—
Henry’s mother, Phoebe, pulled in to the Disneyland parking lot in a boxy white Buick. It made a rattling sound and bounced from left to right on its tires. I knew she was big, but I always thought Henry was exaggerating when he said she was obese. He wasn’t. He helped her out of the car. She wore a pink see-through tank top and her hair, what there was of it, was up in a ruffled bun held together by a faded gold scrunchie. Below the tank top she wore a pair of silk trousers that created a floppy mount above her pubic area and Spanish-style espadrilles. Somewhere underneath the folds of her arms were the traces of a woman of style. She had been beautiful. I knew it from looking at her and from the photos I saw at the store. But her entire persona was afflicted with years of drugging, drinking, and bingeing. Her thin, meatless lips were painted with coral-orange lipstick that squished outside their contour, making her look a bit like a demented bag lady.
I expected a reproach. I waited for a snarky comment, but the moment she stepped out of the car, she smiled to invisible crowds, paid my fine, and shook the Mickey policeman’s hand.
“Thank you for your work,” she said agreeably, avoiding any reference to the reasons we had been kicked out in the first place. It was a simple procedure, a bureaucratic trifle that need not be judged.
We left Henry’s car in the Disneyland parking lot and got in the back of Phoebe’s Buick.
She came inside and released a fatigued sound when her butt hit the seat. She turned to me.
“So you must be Eugenia, the girl Henry’s been telling me about.”
“I am. Thank you for picking us…me…up. I know it’s a very long drive and I’m so sorry about—”
She cut me off with a wave of her hand.
“And you’re from Italy. I love Italy!”
“Oh, you’ve been?”
I looked at Henry to see his reaction. He had never mentioned any travel in his life. He had never told of his mother doing anything except for shooting up drugs, eating, and hoarding.
“Oh yes. Arivedershi Roma! Do people still dance in the streets?”
I told her yes that they did, even though I had never seen anyone dance in the streets because what happened in the streets was mostly honking and cursing. On our ride back she talked about a man named Aldo who was “just so Italian” and lived in via del Moro in Trastevere. He’d given her a taste of the real dolce vita. She told us about a tavern where she drank and sang and danced on tables, about how all the men loved her because Italian women were good for cooking and raising children but not for dancing on tables. Only American women did that because they were freer.
“I was the only woman in Rome dancing on tables,” Phoebe declared, and Henry grumbled because that was just another piece of information about his mother’s youth he never knew, another corner of her life that had not included him.
“Hey Mom, where did you put the cigarettes?” he asked, trying to change the subject.
Inside the car we were worlds away from any dolce vita: trash bags filled with junk, soggy fries, half-open packets of ketchup, and empty extra-large soda cups.
“Do they still make saltimbocca? Is that what that dish is called?”
“Yes, of course…It’s a traditional Roman dish.”
“Why would you care, all you eat is burgers and fries,” Henry said.
“Oh Henry, will you just shut up?” Phoebe snapped. She opened her vowels wide when she called her son’s name, making it sound like a complaint. “Oh, I love those. What’s in those? Is it beef?”
“Veal. With prosciutto and sage.”
“That’s right, sage. La salvia. Oh my god how I loved those saltimbocca. Do you know how to make them?”
“Every Roman does. You could”—I looked at Henry to check if I was crossing a line, but he refused to participate in the conversation—“you could come over and I could make some for you if you’d like.” I offered this as a way to thank her for the ride.
“That would make me so happy.” She sighed nostalgically.
Henry tapped his finger on the window nervously. “Where are my cigarettes, Mom?”
Phoebe ignored him. She started to hum an Italian song she vaguely remembered.
“Fuck, Mom. Where did you put my smokes? It’s gross in here,” he whined abrasively. “Pull over, won’t you?”
Phoebe groaned. She slowed down and pulled over onto the shoulder like she knew what was coming. Henry darted out and around to the back door. He took out a McDonald’s paper bag and started filling it with the scattered litter on the floor by my feet. The wind blowing on the freeway flipped his long hair, uncovering his missing ear as he scoured the car for garbage. He packed the bag with trash and food debris and threw everything over the emergency lane and got back in the car.
“This car is disgusting. Let’s go.”
Phoebe took off with no mention of the litter left behind. That’s when I got it. I understood that getting Phoebe out of her den was a big deal—not only for her but for Henry as well. He wasn’t proud of his mother. He wasn’t happy when he spoke to her or saw her. She shot up drugs, drank, and smoked heavily throughout her pregnancy and that was the reason Henry’s ear was missing, why sarcasm always coated his words. He had fought one big battle as a child and that was the one to keep his ear. The battle was lost and there was no use fighting other, less important battles after it. He had been through hospitals, surgery, infections, and years of antibiotics. Treating microtia required the coordinated efforts of a plastic surgeon and an ear surgeon. His mother’s insurance would not cover all that because her addictions were considered preexisting conditions. So medical procedures were interrupted midway, doctors changed according to policies, and what should have been a normal ear disorder ended up evolving into a case severe enough to require partial amputation.
“In America it’s easier to cut things off when they don’t work,” Henry had told me one day.
Homeless people on methamphetamines chewed their hands to the bones. When they got infected, they went to hospitals and doctors cut them off. Nurses put them in plastic bags, then tossed them out. Nothing was done to reconstruct the faces and limbs of those who could not afford it. You had to find a way to live without your missing body parts, limping through life, trying to reduce pain with chemicals and home remedies. Broken people learned not to ask for help. They lived with their digitless hands and busted knees and missing ears and certainly didn’t call their parents during emergencies. They did not ask the very people who took their ears away to come and make things better.
But Henry did that day, and for that I was grateful.
We stayed quiet for the rest of the ride. When they dropped me off in front of my house, I gave Phoebe a hug through the driver’s window and made a date for our saltimbocca dinner. I promised.
15