The Mother's Silence

The air in my mother’s kitchen was thick with the smell of over-brewed tea and something else, something metallic and sharp, like old pennies. It clung to the floral wallpaper, to the chipped Formica countertops, to the very air I breathed. I sat across from her, the weak morning sun slanting through the venetian blinds, striping her face in pale bars. Her hands, gnarled and veined like ancient roots, were clasped tightly in her lap, a white-knuckled cage.

“Mom,” I began, my voice sounding too loud, too rough in the hushed space. “We need to talk about… about what happened.”

Her eyes, usually a watery blue, narrowed. They didn’t meet mine. Instead, they fixed on a point somewhere beyond my shoulder, a place only she could see. “What happened?” she echoed, her voice flat, devoid of inflection. It was the sound of a stone dropped into a deep well, a dull thud that promised no return.