The House On Mango Street

by Amy Peterson

I looked over the pale yellow walls, the green rug, and my floral couch that sat in the middle of this comfortable room. My legs instantly gave out as I collapsed into the large recliner next to the couch. Rue meowed quietly before settling into my lap. Glancing over the mail in my hand I noticed a small envelope addressed to Esperanza Gomez in delicate handwriting. Slowly opening it, I pulled out an floral card scented with my mother’s perfume.. Puzzled I opened the note and quickly read that my mother was requesting me to come home for a visit. .

I inhaled deeply with a knot in my stomach. I hadn’t been home to Mango Street for a visit in almost 20 years. Over the years I had kept in touch with my mother occasionally meeting her for lunch in the large city just outside of my childhood neighborhood when my hectic schedule allowed it. I shifted in my seat as I noticed the handwritten note inscribed on the inside cover to the card.

Dear Esperanza,

Mama

I hated when left notes like this in my mail or messages on my machine. I loved my mother dearly and enjoyed her company whenever she came out to visit. The thought of coming home was an option that I had refused to acknowledge for many years. Placing Rue on the floor, I quickly grabbed the phone and dialed my sister Nenny’s phone number. She would be able to break the news best of why I couldn’t come home this year.

" Hello?" I heard a deep male’s voice on the other line. I immediately recognized Paul, my brother-in-law.

" Hello Paul, is my sister there? It’s Esperanza." I said slowly. My ears could hear Paul hand over the phone to Nenny without saying a word. Nenny blew her nose before greeting me in a forced tone that I recognized instantly.

" Hello, Esperanza. How are things in Arizona?" Her voice was shaky and she was barely able to finish her sentence.

" What is the matter?" I immediately asked. Then I could hear the sobs and Paul’s comforting words on the other end. My mind raced with a million possibilities of things that could have happened.

" Daddy…..Daddy….Daddy’s dead." Nenny managed to get out. I stood there in silence. My mind went numb and all I could hear was Rue’s purring as she rubbed up against my legs.

I searched around the airport for my sister as soon as I stepped off the plane. I hadn’t hesitated a moment as soon as I found out that my father had died from a heart attack and my mother wasn’t doing well. Rue complained as I swung her travel case around as I searched for my sister. Finally, a striking woman approached me. Her jet black hair danced in ringlets around her heart shaped and her deep brown eyes looked tired. Her painted lips were formed in a frown and she looked severely unhappy. It took me a moment to recognize my baby sister.

" Esperanza." She whispered my name as she hugged me. Her hug was light almost as if she was afraid I would break if she squeezed to hard. I stepped back and looked at her. She looked like our mother so much that it was almost painful to look at her. She took my bag from me and I held onto Rue’s travel case as we traveled through the large crowd of people.

The ride home was mostly silent except Nenny filling me in on how her children were doing in school and how Paul had gotten a promotion in the computer corporation he worked for. I forced a smile on my face, but looked at her made me so sad. She looked so tired and exhausted from taking care of my mother.

The house on Mango Street was different in appearance but the atmosphere was the same. The red shutters were now pink and the dead front lawn now lavished with green sprouts of grass. The broken sidewalk leading to the front door had been repave and my mother’s brand-new Jeep sat in the new driveway. Flowers sprouted up and smiled at me as I walked down the pathway.

My mother’s house was not the only house that had changed since I had last been here. The entire neighborhood had been transformed into suburbia. New families had come in and the most of the my childhood friends had moved away from home. I looked over the house with admiration and disappointment. It seemed almost wrong for my mother to change the house had grown up in. Of course, I would never wish her to live in the types of conditions we had when my father’s gift shop business had done incredibly well and a new, better life could be afforded.

My little mother stood in the doorway of her cute face. Her figure was now thinner and her eyes had dark circles under them. Her black hair had faded to gray, but her face still carried the same strong beauty it had when I was a child. She still wore her hair in curled ringlets framing her face and the genuine smile on her face was as much of a breath taking scene as it had been when I was child.

I wrapped my mother into a hug that was long over due. Her laughter rang in my ears as she kissed me upon my cheek and urged my sister and I into the house. Pictures of us and our brothers covered the living room walls. The carpet was bleach white and the walls were a pale blue that reminded me of my father’s eyes. I took the seat in the dark blue recliner next to the fire place my father had constructed some years back. My mother sat across from me in a matching recliner and my sister took a seat on the blue plaid sofa.

