“What about juice? We haven’t ordered any?”
“Ma, please.” I did my best to control my voice.
“Okay, okay. It’s just that I feel like I see you so rarely these days. I’m afraid you’re going to rush away.”
“And whose fault is that?” I clasped my hands, placing them on the table and sitting forward.
Her eyes narrowed. “I’m still your mother.”
I nodded. “Which is why I’m here. You are my mother, and I love you very much. But that doesn’t mean your behavior toward Angela didn’t disappoint me or that I’d let it stand.”
My mother sat back in the booth, using one hand to push her short hair behind her left ear. “You care for this woman.”
“Very much.”
“Why?”
I tilted my head. “You want me to explain why I care for her?”
“Yes.”
I sighed and thought about it for a moment. Not about why I cared so deeply for Angela?that answer was as easy to come up with as breathing?I pondered whether or not I even wanted to answer my mother. I didn’t feel like I needed to explain myself or my feelings to her. But then I remember how important it was to give a little when it came to relationships with others, even parents… hell, especially parents.
“I adore the way she can light up a room. How she works to make others around her feel included and acknowledged. I love how supportive she is and that she isn’t shy about telling me how well I’m doing while studying for the lieutenant's exam.”
“You’re studying for the exam? For a promotion?”
I nodded.
My mother clasped her own hands on the table, her gaze averted. “I didn’t know that.”
“That makes you upset,” I observed.
She peered up at me, blinking, trying to hide the sadness in her eyes. “No. Yes. Maybe. I don’t know.”
I frowned. “You’re confusing me, Ma.”
We grew quiet when the waitress brought out our plates. My mother’s face remained somber, as she unfolded a napkin, placed it in her lap, and picked up her knife and fork in preparation to begin eating, which we did in silence.
“I just feel like I don’t know you anymore. You’re my only son, and we’ve grown so distant over the last seven years. Ever since you became a firefighter.”
I peered up at her from my half-eaten sandwich, wiped my mouth, and swallowed the last bite I took. “That’s not the job’s fault, Ma.”
She held up her hands. “I know.”
“When I joined, you and Dad made it clear how much you despised the idea. I don’t know if you realize, but going through the academy was the toughest thing I ever did. It would’ve been nice having my parents support me through that.” I clamped my mouth shut, not wanting anymore to spill out. I held that in for the last seven years. Since the academy, I’ve been through a hell of a lot more, but still kept it from my parents because I knew if I dared speak up on the darker side of my job, they’d be down my throat about my quitting and going back to work in finance.
“You’re right. But you have to understand our point of view. We put you in the best schools we could get you in, spent money on all the best tutors and lessons to get you into Harvard so that you could have the opportunities that not many others could even dream of.”
“I appreciate all of that, Mom. I do. But what about whatIwanted? I tried the life you and Dad placed me in. I did the finance thing, and I was miserable every day. I knew early on my calling was to help others, to be a fireman. No, it doesn’t require the Harvard education, but it is a worthy career.”
“I know that,” she defended.
“Then why couldn’t you just support me?” My voice rose higher than I intended. I exhaled, shaking my head and staring off out of the window. “It doesn’t even matter,” I stated, my gaze pinned on a passersby. “All I want to know is what any of this has to do with Angela? Why are you so reluctant to get to know her?”
“She’s just different,” my mother insisted. “I always pictured you with some introverted girl, who’d make the perfect stay-at-home mom or working a regular nine-to-five. Not someone with purple hair who owns a bar.”
“Again, your dream not mine.”
