The Night Shift

He had always known that his Mom was a stubborn one. When he was about 7 years old, he wanted to try skateboarding. She hadn’t thought it would be a good idea, and so she tried to scare him with horror stories of people falling, scraping all of their limbs, and being run over by other skateboarders who were so desperate to land tricks that they didn’t notice a little boy crumpled on the floor. Though this succeeded in scaring him, it still didn’t completely dash his desire to skateboard. So, on Christmas, he ran down the stairs and tore through his small selection of presents to find a long, thin rectangular one. He shook it and it barely moved around in his wrapping. It was, in fact, a used skateboard, and he was absolutely over-the-moon about it. The very next day, they went to the skate park to try it out. He stepped on the board, trying to find his balance, and instantly face-planted into the ground. He felt the unforgiving concrete scrape into his exposed palms and knees. It was like thousands of little fires were burning and stabbing at his skin. He screamed and began crying, but his Mom made no move from her spot on the bench. He yelled to her, “Mom! Help! It hurts”. She looked away from him. Eventually, he managed to get up, and stumbled over to her bench where she still hadn’t moved an inch.

“I fell,” he stated.

“I know,” she replied.

“Then why didn’t you help me up?”

“Well, I told you that you would fall and hurt yourself, didn’t I?”

He was much older now. Though he had never tried skateboarding again, he had embarked on many other adventures in life. He got into a good enough college out of state, and decided early on to study business. Even though he loved examining ancient art works and learning about their original cultures, an interest picked up from visiting his mom’s work, he knew he could never support himself off that kind of salary. At least, not in the way he wanted. So instead he studied business, and when he graduated he got a job in finance in Rome. That way, he could at least be surrounded by the arts and culture wherever he went. He felt bad at first for leaving his Mom behind. She had no other family in New York anymore, after his Dad had left them both when he was a toddler, and she had given up so much so he never had to want for anything more: love, money, or her time. That even meant getting a job during the night shift so she would be there when he woke up and when he got back from school. Still, he knew he had to leave. It would suffocate him otherwise. At first, he tried to convince her to move with him, but she always refused. Said she had moved enough in her life to know when she had put down roots. That she had her apartment, and her plants, and the birds that she took care of that couldn’t be moved across the Atlantic now, could they?

It had been years now since he had moved away. He knew his Mom was getting older. She tried to ignore it, living alone and keeping the same job she had had since he was a kid, but he could tell. He could see it in how the wrinkles got deeper and her back stooped more each time he called. How each time he visited, her apartment was in worse and worse shape and he had to help her with more and more basic tasks. He knew it was time for her to come be with him. It was his duty as a son, even if she didn’t accept it at first.

She woke up, her back already aching before the day (or really, the night) had even begun. Rubbing her back, she got up and started boiling water for her coffee as she began getting ready for work. She checked her cellphone, and saw she’d gotten a text from her son. He worked long hours in Italy, so their waking hours didn’t quite match up, and they never really got to talk as often as she would like. He tried to text her as often as he could, though. Today he asked about her plans for the rest of the night and how long she would be at work. She answered him before going through her answering machine and listening to the calls she had missed while she was sleeping. There was one from her doctor’s office asking for payment information for her recent appointment, a spam call trying to trick her into giving out her tax information, and one from her landlord asking her to call him back to “confirm some things”. She frowned. She would deal with all of them when she got back from work. She finished making her coffee and settled down into her rickety kitchen chair that she had had since she had first moved to this city. She drank it while watching the last rays of the sun set. She placed a coffee cup in the sink and rinsed it, then she walked out of her apartment. She was enveloped in darkness as she headed to work.

The bells jangled softly as she entered the museum. It was dark and the Greek statues looked like haunted angels in this light. It was ok, she was used to it by now. She settled back and began the next 8 hours of watching still videos.

4 hours later, it was time for her to do her first sweep. She huffed up, her back still hurting, and began her rounds. She moved from Greek, to Egyptian, to Chinese art. All great empires, before they fell and were pillaged and ended up here, in New York City. She bet none of the artists had envisioned such an ungraceful death for their art. She had never picked up much about the artworks, even after working here for the past 20 years or so. Knowledge like that can’t be gained just from looking at the art, it just isn’t meant to. It was meant to be learned in hallowed halls with crowds as white as the marble statues. Don’t get her wrong, she enjoyed looking at the art. She liked knowing that there was something that outlasted the everyday squabbles of people. She liked seeing the sheer time and effort that went into the curves of a woman’s hips, the brushstrokes of a quiet scene by a lake. She just didn’t have the words to describe methods or analyze their meanings. They just looked pretty to hear, but wasn’t that enough sometimes?

When she got back to her desk, it was already nearly 5am. She thought back to her son. It seemed like only a few years ago when he was so small she could hold him in her arms, so small that she felt like she had to protect him from all of the evils of the world. Now, he was achieving his dream, but he was all the way across the ocean. Sometimes, she hated that he had left her alone in this big city, but then she would catch and chide herself. Because she was happy for him, really, she was. He had achieved success more than she ever could have dreamed when she had first moved to this country. Meanwhile, she was still working the same job she had since they were young kids and she had added up their rent and food costs for the month and realized she only had enough money to cover one. She got the job through her cousin who worked in the cafeteria of the museum, but kept it even after everyone else had grown up and left for better things. Now, it was far too late for reinvention. She was used to waking up when the world fell asleep and had no other skills besides watching the lights from the cameras flicker back and forth. She did just that for the rest of her shift before the better paid day security guard entered. She collected her few things and quickly left. As she walked out of the museum she stopped to admire how the art looked in the daylight, how much more bright and ethereal the works were.

