| In the tiny bathroom of my parents’ post-war home on Cedar Lane, my mother in her wheelchair squeezed between the sink and tub, myself squeezed beside her, I want to move my mother from wheelchair to the bathchair in the tub. This is how I begin: lock the wheelchair into place; remove her feet from the wheelchair’s stirrups, place them firmly on the floor and put the stirrups in the up-position; take a stance upon feet spaced enough apart for maximum balance; bend forward, loosen my mother’s hands from their clutch on the wheelchair’s armrests, wrap her arms around my neck, speak to her, Okay Ma, lock your wrists; still bent forward, slide my arms between my mother and the wheelchair’s back, wrap them around her body, lock my own wrists at the small of her back, in my arms’ grip her nightgown bunches; now straighten pulling her body to my own, clasping her tightly against me, shift her weight from my back to my hips—as I rise so does my mother. We move together, my mother and I doing a kind of shuffle step, her legs stuttering as I ease her away from the wheelchair and toward the tub. Putting one of my feet into the tub for balance, I say, All right Ma, let’s step up into the tub. I worry as I always do because I cannot help her do this. Using both my arms to keep her as tight as possible against me, I cannot lift my mother’s legs one by one to clear the tub’s lip. Movement is a matter of faith—I have faith her legs can still do this; that time hadn’t robbed them of their scarce strength while she was asleep and I was not looking; I have faith my mother understands what I am asking her to do. My mother pushes her head into my clavicle steadying herself. She raises a leg. Her toenail scratches the tub’s porcelain. When my mother is finally seated upon the bathchair in the tub, I let out one breath, easy, take in another, tense. | | I ready myself for what I must do next. My mother’s body stiffens as I raise the nightgown up and off of her. She squeezes her legs together and crosses her arms tightly against her chest. She hunches forward and shivers. She will not look at me. I close my eyes and wish my sister were here to help me, but it has been years since she has helped baby brother. I open my eyes as I turn away from my mother and reach for the top towel from a stack I’d set upon the toilet cover. Turning to her, I stoop and drape the towel around her shoulders. I straighten again and reach for the detachable showerhead I’d installed when I’d put in the bathchair. Keeping the showerhead’s spray pointed at the drain and away from my mother, I turn the knobs and wait for the water to warm. When the water is the right temperature, I say, All right, Ma, time to get wet. As I pull the towel from her shoulders, my mother reaches out and grips my forearm with powerful suddenness. For a long moment she only holds my arm. I peer into her eyes, brown and cloudy, strange, and in them I see what will happen next. Her fingernails enter me and she drags them down the length of my arm. She does this slowly, and I wait for her to finish. In my free hand the showerhead continues to spray. When my mother is through, she releases me and clasps her hands together in her lap, the tips of her fingers stained. I wash my arm with the showerhead before dropping it, letting it dangle near the bottom of the tub. Backing away from my mother, I take another towel from the toilet and wrap my arm in it. I lean against the sink and hold my arm while my mother watches water skitter along the tub’s bottom toward the drain. We remain this way, sticking to our averted gazes, seeing the spray of the showerhead with our ears. I pull the towel tighter around my arm. It is not long before red blossoms through the fabric. | |