Mothers are everywhere. Blame evolution. Or Freud. Or the network executives who can’t stop re-creating June Cleaver and the greeting-card executives who can’t stop promoting Mother’s Day. Blame mother-of-pearl, Mother May I?, or that camp song that starts “Hello Muddah.” Blame Disney’s stable of stepmothers and godmothers and dead mothers. Blame the Old Lady in the Shoe and her teeming brood or Joan Crawford or Madonna. Blame Mothers Goose and Hubbard, Superior and Teresa. Blame Mr. Mom or the Queen Mum. Blame the metaphor-makers for Mother Tongue, Mother Nature, Mother Lode, Mother Ship, Mother Earth. Pin it on whoever you want, but let me tell you, it’s not easy to get from sunup to sundown in this world without bumping up against a mother-something.
Except at the Tanners’. Apart from the other day with Martin and a few short conversations with Evan, here we steer clear of explicit mentions. In fact, I’ve sidestepped the word at every turn, even avoiding seemingly unrelated topics like kangaroos, because the minute you start talking kangaroos, someone mentions those cute little joeys riding around in mummy’s pouch, and zzt, you’ve tripped the wire. So after five months, I know only a touch more about their mother than I did on day one. She made soup from scratch and colored her hair, she had a failed marriage and two sets of children, she did Jazzercise and would have liked me.
Then tonight, my last night, John tells me the kids want to show me a video of their mum, and I almost have to brace myself while waves of relief and gratitude and fear roll through me.
John cues up the tape and announces that the video is ready. The kids race over to the TV area. Ev shares a seat with Milly, and I take Martin on my lap, pulling him close, wanting to memorize him. John stands next to the VCR, emceeing. We look like a family.
“Okay, the camerawork isn’t excellent. But here we go,” John says, pushing Play.
A title card comes up: EASTWOOD CHURCH PRESENTS THE FIDDLER ON THE ROOF.
The video was shot from a tripod in the main aisle, and the sound is fuzzy. “John was the lead,” Evan says earnestly. “Mum was in the chorus.” The staging is simple, a rural backdrop, lots of straw, a low roof, a man with a fiddle.
John was an actor? John sang?
“They didn’t know each other!” Milly says, eyes forward, tracking the image.
John fixes on the screen while he talks, I think to me. “We met in rehearsals. This was closing night. It ran for two weekends.”
The opening number kicks in, “Tradition.” Despite his old-man makeup, John looks much younger—hardy and sure—as he and the female lead go back and forth about their duties. He must make a living and study the Torah; she must keep a kosher home and raise the children.
As the chorus steps forward to sing the refrain, Martin hops off my lap. “That’s her,” he says, pointing to one of many women in burlap head scarves.
“That’s not her! That’s her!” Milly calls out.
“You’re wrong! That’s Mummy!”
They don’t know. Fault the layman camerawork or the generic costumes or too much time passed, but they can’t identify their mother. They can’t pick her out.
“No, that’s Mummy right there!”
“No,” Evan and John say at the same time, silencing the piercing squabble. They look at each other, and Evan recedes. This part of her story isn’t his to tell, and he seems to know that.
“No, this is Mum, right here—see?” John says, approaching the TV, tapping the screen. “She’s right here.” The joy of reunion lifts his voice, as if she’s really right here, as if he’s really touching her.
“I see her! I see her! There she is!” they cry with relief.
So it wasn’t in an airport, over a cuppa, in his Qantas blues. He was not pressed and trimmed. He was singing. She fell in love with a man who sang, who danced, who played the doting father, who carried the show.
Before bed, Martin comes to give me a hug. I love him. He tells me he’s sleeping with Daddy tonight.
“Before you go, run and snag me some envelopes from the drawer in the kitchen?” I ask.
“For what?” he asks.
“You’ll see.”
When Martin brings back two envelopes, Milly is behind him. I stamp and address them to Kelly Corrigan, c/o the American Express office in Brisbane, and Kelly Corrigan, c/o the American Express office in Christ Church, New Zealand. “Now all you have to do is put something in the envelopes.”
“Like what?” Martin says.
“Like a letter, duh,” Milly answers.
“Or drawings or poems or whatever.” I tell Martin I want to know everything. We agree to write every single day, even though I’m sure he’ll forget me in a weekend; I’ve never seen him worry over people who aren’t here. He’s present tense, standing in his underwear, holding any hand that’s free.
“Tell me about school, about your buddies, all your dinosaurs, trips you take, art you make—”
“Cakes we bakes!”
“Yes, and all visits to lakes. And put in your school photo when you get it.”
“I will do that.” Martin takes an envelope out of my hand and I hold out the other for Milly. Finally, she takes it.
“All right, guys,” John calls from down the hall, “come on, let’s get in bed. Kelly needs to get organized!” The kids scurry to his room, and I slip outside to find Evan before he leaves for work.
I cough when I get to the driveway, and he leans his head out of the garage. “Hey.”
“Hey. I wanted to say goodbye before tomorrow, when everyone’s around.”
“Yeah. Me, too. But wait. Hold on.” He disappears and is back in a minute. “I got you something—” He hands me a paperback copy of My Ántonia. “So you can see how it ends.”
“Oh God, how did you know? I can’t believe you,” I say, taking the book.
We stand close. I want to thank him for keeping me company and teaching me how to play chess and not give up on crosswords, and tell him that my mom would like him so much, but as soon as I start talking, I realize I’m not ready to leave and that I kind of love this person I’m looking at and I’m sure I’ll never know anyone else like him because he’s cautious and timid and I’m blunt and impatient and we wouldn’t make sense in any context other than this one.
I say, “I started to write you a note last night, to make sure I said what I wanted to say, but it sounded stupid. But the thing is, what I really want you to know is that I admire you.”
“Me?”
“Yes, you. I mean, not when we first met.” He smiles. “When we first met, I thought you were a total soap-opera junkie bum who camped out in a garage.” He laughs. “But then it was so obvious that you’re not. People need you. You’re … important. You’re probably the most important person I’ve ever met.”
“Yeah, right,” he sidesteps the compliment.
“No, really. You’re the only person I know who’s actually doing anything worthwhile: staying here, working nights so you can be around for Pop and the kids. All my college friends have these bogus desk jobs, and look at me, I’m basically planning my existence around a dive trip.”
“That’ll be one for the books.”
This was one for the books, I think. You are one for the books.