" It’s been a long time since you have been home." My mother’s small voice filled the silence and a sigh of relief came over me.

" Yes, it has. Too long." I replied in an equally small voice. Not a single soul I even encounter in my life could intimidate me as much as the thought of my mother being disappointed in me could.

" Has Nenny told you that her little Sharon and Margo are doing very well in school? Their smart just like their mother." My own mother looked at Nenny with a pride in her eyes that instantly sparked a jealousy deep inside of me. I looked at my shoes and then remember that this was my mother and she had never approved of my choices in life. I was not married and no children, therefore my life had accounted for nothing as far as she was concerned.

" Yes she did, Did I send you a copy of my article of my interview with the president?" I asked silently challenging my sister to a competition of winning my mother’s approval as if we were children all over again.

" Yes, I believe Daddy…your father read me some of it when you sent it to us last month. " My mother gestured towards a stack of books in the corner of the room with little interest. I bit my tongue at wanting to snap at her for caring so little about my life. I was not here to win the approval of my mother, just to pay my respects to my father.

Little was said between my mother and I for the three days before the funeral. Nenny came over every day to make sure she ate and the day before the services helped my mother prepare the food for the reception. I tried helping, but all that did was once again prove to my mother that my talent did not lie in the kitchen.

Spending time with my family was becoming harder and harder as I was reminded how different I had always been from the rest of them. My nieces were delighted with my stories of meeting the president and other celebrities over the years of my career as a journalist. Margo even declared during dinner that she wanted to be just like " Auntie E" and the familiar coldness appeared in my mother’s eyes.. The same coldness that had appeared when I had declared that I was moving away from home to go to college.

My family hadn’t always been like this, my mother wasn’t always so unsupportive. It had begun with me wanting to be away from home for college , a first in the history of my family. Then my brothers had run away to join the Marines. Only one returned home, the other had been killed in the Mid-East during an operation. Then Nenny went to college and met Paul. Soon after they were married he moved her halfway across the country to Illinois to be near his own family. My remaining brother retired from the Marines and soon joined the F.B.I, he now lives in Washington D.C.

All of us had left home, while my mother had lived near her family her entire life. She wasn’t able to cope with us being away from home. Soon we began to come back. Nenny moved a half hour away from our childhood neighborhood and my brother lives close enough he comes to visit every other weekend. It was only I who’s life path hadn’t brought her back home to my mother. She resent me for it, almost as if I purposely stayed away from home because I didn’t want to be there. That’s wasn’t the case at all.

After getting my doctorate in journalism, I got a job with the New York Post. Eventually I moved my way up the totem pole and got a permanent column of my very own. After awhile people began to notice me, my column, and now it was printed nation wide in every major newspaper in the country. I was forever running from here and there for new stories. I never got a break from my life, so a visit back home hadn’t been an option until now.

The funeral was a lovely service and my sister Nenny gave a wonderful memoir of my father and his life. Sadness comes to my mind every time I think of the looks on my family faces. I stayed for a day or two after the service, finally the day of my departure arrived.

Rue meowed as I again packed her in the travel case. I kissed her on the forehead before locking the door to the case. I sat in the chair and looked over pictures on the wall. I glanced over the pictures and noticed one thing. There wasn’t a single photograph where I had a smile on my face. Several were of my sister and brothers’ laughing faces. Even a few of my father and my mother. Very few of myself. I heard someone clear their throat and saw my mother standing in the doorway.

" Your father made this over the years. He wanted you to have it." She handed me a worn book. I thanked her as I took the heavy book from her and opened it. On the very first page was the article that had been my very first publication ever.

" He loved your work. We had subscription to twelve different newspapers just so he could read every article you got published. He was so proud of you Esperanza." My mother’s small voice became louder and stronger as she spoke.

" I never realized." I spoke with strong regret.

" He was proud of all his children, but you most of all. You were his dream come true." She spoke again. I felt tears form in my eyes.

" I always thought that he never approved of my decisions. I always regretted not getting married like Nenny or staying close to home." I was the one with the small voice this time.

" Not approve? Oh honey, you could never do anything wrong. Your father was so proud of you and…… I am still proud of you." My mother paused before concluding her sentence. I looked up with a surprised look on my face.

" Don’t look so shocked Esperanza’. How could a mother not be proud of anything her child accomplished?" She laughed some as she wiped the tears away from my cheek.

" I always thought that you were disappointed because I never married like Nenny and gave you grandchildren." I admitted.