Avoiding Alicia

I'm avoiding my daughter again. I know it's wrong and I feel incredibly guilty for it. Nineteen years. I have spent nineteen years, two weeks and a day, actively trying to avoid any sort of confrontation with her. In the beginning, I called myself a good mother for it, not knowing when I looked down at my two-year-old daughter's trembling lips and stooped shoulders that my readily uttered "yes" would start a chain reaction. I had no idea I was setting a precedent for our lives. Alicia had always been my noble, strong little girl, determined to have her way. How could I have denied her anything? I remember thinking, "What harm will it do if she eats this candy before dinner?" "What's the big deal if she doesn't get to bed at eight o'clock at night?" I threw out platefuls of perfectly good food and spent endless evenings tired to the bone, wishing she would fall asleep. I thought I was being a good mother, but now I can see that Alicia was right. All my life I've avoided any kind of confrontation.

Just two weeks ago, the day after her nineteenth birthday, we had the closest we've ever come to a big argument. She accused me of not caring about her. She was wrong but I couldn't seem to make her understand. I love her more than life itself and I told her that—as best I could anyway. She sneered at me and shook her head; the pink spikes that served as hair turned in perfect alignment with each movement. Alicia took a drag off her cigarette and blew it toward me. A grimace must have slipped across my face for a moment, because she laughed.

"Mind if I smoke, Mom? Hey, it's your house, right? So, do you mind?" My leather and stud adorned daughter smiled as she put the cigarette to her lips. I smiled too, nervously, awkwardly. I watched her as she ambled towards the counter.

"Well, Sweetheart, you know I don't like the smell of smoke and I wish you wouldn't because I'm afraid of what it could be doing to you, but—"

"I know, I know—If it's what I want, then that's okay." Alicia dropped her cigarette on the floor and ground it under a heavy black boot. "You're such a loser, Mom. Are you aware of that?"

I stared at her boots and felt my blood boiling. After all I'd done for her, sacrificed for her, how could she stand there delivering her judgment like that? No remorse, no feeling. She might have just said, "It looks like rain," for the all the emotion she showed, as though she was simply stating a fact. The butt on the floor was somehow worse though. My house, my simple little house built by my hard work, my dedication, my love. I clenched my hands at my sides and crossed the room toward her. I wanted to say something, anything at all, but the words wouldn't come. I just stood there. I was mute and felt helpless, unable to find the words I needed to say. Looking past the black painted lips and the heavily blackened eyes, I tried to find something, some signal, some small flicker of remorse in her eyes. I remembered the little girl with the blonde curls and the black patent shoes and frilly dresses and wondered where she'd gone and how I'd lost her. She bared her white teeth in a grin. I shut my eyes to compose myself and finally found my voice again.

"You can't do that, Alicia. It's not right. I just waxed that floor."

"What? That's all you have to say?" She crossed her arms and leaned against the counter.

"I don't appreciate what you've done and, now . . . you'll have to clean it up."

My body trembled as I spoke, but she truly had crossed a line. I work hard to make us a decent living and take a lot of pride in what a good job I've done in giving my only child a nice, safe place to grow up. I've been with the same company for the last fifteen years and I show them, and my daughter, nothing but dedication. The meat packing plant isn't the place I would have preferred to work all these years, but the money is all right, benefits are included and they've always understood that Alicia comes first. They always let me take sick days to be with her whenever she's needed me, or whenever the school called me for a meeting or Alicia had a suspension.

"I'll have to clean it up. Hmm. I'll have to clean it up. Wow." Alicia shook her head. "Don't burst a blood vessel or anything, cause you know, you're really stepping out on a limb there. You're very nearly confronting me. I just called you a loser and you're just going to stand there whining about your stupid floor?"

"Why do I have to argue with you? I don't see any point in it."

"Because you have to, mom," Alicia yelled out in frustration. "There is a point in it and the point is you have to stand up and be counted or you'll get walked all over!" She pulled on her pink spikes and screeched. "This is what has been driving me crazy all my life! This. You never stand up to anyone or anything. It's like nothing matters to you. You smile at everything, say yes to everyone, and then run down to Dr. Chopine for a renewal of your ulcer medicine. Can't you see, mom?"

"I can see that I try to be a decent human being, a good parent. I keep a good house and you don't want for anything. So why are you doing this to me? Why are you trying to tell me I'm not good enough?"