She walked back to her apartment and climbed up five flights of stairs because her landlord still hadn’t fixed the elevator. She unlocked her door, ready to collapse down into her old armchair and reach for another couple of hours of precious sleep. She had already forgotten all of the tasks she had set for herself when she got back from work. She began falling towards her chair when she stopped. There was someone else already there. She could see their silhouette peeking out against the beams of sunlight streaming in from her window. She set down her bag, and picked up an umbrella she always kept by the door. She approached the chair from the side, but the creaks of her old wooden floor gave her away. The figure began to stir. “Mama?” It sleepily asked. That voice sounded familiar. That voice was one she had nursed through sick days at home, through screaming arguments and slamming doors, through tearful goodbyes. It was her son.

It had been a long flight from Italy. He couldn’t afford to take any days off so he had left as soon as he finished work on Friday, and had booked their seats back for Monday morning. It would be quick, but he hoped it would be enough time. It had to be. He had made all the other arrangements while still in Europe: talking to her landlord, finding a moving company, even contacting her bosses at the museum. The only one left to inform was his Mom herself.

“What are you doing here?” She asked and she rushed forward to hug him.

He hugged her back, “I just came to see you. Is that so bad?”

“No, no, but you should have told me you were coming. I would have gotten off of work, I could have made you some food and cleaned the apartment. I don’t even know where you can stay. How long are you here for?”

“Mom! It’s ok. I just wanted to see you.”

She paused, narrowed her eyes, and shook her head. “I know you too well. Why are you really visiting?”

He looked away, not being able to meet her eyes, “I did want to talk to you about something.”

“Are you finally moving back here? I always knew you would, I’ve never understood why you moved away to a country where we can’t even speak the language. I—”

“No Mom. Actually…” he took in a sharp breath, “I want you to move and stay with me.”

She whipped around and stared at him, her eyes narrowing. “What? Why would you say that?” she demanded.

“Listen, I know we’ve been talking about it for years, but—”

“No,” she corrected. “You have been talking about it for years.”

He spoke slowly, carefully measuring out each individual word, “We both know you’re not getting any younger, and I know things are getting harder for you. I can’t take care of you when you’re so far away.”

“And you don’t have to! I’m fine on my own. You can go back to your fancy European life and stop worrying about me.”

He got up and started pacing by the window. There was a sense of tension in the air now, as if they were drowning in a pool of cement. He stopped and looked at her. His eyes were full of pain and something more. A plea that he wouldn’t have to say what he was thinking out loud. His voice strained, “You know I can’t do that.”

“Why not? Just leave!” she said angrily, getting up and moving towards him.

They stood face to face, though he towered over her. He shook his head slowly. “That would make me just like him,” he said quietly.

She took a visceral step back and cocked her head. “Your father? Is that really what you’re afraid of?” She reached out towards him and motioned to him to take her hand. He did. “You are such a different man than him. The fact that you’re even here shows that much.”

He mulled this over and sighed, “I can’t leave you here. I have two seats booked on a flight back on Sunday, and you have to come with me.” He looked intently at her, “you have to.”

When he looked at her like that, like he felt the pain of all of humankind all at once, it felt like a part of herself was dying too. She remembered when he had wanted a skateboard, he had begged for it for months on end before she had finally given in and gotten it for him for Christmas, despite all of her warnings. When he tried riding it, he had instantly hurt himself, and he had begun crying and calling out for her. It had taken everything in her to ignore his cries for help, even as every cell in her body screamed at her to go comfort him. It had been so difficult for her at the time, but even then she knew that’s what she had to do to make him a man. A thoughtful, loyal, selfless one. It was exactly what had made him come and insist on her moving, she knew that. That didn’t mean it made it any easier. She closed her eyes, and felt her chest pounding and a headache starting to come on. Like it was coming from another being, she slowly heard herself say, “Okay. I’ll go.”

She rolled her suitcase down the airplane bridge. She had packed it to the brim with memories and knick-knacks that she couldn’t imagine living the rest of her life without. Her son had reassured her nearly a thousand times that he had arranged for movers to come and pack all of her apartment up, that she just needed to bring some clothes and other essentials to tie her over. She had ignored his advice and left all of those in her apartment still. Saving her knick knacks was a sign of her futile resistance as much as it was a practical matter. To anybody else they would look just like what they were: trash, and be quickly discarded. She stopped and looked out at the blinking lights of the airport. If she squinted, from this angle on the bridge, she could even see the faint outlines of the skyscrapers and bright advertisements that dotted the city’s skyline. She didn’t know if she would ever see it again. Before the moment could fully sink in, she turned and boarded the plane. Her son stood behind her, hoping, maybe still unconsciously, that he had done the right thing. You can never really know though, can you?