Eleanor? Well, just my luckthought of you the moment we ran into each other, my sisterinlaw Martha, my mothers cousin, called out as she snatched the young woman at the doorway of the Tesco on Oxford Street. She barely managed to avoid a stray bag that smacked her leg.
Watch where youre standing, love, a hurried passerby shouted, then stopped short when she realized shed brushed her own shoulder. Eleanor? Martha? You two have some nerve!
Martha, why are you calling me a cheeky one? Eleanor gasped. Its clear youre the one who decided to give me a piece of your mind. But why have you turned on me like this, Claire?
Cause you dont know. Lydia borrowed forty pounds from Liza and still hasnt paid it back, even though its been six months instead of the promised two weeks before payday.
Hold ondid I actually borrow money? No way. My husband earns a decent wage, Im not on a minimum salary, and our son moved out two years ago and doesnt need any help, Claire retorted, trying to make sense of the accusation.
She explained, It was Lydia who ran into me. Not forty poundsonly fifteenand it wasnt six months ago, just two weeks ago when she broke her arm. All because of that Martha pointed at Eleanor, who let out a tiny laugh.
Let me guess: youre the one whos been pestering mum, making up stories, and taking advantage of her? Eleanor snapped, tasting bitterness.
That bitterness wasnt born from my mothers old habits resurfacing, but from the fact that Eleanor had believed her two weeks earlier.
Shed believed when her mother called from the hospitals reception, tearful, telling her shed slipped on the stairs and now faced at least two months in a cast with all the usual complications of a badly broken arm.
She claimed she could neither eat, drink, nor sleep without the help of her only, beloved daughter. Social workers, she added, were not only neglectful but also charging triple the usual rates.
The last lieperhaps a misperceptionEleanor let slip past her ears, but everything else turned out to be true. Mum really had broken her arm and been rushed in by ambulance. She truly needed someone to look after her.
Who else but her only daughter could do that? After all, Mum hadnt done Eleanor any real harm. Shed spent her whole life exaggerating her woes, constantly casting herself as the abandoned, forgotten, unlucky woman.
But no ones perfect, right?
Despite her flaws, Mum fed Eleanor, watered her plants, bought shoes, attended parentteacher meetings, and even bought oranges for Eleanors medication when she fell ill.
So Eleanor felt obliged to take a months unpaid leave, move back to her hometown, and help with the housework and personal care.
During that month she planned to find a livein housekeeper who could also act as a carer. If that failed, shed try to convince Mum to move in with her.
She couldnt simply stay unemployed after the incidentthered be nothing to live on.
From the moment Eleanor set foot in the oncefamiliar house, she recalled why shed fled it ten years earlier in such a hurry. Back then, after finishing ninth grade, shed enrolled in the first college she could find in another city, sprinted off to a nearby dormitory, and never returned. Even sharing a room with three flatmates gave her more privacy than living under the same roof as Mum.
Eleanor, what on earth is that? How could a respectable lady wear something like that? her mother, now nearly thirty, scolded, shaking a piece of laundry clutched in a strong hand. Do you even know where the people who wear those frilly things work?
The people who wear those frilly things have a life of their own. That concept seems foreign to you. Have a look in the desk draweryoull find something interesting, Eleanor retorted, slipping a word into her pocket.
She was no longer a teenager, no longer dependent on Mum physically or psychologically, and could firmly defend her boundaries. She also reminded Mum that shed come to help with chores, not to listen to endless selfpity.
Mum didnt stop there. Her next peaceful gesture turned into a theatrical display whenever Eleanor tried to find a quiet corner. As soon as Eleanor settled down, loudly knocking at the door, Mum would claim she urgently needed something from the bathroomdetergent, a freshener, whatever.
Waiting a few minutes for Eleanor to leave was out of the question. The most maddening, yet oddly comic, part was the earlymorning singing. While Eleanor lay halfasleep, Mum would turn on some music channel and start belting out tunes.
When Eleanor finally asked why, Mum shrugged, I just feel like singing. Dont I have the right to sing in my own house? If you want to sleep, just ignore me. Eleanor almost suggested a sanity check, but instead bought herself some earplugs.
She never needed them, though. One bright morning, the neighbour upstairs, fed up, knocked on the door and plainly told the opera lover where and when to keep her voice down if she ever wanted to wake the family before sunrise.
Mum stopped singing after that, but the other problems persisted. Still, Eleanor managed to rise above Mums antics, reminding herself that this was simply an elderly, ailing woman who needed help.
Shed either find a suitable aide or endure Mums presence until she recovered, then let the whole episode fade into the past.
Thoughts of Mums approaching old age and the inevitable return of caregiving responsibilities haunted her, and she shoved them aside with all her might.
Later, Eleanor heard from Claire and Marthafriends of Mumthat she supposedly wasnt helping at all, that shed been fired, couldnt even buy a meal for herself, and was living off a pensioners meagre support. They even painted her as either the devil or his most trusted assistant.
At a small café, they recounted every detail, eyes cast downward, unable to meet Eleanors gaze. She simply flashed her bank statements, showing the numerous, notcheap purchases shed made for Mum over the past two weeks.
When Claire told the story of how Martha allegedly borrowed forty pounds from the sick, poor Lydiamoney that Lydia never even sawEleanor rolled her eyes. Lydia wouldnt ask for anything, knowing her income was far lower than theirs.
Mum, we need to talk, Eleanor said, stepping over the threshold of the family flat with Claire and Martha in tow, about an hour and a half later.
During the next hour, under pressure, Mum confessed that shed been tarnishing Eleanors reputation among acquaintances to elicit sympathy for her own sorry state.
Eleanor could have forgiven a lotquirks, habits, subconscious need for drama. But to be painted as a monster? No. She simply couldnt allow that.
The following day she said goodbye, left town, and urged Mum to rely exclusively on social services, delivery orders, and other solutions, sparing herself any further involvement.
If she was to be a bad daughter, shed rather be genuinely bad than merely seem so. The most Mum could now expect was a modest cash contribution as a token of gratitude for a life saved.
For everything else, as they say, theres a credit card, or a pension plus a little extra from Eleanor. Let Mum now have a reason to whine about a bad daughter.
