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Page 5 of 8
NOW AGAIN
Mary
makes sure she wakes up in plenty of time for work. Her mother also calls to
make sure she is up. Little ways her mother is able to support Mary are all she
can do, the best that can be done as known treatments go.
Mary
puts on a yellow terrycloth pullover with a tiny tomato sauce stain from last
week’s pizza. She notices it in the mirror. “That don’t matter,” she mutters to
herself. “They’ll think it’s a button. Oh, we’re so late. Very late.”
She
prepares two greeting cards, signing and addressing them in unexpectedly
graceful handwriting, then puts on the postage.
Finally,
she leaves her tiny apartment arranged and provided for by the State Department
of Housing for the Disabled, and she walks three blocks to the busy News
Dealer’s office, arriving a half-hour late.
She
is brooding as she goes inside to pick up her stack of thirty newspapers. She
avoids any conversation or eye contact with Mr. McCracken, who also looks down
while she walks by.
“Good
morning, Mary,” says Mr. McCracken.
“Good
morning,” she replies coldly.
“How
are you feeling today?” he asks.
“Lousy.
I’m try-ing. I had this big huge panic
attack. I had all these scary thoughts about running in front of buses. I have
a terrible headache.” She is close to sobbing, unable to glance at her boss.
“Oh, Mary,” says a woman walking by
with a kind voice. “Your blouse, I think it has a little spot—”
Mary’s
face whips around. “I know! I didn’t have any time to clean it! Or, I would
have cleaned it!” She turns back to Mr. McCracken. “And you told me that I had
to wear something bright. And, then, I also had to write a birthday card for my
old counselor, too...” she says like he should know something important
happened. “Plus, a get-well card for my mother’s friend, she went in for a
cataract, you know.”
After
a moment’s pause, he smiles. “No problem. Good luck.”
“Yes,
good luck, Mary,” says the woman with the kind voice.
“Good
luck today, Mary...” another person speaks up.
“Go
get ‘em,” says someone else nearby.
Holding
the heavy stack of papers up against her hip, Mary lifts her head around to see
the faces are all friendly and sincere. She begins crying in an unusual way for
her, quietly mixing tears of gratitude with shame at her own behavior. She gets
a few pats on the back on leaving. A final suggestion crosses Mr. McCracken’s
mind—that she wipe the foam from the corner of her mouth. He keeps it to
himself.
***
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