"I'm not doing anything to you. You are doing this to yourself."

"Doing what? I don't understand."

"Mom, you can't play Perfect Miss Polly all your life. It won't work. It isn't working. Your ulcers will kill you some day, or what about cancer? You seem like a pretty good candidate to me. Just . . . stand up for yourself. Just once. I would love to see that just one time. Then maybe I'd have some good memories of you."

I felt tears stinging behind my eyes and tried to be strong. Alicia sighed as she crossed the kitchen to the table where she'd left her pack of cigarettes. I stared at the crushed cigarette on the floor and willed myself not to cry. I picked up the discarded butt. Behind me, I heard Alicia exhaling a puff. She'd lit another one. I turned to face her.

"You have no good memories of me?" I asked, afraid to ask the question, afraid of the answer but mostly afraid not to ask it. I squeezed the cigarette stub in my hand, feeling my short nails dig little moons into the palm of my hand. A sparrow chirped outside the open window before fluttering away leaving us in silence. Alicia groaned before she spoke. I waited.

"I never said that, well, I didn't mean that exactly. I just meant . . . you can make it impossible to respect you sometimes. I have no respect for you. You've turned into this washed out, lonely, old woman and you did that to yourself. I'm just tired of spending my whole life trying not to be like you."

"But I haven't been lonely. I have you and this house and . . . and my work. I'm supposed to be getting another raise next month and I'm even thinking of applying for that supervisor's position—"

"Where's your husband, Mom? Huh? Where is he?" She looked around the room and then snapped her fingers and pointed her finger at me. "Oh, that's right. You don't have one. Why is that Mom? Is it because you've never been on a date in over nineteen years? You said yourself my father was the only man you ever dated after high school."

I started to protest, explain that I don't need a man to be happy but Alicia cut me off. She was pacing as she spoke, taking quick drags of her cigarette between sentences.

"No really, I mean . . . what kind of a loser spends her life in a meat plant, cutting and wrapping, cutting and wrapping, never really seeing daylight, never really living? You let your whole life pass by you and all because you're too chicken to say anything about it, or do anything to change it. Some guy knocked you up, left you alone and where is he now? Where is this man that you let decide our lives for us, Mom? Not just your life, but mine too! Mine too and I never even met the man. He had no right to do that, and you had no right to let him, and . . . and . . . it's just . . . time for a change now. It's time to change, Mom.”

"But I don't need to go changing my life. I like it the way it is. I don't understand why you can't accept that."

"But you don't like it only you can't admit it. And I don't like it, mom. I'm ashamed of you. I don't bring my friends over here when you're around because then they might have to meet you and I don't want the embarrassment. What do I say to them? Oh, hi, that mousy little woman over there who might burst into tears if you look at her is my mother. Is that what I'm supposed to do?"

"You're the one with the pink hair and the black clothes and . . . makeup so heavy that you hide all the prettiness and you're ashamed of me? You have the nerve to be ashamed of me?"

"Finally, some confrontation. Mrs. Penton has an opinion."

"What do you want from me? How was I such a bad mother? I gave you love, a roof over your head, food in your stomach . . . what did I do wrong?" I clenched my fists together and tried not to cry. My heart had turned to fragile lead, where at any moment, it could break, yet it was so heavy I feared it would choke off my breath.

"You never stood up for anything. That's what you did wrong. Remember when I was in grade four and the principal called you for something that happened at school? I don't remember what it was exactly. It was something to do with wrecking some girl's picture in art, but I remember it was the very first time I ever got in trouble in school."

Alicia took a deep breath and turned her eyes to the ceiling as though trying to ward off tears before turning her black gaze back to me. "I also remember that I didn't do it. I thought you would come and defend me, but you didn't. You just nodded and smiled and made me take a two-day suspension because even though you knew the principal was wrong, you didn't want to confront him." She took a long drag off her cigarette and studied the end of it where the paper and tobacco were burning away.

"Remember when you caught me smoking when I was thirteen? Do you remember what you did?" Alicia shook her head and laughed.

I nodded and remembered. I told her it was bad for her and immediately bought her a pack of cigarettes. I'd rather have her come to me and ask for them than to steal money from me. I was saving her from sneaking around. I'd heard cigarettes were addictive and I didn't want her reduced to desperate measures to get them. I didn't want her to be one of those girls that hang out in front of the convenience stores trying to get people to give them cigarettes.

