Masked
Johnny had told me not to leave the house, insisting that if I needed anything, that I should FaceTime him.
“Hand it over,” he had sighed, extending his hand. He had put on a show of how much this instruction taxed him, like a friend lamenting how expensive a gift was — an accusation that lashes from the tongue and demands an unfounded apology. The gift is now tainted; coated in a glaze of commitment and responsibility — to accept it is to acknowledge that I must reciprocate by not asking for another favor. Maybe that’s why Johnny is so reluctant to help his own mother, he thinks I have nothing left to give besides leaving him alone.
I have learned to add half an hour or so to every time he promises to meet for dinner, which is shocking seeing he drives like his head’s on fire. He moved in with Sarabeth in March last year and she’s been his fiancée for the last five months. She and I were laughing over soft cheese, olives, and biscuits in the dining room as we tried to get their daughter, Polly, to say “Polly wants a cracker” when Johnny arrived, loosening his striped tie with one hand and dropping his keys into a small ceramic bowl with the other. He lifted his head with effort and his eyes settled on me. In them I could see how he had forgotten I would be here tonight; how his long-awaited plans were now shifting: no watching football reruns cuddled on the couch — instead he would have to talk to me. I immediately felt like I should leave but I pretended I hadn’t noticed and grinned stupidly instead, welcoming him back home. It’s my right to be here, I decided. I am his mother after all.
After a bit of shuffling at the entrance, he joined us at the table. His suit looked stiff and out of place in an environment that was a moment ago filled with childish giggles, now being dispelled like olive oil and vinegar. He slid into the chair to the left of me that sounded a groan in protest. He looked disheveled, his eyes red-rimmed and his rusty red hair tinged gray, sprouting like the weeds of old age. I wanted to take his head to my lap and stroke it like I used to, but he would never allow that now. We talked about the usual topics: how there are more unknowns than knowns, how the virus might have started, and when things might go back to normal. Sarabeth suggested that he show me how to work FaceTime while she went to heat the lamb.
“In case she needs anything,” she nodded, balancing Polly in the crook of her right arm and holding her wine glass in her left hand. “She should be going outside as little as possible.”
He sighed as discreetly as he could and shifted in the ladybug red wooden chair to face me. A patch of the paint flaked off the seat and drifted to the ground. It was the kind of chair that had a slightly uncomfortable back; the design digging into that sweet spot between my spine and shoulder blade that only worsened every time I rearranged myself. My bones and muscles did not bend that way no matter how much I willed them to. I didn’t dare comment — Sarabeth had made them along with the various ceramics around the house. I could see the pain of the chair egging on Johnny’s irritability, becoming one of those inanimate objects that contributes to a pre-existing mood.
Gripping my phone in his hand, it was clear how little I used it. I hadn’t bothered to buy a case but it was still pristine as it only emerged from my house when I came here, snapping precious pictures of Polly that moved when I held them down. I considered asking how to turn this function off now but decided against it. Johnny made the piece of technology look as old as me when held next to his slimmer version as if my phone hadn’t caught on with the latest diet trend. He rushed through the instructions, punctuating each step with a jab at the screen or an eyebrow raise. I nodded obediently, knowing that I would forget all of this even though I was trying hard to understand how one button led to the next. I thought back to the times when he had run to me, tears slashing his ruddy face while he gripped his textbook helplessly, feeble highlights and sticky notes detailing a map of memorization instead of understanding. I had dried his tears and told him to sharpen a pencil and bring me a clean piece of paper.
“Let’s start over,” I had said, and sketched out stoichiometry in little circles and boxes until he had completed every practice problem correctly. I knew because I had checked every single one with two pens: the green pen lighting up the page and the red pen lying abandoned. He had mowed me over with a hug and whispered a thank you into my ear, his eyelashes grazing my cheek.
The sound of a cell phone ringing jolted me back to Johnny’s instructions, my phone clutched in his hand displayed his name and the reflection of my confused face. I almost reached for the “accept” button, the tensing of movement in my arm a second away from taking action just after Johnny tapped the “end call” button on his phone. My screen went dark again, asking me why I had thought to bother. Why this attempt to connect would be any different. He let my phone clatter to the table as he pressed decline on his device.
“Easy as that,” he said, looking me in the eye as he raised his glass to the air, a toast to himself.
I know it isn’t safe for people my age to go outside now, but Johnny was never going to pick up my call while working. On the rare chance he did, I could imagine exactly what would happen.
“You need what?!” he’d exclaim.
“Apples,” I’d reply, aware of how stupid I sounded. But he had asked me to call if I needed anything. He would shake his head on the other end of the line, his short-cropped hair rustling against the receiver. He would think I hadn’t understood the rhetorical quality of this question. How foolish of me to have faith in my son. So I set out on my own, determined to commit a small act of rebellion and avoid this phone call. He would never know I had left.
