Pure, Persistent

My mother takes her showers in the evening. She has been doing so ever since my father left us. Exhausted, she opens the weary door with her rough hand, coming home from a long day at the supermarket. Shift after shift, I know that it's for my sake. 

She struggles so that we can barely get by, walking carefully on this tightrope of living in this one-bedroom apartment or falling onto the streets below. Every night when she walks into the living room, she wears a smile. Hiding beneath that supposed joy is a woman tired of her life, wondering what she had done to deserve this. But she silences those thoughts when she looks into my blue eyes and ruffles my unkept hair. 

Have you eaten, she asks. 

I nod my head. 

With gratitude, she sighs and takes her brown coat off, walks into the bedroom and comes out with a lavender towel and her plaid pajamas, the only pair she owns. I listen to the open and close of the bathroom door, the turn of the shower knob. The calming sound of water that has fallen victim to gravity, rings throughout the floor. The world around comes to a halt, controlled now by the mindful movement of her hands which run through her frizzy curls, before placing them underneath her sunken eyes. Irises that well up with sleepless nights, insolent customers, nearly empty pockets, and a failed marriage. 

These images send me to sleep. 

I feel my mother's hardened hands carefully lift my small body and carry me to bed. The scent of fresh green apple floats in the air. 

The sound of water lands on the smooth bottom of the shower, a makeshift metronome. 

And hidden within those droplets, the liquid love of Mary.