REBECCA by LAMB
September 27 2024I come alive when she says her mom is dead. I stare at the green wine in my glass long enough to bead my eyes, then I meet hers and hit her with the perfect line.
What is her name?
Like I said, the perfect line, erasing every other guy she’s ever been with. Oh, are you sorry to hear that? Are you so sorry for her loss? I want to know her name. Not what it was but is. That I rarely get to use it, though more often than you’d think, makes it ultra perfect. After she gives me her mom’s name, I’ll hit her with the perfect follow up, the most wooing sound a woman knows, the sound of her own name.
But she doesn’t say her mom’s name. She cries, which I’m prepared for, then says something for which I’m not.
My mom’s not really dead, she says, she’s just embarrassing. Actually, she’s the best. She’s my best friend. I don’t even know …
I’m turned off. Outraged, frankly. I push my chair back and arc my napkin high onto my plate in disappointment. Wow, I say.
From somewhere in the music playing on some placeless speakers, pushing through the strings, blushing the dim light, the voice of my mom saying my real name.
Now I’m crying. I haven’t cried in maybe seven years. My name’s not Tom, I say, It’s Solomon.
Toward the end of her loud laugh, I fall in love with her. I know my life is over.
We are one now, so our embarrassment at others’ staring hits us at the same time, and we leave without paying. We take the sidewalk together in slow stride. This is how we’ll take the earth.
She drops her hand into the pocket of my coat.
What’s her name? I say. Your mom.
Same as mine, she says.
Lamb is an American writer. www.lamb.onl