Love In The Time of Intrusion

Part 2

She could hear her mother's wheezy snoring when she stepped into their third-story apartment. The apartment was completely dark except for the soft glow of the green incandescent lamp that buzzed like a brood of cicadas on the kitchen table. Next to the lamp was half a loaf of brown bread her mother claimed was her favorite but was actually the cheapest and heartiest. The hearty aroma of stewed beef clung to the air. Her mother's big red pot was still on the stove, which meant her mom had cooked a stew. Annalissa helped herself to a bowl of soup and bread. She pulled a chair out at the table across from the piles of soiled and stained laundry her mother washed for extra money. The glow of the light cast a shadow of a large, fat, lumpy man across from Annalissa. She was used to eating alone since she started working at the shop and smiled at the thought of enjoying the company of the freakishly lumpy laundry person.

    Annalissa finished up and tidied the kitchen as quietly as she could. She would have liked to turn on the radio to listen to a rerun of a soap or a comedy, but her mom would be pissed if she woke her. She could have read, but her mind was racing, and she couldn't concentrate. She was nervous about what her mother would think and say about the dance. She went out to sit on the balcony to watch what little traffic went down their quiet street.

   Annalissa's mother, Mona, had looked longingly at her name on the tombstone next to her husband and son since they died. Annalissa remembered when Mona had green eyes. They turned gray with dark purple bags underneath them that came from crying too many tears for too many years.

    Life had made Mona weary. The weariness was heavy and hung to her bones. Her body was bent over, her bones, calcified wire, molded and shaped by bending over toilets and scrubbing floors on her knees. Her fingers were stiff, arthritic, and thick from the residue of animal fat from scrubbing soap. Her eyes were too sad and drained that they closed when Annalisa would speak to her. Since Mona was too tired to listen, Annalissa started speaking only out of necessity. Mona did not seem to notice that her daughter stopped telling her about her day, her joys, the neighbors' business. The weariness mixed in her blood and made it acidic. It made her urine red and gave her kidney stones and gallstones. It made her irritable at the one person she had left. Her weariness always loomed like a metal hook, waiting to snag Annalissa by the neck and burn her. They could be cautionary tales to not end up like her or some other down-on-their-luck girl who had fallen in love or a neighbor or a friend's daughter who had tried to dig herself out of a hole but ended up in a bigger one. The hot judgment hook burned Annalissa's neck, digging deep, making it feel hot and red with anger and shame. She wasn't sure if the anger was at herself or her mother. Or both.

   Mona heard her, and in a red robe and curlers, she came out to join Annalisa on the tiny balcony with two woven wooden chairs.

   "I'm sorry I woke you!" Annalissa said when Mona appeared on the stoop.

   "It's okay, I wasn't sleeping heavily." Mona took out two cigarettes from her robe pocket and handed one to Annalisa. "Did you eat well? I put extra potatoes in the stew," Mona asked as she lit a match.

   "Maman, it was delicious, thank you," Annalissa told her as she looked out onto the balcony into the foggy night.

   They watched as a group of British soldiers drunkenly strode back to their camp singing an English ditty about a red-headed girl named Annie while one whistled the tune. They were stationed outside the cities as France waited with bated breath for Germany to invade.

   "Goodness, they have tied one on, haven't they?" Mona smiled before darkly adding, "And we expect to beat the Germans with soldiers like that?"

   "Oh, Maman, don't be too hard on them. Don't they need a release too? It's the weekend," Annalisa raised her eyes at that comment. Annalisa knew she shouldn't have this conversation tonight, but the words rapidly ran up her throat with an impulsiveness that Annalisa hated about herself.