Her reflected gaze caught his.

“You have to clean up all your things,” Colin said. It was his usual greeting. “It’s just not safe.”

“You know I’m not going to have that conversation again.” Her typical reply.

“At least the stairs,” he said. “You’ll kill yourself. One stumble and gravity will do the rest.”

“Oh, don’t be so morbid.”

He noticed the cocktail glass on top of the vanity. Empty. No coaster. His grandmother was undoubtedly cursing from her grave.

“Why are you putting on makeup? It’s time for bed.”

She turned and her long, wiry gray hair swept across her shoulders. “Because it makes me happy. When you get to my age, doing things that make one happy is far more important than doing things that make sense.”

Her crooked lipstick and slurred words didn’t nullify what Colin conceded was a sound argument.

“You were ranting about some Linda person,” he said. “I don’t remember her.”

She sighed, turned back to the mirror, and started brushing out her hair. The image that popped into Colin’s head was the tail of a horse being groomed. “Oh, I’m past that,” she said.

“It was only ten minutes ago.”

“I suppose it was just something that needed to come out.”

“How many drinks have you had?”

“One away from enough.” She picked up her empty glass. “Pour me that last one, will you? The bottle’s in the bathroom.”

This was the part Colin hated because he always agreed. He’d put up much more of a fight when he and Meg moved back to Whitefish Bay four months ago. Back then, he’d argue with his mother, even hide her booze. Urged her to see a therapist to help with her mood swings, her compulsive hoarding (collecting, she called it), her need to get on some medication. But he learned he couldn’t force her to do anything, much less force himself to ignore her. So they settled into a routine on these nights, the evenings where she’d rant and call him to her side. He’d lightly chastise her about the clutter, ask her how many drinks she’d had, pour her one last one, and see that she got to sleep. Maybe he was nothing more than an enabler, and when he really thought about it, Colin figured he’d become the parent in the relationship, and that was about as bittersweet as something could be.

He stepped into the bathroom and grabbed the bottle of Plymouth Gin. This was the most clutter-free area of the house, along with a four-foot berth around her vanity set. Colin wondered if it represented some kind of safe zone for her, a place that existed as it always had, a return to her past she held dear while she slowly suffocated herself in the rest of the space.

He walked back and poured her two fingers.

“Thank you.”

“You need to drink less,” he said.

She lifted the glass, her hand wrinkled, spotted, and quivering in a way Colin thought more typical for a person twenty years older.