I wake up with the feeling of discontinued happiness on the firm couch in our living room before the straining sensation of physical bumps make a return.

It is Friday night and we have won the baseball game with ease and much expected hardship.

I squint my eyes as the breaths slowly transcribe from the heaviness to an easy rate whilst my hazy eyes muffle out the blurriness of the room. The dimming yellow glow of the walled light has been turned to high and the most interesting sensation of the moment is the unbreakable noise of something that is coming from the other room.

I sit up as I silently groan from the aching of my overused ankle. The breaths turn into wind as I try to make sense of the current time and place.

The chattering of this "something" reveals its identity as the smacking sound of the typewriter's role flow harshly down to disturb the stillness of the living room.

It's my mother.

I take a couple of minutes of moving like an 80 year old, leaning on every bit of furniture on my way to the mouth of the kitchen area when a sudden bewildering flash in the background catches my attention.

The back of our house reveals the house of Serena Bonneville, a 66 year old widow who has been living as our neighbor as long as I can remember. She has just enough hair to be regarded as a woman, since time has taken everything of her once flourishing beauty, and left her with nothing but borderlesss crumpled skin, osteoporosis and really unnerving bowel movement.

If sometimes you listen closely enough on a low Sunday afternoon, you can catch a runaway sound of the restroom bowl pan, trying to recycle the tin cans of old people's food that she eats regularly, even after knowing their incompetence. I am not a chef and just have basic knowledge of cooking but those don't really meet the requirements of being "food".

But Mrs. Bonneville has an unmatched feature of her life that is so unrecognizable that I never hear my parents talk about it in front of me. But I know what it is even though I never learnt it from anyone other than myself when I went to Mrs. Bonneville's house on several occasions of carrying home cooked meals, helping her move furniture around, assisting with chores and in the heart of winter, shoveling the ice from the entrance of her doorway.

She has a number of nieces and grandchildren who only exists in photographs and was never seen by me. The only people that can be qualified as her visitors would be the passive aggressive social worker who smokes in her car before visiting her, the food delivery guy who has to stop to show her how to cook it even though he has done the same thing a thousand times before, and lastly a few elderly women who aren't much friendly since they chat loudly and make a mess whenever they visit.

Serena Bonneville cautiously hides the pictures, the letters even the ticket stamps, theater stubble, dead flowers from her distant family in a conspicuous looking briefcase under her bed. I noticed it when my mom handed me the vacuum cleaner and sent me to clean her house.

She yanked my summer shirt with a breathless strength that no one really expects from a 66 year old woman when I was peaking under her bed to see if it had any bundles of dusty mess. I didn't hear her stepping into the bedroom and it is an embarrassing thought to be sneaked upon by an old woman who walks with the clumsiness of earth's tumble.

She dispersed me to my house with vacant sentences and scolds. Momentarily, my imagination set her as a dragon and the briefcase as her gold and I was the lonely adventurer who discovered her treasure without her approval.

I did not know what was in it until next week when I returned with the vacuum cleaner and received a bit of affection from her as Serena was feeling bad from her misbehavior. When she slowly limped away to the bathroom, I once again discovered the existence of the briefcase as it rested, leaning on the side of the dressing table.

Old people are below average when it comes to hiding things.

It must be 9 since the TV in her bedroom switches off and in the next 15 minutes her bedroom light will also suffer the same fate.

The conclusive groan is loud enough to scare the refrigerator to stop its annoying hum. But it has no effect on my mother as the typing ballad continues to be produced from the tip of her fingers, dancing all over the layout with ease.

I check the scenery for some knowledge of the possibility of what might be going on in this house. To my right is the kitchen counter and four unwashed mugs stand there like orphans as an iron pot sits boldly on the empty sink.

I forgot that our family owns this much of mugs since only three of us live here but once in a while I can indulge myself in the quantity of glassware because once in a while my mother has the "Writing bug" in her brain.

I don't call it "Writing bug" but instead I take the mature way of referring it as a "Sting" since it sounds cooler. There's a proper noun for what she feels sometimes which I have to know from one of her "News House" friends.

"Mum." I mouth awkwardly as I lean on the counter top with my waist kissing the cold tiles. My midriff has done a lot today and probably in the duration and action of the baseball game, lost a bit of skin in the process.

My mother says nothing but gifts me an unintelligent grunt as the typewriter roll hits the bounds again and bounces back with a new page being screwed in.

"What time it is?" I inquire as I constantly rub my eyes with my body proceeding to the sink to acquire some water to help with the process. Then I glare at the pillar board to find the clock with the off white glass which becomes invisible whenever the yellow light in the kitchen is on.

