Everything was upstairs, the bedroom, the bathroom, Robert’s office where he’d spent countless hours on projects I never quite understood. I hadn’t been upstairs since the accident. The staircase might as well have been a mountain.
I slept on the living room couch for months, propped with pillows, trying to pretend it was temporary.
I used a bedpan like an invalid, humiliation burning through me each time, even in the privacy of my own home.
I showered only when my neighbor Mrs. Patterson could help me into her accessible bathroom, her hands gentle, her voice kind, and each time I thanked her so much my throat tightened.
Michael visited twice.
Exactly twice.
The first time, three days after I came home from the hospital, he stayed twenty minutes. Twenty.
He stood awkwardly in the living room, glancing at his watch, explaining how busy he was with work and the kids, how hard it was to get away. He kissed my cheek like it was an obligation and promised he’d come back soon.
The second time, last month, he brought Ashley.
Ashley spent the entire visit checking her phone, wrinkling her nose at the smell of old house and stale air, commenting on how depressing everything looked. She asked if I’d considered downsizing, as if selling and moving were as simple as ordering new curtains.
That was when I swallowed my pride and called Michael yesterday.
“Michael,” I had said, voice shaking slightly despite my efforts. “I need help. I can’t manage here anymore.”
“What kind of help, Mom?” His tone was careful, already preparing an exit.
“I need somewhere to stay,” I said. “Just temporarily. Until I can figure things out.”
The silence stretched so long I thought the call had dropped.
Then, “Mom, I’ll talk to Ashley. Let me call you back.”
He never did.
So I packed my small suitcase, called a cab, and showed up at their door unannounced, believing, foolishly, that seeing me face to face might remind him family meant something.
Instead I got, Mom, you can’t stay here.
That was the bottom.
That was rock.
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