She turned away from him, this stranger.

How are you doing? he asked, hoping she’d recognize his voice. She didn’t answer.

BAYONNE BY RICHARD BREYER 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 134

The recycling bin Howard lugged down the driveway to the kerb contained a legal-size envelope his sister had dropped off. “Found this in Mom’s top drawer when we cleared out her room,” she said. On the outside was a Post-It with Howard’s name in his mother’s distinctive cursive leaning forward into the wind. The envelope contained reviews of his exhibits, clippings, letters from senators, photos that he had sent to her like a fourth-grader hoping to make her proud. When he thumbed through them he recalled what big deals they were in their time. Today they were no more important than empty feta cheese containers.

There was one thing that he hadn’t dropped into the bin with the envelope. It was a portrait of the author Joseph Roth, a middle-aged man with bulging deep-set eyes and twine-like strands of hair on his mostly bald head, whose novel The Radetzky March Howard had read to his mother in their afternoon get-togethers in the last weeks of her life. He was painting it as a ninety-third birthday gift for her.

The first afternoon Howard took The Radetzky March into his mother’s room, she was in her favorite wingback with yellow and blue floral against a red background. Her head, too heavy for her bird-like neck, was held up, tripod like, nestled in her hands, her elbows planted on the arms of the chair.

He leaned in to kiss her. She turned away from him, this stranger. “How are you doing?” he asked, hoping she’d recognize his voice. She didn’t answer.