CHAPTER NINE — A Mother Who Can't Work
Elara
My mother tried to return to work on a Monday.
She woke before I did, dressed slowly in the dim motel light, smoothing wrinkles out of a blouse that had once belonged to a different life. I watched her from the edge of the other bed, my chest tight as she buttoned it with hands that wouldn't stop shaking.
"You don't have to," I said quietly.
She didn't look at me. "I do."
Her voice held the kind of firmness that came from fear, not strength.
Miriam Vance had worked her entire adult life. She had been the sort of woman who believed contribution was proof of worth, who measured herself by how useful she could still be to the people she loved. Sitting still made her restless. Depending on others made her ashamed.
Losing my father had taken something essential from her.
Losing her independence threatened to finish the job.
"I'll just do half days," she continued, tying her scarf. "Nothing strenuous."
I knew the lie the moment it left her mouth.
The doctor had been clear. Rest. Reduced stress. Medication taken on schedule. None of that fit with factory shifts and standing for hours on concrete floors.
But desperation rewrote logic.
I walked her to the door anyway, handing her the small bag with her pills and lunch inside. She smiled at me like I was still her child, like I wasn't holding the weight of the world in my spine.
"I'll be fine," she said again.
I waited until she disappeared down the corridor before I sat down and pressed my hands over my face.
She didn't make it through the day.
Lucas called me from a borrowed phone, his voice tight with panic. "They sent her home. She almost collapsed."
I didn't remember the walk to the bus stop. Or the ride itself. I only remembered pushing through the doors of the clinic and seeing her in a plastic chair, her skin pale, her eyes dull with exhaustion.
She looked… small.
The nurse spoke gently, but there was no softness in the truth. "She can't work like this. Not now. Possibly not again."
The word again echoed in my head.
On the ride back, my mother stared out the window, silent. When we reached the motel, she finally spoke.
"I'm sorry," she said.
That broke me more than anything else could have.
"You have nothing to apologize for," I said, too sharply. I softened my tone and took her hand. "We'll manage."
She squeezed my fingers weakly. "You shouldn't have to."
That night, she cried.
Not loud, not dramatic. Just quiet, relentless tears that soaked into the thin pillow as she turned her face away from us. I lay awake listening, counting her breaths, afraid they would falter if I stopped paying attention.
The next morning, I hid the job listings from her.
It felt like betrayal. It also felt necessary.
Her days became smaller after that. She moved slowly, carefully, as though afraid any sudden motion might shatter her entirely. She watched me more than she spoke, her gaze following me around the room with a mixture of gratitude and guilt that made my chest ache.
I became her hands.
I filled out forms she couldn't focus on. I stood in lines. I argued with offices that treated illness like an inconvenience. I memorized her medication schedule and set alarms I never ignored.
At eighteen, I learned how to translate medical language into fear.
Chronic.
Progressive.
Manageable.
Manageable meant forever.
Lucas noticed the shift almost immediately. He started coming home earlier, his jokes forced, his anger simmering just beneath the surface. He hated that she couldn't work. Hated that I had taken control. Hated that he felt useless.
Aaron watched everything quietly, absorbing it in the way children do when they don't understand but know something is wrong.
One afternoon, he asked, "Will Mama get better?"
I paused.
Words mattered now. Lies were dangerous.
"She'll have good days and bad days," I said carefully. "We just have to help her on the bad ones."
He nodded, satisfied for the moment, then returned to his homework without another word.
That was when I realized how much they were leaning on me.
Not just financially.
Emotionally.
I was the constant now. The one who didn't break.
There was no room for me to falter.
The motel manager started knocking on our door more often. Polite reminders at first. Then firmer ones. Payment schedules. Late fees. Rules about cooking, about noise, about how many people were allowed in a room.
I smiled through all of it.
Inside, something hardened.
One evening, after my mother had fallen asleep, I sat outside on the concrete step and stared at my phone. Missed calls from places I'd applied to. Rejections that sounded apologetic but final.
No experience.
Too young.
Overqualified.
Underqualified.
Pick your poison.
I thought about school—the plans I'd put on hold, the future that had quietly folded itself away without asking permission. I thought about how quickly everything I'd been had narrowed into one role.
Caretaker.
Provider.
Shield.
I wondered if this was what adulthood was supposed to feel like.
Later that night, my mother called my name softly.
I sat up instantly. "What's wrong?"
She shook her head. "Nothing. I just… couldn't sleep."
I climbed onto the bed beside her, careful not to jostle her too much. She studied my face in the dim light, her eyes filled with something like mourning.
"You look tired," she said.
I smiled. "I'm fine."
She reached up and brushed my hair back, the way she used to when I was younger. "You're carrying too much."
"So did you," I replied.
She swallowed. "I was supposed to protect you."
The words landed heavy between us.
"You did," I said, even though we both knew protection had limits. "You still are."
She turned her face away, but her shoulders shook.
That was the moment I stopped seeing her only as my mother.
She was human. Fragile. Afraid.
And she couldn't work anymore.
The world didn't care why.
Bills didn't care about illness. Deadlines didn't pause for grief. Landlords didn't accept love as currency.
The responsibility settled deeper into my bones.
I would find a way.
I didn't know how yet. I didn't know what it would cost.
But I knew one thing with absolute clarity—
My mother would never have to apologize for being sick again.
Even if it meant I had to become someone I never planned to be.