Contest #177 shortlist ⭐️

17 comments

Fiction Coming of Age American

This story contains sensitive content

CW: Brief reference to sexual assault

My mother likes to say "I was made in Bulgaria, but born in New York." 


She flew to the States in the summer after the Wall came down, wearing a trench coat in July to cover the bump I made in her belly. Sweat beaded from her forehead, pooled in her armpits before leaking down her triceps and ribs. She passed the airport security agent. He eyed her with knowing contempt. He was stuck there, in his booth, in this land of in-opportunity, destined to remain in a country crumbling from within like Bulgarian feta. 


My mother meanwhile could escape. She, with a scholarship to her name, could fly away, pick up the piecemeal pieces of her life and move to the Upper East Side, elbow-to-elbow in subway cars, umbrella-to-umbrella down dreary sidewalks booby-trapped with slush, twelve hours a day in the lab, on the promise of the American fever dream. 


At least there was working electricity. And a chance for her daughter to make something of herself. Though whether I've made something of myself is a different story.


My mother was and is a scientist. Of course, in communist Bulgaria, you're whoever and whatever the government wants you to be. That's how she met my father, also a scientist. In the summer of '89, they canned vegetables together. One day, my mother feigned a toothache to get out of work. Exhausted, with fingers blistered and cracked like The Stone Desert across her knuckles, she lied to Youri the assembly line officer, told him she had an appointment to remove her wisdom teeth. Youri escorted her directly to the dentist's office himself. Without novocaine, they pulled my mother's teeth with a pair of stained—not stainless—steel forceps. 


I hate myself when I think I might become her. But I hate myself more when I hate myself for worrying about that. What's so awful about my mother anyway? Everything she's done in life she's done for me. And for my brother.


My brother is sweeter to her. Though it's not exactly fair. She was twenty-four when she had me, thirty-four with him. I was raised by a child and her man-child husband. No wonder I, in turn, became a wild child.


We were stoop kids: Ferris, Luke, Sarah, and me. We stole gin from our parent's liquor cabinets, pulled hey mister's to the bums standing outside bodegas in the Lower East Side, set up shop on random apartment staircases and took turns passing around the Poland Spring bottle filled with indeterminate liquor and Crystal Light. A few nightclubs actually let us in at night. The bouncers would up-down my barely pubescent body, see the outline of my boobs in their pushup bra, and nod us in past the freshly unclipped faux-velvet rope. I lost my virginity when I was thirteen. He was my boyfriend, a wrestler. The only thing I remember, aside from the pain, was feeling terrified his cauliflower ear might touch my neck while he grunted against me in sputtering little stop-start bursts. 


My parents split when I went off to college. What can I say? They came from a broken country. I come from a broken home. Growing up, I didn't know how unhappy they were. It's so painfully obvious now. My mother went to the lab, snapped the spines of mice to study the genes in their hair and skin. My father went to a separate lab, snapped spines for cancer research. At home, they snapped at each other. 


After they divorced, my father got fat. He developed a deep love for fried pork and other endless city delicacies my mother never cooked for him. In turn, he developed one of those enormous man-stomachs that’s somehow rubbery-fat and concrete-hard all at the same time, like a wheelbarrow of gristle. 


My mother started dating Alfredo, who I can't stand. He’s an optometrist’s assistant. Not even an actual eye doctor, he just files paperwork, greets customers at the door with a clipboard, brings trays full of frames for people to choose from. What my mother and he talk about when they're alone together, I have no idea. My mother's English isn't exactly Oxford-level. Nor is Alfredo's. When I'm home for the holidays, having dinner in her Upper East Side shoebox, the conversations are a patchwork of broken English, Bulgarian, and Italian pleasantries. Never anything more than pleasantries. With Alfredo at least. With my mother, it's pleasantries for the first few minutes, then we’re at each other's throats. She hates the freedom she afforded me, resents me for the better life she worked so hard to provide. I hate that she, after all of it, still can't be anything more than a mother to me. “Overbearing" is an understatement. 


I moved 3,000 miles from home to get away from her. But even that—running away from my problems—I inherited from her. Maybe it's not running away though. Maybe people just move on. We can't reasonably be expected to be the same person all our lives. The ones who stay put are the real psychos, I'm sure of it. 


