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Show Woodworth/65 "Me meet him half way? I've gone more than half way to meet him, all along. But he just won't do the same for me. He stays at the hospital all the time, I know he does, even when he doesn't have patients, and doesn't come home. So what am I supposed to do? Sitting here? And not even having any lights? And you don't even come home, either." n T n X • . . "Not right away, you don't. So I sit in the dark. Because whatever he did, it didn't work. The lights were on last night, but this morning, after he left, they were out again, and I'm just going to have to spend the money, because he obviously can't fiz anything, and oh dear, I can't tell, but I think this is burning now. I think I smell it burning. I know I shouldn't be calling you at work." "Mom? Mom?" There is no answer, and Marty hears the oven door slam shut, hears her mother bumbling around, and sound of something falling heavily on the floor. "Oh, shit," her mother exclaims. Marty hears the freezer door open, the sound of ice cubes against plastic, the freezer door close. Running water against the bottom of the aluminum sink. "Mom? Mom?" A glass hits the counter. Ruth begins to sing, "I've been working on the railroad, all the live long day." Silence. Then she starts again, "I've been working on the railroad. All the live long day..." "Mom?" Marty yells this time. The receiver hits something hard. "Damn it all," her mother says into the phone. "The bread dropped on the floor. But I think it's all right. It didn't come out of the pan." "Should I come home?" she asks. A hand claws at her stomach. "You should probably be getting back to work," her mother |