My Mother's Blue Dress

By Bianca Manolache

My canvas hangs idly in the corner of the dimly lit gymnasium. Some pass, sparing me a quick glance, some stop, making odd expressions as though they are pondering, and some talk to me about my art. I do not appreciate one more than the other. I look around at the other canvases, sculptures and photographs neatly lined up alongside mine, but I feel a tinge of jealousy. I do not like that my aspirations are unoriginal, but then I think about how silly I sound, and I look down at my shoes.

After the show ends, I walk to the bus stop in the brisk November air, the tips of my fingers tingling as I carry my canvas. Where will I put this when I get home? I board the bus and stand despite being one of the only three passengers and look out the window all the way home. My canvas is very heavy in my hands, and I am aware of this.

I thank the bus driver and walk the rest of the way, worrying about where this canvas will go and what my excuse will be if it is ever found. My mother is not supportive of my art. I twist and jiggle the key as the door creaks open and I slide off my shoes. My steps echo through my cold, empty home as I walk up the stairs to my room and lock the door. I place my bag in the corner and leave my canvas under my bed. No one will find it tonight.

I get ready for bed in silence, in an almost robotic fashion. The whole time I wish my mother came to my show.

The next morning, I wake up and go downstairs to make breakfast for my mother. As I fry her eggs and butter her toast and cut her melon, my chest feels hollow. Am I doing this out of resentment? Yes. Yes, I believe I am. But does that take away from my good deed? I don’t think that far. She jogs down the stairs and by the way she speaks her native tongue, I know she is on the phone with her mother. I do not understand a thing she is saying. She gives me a passive smile, poking at her food while laughing loudly and making quick remarks. I sit at the table quietly wishing she would thank me. Or even just look at me.

I scrub the dishes so hard I fear I will break them. The water is so hot, it burns my hands raw. I don’t mind. At times, I feel as though her life continues in Romania rather than here, with me.

The next day after school, as I walk towards my driveway, my breath becomes quick and shallow. My mother’s car is in the driveway. She is supposed to be at work. Why is she home? I breathe in deeply, go to unlock the door, but I feel a strong pull from the opposite side. There is my mother. As soon as I see her face, I know. She’s found my canvas.

“What is this Raluca? You think you’re a big, smart, girl doing silly drawings. Using MY life for these silly drawings. Do you do your schoolwork how you do these drawings?” Her thick Romanian accent coats each of her syllables so her voice feels even angrier than it already is.

“I thought-” She cuts me off. “I do not care what you thought. Always you you you, no me. No thinking about what I did, what I went through with your father for you to have this life. Only thinking of you” She raises her voice even more. I shut the front door behind me.

“You want to live in this world? You want to be more than me? Then listen for once. You think I came to this strange country for you to scribble around Raluca. You want to put my work to waste, then use it for your fun. You will not get anywhere with that.”

I want to tell her I have been listening my whole life. But instead, I yell back. I raise my voice every time she tries to interrupt me. I tell her she cannot live my life just because she is unhappy with hers. I tell her I am going to do better for myself than she ever could.

“If I can, I will. And I know I can” I shout in her face, close enough that I can smell her sweet perfume. She stands still. Her expression does not waver.

These words full of hatred and malice feel like a foreign language as they escape my cracked lips. My mouth goes slack from disbelief.

I did not mean a word I said.

Why did I say that?

“You are so selfish, so proud. Just like your father,” she states flatly. With that, she strides up the stairs knowing she’s won. She always does.

We do not speak for the next four days. I continue to make her breakfast and she continues to fold my laundry. When I see her in the mornings, it feels as though I am seeing a ghost. But what is even more eerie to me is the way my mother looks right through me. My presence does not affect her, or at least she does not allow me to see that it does. I am so lonely; it feels heavy on my shoulders.

Those four days pass and we are still not speaking. I accept my offer to art school, but it does not feel as fulfilling as I believed it would be: I only feel guilt. I am still making my mother breakfast, by the way.

The sun begins to set, and I am studying at the kitchen table when I hear light, delicate steps coming down the stairs. My mother is wearing a familiar, sleek, royal blue dress, it is loosely hanging from her thin figure. She is beautiful. I look nothing like her. I am all my father.

“Could you zip it up?” She asks meekly. I look up, almost in disgust but see small, crystal-like tears forming in her eyes. I pull the zipper up in silence and watch as the material begins to take the shape of her body. She walks towards the door without a word, and I so badly wish she would look back at me, just once.

I cannot focus on the rest of my assignment. My mother, the strongest woman I know looked like a child, so weak, so vulnerable. I gather my books and as I pass the door to her room, I see a flash of blue. I open the door further and I am shocked to see my canvas hanging above my mother’s bed. There she is, in that same blue dress and there is my father in his blue suit.

Newsletters and forms from art school flood the mailbox in the following months. My mother and I exchange very few words. Other than that, there is only silence. Perversely, I feel this silence as a sign of her love for me. Things could be worse. But could they really? What is worse than seeing your mother come to a strange country, hoping for a better life for you, then doing nothing but disappoint her. The more I think this way, the harder it is to breathe. I know my mother loves me, but does she like me? I don’t think that far.

Every so often I think of the painting above her bed. I don’t know whether to feel proud or bitter that it hangs there. I wonder if she thinks of it as I do, whether she admires my brush strokes, and colour choice, or if it just a reminder of life with my father. A reminder that she was once in love, she once had hope, she was once not alone. Does she think of what her life could have been? I mostly just think of how beautiful she looks in her blue dress. My father looks just ok.

My mother does not ask me zip up the back of her dress this time, but I do anyways, I offer. I wonder, if with this small, insignificant act I can take back the past seventeen years. I wonder if thirty years from now this will be her first memory of me and not the times I reminded her too much of my father. I hope when she thinks of me, she thinks of the good parts of my father and not the bad parts of herself. I even hope that when thinking back, it is him who zips up her dress tenderly, not me. I want nothing more than for her to have somebody to love. Somebody who makes her proud. Somebody who makes her struggle worthwhile.