“What’s going on?” I cautiously approached her and put a hand on her trembling back. “What’s wrong?”
“Everything’s fine.”
She wiped away her tears with her hand, then tried to smile at me.
“You’re worrying me.” I pointed out the big splotches of color that were smeared on the tiles.
“Honey, you shouldn’t. I just had a moment—”
“Is it because of the money issues you hinted at?”
“No.”
I watched her turn on the tap to finish rinsing the brushes. She did it angrily, like it was her stress reliever, like she only knew one way to face disappointment and sadness, with painting everything going on around her.
“We don’t have money problems, and maybe your school’s a little too expensive, but no, it’s not that. It’s my personal stuff. I still haven’t made lunch. How about setting the table so we can eat something?”
No, there was something deeper than that.
“Mom, normally I’d let it go, but given that a part of your personal life affects me too . . .”
“What are you talking about?”
“What’s going on? Does it have to do with Jordan?” She hid behind her blond hair. Bingo.
“Come on, I told you, it’s a professional relationship, and that’s how it’s gonna stay.”
“Why don’t you seem happy to tell me that?”
“Because he took me out to dinner the day before yesterday.”
So that’s where Jordan Hunter was the night I was with Jasper.
“Didn’t you just say it was a professional relationship?”
“Yeah, it is, but—”
I couldn’t control myself when I saw her hesitant face. “Spit it out, Mom. Please,” I urged her impatiently.
She looked at me in the mirror as if she didn’t have the courage to turn around and say it to my face.
“We kissed.”
I knew it. Damn it, I knew it. Why was I still upset?
“June, I regret it so much.”
She sat down on the edge of the bathtub sighing, trying to make me come closer.
“June.”
I couldn’t be upset with her. Right then she seemed so weak and fragile that I would’ve just given her a long hug. But I didn’t. I stayed still with my arms folded.
“Do you regret it because he’s a bad kisser?”
She cracked up, and a few lines showed up on her face.
“It’s not because of that. It’s because I have to think about work, I have to think being a mom. I can’t go out like a woman in her twenties.”
