Death Row novel · Chapter 7 of 24

Chapter 7: Thursdays

My mother came to see me six days before the date.

I hadn't seen her in fourteen months.

The drive is two hours each way, and the care home had stopped bringing her because the trips left her confused for a week afterward.

Evan had arranged this one.

He told me it would be the last, and he didn't have to say what he meant.

An aide pushed her wheelchair into the booth next to the glass.

My mother is sixty-seven now.

She used to run a school cafeteria and keep a list of every child's allergies in her head.

She had on her blue cardigan with the pearl buttons, buttoned wrong by one hole, and her white hair was combed flat.

She looked at me through the glass and smiled politely, the way she smiles at the people who bring her lunch.

My throat closed.

The aide lifted the phone and held it to her ear.

"Mom," I said. "It's Leah."

"Oh," she said. "Hello, dear."

"How are you feeling?"

"Fine. They gave us fish. I don't care for it."

"I know."

"I used to make a very good fish. With the lemons."

"You did."

She nodded and looked past me at the wall.

I had seen this so many times that I knew how to wait.

In the care home, they told me, she had hours that were clear and days that were not.

I put my palm against the glass.

"Mom, I miss you."

"Do you?" She turned back and looked at my hand.

Something moved behind her eyes, a small light going on in a far room.

"Leah," she said.

"Yes."

"Where's your hair? You used to wear it long."

"They cut it."

"They shouldn't have." She frowned. "Is this the school?"

"No, Mom."

"Is it a hospital?"

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