A Mother's Day surprise

Disclaimer: Extremely graphic and disturbing content

A Mother’s Day surprise

Sarah couldn't believe how incredibly beautiful the woman still was. Her face was pale and crinkled. She had olive green eyes. And she kept brushing away the silvery strands of hair that blew across her face from the old fashioned circular standing fan.

Mrs Marek was a second-generation Polish immigrant. She was half-Irish and her father was a metalworker in Warsaw who sailed to Staten Island in 1911 just before the war. Her mother, Henrietta, was a lacemaker who also bagged a small side-hustle of making table-cloths. They were hardworking folks and would migrate from New York, Connecticut to eventually here in Kentucky when Thelma was born in Adairville where she lived her whole life.

But Sarah was here for a different story this mother's day. Everyone laments about his or her mom missing on that day: either they passed away or were simply not present in their lives, if not extremely abusive in the worst case; so Sarah wanted to turn the table and interview Mrs Marek for having lived 38 years in her New England villa solitary confinement. She persisted and perished for all these agonizing years without having a single soul whisper a greeting on the day.

Everyone has internet now. Sarah blasted out a message on Facebook asking if any willing mother will share the story about this poignant day and sure enough Mrs Marek reached out via DM.

Soon Sarah was on her way booking a flight from New Hampshire to Kentucky, where she was doing research on bunchberries which purported to have hallucinogenic as well as medicinal properties as published recently by Harvard Health. She was also intrigued by the folklore of a vampire woman who apparently chopped off her kids and fed them to the dogs. Then again, these southern women had too much time for such old wives tales and urban legends. This was no Bible belt but many flat-earthers and woohoo crowds abounded in that strip of USA. It was an exhausting flight with Delta taking everything off the table (and flight) save but a trip and an oxygen mask.

She was on a tight deadline as May was almost here. Sarah almost felt transported back several decades when she parked her rented EV in front of Mrs Marek's wooden porch, walked through the quiet, gravel garden with magenta hibiscuses and bed of irises, and knocked on her door as the wind-chimes seemed to alert her presence.

Thelma Marek threw out a giant hug and almost pulled her in. She had some coffee and biscuits made of blueberries. The coffee was piping hot in the kettle as if Mrs Marek was waiting precisely for this moment. Frankly, Sarah wasn't used to such "southern hospitality" having lived in New York all her life.

"Oh Mrs Marek, I wasn't expecting this." Sarah gathered herself. "I could surely use the coffee as I feel drained!"

Thelma kissed her on the cheek again. "Oh dear don't be so coy. Mi casa su casa... as they saey."

The conversation dragged on for hours. Sarah actually carried an antiquated MP3 player - in the sense circa 2004s- which made her job much easier on occasions, having her free herself to give undivided attention to her subject.

"Oh Danny was maaih heart. I remember one day when I was wuuorried to deeeath that he was taking so long to come back from schooul. The schooul was that building right next to that K-Mart parking lo...well now it's not K-Mart no mo but it used to beee. So aneehoo..." she pointed to a lot near across the street by some cypress trees and a church. "So I wuaz livid. And I meeean lee-vee-id. The poor boy was drencheyed with water pouurhin from all sides from his baeeseball caaap..." And then she started welling up. "Baaaeseeeball....caap as he rodeee the bike...in heeis taainy chicken leeegs.... that tiny ieeetsy-bieetsy peedaahls..." She couldn't finish her story from her sobbing.

As Sarah unraveled, Mrs Marek would later find out that the only reason Danny was late was because Mister Mullen was taking too long at the apothecary and after the thunderstorms broke out he was not sure if he should ride back home or just wait under his shed. When the rain eased up but showed no signs of stopping, Danny rode his bike 3 miles back home with her pillbox through the hazy and feathery comfort of the wheat sheaves which caressed him as he trundled on the narrow path in the field.

"And wheeeyaaaan I found ouuuut abouuut it I was cruuushed. Deevaaastatid!! You know Sarah... muhhh Danny was aen aengeel. An aeeengeeel."

Sara slightly held her hands. She didn't want to be patronizing by trying to comfort her, but she knew the story was still dear to her heart even after all these years. Mrs Marek wasn't healed. And understandbly so. Studies show that in Japan, seniors in their final years who are alone have a terrible time.

