Читать книгу It Hit Me Like a Ton of Bricks: A memoir of a mother and daughter - Catherine Burns L. - Страница 6

My answering machine is ablaze. I have sixteen messages, all from her. She needs to see me right away. What a pain in the ass. She lives in the Village. I live in Harlem. “Please hurry,” she begs.

I walk in her front door an hour and a half later. She is in tears. I have been her daughter for nineteen years and this is the first time I have ever seen her cry. I don’t like it. I thought I would like it. I concentrate on hanging up my vintage faux fur coat. “I thought you were dead,” she tells my back.

“Well I’m not,” I say. She leads me to the living room, to the center of the U made by her three white Knoll sofas. There are tissues everywhere. She is shaking, clinging to me.

Oh my God, I think, this is it. This is the moment I have steered my whole little life toward.

“I’m so glad to see you,” she says, blowing her nose. “I thought you were dead. I was terrified you were dead.”

“I’m not,” I repeat.

“And then it hit me like a ton of bricks.”

I sit down next to her. She is going to reach out to me. She is going to apologize. I look into her bloodshot blue eyes.

“It suddenly hit me today,” she says. “I don’t know why, but it hit me like a ton of bricks. This has nothing to do with me. If you kill yourself, it is simply not my fault. I am off the hook. None of this is my fault. I am not responsible.” She looks almost euphoric as she takes my hand. “And I couldn’t wait to tell you.”