“What if I do do a little toot on the weekends? It’s no worse than all that sipping you do. Ever since I can remember you’ve had a little glass next to you in the kitchen or wherever. You know, Mom, alcohol kills, eventually. There are these scientific studies that show coke is much less harmful to the body than booze.”

“Well,” she says, tugging her short khaki skirt down over her thighs, “it may be less harmful but it seems a lot more expensive.”

“That’s because idiotic laws make it illegal.”

“Yes, that’s right – whatever bad you can say about alcohol at least it’s legal. When your grandaddy Springer was young it wasn’t and he never developed the taste for it, or he might not have made such a good thing out of his life for us all to enjoy.” She sees his lips parting to interrupt and lifts her voice to continue, “And you’re a lot like him in a lot of respects, Nelson. You have his nervous energy, you always have to be figuring at something, all the time, and I hate to see that energy of yours wasted on a self-destructive thing like this.” She sees him trying to break in and concludes, “Now, you must tell me about cocaine, Nelson. You must help an old lady understand. What makes it worth it? Pru says your unpaid bills are piling way up, so it must be worth quite a lot.”

Nelson in exasperation slaps his body back into the chair, so that the wicker creaks; she hears something snap. “Mom. I don’t want to talk about my private life. I’m thirty-two years old, for Chrissake.”

“Even at eighty-two you’ll still be my son,” she tells him.