It wasn’t unusual to see Mabel splayed out on the bench in the memorial square on the corner of Fulton. Often she was there, her arms extended along the back of that same bench, her head lolled over in sleeping crucifixion. Someone must have thought this time was different and called an ambulance, because there were two paramedics looking down at her. One was touching her shoulder, “Mabel honey, is everything alright?” She didn’t open her eyes. She didn’t smack her lips together and pull down her skirt, which had ridden up revealing oversized floral underwear now a dingy grey.  She didn’t let out a belly laugh, all just her silly little prank. She was still.

 I looked on from the car while the paramedics, all urgency, closed in on Mabel. The traffic light turned green, so I drove on my way, heading to Rite-Aid Pharmacy; I needed diapers, multivitamins, cotton swabs, a bunch of other things.  Mabel lingered in my mind with vague concern. Halfway down the block, she still haunted me, her life playing out and mixing with the list of things I had to do that day.

A few days later I happened to see Mabel’s oblong face looking out from the obit section. I was still in my bathrobe. Ed had finally bundled up the baby to take her for a walk. I was pretty sure he was miffed at me, because Sophie squealed as he jerked up the zip to her bumblebee jacket and carried her out without saying goodbye. As soon as they were gone, I should have cleaned the toilet, or reorganized the outgrown onesies, got on the phone to fix up our credit card, or even brushed my hair. Instead I sat at the kitchen table. I sat in the chair, not moving except to look at the clock every short while, wondering if they were already on their way back. The bathrobe hung off me, given up, my legs coming out with nothing seductive about them. I didn’t bother to pull my robe closed. I didn’t bother even when Ed glanced at me when he didn’t think I noticed. I think he was expecting me to start pulling together more than just the robe. It was reminiscent of the look he tried to conceal when I had the third miscarriage. I didn’t cry that time, but I couldn’t help but say, “I know how bad you want a baby. If you want a divorce, I understand. Try with someone else.”

I had said this to him unable to endure a cruel repeat of my own history. I don’t think my mother and father were even married when I was born. Regardless, my father didn’t stay around. He was never even curious about me; he never called up out of the blue, just to hear my voice. My mom married Alexander when I was two, but I was not encouraged to call him Dad. They tried everything including several rounds of IVF but my mother didn’t conceive with Alex. Disappointment became a dead sibling in the family, which made a hallowed space I was not allowed to fill. My mother was too embarrassed to get close to me, and in deference to Alexander, and his unborn, she wouldn’t give me much attention or she would put whatever blame there was onto me. I accepted this. When it seemed Ed and I couldn’t have a baby, I wanted to run away and not face that crushing disappointment, but along came Sophie. 

Her delivery was horrible though. I couldn’t handle the pain. Every part of me felt like I was being ripped a part. My BP skyrocketed. They knocked me out and I missed the whole thing.  The next day when I awoke, four or five people had already held her. I wouldn’t be able to tell her the story when she is older of how she opened her eyes for the very first time and we gazed at each other, soul to soul. 

At a few months old, Sophie’s crying and puking was less incessant. We started talking about me going back to work, but truthfully, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. Some days I was desperate to get out of the house, get a paycheck. Other times it was hard to see the point to going back to a job mechanical and deadening as an x-ray technician. When I was a teenager, I wanted to become a doctor, save lives, be the hero behind a surgical mask. But no one said, “Great idea, you would make a wonderful doctor.” In the x-ray room, all I said was, “Hold still please.”

When I heard the stroller getting dragged up the steps to the front door, I snatched the Sunday paper to look busy. Before Ed and Sophie had even come through the door, I saw the photo of Mabel. It was small and blurry, someone’s shoulder blocking part of her face, the image clearly taken from a bigger picture maybe of a group pose. Still, she stood out on the page. Mabel was a fairytale come to life, with her crooked nose, boxy shoes, hunch in her back and the kerchief always tied tight under her chin. She looked carved out of a potato. 

Greenville was a big town but small enough locals recognized Mabel. She walked everywhere slow and stiff-legged no matter what the weather, making her rounds. It seemed she lived at the bench. It was her encampment. She sat there behind her shopping cart loaded with plastic bottles, a box of corn flakes, a rubber band curled around faded coupons, maybe a winter hat covered in mud clothes-pinned to the cart handle. “Run it under the tap and it’s a perfectly good hat,” would be something she would say. Some people called her the “cat lady” but who knew if she even had any cats. Living in Greenville, people were bound to see Mabel at some point. She was a landmark, not too unlike the abandoned Woolworths that still had a sign saying, “Breakfast all day.” Now it was a popular spot for drug deals.

