I . Mother
I count eight windows up to the one groped by ivy , my mother ’ s room , and hurl a rock at it . The stone on hard , thick glass rings out across the parking lot , like the shot of my father ’ s gun . When I was little , my job was to retrieve the carcasses of the mourning doves and ermines he killed , their white furs stained dark with blood . Later he would ask me to hold the gun , to take my own shots that would echo as the rock now echoes off the window .
I wait for the curtains to shudder or darken with my mother ’ s presence , but they remain still and shadowless . Perhaps she cannot move to the window because of the tubing that weaves through her veins like the strings of a marionette , stinging her skin when she tries to tear herself away ; maybe she ’ s sleeping and the sound of the rock was the sound of the gunshots in her dreams ; maybe she stays away from the window because she knows that my intention is to shatter it .
When I reach for another stone , I hear the hospital inhale as its automatic doors slide open . A male nurse is exhaled into the parking lot . His round , bald head sinks into his bulbous torso in waves of neck fat . Pinched and constrained by his nurse ’ s outfit - the meager blue shirt , the tight pants and rubber soled shoes that struggle across the rough pavement - he shouts something like “ hey !” or “ stop !” but I barely hear him as I turn and bolt .
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I hurdle over a plain of yellow dividers , their sulfurous color drawn out by the parking lot lights . At the edge of the road , where weeds erupt from the pavement ’ s cracks , I stop and turn and watch . The nurse stands like a mosquito trapped in amber ; the overlapping light from the parking lot lampposts . I laugh at the nurse as he looks for me and , when I realize he can ’ t hear me , I laugh louder so that he can . He turns away , kicks at the ground with his rubber soled shoes , and is inhaled into the hospital once more .
II . Silkie
Down the street , trees cave in over the road as it tilts upward . The neighborhood built alongside the hill is cut in half by its slant . Families sit in the frames of bright , open windows , waiting at tables for their mothers to arrive with dinners in their oven-mitted hands .