by Joan Pedzich

I hit a bird that morning. Impaled her on my hood ornament. She was a sparrow, I think, a small brown thing, one of millions. She flew into me. I didn’t do it to her. Still, I felt bad seeing her stuck through, feathers lifting in the current. She was a distraction, not to mention a mess. Nice fellow at the gas station used a chamois to get her off. He was so gentle. I had to run the car through the wash, of course, and got off schedule.
 
Mother was waiting for me, all dressed, her handbag on her arm, her coat folded on her lap. She dangled her watch. I laid it on her wrist and did the clasp for her. She listened to it tick.
 
“Is it correct?” She looked at the face, and held it out for me to see.
 
“Yes, I’m late,” I said. I bent and gave her my elbow. She pulled herself up from the brocade chair. I waited for her to get steady. “Couldn’t be avoided.”
 
“What about my chair?”
 
“They’re coming for it later. Remember? You should have it by dinner.”
 
“What time is dinner?”
 
“Five. Promptly at five, I imagine.”
 
“So early?”
 
“Yes, but of course, that gives you your evening. And there are activities.”
 
“It seems very early,” she said, patting her hair. “How do I look?”
 
“Where’s the good lipstick I got you? You could use a lick of that.”
 
“I’ll put some on in the car.” She patted her bag. “So we won’t be so late. I’m not sure it’s my color though.”
 
It took the entire trip for her to manage the lipstick. I palmed the wheel, and breached the limits of the yellow lights. She searched the bottom of her bag, and produced a piece of mirror, a suspicious looking Kleenex, and the lip color from Elizabeth Arden. She held the tube in front of her for a while, then twisted the cap off, and handed it to me. I adjusted my rearview, and flicked the windshield washer while she applied the Carefree Coral. I knew the procedure. Top lip. Bottom lip. Extra swipe to the points of her cupid’s bow. Lick. Pucker. Blot. Check the mirror.
 
“There,” she said. She took the cap back from me. “Presentable?”
 
“You’ve got a blob of it on your finger,” I said.
 
“What time is dinner?”
 
“Five-ish, Mother.”
 
“So early?”
 
“Mother, you’ve got lipstick on your finger. Where’s that tissue?”
 
“Why so early?”
 
I pulled in under the portico and the aide was right there with a wheelchair. He opened her door and held his hand out for her.
 
“Who’s that?”
 
“Well, let’s see, his tag says Raymond. Hello Raymond, will you be helping us settle in?”
 
“That I will,” he said. “I’ll take you to your new digs. If there is anything you need to know, just ask.”
 
Mother grasped the edge of the car door with both hands and raised herself. She handed Raymond her handbag. He hung it on the wheelchair handle, and helped her sit. They turned toward the entrance. I followed them, closing her door on the way. There was a nugget of lipstick on the outside of the car window, the head of a waxy smear of color from Mother’s finger.           
 
“Raymond, is it? I’ll call you Ray,” Mother said. “What time is dinner?”          
 
On the way back I pulled into the car wash. I sliced my card through the reader and got myself the deluxe treatment - special soap, underbody spray, tire dressing, hot wax, laser drying, nozzles, hoses, stinging liquids, whirling brushes, and slapping fabric strips. When the rinse started, a throbbing blue and gray torrent from the mechanical arm, I put my palms on the windshield, and waited for it to take the last nub of Carefree Coral.
           

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