Free Thank You for All Things by Sandra Kring

Oma takes the remote from the end table and pushes buttons ’til she finds the History Channel, then sets the remote down on the arm of his chair. Only when Oma looks up and says, “Tess, could you …” do we realize that Mom has left the room.
    I follow Oma into the kitchen, past where Milo sits, already deep in his studies. “Where’s your mother?” Oma asks him. He points to the back door, which is slightly ajar, a rusty screen door showing. Oma squeaks it open and slips out, only partially closing the heavy door behind her. I follow Oma to the door and stand still, peeking through the gap to watch them through the mesh screen.
    Mom is sitting on the back porch—or deck, or whatever it’s called when it has no walls, when it’s only a large surface of grayed boards with six pillars holding it off the ground—her legs dangling over the side. Oma sits down beside her.
    The backyard beyond them is spacious, with two clothesline poles made of rough wood in the shape of crosses. There is a dog tied to the pole, which Oma must notice at the same time I do. “Oh, poor thing.” The dog is black and looks like a Labrador but for a white splotch between his eyes and a patch of long hair that runs down his back like a Mohawk. He is sitting on his haunches, wriggling, as though he wants to bark.
    “You okay, honey?” Oma asks, ignoring the dog for a moment.
    “I’m fine,” she says. I’ve never heard tears in my mother’s voice before, but I hear them now.
    Oma sighs. “It’s a shock seeing him like this, I know. It was for me too. He was always such a proud man.”
    “Arrogant is more like it,” Mom says.
    Mom’s head rotates like an oscillating fan set on
slow
, as she looks over the yard. Her legs are bouncing. “You remember how upset he’d get if anyone pulled in the yard? He never wanted anyone he was trying to impress to see this place. And oh, God forbid if someone did dare to stop in when there was a speck of dust on the furniture or a newspaper laying out. You busted your ass to keep this place clean. And it looked decent, considering he wouldn’t let you have a dime for upkeep, but it was never good enough.
We
were never good enough.”
    “Oh, you know your father. First saving every penny for that sawmill, then for his retirement.” Oma sighs. “Isn’t that the way it goes, though? We get caught up in getting ahead, planning ahead, and for what? Whatever money he could have left at this point is useless to him. What does any of it matter in the end but who we loved and how we loved them.”
    Mom leans back, propping herself on hands that are splayed behind her. “He was such an ass about money,” she says. “And about most everything else.” She is quiet for a time, and the dog watches her, squirming as though he’s waiting for her to say more, just as I am.
    “You know what’s the first thing I saw when I came through the door? Grandma’s old mirror, hanging in that same odd place—not centered on the wall but hanging where you hung it that night, butted too close to the archway. And all I could think of when I saw it was how insane it is that you stayed with him all those years.”
    “There was purpose in even that, Tess.”
    Mom huffs, “What was that? So you could experience hell here on earth?”
    “Oh, Tess …”
    I want to hear more, of course, but Milo interrupts by nudging me out of the way. “Oma,” he calls. “Grandpa keeps switching the TV channels and won’t stop. I can’t concentrate when he does that.”
    “I’ll be right there, honey,” she says. Rising, Oma pats Mom on the shoulder, and says, “Tess? Could you please stay for a while? Even a couple of days? I know you don’t understand why I had to come back and do this, and I don’t suppose there’s any way I can really make you understand it, but my choosing to be here doesn’t mean it’s easy for me. I have my memories too.”
    “I have to get back to the city and pack. Figure out where in the