Mrs Marek didn't remarry after her husband passed away. Danny was all she had. Thelma showed all the photos all across her home. There was a small family portrait on a dressing table in a frame with acanthus borders. There were oval frames hanging throughout the wall from Danny as a five year old holding a baseball bat twice his size to his varsity swim team photos to finally as an adult when...

And this is where Mrs Marek went silent. Sarah needed the full story but was afraid to be too pushy. It's as if, like Scheherezeda's tale from the Arabian Nights, Mrs Marek dangled the cherry: "How abouuut I tell you tomorrow... oooh goodie...look aat that... we loust track of aaour time."

Sarah peeked behind the curtains. It was dusky and she knew it would be an hour drive to the motel. She can make it, but she was just too "darned tired". It must be the strong potion of jet lag and just burnout despite the coffee. She surmised.

So she decided to crash. Luckily she had the carry-on in her trunk as she didn't want to leave all her documents in an unknown place, be it so may it was a reputable chain. She has heard of break-ins or housekeepers stealing far too many times to have her trust in the motel.

Mrs Marek wasn't particularly chatty. And Sarah felt a sense of unease every time the topic veered ever so slightly to Danny when he was past eighteen. Almost like a roadblock or forced blockage that Mrs Marek wasn't about to blast through. And Sarah understood. Psychologist she was not; but Sarah knew it well when not to push. These are extremely sensitive issues and anything could have happened. Severe trauma numbs and even blocks access to those memory as humans have adapted incredible defense-mechanism to sidestep around those issues or topic. This is why anyone who had a troubling experience with a peanut allergy from a Thai restaurant can develop anathema from simply anything to do with that culture, say muay Thai or Thai kickboxing.

As Sarah showered and changed her dress, crossing half her feet on the chair, Mrs Marek spoiled her with a Cornish pie and fixed her some moonshine. She dined quietly and Thelma suddenly fell awfully silent too. As she washed her hands and somnambulistically walked to 'her' room, she kept on spinning permutations as to what could have happened to her son. Was it the 1960s? 70s? Vietnam? Korean War? Did he die on duty? There is the photo in black and white of him in his bicorne hat in uniform with her in the living room after all. Danny had a faint smile on his face as he beamed tucking his mother under his arms. It was hard to decipher what particular branch he was in as Sarah was not too familiar with the insignias. She looked around the kitchen which was strewn with empty medication containers.

"Ouuhhh yeah.. Danny served in the Navy. He was 24 when he was in Vietnam. When I heard the news..that his leg was bruised from the shrapnel...aiiye remeember droppin maih plaates theeyar... " She pointed to her sink. "But it wassn't thaayaat bad. I tell youu. Lawwd saved Danny and meee thaaat yeear as gloryyy to Jeeesus... he waaas heealed."

Sarah didn't expect this sudden religious revelry from her. Almost like Mrs Marek was riffing like a comedian or an actor from the golden age of cinema.

"And whyaaah wouldddn he. For I praaayed. I praaayed and prayeeed and praaayed like there was no tomowwoh. I musstabv went to Pastor Thomas 9000 times just thaat Aperil." Mrs Marek chuckled.

Sarah mimicked her politely for empathy.

"Woulld you laaaik mour coffee dear?" Mrs Marek asked as she poured the kettle.

"Nooo nooo Mrs Marek," Sarah protested. She was full from all the sausage links, omelet, and waffles with blueberries and maple syrup.

"Weeyaal how was your sleeep? Did you sleep well dear?"

Sarah nodded. It was actually her last day here. She was not willing to spend any further delay on this story than it needed. Her flight was at 3pm and she needed to leave just to drive back to the nearest airport at Hebron which was about 48 miles away. That was about an hour drive from her motel. And she needed to check out too.

"And here I thought I will coooukh you a good steeyaak dinner." Mrs Marek appeared through a tunnel it seemed. Although Sarah spent the whole night there, she didn't even realize there was a door in the kitchen which led downstairs to the basement. Mrs Marek appeared with some meat manifested in her hands in a plastic bag.

"Ohhhhh Mrs Marek you are too sweet," Sarah walked to her, hugged, and kissed. Sarah brought out her "manipulative bitch" side as her ex Stalin (yes that was his real name and he was from Moscow) would often point out. But she was just more keen to find out how Danny passed away and why it was such a sore topic to Thelma. Was it because her father wanted a son and not her as she nonchalantly mentioned yesterday?

