Iris Beckstein lived alone in her old house near Lowell Park. Miriam felt obscurely guilty about visiting her during daytime working hours. Iris never tried to mother her, being content to wander around and see to her own quiet hobbies most of the time since Morris had died. But Miriam also felt guilty about not visiting Iris more often. Iris was convalescent, and the possibility of losing her mother so soon after her father had died filled her with dread. Another anchor was threatening to break free, leaving her adrift in the world.

She parked the car in the road, then made a dash for the front door—the rain was descending in a cold spray, threatening to turn to penetrating sheets—and rang the doorbell, then unlocked the door and went in as the two-tone chime echoed inside.

“Ma?”

“Through here,” Iris called. Miriam entered, closing the front door. The hallway smelled faintly floral, she noticed as she shed her raincoat and hung it up: The visiting home help must be responsible. “I’m in the back room.”

Doors and memories lay ajar before Miriam as she hurried toward the living room. She’d grown up in this house, the one Morris and Iris had bought back when she was a baby. The way the third step on the staircase creaked when you put your weight on it, the eccentricities of the downstairs toilet, the way the living room felt cramped from all the bookshelves—the way it felt too big, without Dad. “Ma?” She pushed open the living room door hesitantly.

Iris smiled at her from her wheelchair. “So nice of you to visit! Come in! To what do I owe the pleasure?”

The room was furnished with big armchairs and a threadbare sofa deep enough to drown in. There was no television—neither Iris nor Morris had time for it—but there were bookcases on each wall and a tottering tower of paper next to Iris’s chair. Miriam crossed the room, leaned over, and kissed Iris on top of her head, then stood back. “You’re looking well,” she said anxiously, hoping it was true. She wanted to hug her mother, but she looked increasingly frail—only in her fifties, but her hair was increasingly gray, and the skin on the backs of her hands seemed to be more wrinkled every time Miriam visited.

“I won’t break—at least, I don’t think so. Not if you only hug me.” Iris grimaced. “It’s been bad for the past week, but I think I’m on the mend again.” The chair she sat in was newer than the rest of the furniture, surrounded by the impedimenta of invalidity: a little side trolley with her crochet and an insulated flask full of herbal tea, her medicines, and a floor-standing lamp with a switch high up its stem. “Marge just left. She’ll be back later, before supper.”