Monday's Lie by Jamie Mason Page B

being the life of the party than he was at chemistry and biology. The funds for his tuition and books burned like straw in pursuit of beer to chug and white powder to whisk up his nose. And he was generous with his vices to an extra fault. His no-account friends warmed their party at the bonfire of Justin’s money and good sense, and the situation went from a concern to a disaster in record time. Marie had cut him off financially, and he never called her except to wheedle her into a change of heart and out of some cash, only to break that heart with the vow to never call her again when she said no.
    At the time of my mother’s Long Trip, Marie was depressed and anxious—and also anxious over being depressed, because the most basic things in her life weren’t getting done when she couldn’t find a reason to get out of bed in the mornings. Her sick leave from work dried up, her checking-account balance fell to overdrawn, and her pantry was full of out-of-date condiments and not much to eat.
    Then my mother needed her in a flurry of dramatic emergency and hasty exit, and Paul, the standard-bearer of my mother’s much more glamorous troubles, was an intriguing distraction for Marie.
    His attraction to her was both nuanced and obvious. Even at thirteen years old, I saw that Paul’s control over my mother had its gaps, and that those unbridgeable ravines bothered him. If he looked at it sideways, sex and affection with Annette’s look-alike could rough in a more complete illusion that he owned full jurisdiction over his protégé’s kingdom.
    And all of that might not have been a fair appraisal of Paul’s motives and Marie’s weaknesses, even though it was probably the state of things. Whatever else it was, it could still have been true love also.
    Either way, my mother wasn’t having it.
    Aunt Marie had lived only a few miles away from our house. For the duration of my mother’s trip, she stayed most of the nights with us, but she never technically moved in. She launched her workdays from her own place, getting ready for the office from her own shower and closet after seeing Simon and me off on the bus.
    I knew that Paul had a key to Marie’s house. He also had the good sense not to make a habit of being in my mother’s bed when Simon and I woke up. But there were signs he’d stayed over, sneaking in after our bedtime and ducking out before dawn. There were double glasses in the sink, or too many cigarettes in the ashtray, and often a sheltered dry patch on the driveway that would have been dew-soaked if a car hadn’t been parked there all night.
    Marie lightened and brightened with purpose into the stretch of my mother’s absence. I wanted not to know why, but two obedient and well-groomed children to roll out as evidence of her decency and capability went a far ways to soothe her fear that she couldn’t do anything right. And a world-traveled lover to round out that picture, an image of achievement to cover over the hole of failure that she’d been staring into, was plenty reason enough to cradle the hope that it would last, if not forever, than for longer than the reach of her old melancholy. I’m sure Aunt Marie was relieved when we would get news of her sister that served as proof of life, but she wasn’t on fire to have my mother back either.
    Whatever final terms my mother put on the table when she learned of their relationship, Paul chose them over Marie, who, of course, never forgave my mother. Marie remarried within a year after a whirlwind romance, then relocated to the West Coast with her new husband, who was little more than a stranger to her, and died with him at her side behind the wheel in a drunken confrontation with a hundred-year-old oak tree without ever reconciling with her sister or her son.
    With Paul, after Marie left, my mother’s methods became both harder and more gentle. She teased him less, but thanked him