Suddenly Sarah didn't care. The urgency to catch her flight evaporated everything that pertained to the story. Suddenly one by one - from the quaint chair and the stools of a Van Gogh painting to the oval portraits and Danny's boots that Thelma still kept on her balcony to the bags of meat to the kitchen curtains and finally the kitchen itself along with the whole house and Mrs Marek- slowly disappeared and Sarah found herself walking towards Terminal 2 with her boarding pass.

Kentucky International Airport had quite the snazz. As a perennial New Yorker, she always held contempt that liberal cities on the coast must be shangri-la whilst the rest of America must be corn husker field with rubes. No matter how much she traveled she couldn't shake away the nagging judgement that all these were actually real places as pins on map with real stories and nuanced rich traditional culture.

She couldn't help but smirk at the handsome guy in suit next to her as she flipped open the laptop. Henry Cavill he was not but she could dig him. But she wiped away these obtrusive thoughts.

As she sipped the second cup of coffee that day, she started to hammer away as if Chopin himself was composing a symphony. "Mother of the year".. she typed and then hit backspace. Again she typed. Dawdled. Hit the backspace.

"Something doesn't add up." She thought.

Then almost on a whim, she closed the Google Docs tab. She went to Yahoo!... yes it was her guilty secret and typed in "1911 Polish immigrants". What was she even expecting? Mrs Marek would show up with a plate full of biscuits.

Sarah didn't even realize that the plane took off, seatbelt signs chimed off and the friendly waiter asked her what kind of juice she wanted. What a contrast to the previous flight! Sarah noted in a muted manner. She was far too absorbed in digging through Flickr, Internet Archive and old images of newspaper cuttings in various digital forum of ancestry and the past. She felt she became an expert on 1911 immigration.

Then it dawned on her. She didn't know if it was the buzz from coffee in full swing and effect or just pure adrenaline from stalking a 86 year old lady in the name of investigative journalism - but the revelation woke every cell and hair on her. The ad with yearbook photos was driving her nuts and she kept clicking the x. Yes, ideally she should have ad blocker. But ad blockers are clunky and sometimes bloatware or spyware.

The math does not add up. It LITERALLY does not add up.

She thought as she double-clicked her calculator app. If her parents moved into the states in 1911 - assuming they were in their 30s or 40s at most or even 20s - then how can Thelma possibly be 86 years old?

Motherfucker.

And how can Danny be born in.. Sarah looked at her notes. There was no date. Thelma didn't tell her. But Sarah did take photos and there he was, Danny in his uniform, with the date 1965 printed in the photo. Etched for eternity. Forever timestamped.

Unless...

Unless... she thought. But she was too lazy (or crazy?) to even think now. Let alone hammer away on the keyboard. She physically felt the breath being sucked out of her nose. Sarah opened the folder with all the newspaper cuttings and clippings she kept in a zipped drive called totem.rar.

It had all her research she ever conducted linked to cloud. She kept browsing and scrolling but she couldn't find the story. It seemed to have disappeared.

So she Googled. She had to know. Fuck Yahoo! Google is best to dig up these data. "Cannibal woman Kentucky".

And sure enough 190,000 matching results came up.

Sarah's mind was spinning now at 14 quintillion hertz. What on earth just happened? But how...? How...?

As the yearbook photo ad popped up, Sarah was about to explode. Jesus FUCKING Christ you capitalistic pigs.... Do you REALLY need to make these dimes?

Sarah screamed in her soliloquy about to go on a Twitter rant. And then suddenly she became still. She was frozen. There it was.

Her monkey mind which was doing a tarantella dance after being bit by a spider completely came to a halt.

There it was. There was Mrs Marek's... There was Mrs Thelma Marek's dear son on the inset of the yearbook ad. Except the name was Tommy O.

Sarah returned to the article and photoread the entire article in 5 seconds. A Kentucky woman murdered and chopped her son up... She kept reading. When the police arrived, they found bags of human kidneys in a basement at an Adairville home. The woman, who went by the name Iryna Warcyzna was a deeply troubled and unstable person who was institutionalized for 9 years on a reduced sentence before she escaped.... No one recovered the remainder of her son's bodies and neighbors speculate she subsisted on her son's remains for 9 months. Iryna did not even attempt to hide the stench before she bought the freezer and her neighbors could sense something was off. The authorities concluded... The Kentucky Herald went on: ...Iryina Warcyzna passed away in 1980.

Except she didn't. She plastered her entire home with fake memorabilia and constructed an entire reality with AI-generated images.

Those sure were no darned sausage links. Sara muttered.