days ago. This time I didn’t arrange my face. I didn’t try to look
any special way.
“I was there because I was studying art history, and my
project was about the bodies of female saints,” she said. “You
know I’ve always been fascinated by the stories of the saints.”
“You used to tell me their stories,” I said. “When I was little.
At bedtime. You told me terrible stories about women getting
cut up and being killed and going to heaven to be with Jesus.”
“That’s insane,” Mom said. “I never did that.”
“Yes,” I said, “you did. All the time. I remember their
names—Philomena and Dymphna and Agatha—”
“Don’t be silly,” she said. “I did no such thing. Anyway,”
she went on, “I was there doing research, and your father was
there on vacation with his family.”
“You mean with Nona and Dada?”
“No,” she said. “With his first wife.”
“Oh,” I said, and I felt things whirring around in my head,
the picture I had always imagined shifting and rearranging to
make room for this new piece of information. I knew that Dad
had, of course, been married to Judy before my mother. What I
did not know was that Dad had still been married to her when
he met my mom.
“I’m not proud of it,” Mom said, but she lifted her chin in a
way that made her look proud. “It was just one of those things.
There he was, with his wife, taking pictures of saints they knew
nothing about, and there I was, barely twenty years old, half a
world away from my real life, all on my own.”
“Oh,” I said, again.
“I’ll take you tomorrow to see the saints,” Mom said, turn-
ing back to the window. Like the saints were the interesting
part of her story.
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