“Can promise you that one day you’ll be longing for someone all over again. But right now, I’ll bet the only thing you want is to get away from all of that. Let’s do some collabs or something like that. I’ll write up a script and you can narrate it together with Gina. Just focus on getting stuff done. It’ll be good for you.”
“Yeah, maybe.” I looked at the passenger seat, and I wondered how long it would take before it stopped feeling like it should have had Victoria in it. “I’m gonna drive now. I’ll talk later. If you have an idea for the script, you can start writing it up, I’m looking forward to it.”
∞∞∞
Of all places, I didn’t think I’d end up here when I started driving, but I guess it felt like the right thing to do. I knocked on the front door of the house, and even though she was the one I was looking for, it still made my stomach turn that it was Miranda Jameson who answered it, standing in the immaculate foyer of the Jameson family house. She went through a whole series of emotions at the sight of me before settling on something cautious, opening the door a little wider.
“Bridget, you’re going to freeze in that daft little coat,” she said. “Come inside.”
Nan’s voice floated out from somewhere inside. “Oh, did you say Bridget? Ask her does she want any eggnog!”
“It’s Bridget,” Miss Jameson called back, and blessedly, she did not ask me if I wanted any eggnog. I walked inside, and she shut the door behind me.
“Thanks,” I said, stripping my gloves off and then my coat after, hanging it up by the door and shivering a little against the cold that clung to me like wet clothes. “Sorry about dropping by without a word.”
“It’s quite all right. Is something the matter?”
“I just wanted to talk. About Victoria,” I said, hunching my shoulders. “Has she been talking to you?”
She drew herself taller, crossing her arms defensively. “She told me about her job offer in Seattle,” she said in a ghost of a voice.
Nan came into the room with a glass of eggnog, and she handed it my way. “Drink up, it’s good for you.”
“It’s definitely not,” I said. “Not with all that rum in it, it isn’t.”
“Oh, don’t be a daft monkey, I knew you drove here, there’s no rum in this one. That’s why it’s good for you.”
I guess healthy living wasn’t the highest priority over a hundred years old. As far as I’d heard it, Nan was approaching her hundred and third birthday running on sheer spite and determination to outlive her daughter-in-law. Either way, I took the eggnog. I’d been hoping to have the conversation just with Miss Jameson, but I guess Nan was a part. “Victoria and I were… sort of together,” I said, and Nan shook her head.
“They were bumping uglies while pretending there was nothing more to it, is what she means.”
“Grandma,” Miss Jameson said, going white in the face.
“But we’re done now,” I said. “She’s probably going to leave, and even if she doesn’t, she doesn’t want to accept her own feelings, so I guess it’s done, even though I swear if there’s anything I could have done to change her mind, then I would have.”
“I don’t know what…” Miss Jameson started, but she trailed off, wide eyes fixed warily on me.
“When I was here on Christmas, I asked you if she ever gets to reach out to you, talk about how she feels, if she’s safe here, ifyoureach out and tell her you love her or anything like that. Did you?”
Fire flickered in Miss Jameson’s eyes, drawing herself defensively tighter. “I don’t know why you’re here telling me how to handle my family and my own daughter—”
“Oh, Miranda,” Nan sighed, “you love the girl when she compliments you and you get all haughty when she calls you out. Be the bigger person. Can’t let Bridget be the bigger person here, she’s smaller than I am.”
“Barely!” I huffed.
Miss Jameson pursed her lips. “So you’re saying it’s my fault this happened, because I didn’t love her enough?”
I guess. I didn’t know what I was saying. I just wanted to cry and break down and give up on ever caring about anything again, but before I gave out, I wanted to at least do something that would help Victoria be happy. Even if it wasn’t with me. What a sucker I’d turned out to be. “I don’t know,” I said. “No, actually, I do know. Yeah, I am saying that. Not just you, but a whole world of people who never cared about her no matter how hard she tried. No wonder she never feels like she’s good enough. And maybe there’s no fixing that damage, but why would you not at least try? While you and your daughter are still alive, reach out and tell her you love her and that you’re proud of her, just so that she can feel okay with herself for one day?Maybe I’m out of my mind for saying it, but hell, I just want her to be happy,” I said, my voice cracking at the end, and I wiped my face. I guess I was crying. Ugh. Falling for girls sucked.
“I know it looks simple on the outside,” Miss Jameson said, her voice tight, “but it’s more complex than—”
“Oh, come off it, Miranda,” Nan said, before she knocked back her eggnog. “It’s perfectly simple. Bridget’s right. Even when Vicky’s back in town like you said you wanted, you’re barely acknowledging the girl, and when you do, it’s to complain about her brother’s boyfriend who she likes. All nasty business, complaining about this, complaining about that. No wonder she wants out. If I were younger, I’d strike out and go be a stripper at Vegas.”
Miss Jameson huffed, shaking her head. “Well, we’re lucky at least Bridget has better sense than you, Grandma.”
“Not really,” I said. “My actual job is making lesbian smut on the internet.”
Miss Jameson stared at me. “I… I beg your pardon?”
