Dirty Secret by Jessie Sholl

him?” I ask.
    â€œHe ran away from a veterinarian’s office.”
    â€œWhat do you mean, ran away?”
    â€œIt was a kennel, I mean. Roger and I went to Florida, and when we came back they said he ran away.”
    â€œWhat did you do?”
    â€œNothing,” she shrugs.
    That’s not like her. This is the woman who used to regularly call television stations when I was a kid to complain about sexism in cartoons, who threatened to sue the Mayo Clinic because she believed Roger died for lack of funds; this is the woman who’s been talking nonstop these last few days about suing her former employer. This is not a woman who backs down when she thinks she’s been wronged. This is a womanwho searches for instances of having been wronged, then wields them like hand grenades.
    â€œYou didn’t try to sue them?” I ask.
    â€œNo.”
    â€œDid you try to find the dog? Did you put up signs or anything?”
    â€œOh, yeah, we did that. But no one called.”
    It occurs to me that possibly the people at the kennel could tell the dog was being neglected—I can’t imagine my mother taking the time to brush its long fur or walk it or even remember to feed it—and said it was lost when it wasn’t.
    â€œCan I have the name of the kennel?” I want to find out the truth. It feels important.
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œBecause it’s not right that they lost your dog.”
    She looks uneasy. “It was so long ago. I don’t remember the name.”
    â€œMom, really. Tell me.”
    â€œI think the place shut down,” she says with finality.
    It’s obvious that she doesn’t want to know what really happened. And I don’t blame her.
    THROUGHOUT THE DAY I come across other photographs of her and Roger together, as well as (unopened) Mother’s Day and birthday cards from me; in each case the objects are on the floor under or among one of the junk piles. Someone who didn’t know my mother might wonder how she could be so careless with these things.
    But it isn’t carelessness. It’s the mental illness of compulsive hoarding. That’s why she insists on keeping broken sewing machines and broken coffeemakers and a broken dishwasher hoggingthe last of the free space in her kitchen; that’s what leaves her frozen in place whenever she needs to make a decision—in the bank, in the grocery store, in the middle of her cluttered staircase—while she mumbles to herself, weighing the consequences of choosing X, Y, or Z.
    I’m at the other end of the room from my mom when I find a cardboard box under a pile of yarn, clothing patterns, two orange lava lamps, and a stack of newspapers. The box is square, about two feet by two feet, and sealed at the edges. I pick it up and give it a shake. Whatever’s inside is too light to warrant a box this size.
    My mother, going through a pile of papers, sees me holding the box and looks petrified.
    â€œWhat’s in here?” I ask.
    She hesitates.
    â€œMom, what is it?”
    â€œRoger.”
    That’s a sick joke, even by her standards. I wait for her to laugh and tell me the truth.
    â€œReally,” she says.
    I’m horrified. “Under all this junk? When you loved him so much?”
    â€œI haven’t found the right spot for him yet,” she says, but her half smile reveals her shame. She knows it’s wrong to leave him like this, but she doesn’t know what else to do. She’s paralyzed by indecision.
    A bureau with shelves sits along one wall in the living room and I get up on my tiptoes and clear off a space on the highest shelf I can reach. I slide the box with Roger’s ashes into the spot.
    â€œHe’ll be safe from the clutter up there, Mom, until you find a better place for him.”
    â€œThanks, honey.” My mother sounds equally humiliated and heartbroken.
    My poor mom. She doesn’t want to live like this.
    I wish there