This time, although it was hard, he sat silent, too.

She spoke at last in a brittle voice. “What is it that you want to know?”

So easy? he marveled. Had he simply never asked firmly enough? Did that place the onus for the not knowing on his own shoulders, not hers?

He swallowed. “I keep wondering when depression might hit me. When did he start having trouble?”

“How would I know? He certainly wasn’t honest with me!”

Wasn’t honest with her?

“You mean, it started before you met?”

She made a sound he identified after a startled moment as a laugh—the angriest one he’d ever heard. “At the funeral… Can you believe it? I’m burying my husband, and one of his best friends from back home tells me that he’d tried to kill himself in high school.”

“Dad tried to

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.