Still sitting at the table, I told Ed, “I’m taking Sophie out this afternoon to St. Theresa’s. You can have a break.”

“Why’re you going there?” he asked.

“A funeral.” He did not to take it any further.

I walked Sophie over in the stroller the seven blocks to St. Theresa’s. I thought maybe she would fall asleep on the way but instead she just stared at me, her face immobile under her pink bonnet hat. Even though she didn’t cry as much, she wasn’t a smiler. I couldn’t help but think I was to blame. I read all the childrearing books, but I guess being a good parent is inherent. Her eyes on me, flat and doubtful, showed she had made her assessment and wasn’t overly impressed with the mother she was born to. 

The church wasn’t packed, but there were a surprising number of people in the hall, considering Mabel. She wasn’t the kind of person you asked to come to dinner or babysit your kids. People knew her by bumping into her coming out of Bill’s Luncheonette, Cumberland Farms, Walgreens, and the bottle redemption center. That was not reason enough to come to her funeral though. Maybe they knew Mabel well, had long talks over spaghetti and lemonade. I doubted it, and wondered what brought all these people to the funeral. Why was I there?

From a distance I could see the tip of Mabel’s nose just poking up from the top of the open casket. Near the coffin was a small cluster of people, a woman at the center. She was in her early 60’s and held a resemblance to Mabel. The way she threw out a dramatic pained look at the rest of the mourners, declaring her grief was the greatest, taking possession of the funeral, made me know she must have been Mabel’s daughter. She sniffed in her tears like she was snarling and when I gave my condolence smile from across the room in response to her glance; she looked away in an obvious snub. “Fine,” I didn’t need her acknowledgement, I thought. Still, I felt the burn. Her accusation, a little something sharp under my clothes, insignificant and unavoidable. Having done her work with me, Mabel’s daughter continued on with her general performance, one minute tearing at her hair, the next loudly commenting that the last time she saw her mother a few years ago, she told her, “you keep getting so fat, watch out, its gonna kill you. That’s just what I said to her, swear to God.” Just looking at this woman revealed she didn’t waste any time turning every drop of remorse into anger. At least I didn’t do that.

Bouncing Sophie in my arms whispering “ssshhhh,” I kept her face tight to my shoulder as I approached the casket. Mabel lay there, unrecognizable with her vivacious spirit absent. They had removed her kerchief, which she always wore in life. Without it, they had brushed back her thinning grey hair. It was clear the kerchief was also meant to conceal a long scar that went from her left temple straight down to the base of her throat. It was a vicious scar, not something she would have gotten from falling out of a tree when she was a kid. To look at it, made me flinch feeling the sharp blade going for my heart. Mabel would have said, “Auww, it’s nothing really. Just a stupid thing. Nothing to go on about.” Hearing her voice in my head made me choke up. I should have been better to Mabel, kinder, more caring. I should have brought coffee to her on the bench, sat with her and let her talk about the bunion on her foot, the sale on grape soda at Shoprite, the beautiful head of hair on her baby that died two hours after being born.

I had first met Mabel at St. Theresa’s. At the back of the church there is a community center that serves lunch. When Sophie was only two months old, I said to myself, “This is the time to get started! I’m not working now. Follow my dreams, give back, and do all those things.”   At the time, I thought it would be easy, and signing up to volunteer at St. Theresa’s was a good baby step. I guess I thought wrong. 

With Sophie strapped to my back and an apron in front, I felt like such an earth mother while I cut carrots and diced bologna for some kind of casserole. Fifteen minutes in though, I had to ask someone to untangle us from all the straps and sit the rest of the time out while I tried to get Sophie to take the lactose free milk bottle, putting it in her open mouth, she screamed instead of nursing. 

Mabel said, “There’s a trick to that. Always worked for me,” her voice dropping in on me from nowhere.

I might have pushed her and yelled for help given the chance, but she was a lightening bolt grabbing Sophie in one arm and was wiggling her pinky finger with a yellowed nail inside Sophie’s mouth. Sophie looked as shocked as me, but stopped crying. I couldn’t help but stand there. Sophie was instantly quieted sucking Mabel’s pinky.

“What a sweet little nipper. Sometimes they need to gnaw on something hard and knobby, gum an old bone like me.” Then she opened her mouth wide to let out a silent “Haw.” A few flecks of spit shot into the air like little fireworks and her eyes crinkled with a smile.

