“I’m here,” I told her. “You don’t have to worry about anything. I’ll handle the house, the bills, everything now, Mom.”
Her mouth moved several times before any sound actually made it out.
“Don’t abandon Cole,” she finally managed. “Promise me.”
Promise me.
I felt anger arrive before the grief did. Cole hadn’t even come to the hospital, and here was my mother, spending the very last of her strength protecting him one more time, instead of simply resting, instead of simply being with me.
“I promise,” I whispered anyway, though resentment made the word taste bitter going out.
She closed her eyes and died quietly before sunset that same day.
After the funeral, I cooked a pot of beef stew, packed a loaf of bread, and drove out toward our old neighborhood, carrying the weight of a promise I’d already half-decided to resent for the rest of my life. I expected to search the old dump, maybe ask a few remaining neighbors whether Cole still wandered anywhere nearby. I planned to leave the food, tell whoever I found that Mom was gone, and consider the whole obligation finally discharged.