It's half past 2.

"1 a.m." My mother shoots the words under her breath as she halts from bashing the keys to squint at a book, adorned with loose papers and notes etched on it. Then carries on to punch the keys with untold emergency.

"It's 2." I answer briskly as I drag a mug from the side to get some water from the tap. The tap whistles on and she answers as the keys are dancing along.

"Oh."

I feel an abrupt emotion of being unimportant which sneaks up on me without invitation as I climb on to the bar stool and examine the mugs with a nonchalant melancholy, creeping on to me. All the mugs need washing since at the bottom of them lay unresolved, wet crumbs of sugar and coffee grains.

I check the pot. It has the same scent of the familiar crime.

The dancing keys seems to hold the floor of our house as I silently sit and scrutinize the air for the presence of a possible third creature in the walls.

It is Friday and my father is still not home.

I don't have to check the master bedroom or ponder at the shoe closet in the entrance to see if he's in or not since there are certain signs that speak of my father's homecoming.

He likes mashed potato and even if it's in the breakfast club, my mother always succeeds at making the best mashed potato on Friday nights, since it is the practice of making it all those years that made her perfect.

There is no current evidence of anything yet.

I lock eyes with the back of my mother's image as the same disapproving emotion rendezvous with my mind. It is the juvenile, captivating feeling of being uncared of, ignored by and unloved.

Her fingers simmer down to turn her head to one side, drowning in irresistible thought then her hand wisps her hair back to its messy structure as she returns to her precious work.

My mind slowly converts to its understanding prose.

During a "Sting", my mother's ability to communicate reduces to a low level since she doesn't talk to anyone, answers with long delays and let the world hang on the clock because she could only care about one thing, her work.

Those are the only times when I get to observe the writing ghost of my mother as she leaves countless mugs, well four or five, unwashed on the sink, grants herself to break the routine of daily doldrums and lets her hair flow down to tangled up, messy twists.

I don't disapprove of my obscene emotions of being forgotten or discounted but I came to suppress them.

My mother was in Social before she decided to move away and in her olden days which were definitely golden, she used to write endless columns, articles, structures and lectures. So, it's suffice to say that, according to Earnest Hemingway, "Once writing has become your major vice and greatest pleasure, only death can stop it."

So, I forcefully keep myself on the pillar of understanding as I understand she is not ignorant towards me or hates me for some reason. But she is tugging at the heart strings of her passion.

"It is our duty to make our friends and family feel safe with whatever that make them feel small, less worthwhile or guilty. To make them acceptable then change for the better days. That's what makes us social. Makes us a community. Even if it calls for the habit of tolerance and the wearing the shackles of temporary pain."

It is the quote that my mother often mummers to herself on several occasions as according to her words, it is one of the best things she had ever put down in ink.

I understand how that emotion came to reach her since my father's passion on life is to help people through his job which most of the time, resulted in being away from home.

So my mother has fixed herself an understanding to hang on to.

I do the same with her.

Approximately, at 3:18, an yelp of a loud "Yes!" smashes into the living room, followed by a powerful thump on the wooden dining table, with screeching of chairs.

I quickly diffuse the mono of my mind where a melancholy has started to plant its seed and quickly limp before jumping on to the couch as the silhouette of my mother tiredly walks towards the living room.

She harasses her sweater and relentlessly tug at her collars as she continues to pace up and down before catching a glimpse of me.

"Oh, hey, Frey." She grants a loud, long grin before crashing right beside me with a roaring sigh.

My mother throws a class of uncomfortable grunts into the air as she twiddles her hands around and rubs the chinks of her wrists. She mutters a few restless terms and nouns to me but I don't have a simple clue of what they could be.

"You seem tired." I begin the conversation as I slowly float away to the other side of the couch.

It is the premature, pensive somber in my soul that is motivating me to act nonchalantly sad.

It is a defense mechanism, a silent, wallowing yearn for attention.

"Oh, God. What time it is?" She asks me and before I could answer, gets up and trots back to the next room to read the time.

"3?!" The loud gasps flies to the me and then a smiling face returns to the living room with a disposition of accomplishment and satisfaction stuck to herself.

"Jeez! I thought I would be done by midnight. Then 1 and then . . ." She sighs as she throws a look at me.

"Frey. Did you eat anything?" She inquires me and then from a lack of response walks to disturb the peace of the refrigerator.

"Mum. It's fine. It's okay. I'm stuffed." I answer with the grinning enthusiasm of acting.