It was Mabel’s custom to stand outside at the soup kitchen glass door at least 20 minutes early waiting, shifting her weight from one swollen foot to the other, the Velcro near bursting on the strap of her beige Mary Janes. 

She would bang on the glass, “It’s so cold out here! I need to go pee!” 

Sandra, the only paid worker at the kitchen, would yell, “Mabel you know the rules. We open at 11:30.” 

As soon as the locked clunked open, she would burst in panting, holding her chest, give an exaggerated sigh then say, “I don’t gotta pee no more, but gawd am I hungry.” 

Sandra would shake her head and pat Mabel’s back, “There’s mashed potatoes with the goulash today.”

“That stuff is all I can eat Sandra with these blasted dentures and all. Wednesday’s taco things kept getting stuck.”

I stepped in close to Mabel, she looked like she was going to keep holding on to Sophie. Her eyes showed a departure to some other time as she cooed to Sophie, who looked up at Mabel dreamy and appreciative. Mabel took a deep sniff, shook her head, and then handed Sophie back to me.

“Wow,” I said as Sophie’s brow drew down like she was put out by my very presence, “you have a knack with babies.”

“Well I damn well should! I had five of my own, and I was the oldest of nine.”

“That’s a lot of kids.”

“Yeah, only it didn’t end up like that. Things happened. A lotta shit. Oh, excuse me. I didn’t get to have all my babies. And now I don’t see none of the ones still around.” She paused then straightened her back, “but I know babies alright! There would be a line of mamas out my door at one time or another; asking me all kinds of stuff,” her lips slapping on the f’s.”

“You’ll have to tell me sometime,” I said.

“Sure thing. I got a lot of appointments during the day, but after them, I’m good for anybody. ”

I smiled at her, but tired and disinterested, I didn’t really hear her. Mabel smiled back. “Good then.”

After the meal, I was able to wipe down tables. Sophie slept in her stroller. Mabel finished the last of the coffee and came to me at the same time trying to zip up a hoodie that was way too tight for her, something from the thrift shop next door.

“That baby will come good. Don’t worry about that,” she said. “I used to worry all the time, especially about screwing things up. We all do plenty of that, don’t we? I’m used to people telling me what’s wrong about me. I don’t listen no more. You just gotta believe you’ll figure it out alright in the end.”

I didn’t really know what she was talking about. I had already put down the sponge and was taking Sophie out of the stroller, who had woke up and her head began to thrash, a red flush rising over her cheeks into her forehead. It was starting again. My hands shook undoing the straps, racing like there was a hidden bomb on a timer.

“I could go over some of them baby things sometime over dinner. Maybe they’d help, maybe not. Most of the time I talk nonsense, but every now again I got an idea.”

I was bouncing Sophie and trying to put a bottle in her mouth shoving the nipple up to her clamped shut mouth. It kept bending sideways leaking milk and sending it dribbling down her chin.

“She don’t want a bottle. She’s probably got gas that’s all. Take it easy. Don’t show her your scared. I didn’t learn that till many babies down the line.” 

I made a half smile and kept trying to put the bottle in Sophie’s mouth. Mabel continued, “Sometimes I get inspiration so to speak, in my dreams. Maybe I’ll have a dream for you. Then we can talk about it over dinner.”

Sophie started screaming in a high pitch. The other volunteers cleaning up gave an alarmed glance our way. Mabel made to reach for Sophie again, but I turned my shoulder away and curled my body around Sophie, her little baldhead touching my chin.

“Sure, that’d be nice,” I said making ready to escape.

Only because I’d signed up already did I go back to St. Theresa’s the next week. Things at the kitchen went a fraction better than last time with Sophie. She stayed in her stroller, mostly sucking on a pacifier, her brows furrowed, watching the goings on like the world had gone mad. I washed green beans and opened up multiple cans of cream of mushroom soup. I didn’t see Mabel until we were leaving. I was trying to negotiate the stroller through the main door, when Mabel waddled over like a penguin rushing, “Hey, hey, I got that door. Let me give you a hand.”

“Oh thank you. You don’t need to.”

“We all can do a little something at times. I can’t do grand big things so I do the little helps. And when I meet my Maker, after I finish yelling at Him for making such a mess, I can bore Him with my long list of little good things. It’s no big deal what He thinks up there though. I know I’m alright,” and she gave me a wink.  

Outside, we all squinted in the sunshine. “This Thursday would work for me.”

“This Thursday?” I asked.

“I don’t got much going on that day, so its good for me. I could even bring some diet cola.”

