Great Things

"The Greatest Things"

By Camden Shortridge

Vocal.com

August 22, 2021

"Good things come to those who wait"

That is what my mother always told me, as I begged her to let me go out and pick pears for lunch; they were never ripe. She always said that and put her fingers through my hair to comfort me. I loved pears, but they only came every now and then. However, when they did, me and mom would share them and sit on the couch together and watch movies.

Those were the days of summer when I didn't have school. Boy, how I hated school. Mom would force me to wake up extremely early to get ready, but I was so distracted with drawings and homework at night that I sometimes didn't go to bed until the birds were chirping. I developed insomnia in my youth and I can't believe it made it any easier on my mother . . .

As I matured into my teen years, I made a lot of mistakes. At age 14 I got involved in a drug deal that caught my best friend Isaiah in jail. I was really angry at that, and my anger evolved into hatred, and the hatred looked for someone to blame. Mother hated Isaiah. I was convinced she was involved in his imprisonment and thus did my best to exclude her from my life. She initially wasn't mad at this at all - but over time it became increasingly obvious she wanted me back in her life.

One night sticks with me a lot. I was maybe 17 and had stayed out partying till maybe 3 or 4 in the morning, when I decided to come back home, drunk and high, and lay down. I was hoping mom wasn't awake but when I drove up the lights were still on. I cursed through my teeth and began to walk into the house, preparing myself for the scolding I was about to get. However when I walked through the door, mom was awake watching the news by herself, wide awake. She looked at me, smiled, and said:

"Hey honey, how was your night?"

I was tired. I just wanted to get to bed. I ignored her and walked past, trying to get to the stairs. She stopped me and asked me where I was all night. I kept walking and said:

"Leave me alone mom, you bug me."

She asked me again, louder this time, where I was all night. I simply kept walking. When I made it up to my room, I slammed the door and went to bed.

Maybe about a year later I was getting ready to go on a paid-for trip to Tokyo with a friend for school. As I was leaving for the taxi to get to the airport, Mom walked up to me and said "Have fun on your trip, I love you."

I returned only a "bye" and left.

A couple days into the trip, I'm in the hotel room and I'm feeling great. Nothing could have defeated this moment.

And then, the phone rang.

I picked it up and it was another friend from school who had stayed home. He talked to me in a panicked tone. As I tried to calm him down, I asked him what was the matter:

"I- I can't tell you Mac."

"Why? What's the matter?"

"I just can't do it."

"Tell me. Right now."

"Mac - your mother is dead."

The silence suddenly became deafening around me. I felt every blood cell racing through my ears and through my legs and I became faint. I hung up the phone without saying bye and I trudged out of my room with weakened knees. I ran out of the hotel and into the silent streets of Tokyo at 3 in the morning and I looked at the sky; somehow it appeared as if the sky was looking back at me. I shouted at the top of my lungs to the sky: Mom; come back, I'm sorry, I have to apologize . . .

I immediately flew back home where the funeral was being held. Everyone in the family was around - sobbing, crying. Somehow I was too sad to cry, or maybe the utter shock had not yet settled in. I was too afraid to go to the casket and see her - maybe it's because I thought she would be disappointed in me, even through the lenses of her own death.

I eventually brought up the courage to see her. She was there - she was beautiful too, in her favorite dress. I looked down at her and the full impact of what had happened to her - to me, began to settle. I thought about every time we watched a movie and every time I begged her to let me have a pear, and somehow those thoughts seemed significant enough to have an impact on her life, but most of all I began to hate myself for the terrible things I made her go through - and for what? because I wanted to get drunk? I wanted to be cool for friends?

It's been about twenty years since then and I'm not sure I've fully recovered. On the outside, yes I'm mentally here. However the shock that occurred that night has never gone away.

Every now and then I come back to the house I grew up in and I take a pear. They are by far the best pears I've ever eaten. I'm sure she would've enjoyed them here with me. But as of right now they are only for me. I’ve never eaten an unripe pear.

Camden Shortridge is a North American writer/singer/songwriter from Virginia. He enjoys playing piano, writing, drawing, and playing with computers. He hopes to attend MIT and open his own computing business someday but as of today he participates in writing challenges just like this one.