Acting to be happy is the best way to be glad when I am not.

"No, you are not." She orders as her hands poorly snatches a packet of stale bread, cheese and other accessories away from the freezer's belly and plumbs down on the counter without care.

"I am. We were at the Palladium. I can't even remember how much pizza I ate." This wasn't a lie since the joined money from everyone, with the saved account of Harvey's rich parents made a feast rather than a celebratory meal for us.

She halts with the tomatoes in her hand as the void of reality slowly returns her to earth.

The left brow looks aggressive.

"Why were you at the Palladium?"

I fall stumped at the second since Palladium is commonly known to parents as a place for endless drug dealing, hormone stricken teenagers throwing away cash and sketchy characters.

"Because of . . . the game--the baseball. We won the game."

"Oh! The game. Yeah! Yes. I completely forgot." She coaxes everything in her arms as she bumps me and we walk to the confining caress of the living room.

"So, that's why Henry was yelling so loudly at . . . like 10 p.m. I was wondering who it was. So late and all."

"It's Harvey, mum and yeah he was very pumped."

"Oh . . . Harvey. Yeah, yeah."

At the moment, her adrenaline is pumping through every bit of her blood since she has done something that she is passionate about. The sheer level of ecstasy in her system is so much that I can say anything right now and it wouldn't upset her.

Anything at all.

Like ask who my grandparents are.

Who Margaret is.

"Oh, Frey." She exhausts another excited sigh as she looks at me with care and wonder. Not for me, but for herself.

"Are you alright?"

"Yeah, mum. Sure. Got a little stingy on my ankle. And my butt." I laugh as the joke infuriates a series of laughter in her.

"Do you want me to take you to the doctor? Maybe tomorrow?"

"No, that's alright. It'll buff out."

She continues the unconstrained laughter as she leans back on the couch head and lets go off the shackles of the conversation.

My mother is currently drunk on the high of her achievement. She looks satisfied.

Happy.

"Want me to make you a sandwich?" I ask as I lean towards the table where the brought elements are sitting dumbly and waiting to be used.

"Um . . . sure. Wait. Let me make you one."

"No, mum. Sit back. You seem tired. I got this!" My comical thumbs up assure her as another bouts of smile rush to her face to conquer.

The tinging tickles of knives and cheese substitute the loneliness in the air for a few seconds as I revive the chat.

"Are your glasses fine? You said it might be off balance. The powers . . . the positive on the right?"

My mother stares at me dully. She still hasn't freed herself properly from the effects of her contemplation.

"Oh! The glasses? No, they are alright." She answers fidgeting as she takes them off and examines as if my notice has broken them.

"You could ask Dad to take a look. And where is . . . he--um? Do you want tomatoes?"

It is on the tip of my tongue to ask her where he is and then when she says something inconclusive, question her when he will be back.

My melancholy wants to but I don't.

"Yeah, sure. Throw in some ham." She answers smiling as she slaps me on the back.

My mother eats with the grubbing quarks of tomatoes being crushed under her incisors while I carve a smile on my face and busy myself with a thin look at the window of Mrs. Bonneville.

The light has yet to be extinguished from her quarter.

This is the course of the night where we switch our roles to match the scenery and carry on the conversations.

I am wearing the pants of a responsible, communicative adult.

My mother is sitting in the body of a teenage woman who is aloof and deeply in love with something but cannot find any solace in expressing it to anyone.

In this case, it's her work that she is in love with. Not some man.

"The typewriter's alright? Does it need . . . a one of those oily thingies or--"
"No, it's fine. It's great. I switched the pins this morning."

That may seem like a dumb question to ask since my mother has an undivided love for that old thing. It was given to her from a college professor and in her youth, they were rumored to be romantically involved.

She likes to talk about those days and the shy disposition of my father's face becomes distressing when she recalls about him.

I enjoy those moments more than anything else about my parents.

"Jealousy can only exist with desire."

My mother's excited bundle of explanation for her words are sitting on the edge of her teeth, like a cannon waiting to fire the fiery ball to destroy something which resemblances the boredom of her life.

She needs someone to ask, to inquire.

And I am the faceless mannequin with the fuse in my palm.

"Been writing anything fun lately?"

"Yes! Yeah!" She answers with the giddiness prodding the chuckling cheeks of her as she sips the soothing milk down.

"There's this . . . well, Jan called from the News House this morning. And . . .and . . . uh--"

She stutters from the flowing excitement then carries on with the same exciting unease.

"And she said if I still had those . . . um Fred's Social Enigma books with me."