“What do you mean?” I stepped backwards, but Mabel kept in pace with me.

“That’s when I could come over to your house. Give you baby advice.”

When I stood there blinking she added, “It don’t have to be for dinner. I just thought it would be nice. I just thought, but…” Mabel started rubbing her thumb along the tips of her other fingers, looking down at her Mary Janes. “We don’t have to. You got your hands full. We don’t have to.”

I said, “Maybe next time I come here, we can figure something out.” Then, spinning the stroller around, I left. Mabel stood there watching me a moment, then went back inside.

For a few blocks, I thought about Mabel. I had seen her around town many times. What kind of life must she have lived? Such a big family, how did she end up alone? Always seeming like an old woman, it was hard to imagine her young, giving birth to babies, flirting with a man, her long hair falling over big brown eyes, playing Ring Around the Rosy with her small brothers and sisters. Instead, she had tragedy always whirling around her. Sickness, stupid decisions, doors slamming repeatedly on her fingers, they all clung to her as closely as the kerchief tied to her head. But I also envisioned a Mabel laughing, coming from a pristine place she kept protected and remained untouched no matter what adversity. She would put her faith in her own innocence as if it was the bible, and she was ready to share her joy with anyone.  Mabel knew who she was; it didn’t bother her. Unlike me, she was okay with being Mabel.

Two blocks away I put thoughts of her away and was only reminded of her when Ed asked me how things went at St. Theresa’s. “This old woman cornered me, wanting to come over to the house. Wanting me to cook dinner for her.”

“There’s a lot of leeches out there,” he said. “Especially the homeless. They’ll take what they can get. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t make it at all.”

“I don’t think Mabel is homeless exactly.”

“Mabel?”

“There’s something kind of sweet about her. It was hard to say no.”

“What do you mean ‘hard to say no’?”

“Well, I didn’t say yes, but when I saw her face, I indicated maybe next time she could come over.”

“So you did say yes. To her, you said yes. I can’t believe you did that! It’s dishonest and pretty cruel.” 

“I wasn’t cruel! I was actually trying to be kind,” I shouted back. “Maybe, I didn’t go about it right. You know, you don’t always have to point out all my screw ups.”

“What if she shows up at our door now?”

“Oh for God’s sake Ed.”

He was about to say more, but shrugged instead and walked out of the room. 

I didn’t go back to St. Theresa’s. I wasn’t planning to anyway and now with Mabel, I was definitely not going. A few weeks later, Ed stayed home with Sophie while I ran around trying to do a thousand errands. I was maneuvering the car into a tight space downtown, looking in my rear view mirror there was Mabel on the sidewalk waving me on to keep coming back.

“You got plenty of room.”

“I’m not going to fit. I’ll have to find somewhere else.”

“No, no, you’ll fit. Keep on coming. Not that I drive, but I know you’ll fit.”

I was still getting out of the car when Mabel came around to the driver’s side door, not at all minding that she was out in the middle of the street.

“Where’s the nipper?” she said peering into the back seat.

“The baby is with her dad.” Since she was following me, I stopped on the sidewalk to face her and keep her from going into the store with me.

“You haven’t been back to St. Theresa’s.”

“No, I’ve been too busy.”

“Is nipper still causing you trouble?”

The night before had been more terrible than usual. Sophie cried without seeming to breath, from sunset until the sun rose. Every cell in my body was raw. “Yes, she still cries a lot.”

“Oh gawd, that’s gotta wear you thin. Why don’t you let Mabel here help you? I wouldn’t charge you or nothing except maybe that dinner. I just love them when they’re little like that. Give you a bit of a break. You’d like that wouldn’t you?”

“Yes, I suppose,” I said but I guess because I was so wired and it reignited the fight with Ed, I continued, “But really I cannot have you to my home.” Mabel’s smile disappeared and she kept silent. I said, “Look, it is very nice of you to offer, but I don’t know you. You can’t come over. Strangers cannot come to my home. I don’t know anything about you.”

Mabel’s face contorted, her lip curled upwards. “No, you sure as hell don’t know me. I’m a fucking ax murderer after all! I’ve lived here for 38 years, never a problem from me. But even still I must be a nut job!”

“What I mean…”

“Don’t say nothing more. I know what you really mean. There’s tons of people like you, who want to tell me what they mean. I thought you needed a bit of help, a kind word, some motherly advice. I know what its like not to get that.” At this she gulped and stumbled on her words but continued, “I learned grace comes from weird places. I learned to know I deserve a little grace, I guess that’s something you haven’t got in your thick skull yet. And you miss out, cause you see me and think I just take. I got nothing to offer. I’m just a dope who doesn’t know shit!” Her voice was loud and I noticed people on the street looking over.

