“This is an eff… I mean a… a birthday cake.”

Jake is showing me a pile of junk food smashed together on a paper plate.

I’m still stunned by the orange of his uniform. My son is in prison, my son is in prison, I said to myself on the drive here. Twenty years living two hours away and I never knew this place existed.

“Unbelievable, right?” he asks. “It even has a name. Correctional Cake. That’s what they call it. Prison is a weird freaking world.”

He shakes his head. Mine is immobile. I want to say how sorry I am for not bringing him a cake on his birthday, but the words are stuck.

“There’s an actual recipe for this crap, Ma.”

Jake is still talking about the so-called “cake.” I can tell he’s struggling to avoid cursing.

He goes on. “It’s mostly candy from the vending machines. This part here is smashed up Oreos—just the crunchy parts—mixed with water.”

Jake’s pointing at the crust. I smile a little. For the thousandth time, he’s telling me how something’s made.

“The white part, the filling, is like icing. A layer of peanut butter, some M&Ms on top. That’s a god da-… a Correctional Cake.”

I slant Jake a look. He says, “Sorry, Ma.”

Did he always talk like this, and I just didn’t notice? Or have two weeks in prison changed him already? I look at his face, my boy’s face, and I want to caress it. But I resist and ask him where they get the peanut butter. From the canteen, he says.

“And the other inmates, they made you this cake, even though they hardly know you?” I ask.

“No.”

Jake looks sad for the first time since we sat down on the plastic chairs.

He says, “It was someone else’s birthday last week. I saved this for me and you.”

I feel like he’s six again, not twenty-six, and we’re cozy and safe and planning another science experiment, convinced of a happy future.

“I’m really sorry I didn’t bring you a cake, sweetie,” I say.

For his thirteenth birthday, I bought him an ice-cream cake. Before we even opened the box he asked why it was cold. I explained what type of cake it was and he grabbed the knife and started screaming, “Mom! Ice cream is ice cream and cake is cake! Why the hell did you buy me this?”

Right. That’s when he started cursing. And when fear for his happiness and mine first flowered in my mind.

***

I realize I haven’t looked at the other visitors, so I sweep a glance around the room. For a second it feels like we’re all in church. Obligated, and desperate for a better situation. I stopped going after Jake’s arrest. Maybe these people did the same thing.

I say to Jake, “Honey, I was going to bring you a cake. A regular cake with frosting and candles. But they told me I can’t until you get to minimum security.”

“Ha!” Jake blurts. “Well, that’s gonna take a while.”

“What do you mean? Aren’t you taking your meds?”

“Uh, yeah. They make me take em. But they’re no guarantee.”

Panic takes over my mind and heart. The roller-coaster is moving again. Love, then fear, over and over.

“Ma, you need to stop worrying. I can’t really hurt anybody in here like I did out there.”

I remember the court photo of his boss’s knife wound.

“Jake, that’s not the point. I want you out of here.” I feel my face flush. More than anything anyone has ever desired, it seems, I long to put my son in my car and take him home and carry him upstairs to his room and put him to bed surrounded by his Einstein posters and scouting awards.

A guard walks by and studies Jake sharply. I want to tell him about my Mother’s Day breakfasts in bed.

“You sure, Ma?” he asks, squinting toward the columns of sunlight entering the barred window.

“Of course! You’re my son,” I say.

“But, Ma. After everything I put you through, you want me back?” He’s looking straight at me. I rest my chin in my hands and my eyes on the table.

Antisocial personality disorder. That’s what the psychiatrist called it. ASPD. His father had something similar, but mixed with alcohol.

“What do you mean, Jake? I love you. You’re my son. I know you don’t know what that means because you don’t have children, but believe me, you are my whole… my everything.”

“Yes, I know all that. But don’t you ever wonder if I’m better off now? In here? And maybe you are, too?”

I jerk my head back. My first thought is Hell, no! That’s impossible! But I stop myself from saying it. I don’t say it. There’s something else, another thought, trailing it at lightning speed as if it had been lined up in my mind and ready to introduce itself to my consciousness as soon as a path there was paved for it. And Jake, who suddenly seems impossibly wise, is sitting calmly, serenely, knowing he just created that path.

“Oh, Jake,” I say, and start to cry. “I want to go back and start over. Maybe if I did something … something different, you would be…” I stop myself, afraid of making him ashamed.

***

But he’s facing me looking as confident and comfortable as the Eagle Scout he never became.

“Ma, no. It’s not like that. I am Jake Jensen, crazy, sometimes violent, guy. Not what I want, but what I am. You are Catherine Jensen, single mom. Great mom. Someday I’ll get out of here, and who knows? Maybe by then I’ll be different, but maybe not. For now, here we are. You, me, and this crappy cake.”

He hands me a spork. The taste is sweet, and strange. I tell Jake it’s delicious.

He rolls his eyes and says, “Right, Ma.”