Last summer, my mother took us to Bulgaria, my brother and me. It was our first time, her first since leaving. We saw where she grew up as a little girl in Sofia, a dirty gray tenement building with clotheslines draped from balconies, cats crawling over the parapets, almost cliché in its Eastern Bloc-ness. We traveled to the countryside. Long-lost cousins and witch-nosed great-aunts spilled out of the woodwork. They showered us in hugs and grotesquely moist kisses, smelling of meat-stuffed peppers and goat’s cheese. They jabbered their stroganoff swirl of Bulgarski. My brother and I barely kept up. We understand our mother’s mother tongue. But can barely speak it. Our kids, should either of us be foolish enough to have one day, will have nothing left at all. No language to tether themselves to, no import of identity beyond that of the iPad teat in all likelihood. 


Our mother meanwhile seemed to unearth something within her that night, there in the potpourri den of distant relatives. It was something she lost long ago. Somewhere in those thirty years between leaving home and coming back. I saw it only for a moment, flickering in her eyes in the candlelit glow, a glimmer, a barely perceptible spark. She was happy.


My mother in the Motherland somehow, finally, became more than just a mother. She became whole. 


December 23, 2022 17:14

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17 comments

Wally Schmidt
20:03 Dec 30, 2022

What a beautiful story of immigration-what we take with us and what we leave behind. There is a sadness that the children of immigrants can not fully understand about what has been sacrificed when you leave one place for another, the little drips and drops of culture, language, happiness that do not make it to your new life. A very poignant story. Welcome to Reedsy and congrats on the short-list!

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Sophia Gavasheli
03:38 Jun 09, 2023

"Our kids, should either of us be foolish enough to have one day, will have nothing left at all." -oh, I can relate to that painful thought so much.

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Amanda Lieser
01:08 Jan 04, 2023

Hi Ry! Welcome to Reedsy! Congratulations on the shortlist! This was a breathtaking piece. It combined the very best imagery with heartbreaking themes. I loved it!

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AnneMarie Miles
16:33 Jan 02, 2023

This is really well done and so powerful. I love the way you contrasted the parents work and home life relationships. I can see why this was shortlisted. And I'm glad it was so I could read it. Congratulations 🎉

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Laurel Hanson
19:57 Dec 30, 2022

Gorgeous. Love: "Our kids, should either of us be foolish enough to have one day, will have nothing left at all. No language to tether themselves to, no import of identity beyond that of the iPad teat in all likelihood" as it sums up the reality of what happens to the immigrant culture and family structure, tragically, since there are so many dreams bound up in coming here in the first place. Fabulous conclusion.

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Wendy Kaminski
19:53 Dec 30, 2022

Congratulations on shortlisting!!

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Ivona Coghlan
19:27 Dec 30, 2022

There is so much story in such a short amount of words. All the characters were fully realised. I felt like the relationship between Alfredo and the mum was really easy to imagine. There were some excellent descriptions. One of my favourites was, 'In turn, he developed one of those enormous man-stomachs that’s somehow rubbery-fat and concrete-hard all at the same time, like a wheelbarrow of gristle.' That last paragraph really packed a punch.

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Shirley Medhurst
19:46 May 27, 2023

Very well written, bravo! I was drawn in right from the start.

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Raizy Beaton
20:57 Feb 06, 2023

This story took me on a ride with it! The atmosphere is built so well. Really enjoyed...

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Philip Ebuluofor
09:57 Jan 08, 2023

Congrats. Fine work. A submission, a mention. Not an easy feat.

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Story Time
17:06 Jan 05, 2023

"No language to tether themselves to, no import of identity beyond that of the iPad teat in all likelihood" Just a miraculous deft of language throughout the story. I loved it.

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Tom Ortega
09:16 Jan 05, 2023

I enjoyed your story

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Tommy Goround
18:10 Dec 30, 2022

Congratulations 🎉🎉🎉

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Suma Jayachandar
06:50 Dec 30, 2022

This is truly a work of art. Absolutely amazing. Thanks for sharing.

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Zack Powell
05:13 Dec 30, 2022

This is beautifully written, Ry. A perfect example of telling a complete story in just 1,000 words. Great sense of character with the narrator and the mother, great family dynamics in general, a beginning, middle, and end. It really feels like every single word in the story matters, and that they were all meticulously chosen. I'm amazed how you were able to span a whole history in so few sentences. This is quality writing, truly. Would not at all be surprised to see you win tomorrow. Wonderful story. Keep on writing and never stop.

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Tommy Goround
14:25 Dec 29, 2022

Clapping . Congratulations on being Recommended Reading.

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Tom Ortega
10:08 Jan 05, 2023

Hi again. I gave you a like on your story. It's only polite to give me a like back on MY story. Thank you. I appreciate it.

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