"The ones with the blue covers?" I match the enthusiasm filled tone with my mother. It shows that she is not alone in her own fantasy world.

"Yeah, those ones. And of course I have them, Jan!" She gestures to disfigure the possibility and continues.

"And she tells me to get drafting because they are expecting something out of News House before the next Monday."

"And who can do it better than you?" I jumped in with the affectionated compliment as she ranged a smile.

"She said the same thing. So I sit down after going through Fred and the newspaper and the mail."

"Like you do." I laughed.

"And there I have it. 8 pages of unadulterated, crisp expression. Well, 8 and a half, maybe. Two on par . . . in case. If you know what I mean."

To be honest, I have no certain clue about her talks but I don't have to since a communicative adult would never announce his ignorance but support through.

"Well, what's it about?"

"Um . . . a lot of things. But mostly, teenage transformation."

"Uh-huh." I notice I failed in the moment since a glower of confusion strikes her face and then disappears.

"I'll show you."

She chirps and jumps as the crumbling stale bread floats into the mid air before disappearing.

My mother is roughly in her 40s. But tonight she's 21 with the blood of endless ecstasy.

It is scary what passion can do to people.

Scary and also beautiful.

She trots back and slumps down as I pose attentively towards her.

"The teenage transformation." She starts then lobs a look at me to see if I am attentive enough.

The next 15 minutes flow through fast as my mother pronounces and announces hard to say words and bullet points with the rough drafts of this and that occasionally poking in.

"So? You are saying--" I throw in my hands to perform an intelligent gesture that hardcore debaters are always seen to use.

"Yes!" She answers without my conclusion.

"So . . . isn't it?"

"It's simple, Frey. Come on." For a biting moment, her condescending words poke me a little.

"You see, when you are 5, you are busy trying to walk and run and talk, say things, new words. Still climb onto mummy's laps and things, right?"

"Uh huh."

"When you are 10, that is reduced. Then you are making friends and playing outside. Whining to your parents about getting new toys, getting jealous of someone's backpack and shiny things."

"Did I?" I ask humorously and she fails to grasp it.

"Not you but a general, an everyday 10 year old."

"Alright."

"Then, when you are 15, you are interested with girls and girls are interested with boys, playing games aren't enough anymore, you have a will, a desire let's say, to imitate the adults. Smoking, drinking and stuff."

"You're right, that is not me." I chuckle.

"Yes, yes. And when you will be 19, at the end of the juvenile . . . age range, you will do all of those things, maybe something wrong too and then your body chemistry changes to mature yourself to things. Decisions, responsibilities, life goals and things like that."

"That sounds . . . interesting."

"Yeah. But that's what everyone thinks but no one says things like . . . how to adopt to it or how the are becoming so distant from things they like. How they are growing up and the right way to deal with society and let society and life deal with you."

"Profound."

I answer as I lean back with the admiring facial disposition take charge of myself.

"Isn't it?"

"It is. Really. Is it gonna be long? I mean, it's for the paper right?"

"Yeah . . . I thought about that too. Me? I'm no good with Summaries."

"Why cut it then? It's perfect just the way it is."

"Aw, Frey. You have to. " She professes as she pulls me closer by the shoulder and lets her hand hang.

"Do you really?"

"If I don't then they will say it's too long to be in the papers."

"You can always write a book."

"Now, that's costly. And needs work."

"Sounds like nothing you can't handle, mum."

"That's sweet, Frey. That's sweet."

She echoes as her head falls back and continues to brush my shoulder in leisure.

It is a possibility that I might have pushed her farther to an extent where a luscious, illusive dream stood which she couldn't touch.

But she proves to be quite pleased with what she has as she jolts back to life to see the fruits of her labor on paper, stamped in ink and proud.

The clock dings on the edge of 4 which breaks the trance of my mother as she sits up.

"Get some sleep, Frey. I'm . . . sorry I couldn't fetch something up. Did you guys get a trophy?"

"Yeah, it was quite shiny. You should see it. It's on a loop. Harvey has it now to impress his parents for the week." I smirk as I falter on my slow walk to the stairs.

"Sure, I'll wait it for it."

Her voice finds me when I am on the edge of the staircase.

"You are a good kid, Frey."

The blessing is genuine. There's no doubt for it. My act was perfect. The night resolved, as my mother stands motionlessly staring at the darkness of the porch.

I catch a simple glimpse of her on the hallway mirror.

There stands a woman who doesn't need anything or anyone for the night since she is already occupied by a hauntingly beautiful thing called "Passion" .