Thursday, February 11, 2010

Mother and Daughter, continued

 
So much can be said in the silence of the lips. The eyes say what needs to be said: often so eloquently, so scathingly, so very to the point. Yes, the eyes have it.
 
Theresa, never before seeming to possess a thought of her very own, was forced  to think, to act without reservation. She was such a child in a number of ways, but her father's brutal execution turned her into an adult overnight. The physical comfort and security of her home could not, of itself, assuage the emptiness she felt.
 
As Renata approached Theresa, breaking into her daughter's troubled reverie, she put her cold hand upon Theresa's shoulder. She hadn't the emotional capacity to embrace and comfort her daughter wordlessly, as a normal mother might do. Yet, strangely, the readily confident and glib woman had no words. If there had been any, they would have stuck in her throat. Theresa looked into her mother's eyes and said nothing. The inwardly distraught but poised Mrs. Gettleman sought sympathy from Theresa with her eyes. Traits such as compassion and mercy, typical of any decent human being, were scarcely spiritual waters deep within the well of Renata's soul.
 
Theresa's awakened eyes saw fear in those of her mother. So unnatural, so untypical for the woman who plowed her way through every obstacle, challenge and person who stood their own shaky ground. With her right hand, warm and utterly feminine, she firmly grasped her mother's hand, still upon her shoulder, and silently declared that never more would they touch ...
 
Nor speak.
 
Miss Gettleman has left her childhood home for the last time, never to return. The shell of a woman, ghostly in pallor, stands motionless on an upstairs landing  and stares at the street below ...
 
Through a darkened pane....