Her mother’s room was halfway down the hall, number 312. The door was ajar.
Hazel stood outside it for a beat too long, her hand hovering near the frame, her heartbeat high in her throat. The scent of rosemary and chamomile drifted from inside, faint but familiar. It was the kind of smell that made her think of bathrobes and tea bags and old drawers lined with sachets that never lost their strength.
She knocked, her knuckles gentle against the wooden door.
“Come in,” came a voice, soft and unhurried.
Hazel pushed the door open.
The room was small but bright, just as she remembered it. There was the same narrow bed, the same writing desk, the same padded chair by the window. A calendar hung beside a bulletin board with no pins, only taped edges, and a small bookshelf housed a few paperbacks. There were books filled with crossword puzzles and a photo frame with no glass that held an image of Hazel as a teenager she hadn’t known existed.
Her mother was seated by the window in a thick green cardigan, her legs curled beneath her, a mug resting on the windowsill beside her. She looked up as the door pushed open and her whole face changed.
“Hazel,” her mother said, her voice catching slightly on the name, like it had weight. Like itmeantsomething.
Hazel’s throat closed for a beat. Her hands stilled at her sides, breath hitching in her chest. It had been a few years since she had laid eyes on her mother, but she looked just the same. An older, softer version of Hazel herself, with the same olive-toned skin, the same dark hair, the same cheeks dotted with freckles.
“Hi, Mom.”
Her mother’s face softened, folding into something warm and full. She adjusted her mug carefully on the windowsill, her fingers trembling just slightly, and stood. For a second, Hazel thought she might just smile and stay where she was, but then her mother moved, crossing the linoleum in her slippered feet and gathering Hazel into a hug.
She froze.
For the briefest moment, she didn’t know what to do with her hands, didn’t know how to absorb the shape of the moment. It had beenso longsince she’d been held like this by her mother— so long since the scent of rosemary tinted lotion and tea had been somethingrealand not imagined. But then her body caught up to the memory, and her arms wrapped around the woman who’d once sung to her in the dark and whispered bedtime stories like secrets.
Her mother pressed a kiss to her cheek as she pulled back, soft, careful, and familiar.
“Oh, my girl.” Her voice was fuller now, brightened with something like joy. “I’m so happy to see you. I didn’t know you were coming.”
Hazel held on a second longer than she meant to, her face buried in the curve of her mother’s shoulder. Her throat was so tight she wasn’t sure how she’d ever find the room to breathe, let alone speak. But after another moment there, in the silence, she swallowed, clearing some of the lingering emotion that had gathered.
“I thought I’d make it a surprise,” she murmured as they pulled apart. She stepped further into the room, her boots barely making a sound on the floor. “I hope that’s okay.”
“It’s better than okay.” Her mother smiled, and it was the kind of smile that touched her eyes, brightening their green and brown depths. “Come sit, I was just watching the birds. They’re greedy this week, I think they know something we don’t. Must be a lot of snow coming.”
Hazel smiled faintly and moved to sit beside her, easing onto the cushion beneath the window. The seat was warm from the radiator below.
Her mother sat down again beside her, tucking one foot beneath the other. She reached for Hazel’s hand as she sat, her fingers cool but sure.
“How’s Boston?” her mother asked, brushing a thumb across Hazel’s knuckles. “How areyou?”
The question landed like a pin dropped in a still room.
Hazel’s breath caught. She opened her mouth, then closed it again, unsure of how to shape the truth into something her mother could hold. That one word—Boston—was heavy with all the things her mother didn’t know; that Hazel hadn’t lived there in months, and that her apartment was still full of her things, even though the lease was ending soon. The job she had worked so hard for had already been left behind and the city itself had stopped feeling like home long ago and, instead, had started feeling like a cage.
Her mother didn’t know she’d left. Didn’t know she’d comehome.
She also didn’t know, would neverknow,not really, that her own mother was gone.
Hazel stared at their joined hands and the warmth of her mother’s skin beneath hers, the quiet steadiness of this moment. She could feel the tilt of a decision forming in her chest.
This was a good day. And good days were delicate.
She had to do what she could to preserve it. And so she did.
“I’ve actually moved,” Hazel said, working to keep her voice level.
Her mother’s eyebrows lifted, eyes brightening as though someone had opened a curtain behind them.