Apples cannot be substituted. Greek yogurt can be used to replace sour cream, seeds that have been soaked in water for eggs, applesauce for sugar. I had found these tidbits on a website called Common Sense Home, a little victory during quarantine that wouldn’t be a victory at all in Johnny’s eyes. I allocate an hour before lunch, from 11–12 every Friday, to search questions that I compile over that week on the notepad in my kitchen. I want to take advantage of the internet as much as I can during this pandemic, but most of all I want to show Johnny I’m trying. I brew an extra calming tea to combat frustration and whip out the glasses I barely wear. I then boot up my desktop computer, search “Google,” and type my never-ending questions into the little box that holds endless answers:
“What year was bread invented please”
“How much is it to get a bathroom sink fixed please”
“How long does it take to boil an egg”
“Please”
But there is no substitution for apples. I don’t need the internet for that. They are an integral ingredient in carrot ginger soup. I want to make carrot ginger soup and I want to eat carrot ginger soup. I want to fill my quiet house with the ruckus of chopping: when metal meets food meets wood over and over again until I have a mound of shapes — crescents and rounds and strips, no doubt a quarter of which tumble to the ground or into my mouth. I want the smell to fill up my house, the lingering zing of the ginger reminding me of the fact that I accomplished something. I long to see the bubbles emerge out of the thickening, autumn-colored liquid that requires my care and time, two things that I am teeming with and have nowhere to pour. Then, my favorite part, designing a bowl that looks good enough to feature in a cookbook. The carefully random sprig of cilantro freshly separated from the stem, the artful swath of sour cream, and a sprinkle of salt and pepper to taste. Sometimes I take a picture if I’m especially proud of my presentation, so beautiful it seems like a waste not to. I like to print them out and keep them in the top drawer of my desk, fastened by a paperclip: a slapped-together scrapbook. I position the plates at an angle on my marble dining room table in the afternoon, when the sunlight floods the surface and exposes the miniature pieces of metal that glint and dance as they relish the spotlight. I pick flowers from the garden, arrange cutlery on a matching napkin, and laugh when I realize that this is all for myself. The only other presence in my house is the silence that materializes whenever I stop moving. Maybe it just wants some soup too.
After taking the picture, I poise my finger over the share button. It hovers there for a while, tempted but not convinced until I click away. Johnny would send a one-word reply and then make a comment when he saw me next about how I never made that for him when he was younger. I would then begin cleaning up, finding a place for everything to go again.
I wish someone would place me where I’m supposed to go.
Positioning the cloth over my face, I inspect its coverage in the copper-rimmed circular mirror, one of my few wedding presents left that isn’t yet lost or broken. I smooth down the material, closing any offending gaps.
“It was the second-to-last box at Duane Reade,” Johnny had said as he handed over the UniMask box to me; regret laced in his voice.
I would never know how many times the contents of this box might save me. I am a liability but all I want to do is make soup.
The ShopRite doors open with the same swoosh they always have. Save for the aisle with disinfectant and toilet paper, I am shocked at how bountifully lined the shelves were. The jingly tune that I usually hum along to now sounds eerie and inappropriate, like a laugh at a funeral. I make a beeline for the apples, passing the bagels (now all individually wrapped) and the markers on the ground indicating the required six feet of distance. Then I see them, glorious as ever: Gala, Fiji, Red Delicious, Pink Lady, all lined up neatly and silently, their glossy skins brushing against each other. The only skins brushing against each other. I basket two of each kind and headed straight for checkout, any distraction or detour from leaving as soon as possible unwelcome. As I stood there, spaced evenly between fellow shoppers, I thought about distance. How I’ve gotten closer to silence and fear, almost befriending them. How I’ve somehow stepped further away from Johnny without realizing, or maybe he stepped first.
“Next!” the shop attendant calls, indicating that check-out aisle six was vacant. I nod a hello to the friendly check-out girl who always makes sure to handle my apples carefully. When I paid, slipping the exact amount in folded bills and coins in the cup of my hand, I step forward and a small tickle creeps up the back of my throat, a cough that demands to be heard. Not here I command myself, but before I could pull out my handkerchief it erupts out of my throat. Everyone leaving turns to stare at me and the ground, like an invisible blanket of death had coated the floor and was now bounding towards them. I hurried quickly out the store and around the corner, walking as fast as I could and had in decades until I reached the door and closed it softly behind me as if I wasn’t scared of what I had felt weighing me down this week: the scent of fear, the worry nipping at my heels and closing in. I leaned against the frame for support, sinking to the floor until my knees were curled in front of me. I imagined letting the apples roll and tumble over the floor, bathing in whatever threat that lurked there, and then taking a big juicy bite out of the reddest one, sticker, core, seeds, and all. Come get me, Coronavirus I would think.
But I continued to clutch the bag, the apples sitting on top of each other and sealed safely. I’m not brave enough, not daring. I feel a cough seize my body again and make no effort to hold it in. I let it bounce off the walls and scare away the quiet. I coughed until my throat went raw.
