Clara hung around her mother’s bedroom door. It was open, and she watched Ellen sleeping. It was still early, but Clara was up because she hadn’t slept. She feared today, what she would learn, but she had to ask it. And not with Beatrice around. Ellen was going to tell Clara why she disappeared because Clara would make her.
She felt a surge of anger the longer she watched her mother sleeping peacefully. You don’t get to come back into this house and take over like nothing happened and then sleep soundly at night when I’m going crazy with insomnia, Clara thought bitterly.
“Mom!” she shouted at the top of her lungs, and Ellen jerked awake startled. She jumped out of the bed.
“What’s wrong?” she cried looking all around her.
Clara folded her arms over her chest and leaned against the doorway. “We need to talk.”
Ellen drew in a long breath. She exhaled slowly, fighting the urge to strike her daughter in the face. “Jesus Christ, Clara,” she said flatly. “You couldn’t get me up any other way?” She sank down on the bed and rubbed a shaky hand over her forehead.
“No, I couldn’t,” Clara replied pleased with herself.
Ellen grunted.
“Where did you go?” Clara demanded.
Ellen was silent.
“Where did you go, Mom?” Clara insisted. “I won’t tell Beatrice. She’ll never know. But you owe me an explanation. You know you do. All of the shit you left me to deal with! My birthday you missed! Christmas! You owe me! How about no heat? Or electricity? We had no money! No food! You left us with nothing!”
Ellen ran her hand through her hair and sighed. “Okay.”
Clara walked over to sit next to her mother.
“I suffer from severe depression,” Ellen began.
“Me too,” Clara said. “At least I think I do.”
Ellen looked at her eldest daughter and burst into tears. Clara was stunned. She simply let her mother cry, not touching her, not saying soothing words, just letting her cry. Ellen took deep breaths and tried to steady herself.
“I was so depressed, Clara. I felt overwhelmed. I missed your father. I missed my mother. I felt like I destroyed everything around me. I didn’t want to destroy you, too. You and Beatrice. I thought you would be better on your own.”
Clara blinked her disbelief. “Did you think about the bills, Mom? The responsibilities I’d have to take on? The possibility of being turned over to the state?”
“No, Clara,” Ellen replied. “I really didn’t. When you’re out of your mind, you don’t think about things like that. All I thought was that I needed to get far away from you. If I got far enough away, you would be safe from me. You would be happy. Remember how sad and angry I was? How I took it out on you girls?”
Clara nodded remembering the doors torn open and angry curse words flung at her for reasons she didn’t understand.
“I was broken,” Ellen whispered. Her face streamed with tears, but she didn’t wipe at them. She sat immobile except for the movement of her mouth as she told the story she hoped she would never have to. “I took up with a man. He was an asshole, but he gave me a place to stay. I had no self respect so it didn’t matter.
“I . . . I tried to kill myself,” she confessed. “I’m not proud of that. I overdosed on pain medication and the asshole took me to the emergency room. I’m surprised he did that. I thought afterwards that perhaps I had something to live for. Someone. Well, two someones,” she said smiling sadly.
Clara was silent. She studied her mother and saw a possible future for herself, the pain and anguish of a mental disease she could neither will away nor control. She thought she could hate her mother for doing that to her—giving her something so devastating that accounted for the voices, the sadness, her inability to cope with anything.
“When did you learn you had depression?” Clara asked suddenly.
“What?”
“You heard what I asked,” Clara snapped.
“I knew in my early twenties,” Ellen replied, confused.
“So before I was conceived?” Clara asked.
“Just before.”
“And you had me anyway?” Clara went on. Her skin went hot with the realization.
“What do you mean, Clara?” Ellen asked.
“Isn’t depression hereditary? Obviously it is if I think I have it,” Clara said.
“I suppose. It’s not a definite.”
“No, but a possibility?”
“Well, yes,” Ellen said softly.
“So if you knew you were so fucked up, why did you have children? Didn’t you know that you could pass that on? Did you think about that, or were you too busy being selfish?”
“You’re asking me why I gave birth to you?” Ellen asked, bewildered.
“Yes. You had a choice. And you made the wrong one. And guess what? Now I have to deal with it. I have to deal with your fucking selfish choice to have a child when you knew you could pass on your fucked up depression and—”
The slap was swift and biting. Clara put her hand to her cheek and stared at her mother in disbelief.
“Never talk to me like that again,” Ellen said. “I had you because I loved you!”
Clara sprang from the bed. “That’s rich, Mom! Love? You loved me? Did you love me when you left me with all of your debt? How about when you missed my birthday? Beatrice can forgive you because she’s young. Her heart isn’t a fucking stone in her chest like mine is. But I can’t forgive you. The hell you caused us. You’ve never even thanked me for taking care of Bea! I don’t care if you were feeling sad! I don’t care if you tried to kill yourself! I don’t care!” Clara screamed.
She wheeled around and stomped to the doorway. She heard Ellen sniffle behind her and turned around.
“I thought I could stop hating you. I thought it could go away. But then you slapped me and reminded me why it never will.” Her words were calm, like she was working them out as she spoke, discovering her feelings for the first time. “I think I’ll always hate you.”
Ellen let out a stifled cry. “Clara,” she whispered, but her daughter was already walking out of the room.