“Oh!” Her voice is full of wonder. “True . . .man.”
        Her careful repetition of the name chokes off my own voice, and we stare at the image together in silence. The picture was taken in Mother's independent living apartment last May, only a month after she fell. She grins back at the camera while Truman Francis Heller squirms in her lap, his mouth gaping in wide delight, as if he's trying to swallow the entire world. He's ten months old at that point, and doesn't yet have all his hair. Mother still has all of hers, though; the radiation of her brain has just begun. The lung will come later. When Sheyene snapped this picture, we had been married almost eight years. She and Mother have become good friends. I can see why you married her, Mother once told me. She's real easy to talk to.
        “Truman's fourteen months old now, Mom. He jabbers, he runs, he climbs, he gets into trouble every fifteen seconds.”
        Mother looks up at me as if she remembers all these things.
        “Sheyene's real sorry she and Truman couldn't make it this time. They'll come with me to see you in December, for Christmas.”
        I wait for her to nod, but she doesn't.
        “Can you hear me, Mom?”
        She stares straight back into my eyes, but I can tell her gaze has turned inward now. She might be dreaming once again, as her chest rises with the effort of another shallow breath.
        As I wait for her head to nod or simply tilt forward beneath the blue bandana, enclosed in the merciful respite of sleep, words well up inside me. I want to shake her awake and shout: Mom! You once told Dad that you wanted me to have a full life. Well, it's 2008, and I do a have a full life. Sheyene and I live in California now, remember? I have a great job directing a creative writing program, and Sheyene teaches classes online so she can stay home with Truman. We talked about having a child of our own for nearly seven years before deciding to go ahead. We're glad we did, Mom. Truman is healthy and happy and charmingly unaware his daddy is old enough to be his granddaddy. Your other grandchildren all live in Hawai`i now, my special place. Isn't that ironic? David is a breakdancer at Cirque Hawai`i. Michael works at the airport. He's dealing with his problems and making a life for himself. Daniel has exceeded the wildest dreams of all his special ed. teachers. Daniel learned to drive, Mom! He has a Hawai`i driver's license and works at the Manoa Safeway. He has no trouble relating to adults, and there are no mean children left in his life to taunt him. Rachael just started school at Iolani. She makes stop action movies with her computer. She's charming and brilliant and beautiful and will scare us all to death when the boys start coming around. Whenever Mary has a conference on the mainland, Sheyene and Truman and I fly to Honolulu and stay at her place to see the kids. The kids all love Sheyene . . . You can't remember anymore how hard it was to get to this point, Mom, how much pain everyone suffered . . . But pain is not what you need to recall. You can no longer find your way back through the crushed labyrinth of your own recollections. So I must choose for you, Mom, though I lack both the wisdom and the right. Do you remember the world we used to live in, back in Oklahoma? You and Dad and me, we were America, even though we  were  never on TV.   Remember  when I used to sit in your  lap  and

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