I stood in silence a long moment then said, “I’m so sorry,” coming out a soft breath.

Mabel’s shoulders shook. She started crying like a little girl, with tears jumping off her face and loud sobs. “I’m sorry too. I can be so bold. The counselor calls it ‘inappropriate.’ I don’t mean to be mean or nothing. I just end up inappropriate.”

She stopped crying. We both stood there looking at one another not knowing how to fix the conversation. Mabel spoke first, her big semi-toothless smile returning to her face. “Don’t worry honey, Nipper will come good real soon. She’s got her Mamma taking good care of her.”

She turned and went the other way, her coat pulled tight even though it was a warm day. I watched for a long moment but I didn’t call after her and I never invited her to dinner. 

As I turned into the Rite-aid parking lot, my mind ended the rambling of what would have happened if actually I had met Mabel. For the whole time it took to drive from the little park to the store, I had contrived a scene with this woman who was only a fiction to me. I have never really met Mabel, except for seeing her at a distance on her bench while I waited for the light to change, or coming out of the convenience store, a big jug of soda in her hand. I imagined this confrontation, which if I had gone to the soup kitchen in reality, probably would never have happened anyway. I don’t think I would have even talked with Mabel, if I were to have gone to volunteer at St. Theresa’s at all. 

In my mind, it was if I had sent Mabel to torture me. To show me up for the numerous deficits I see in myself. Her yearning to be understood, to connect, to matter, we were no different. But I couldn’t accept her. I wouldn’t embrace her as is, her shopping cart full of junk got in my way. “Strangers cannot come to my home,” I told her. But Mabel did what I have not been able to consciously do yet. Mabel could forgive. She could get on without dishing out so much judgment. She didn’t see herself always in the wrong like I did, and she didn’t box people in categories. She didn’t want to read my list of deficiencies, instead they were what made her want to love me; something I wasn’t able to allow.

If I were to be the person I would like to be, I would change my thoughts. Things would go differently. Things would go right. I would hold the screen door open for Mabel as she stood in the entrance to my home surveying inside.

“Very nice house. How long you lived here? I like that dining set, where’d you get that?” 

Later at the table, Ed would pick up the dinner plates; Mabel’s scraped clean after three servings. There would be nothing left of the beef stew, or the roasted cauliflower. She would have eaten insatiably, which seemed to give the rest of us a rejuvenated appetite. While Mabel patted her distended belly, she would let out a loud and long belch.  

“Oh, excuse me for that. I’m a gassy girl, just like Sophie there.” 

Ed and I would laugh. I’d ask her, “Do you want some coffee to go with that nice Danish you brought, Mabel?” 

“If you got decaf that’d be nice, otherwise I’m up all night.” 

Sophie would start to fuss while I cradled her in my arms at the table. Holding her tighter, I would gently bounce her back and forth.

“You got one of them swing things? They work wonders for fussing kids. If not put her in the car seat. Sometimes babies don’t want to be held, they need some time in their own skin.”

After putting Sophie in the car seat, I would make the coffee. Mabel would rock the car seat with her foot, a purple ring from the top of her compression sock appearing on her calf from under her skirt. Sophie would go to sleep like she had been waiting for that moment all her little life. From the kitchen, I would watch Mabel a long time. Tomorrow, I thought, I’ll buy one of them swing things.

Later driving Mabel to her home, which was in a three-story apartment run by the Greenville Public Housing Authority, we would sit in the car a few minutes staring at the streetlights.

“Well, that was real nice. Very enjoyable,” Mabel would say to herself, forgetting I was there.

“Mabel, I’m sorry it took so long to invite you to my house.”

“I don’t need sorry. These things happen. I had a good time and you had a good time. That’s enough.” She would look at me with a big smile, putting her hand on my arm.

“See you around,” she would say, pulling herself out of the car.

“Thank you Mabel, for coming to dinner.”

In the pharmacy parking lot, I unbuckled Sophie from her car seat. At that same moment, the paramedics were wheeling Mabel away from the bench and towards the ambulance, her chariot to take her away. I would never know what happened to her. I didn’t see her on the bench ever again. I imagined her kerchief floating from the sky, leaving it behind for me as it landed in my open hands while she had it out with God. It would be her gift to me from the heavens to the parking lot where I waited.