I fucked him in a stall in the ladies’ locker room. You look just like my daughter Jackie, he said, panting.

I put my clothes back on over my suit and drove to the grocery store, where it was approximately forty-five degrees Fahrenheit inside. On Mother’s card I charged a hand of green bananas, a gallon of orange juice, some mixed nuts in a red netted bag, and a tub of pistachio ice cream.

At Mother’s condo, I ate the ice cream from the tub with a large spoon. It had been whipped in a way to make it very airy. It scooped itself in soft, generous green slabs and dripped onto the speckled countertop—a garish variety of pinkish granite that looked like vomit.

Where were you? Mother said when I got back to the hospital. I’m so cold, she said. I’m really hungry, she said. I got her to the car and drove to Rita’s. Mother sat in back, looking out the window.

I was just thinking about that time you were supposed to watch your brother, she said. When he almost drowned. Do you remember that?

She ordered the egg plate with hash brown potatoes, sausage links, white toast with jelly, and fruit cocktail. Her insurance covered the chemo that doesn’t make you sick to your stomach, which was much more expensive than the one that does. It let her keep her hair, too—a thick headful she set in hot rollers and wrapped in a cap when she showered.

My daughter would like to order something, too, Mother said.

I’m fine, I said to Rita. Thank you.

She’ll have the egg plate, Mother said.

I don’t want the egg plate, I said to Rita.

What’s wrong with the egg plate? It’s delicious, Mother said.

I’m sure it is, I said to Rita. All of your dishes look very appetizing.

She’ll have the egg plate, Mother said.

Mother ate everything, then used her toast to wipe up. She looked at me. She looked at my egg plate. We’re not leaving until you eat that, she said.

I’ve got no place to be, I said.

The sun was setting when Mother woke up from her nap. I’m hungry, she said.

Alone, I drove past the hamburger place, the pizza parlor, the sub shop. I stopped at a Thai restaurant in a strip mall.

There was a pair of large gold elephant statues that greeted you when you came in. I passed beneath a jeweled curtain to the hostess station and ordered two shrimp pad thais to go, then went back outside to wait. The sky was a ridiculous pink, dotted over with little shreds of purple cloud like a torn-up letter. The palms were doing their slow wag in the wind. Heat rose from the concrete as from a radiator. It was six o’clock, but it seemed everyone had gone to bed.

Back at the condo, I dumped our noodles from their foam boxes onto plates. Mother chewed each bite a long time, looking thoughtfully at the food, her head slightly tilted to one side. She picked up a large shrimp with her chopsticks and carefully bit off the head end. When she’d swallowed it, she looked at the rest of the body, then at me. What sort of chicken is this? she said.