"You never spanked me, or grounded me or anything a normal parent would do. I'm surprised you didn't start running out to buy my drugs for me when I started into that." Alicia put her cigarette out in the ashtray and didn't hesitate a moment before lighting another one.

"So you're telling me that if I had just been abusive or grounded you, we could have avoided this whole conversation?" I asked.

"You don't get it! You just don't get it. I just told you I do drugs. Do you care? I'm trying to talk to you and you're still trying to figure out how to avoid it. I can't handle any more of this." She picked up her purse and cigarettes and started toward the door, her boots leaving a scuffmark that I'd have to clean up later, along with the burn mark.

"I can't handle you anymore, Mom. And I just can't deal with . . . whatever you call this garbage between us."

"But where will you go? This is your home." Panic, rising in my throat as stomach acid, jolted me to desperation. I was scared she might leave. For good. I couldn't let that happen. I couldn't let the only reason I had to live walk away from me, hating me. "Please, Alicia. Don't overreact, Honey."

"I'll crash with some friends and maybe when we've had enough time to get our heads together, I'll call you. I need some time away. I just want to figure out how to be me, without worrying about being different from you."

"How long? How long will you be gone, or until you call me?"

"A day, a week, a life time. That's one of the things I have to figure out. But when I do, I'll let you know."

Did I see sadness in her eyes? Damn that black crap, it hid her eyes too much. I couldn't tell what she was really thinking or feeling. "But what about college and . . . and a future? How will I know you're okay? How can I get in touch with you?"

"Look at me, Mom. Look at me. Just stop trying to pretend that we're this normal, suburban little family, because we're not. We don't picnic in the park and I don't wear sweater sets and giggle with my girlfriends in a college dorm. I don't have a dad who calls me Princess and gives me the car keys so I can get to the library, wink wink. That's not us. That's your stupid dream and like everything else about your life, it isn't real."

"Give me a chance. Please." Tears began at the corners of my eyes but I wiped them away. I had to show her I was strong. "We can try, Alicia. Please, I'll do whatever you want."

Alicia shook her head and opened the door. "Bye, Mom." She was halfway down the front walk when I reached the porch.

"Alicia, wait! I want to talk now. We can work this out." She kept walking. I ran down the front sidewalk, calling out to her, "Alicia! I'm not a loser! You get back here now, and let's talk. I'm standing up for myself, Alicia. See? I can do it."

Butterflies fluttered in my stomach when she stopped and turned around. I thought she'd come back, but she shook her head, her shoulders slumped as though she were defeated. I was sure she'd come back then, but instead she stood tall and cupped her hands around her mouth.

"Stop trying to please me and just be yourself for once."

I watched my little girl walk away, and looked around, hoping no one saw us. I berated myself for being so weak and for not standing up to her sooner.

I didn't hear from her. Every day I waited for her to walk through the door, or just call me. I wrote her a letter telling her how sorry I was and that I'm not truly happy, but I didn't know where to send it. In the letter, I asked her to please come home, help me to be strong, to overcome my fears, my people-pleasing tendencies—so that I could be the mother she wants me to be. I started to wonder if I'd ever hear from her again.

I stopped wondering this morning, when the police came to my door. Relief flooded my whole being. Their arrival was really no different than when the principal used to call. She was at least somewhere I could see her again, safe under police protection. Alicia would see that all daughters need their mothers, even when those mothers aren't perfect. Relief turned to tears as the men in the blue suits explained how they'd found her in a crack house.

Now, I'm sitting outside in a lush green park, remembering how much Alicia loved to go the park when she was small. Squirrels are racing through the branches high above me, and sparrows are fluttering about, dancing on the edges of the water fountain before flying out of sight. The sun is beating down on my back and I am so cold. I want to enjoy this scenery, but it all seems so unreal. I keep glancing up at the big brick building in front of me, knowing Alicia's in there. I hope it's all a mistake. I hope and pray it isn't my daughter.

I don't want to go in there, but I'm the only family she has. I'm the only one who can identify her body.

I think I'll stay out here just a little longer and pray that she'll forgive me, this once, for avoiding her again.