“Bardot!” She squeezes me back and runs her elegant, calloused fingers along my braids, lifting them and letting them fall against my back. “My baby girl. I missed you so much.” She presses her face into my forehead, staying there.
“I missed you, too.” I don’t even realize I’m crying until the wind hits the moisture on my face. Embarrassed, I wipe it with my sleeve. “I didn’t know you were coming home early.”
She beams. “Surprise.”
Beau catches my eye over her shoulder. His lips are pursed, his expression wary, bordering on a scowl.What is his problem?
“Come inside, sweetie.” Mom keeps her arm around me, and we walk into the house together. “Let me make you something to eat. You hungry?”
“Yes,” I admit. “I skipped eating out with Zayne so I could get here.”
She starts up the stove. I can’t stop staring at her. It’s bizarre to see her in this house, tangible and vibrant, standing right in front of me. She barely spent more than two weeks here before she left for rehabilitation, so this house probably still feelscompletely new to her. I’m almost scared to blink, lest this turns out to be a hallucination instead of reality. “Zayne,” she repeats. “He the boy you’re in the play with?”
“Yeah.” My face gets warm. I haven’t yet filled her in on how much things have changed between me and Carlton. And Zayne.
“He’s also her boyfriend now,” Beau mutters from the corner of the kitchen. He’s leaning against the wall with his arms crossed.
Mom raises her brows at me as she stirs something in a pot. “Is that right? I can’t wait to meet him.”
“Does Aunt Lucille know you’re here?” Beau blurts the question like it’s been boiling inside him. Part of me wants to strangle him for being so agitated right now. It’s spoiling the moment.
“Beau, come taste this,” she says, blowing on the spoon and holding it out to him. It’s as if she didn’t hear his question. “Tell me if it needs more seasoning.”
Beau sighs in frustration before rolling off the wall and reaching for the spoon. He samples the food and with a shrug mumbles, “It tastes great, Mom.”
She smiles and opens the fridge, pulling vegetables out. “That’s going to be the perfect base for the soup I’m making.”
I brighten. “Soup sounds great.” I scoot a chair out from the table and sit. “So, how’s it been at Aunt Lucille’s? Tell me about what you’ve been up to the past couple months.”
She pushes her short curls away from her face with the back of her hand. “Oh, you know. Just been doing my best. But it’s hard out there in the middle of nowhere. It kinda feels like I’m losing touch with reality sometimes.” She smiles at me again, but it’s a sad smile this time. My stomach feels like it’s been wrung out by a pair of hands. “Being here makes me feel human again. I haven’t seen anyone but my sister in much too long.”
I swallow back the knot in my throat. “I’m happy you’re back,” I say.
Beau clears his throat. “That’s great, Mom. But you still haven’t answered my question as to whether she even knows you’re here. As to whether you’reokaybeing here, yet.”
I glare at him. “Beau, stop. Of course she’s okay to be here. She wouldn’t have come otherwise. Right, Mom?”
But before she can answer, the front door unlocks and opens, producing Dad. The kitchen goes silent as he walks in, taking in Mom standing at the stove, wooden spoon in hand. I have no idea what thoughts are running through his head as he stares at her, but in one swift movement, he lifts her off the ground without a word, hugging her as they spin in a circle.
It’s such a beautiful sight.
And I’m crying again. I elbow Beau, who is also watching them with a softer expression than I’ve seen on his face since I came home. “Come on. Let’s let them catch up.”
“Yeah.” He blinks, lost in the moment we’re witnessing, and then nods. He follows me down the hall to my room. I plop down on my bed and Beau sits at the foot. He stares hard at the ground, his guarded and annoyed glare once again present.
I can’t take it anymore.
“What’s wrong with you?” I demand. “What’s with the attitude? The interrogations, when Mom just got here?”
He shakes his head at me. “I have a bad feeling about her being here. I don’t think she’s ready. If she were in a rehabilitation facility, she wouldn’t even be allowed to visit us yet.”
“But she’s not in a facility!” I throw my hands in the air. “That was the whole point of her staying with her sister. So she could call us when she wants to, and come home for important stuff, like the play.”
“I guess.” He shrugs. “But what if she…” He trails off, unable to complete the sentence. But I know what he’s going to say.Relapses. What if she relapses?
I don’t blame him for worrying, because the possibility is unthinkable, unfathomable after all this time we’ve spent apart. After all the effort toward progress she’s made thus far.
“She won’t.” I try to sound firm. Confident. “She’ll be fine, Beau. It’s a short visit. Everything will be perfect.”
