Chapter 22: The Laundry Room

Gael parked the van at the curb of my mother's house at eleven that night and turned off the engine.

"I'll be where you can see me," he said.

"I know."

The house was dark except for one window at the side, small and yellow, on the ground floor.

I let myself in with the key I had never given back.

The hall smelled of floor polish and gardenias, and nobody had cleared the Sunday jug from the long table in the garden.

Fourteen chairs still stood around it in the moonlight, in a ring.

I followed the yellow light to the end of the house.

It came from the laundry room.

The door was open, and my mother was sitting on an upturned bucket between the washer and the shelf of detergent.

She was still in her emerald silk.

Her shoes were off, and her handbag lay on the floor beside her, and she was looking at the wall.

I stood in the doorway.

I had not been in that room for eighteen years.

It was smaller than I remembered, and the paint had been redone, and it still smelled of bleach.

"Is she with you?" my mother said, without turning.

"Paulina is with Abuela. She looked for you in the car park until they locked it."

My mother closed her eyes.

"I walked," she said. "I stood by my car, and I couldn't think where I was meant to drive."

I said nothing.

"I did it for her," she said. "You understand? She was three weeks old. She had no one."

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