Terms of Endearment Read Free Page A

them. No one had ever been able to stand to see her mother looking that way, Emma least of all, and only love would change it. She began immediately to make loving sounds, and her mother, as usually, tried to fight her off.
    “No, get away,” Aurora said. “Fetuses. Ugh. Yick.” She recovered her capacity for motion and floundered across the room, waving her hands and making swatting motions, as if she were knocking tiny batlike embryos out of the air. She didn’t know what was wrong, but it was a blow at her life. She knew that much.
    “See! Now I’ll lose all my suitors!” she yelled, turning for a last moment of defiance.
    “Now, Momma… now, Momma, it’s not that bad,” Emma kept saying as she advanced.
    When Emma finally cornered her, in the bedroom, Aurora took the only course open to her: she flung herself on the bed, and her light pink garment billowed down after her like a sail falling. She sobbed for five minutes uncontrollably, and for five more with varying degrees of control, while her daughter sat on the bed beside her rubbing her back and telling her over and over again what a dear, wonderful person she was.
    “Now, aren’t you ashamed of yourself?” Emma asked when her mother finally stopped crying and uncovered her face.
    “Not in the least.” Mrs. Greenway said, pushing back her hair. “Hand me a mirror.”
    2.
    E MMA DID , and Aurora sat up and with a cool, unsentimental eye inspected the damage to her face. She rose without a word and disappeared into the bathroom; water ran for some while. When she emerged, a towel around her shoulders, Emma had just finished folding the clothes.
    Aurora settled herself on the couch again, mirror in hand. There had been doubtful moments, but her image had somehow struggled back to where she thought it ought to be, and she merely glanced at herself thoughtfully a time or two before turning her gaze upon her daughter. In fact, Aurora felt quite ashamed of her outburst. All her life she had been prone to outbursts, a habit which ran contrary to her preferred view of herself as a rational person. This outburst, considering its cause, or at least its starting point, seemed particularly unworthy of her. Still, she did not propose to apologize until she had considered the matter carefully—not that her daughter expected an apology. Emma sat quietly by her neatly folded clothes.
    “Well, my dear, I must say you’ve behaved rather independently,” Aurora said. “Still, the times being what they are, I suppose I should have expected it.”
    “Momma, it has nothing to do with the times,” Emma said. “You got pregnant, didn’t you?”
    “Not consciously,” Aurora said. “Not with unseemly haste either. You’re only twenty-two.”
    “Now stop it, just stop it,” Emma said. “You’re not going to lose your suitors.”
    Aurora’s expression was once again a little bemused, once again a little aloof. “I can’t imagine why I should care,” she said. “All of them are miles beneath me. I’m not at all sure that’s why Icried. The shock may have made me jealous, for all I know. I always meant to have more children myself. Is Thomas coming home soon?”
    “I want you to call him Flap, please.” Emma said. “He doesn’t like to be called Thomas.”
    “Sorry,” Aurora said. “I don’t like using nicknames, even charming ones, and my son-in-law’s is hardly charming. It sounds like part of a loincloth.”
    Emma gave up again. “He should be here any minute,” she said.
    “Thomas is not likely to be prompt,” Aurora said. “He was late on several occasions while you were engaged.” She stood up and picked up her purse.
    “I’m leaving at once,” she said. “I doubt if you’ll mind. Where are my shoes?”
    “You didn’t wear any,” Emma said. “You were barefooted when you came in.”
    “Remarkable,” Aurora said. “They must have been stolen right off my feet. I am hardly the sort to leave my house without shoes.”
    Emma