Carmiel Banasky - The Suicide of Claire Bishop

A cat slinks in and rubs against my ankle. Her gray fur has a hundred vortexes swirling in it. But when I reach down to pet her, she runs away.

“Mom.” Say something nice. Why is it so hard to say something nice to her? “Thanks for this.” I gesture around the room. “I like it.”

My mom smiles at me sadly. “You stay here as long as you need, honey. No one’s making you go to the hospital.”

And when did I start unknowing myself?

2 pills left, 112 species of wildflowers in the state of Washington, all fashion trends 2 years behind on the West Coast, 2 hours of indigestion, 4 dying cats, 1 dial-up Internet connection.

As soon as I can get away from my mom after dinner, I lock myself in the bedroom. My bare toes fold over the end of the mattress and my head touches the wall. Some kind of animal is screaming outside my window, being murdered. I wait. And wait. But the portal hasn’t been activated. Why? My stomach curls from Mom’s “famous” tuna noodle casserole. Is that what’s blocking the portal? No, it’s exactly right. My body is replicating a physical state from my childhood, struggling to digest this particular form of horrible: Mom’s cooking.

I could not be nearer to finding my origin. This room, a replica of my childhood, it has to be the portal. It cannot be a coincidence that my mother did this at this moment in time. But it’s locked. Fragments of my past are spread around me — my old jacket and toys, feeling the same old frustrations with my mother. Could they all be part of it? A code of sorts.

But maybe the items of the code aren’t laid out properly. Like the comic books — they were hardly ever in their sleeves. I get up and spread them across the desk. And the box of cars and dolls was to the right of the electronics, not left. I move the bins just so. Still, nothing happens. I try to imagine I’m already in the past. I’m watching Dallas and Matlock while I wait for my mom to come home from her animal-rights “activities.” “Honey, I’m home,” she calls in a Ricky Ricardo voice. In my room, she tells me some version of what she did that night — targeting a pet shop chain in Tacoma, spray-painting figures of dead cats and dogs with X’s for eyes, breaking into an animal-testing center, firebombing a car in a lab parking lot. She’d go on weekend raids to mink farms around the state, freeing tens of thousands of animals. It is a fairy tale in the dark, imagining those furry friends dancing around her, their princess, in dewy midnight fields, silk tails sparkling with moonlight. After one raid in Snohomish County, there was a reward out for her, which was exciting.

The portal still isn’t working. It’s like I’m at the station doors to my past but they won’t let me on the train. Where’s your ticket, sir, you need a ticket! But I have a ticket! I unroll the painting and drape it over me like a blanket.

Some nights, during the divorce, she’d talk about how much she missed my dad. Scratching my back absentmindedly, her fingernails jagged from biting, she told me how handsome he was when she first saw him fight at the local dojo, but he’d swept her off her feet only when he promised to give up his black-belt training for her — she didn’t believe in fighting. Other nights she’d tell me what a motherfucker he was: he couldn’t do any better than her, just let him try, and he was a terrible father and she was sad she even brought me into the world with his DNA.

I’d listen with eyes half closed as my mother sat on my bed in the near dark, always a cat on her lap, and that nightlight in the hall, and the wispy top of her hair lit from behind like the frazzled ends of comets. Her voice would fall on my dreams, pebbles of information would turn into skipping stones in a creek, or rain, or an army of robots marching to destroy the world.

“It’s ten o’clock, come on,” she says. But I can’t move. I’m paralyzed. “Your dad would throw a soaking wet towel on you to get you up for school. Should I do that?”

I sit up straight in bed, breathing hard. I’m in my childhood room. The real deal.

“I was just joking,” Mom says.

“What day is it?”

“Wednesday.”

“No, what date? What year?”

“Don’t be silly. Get up now, I’m starving.” She picks up the loose canvas from the bed and studies it. “What’s this?” She touches the woman’s face closest to the bottom.

In the mirror above the broken dresser, my face is the same as in 2004, except with dark circles under the eyes. But maybe that’s only my own perception. I wouldn’t look different to myself when I time travel, would I? Only to other people?

“Where did you get this?” she asks about the painting. “It’s creepy.”

“Mom? How old do I look?”

“It’s creepy, but it’s not. You know? I think I like it.”

“Mom.”

“You’ve always looked younger than you are, nothing wrong with that.” Then she walks out, calling behind her, “Get dressed already.”

I don’t want to freak her out. Timeline wise, we must be after the divorce, since she talked about my dad like that. But there’s no other clue in her face. She looks young and old.

My enemies are catching up to me and I’m making no progress! I didn’t time travel, which is evident when we leave the new house. Mom drags me to a late breakfast at the airport café, a little diner on the landing field where Cessnas fly in and out. We sit on the porch and watch the green, matted ground send up sparks of insects. The sky is gray and I can just make out the peaks buried in the thick cloud cover — the Olympic Mountains like stones under a blanket. Mom and I both order the same thing and smile at the tired waitress: two eggs over easy with home fries and a piece of pie. It’s the best marionberry pie in the world. It’s what I think of when I’m eating street falafel in the city and I miss home.

A man in a black suit is sitting at the table next to us behind my mom, facing me. Did you see him sit down and not tell me? He folds his chubby hands together under his chin and sits very still. Not many people in this town wear suits like that, especially at the airport.

I have to think quicker. Of course I didn’t time travel because she would never leave such a simple clue for just anyone to find. But I’m on the right track. Nicolette has been meddling with my past — slipping herself into my yearbook, reassembling my room. But the bedroom alone is too easy. Remember it’s all about the image with her. Maybe my room is just one of many scenes she left for me to find here. Maybe there isn’t just one moment of original pain, maybe there are many puzzle pieces that make it up. I have to collect the other tableaux. I have one — but how do I know how many more there are and where to find them?

A plane rumbles from the overcast and lands shakily on the runway. The gnats and bees are out in full bloom. Bees everywhere, even though they’re supposed to be disappearing. The waitress brings our food. I can’t take that first bite of pie quick enough, mouth runny with expectation. The man in black is reading the menu but looks over at me every now and then.

“As good as you remember?” my mom asks.

It is not. A little dry, a little fake-sweet. I nod. “So where’s Dad living now?”

She looks down at her pie. “Is yours warm? Mine doesn’t seem warm.”

“You haven’t tried it yet. Does he want to see me?”

She takes a bite. “It’s warm.” I give her a look. “Of course your father wants to see you. I’m just not sure he’s in town this week. Always something. Fishing. Don’t worry about him. I’ll give him a call and see if he can’t come by tomorrow. I thought you two were writing again.”

The waitress comes by with coffee and whispers something about biting off my head, but my mom doesn’t hear. When the screen door slams behind her, I ask the big question: “Mom?”