“Understand that with me on tour or on set or writing and him working and traveling and taking meetings, our lives are like ships passing in the night,” Mom says, calm enough to serve herself some chilled salmon, but shaky enough for it to be noticeable. “We’ll do the formal announcement, the family interview inVanity Fair. We want to give this the proper send-off it deserves. After the New Year, we plan to weave a tale of lost love and mutual parting and a family unit that will survive on respect and shared parenting. We expect you to adhere to that.”
I exhale. “Okay,” I say, resigned, like Hector was when I left the cabin. There’s no fight wobbling inside me. I’m sure they were expecting an outburst, but I’ve matured since they last saw me. Wind River, even if it did betray me, taught me so much. If I can plan a stressful gala in two weeks, I can handle this.
“Oh.” Mom’s lips purse.
“Good,” Dad says, straightening his tie.
I blink back at them for a minute. They’re still holding their breath. “If it’s all ‘oh’ and ‘good,’ why does it feel like there’s more?”
It’s Dad’s turn to nudge Mom under the table. They think they’re being so discreet. I can read it all over their faces. When did their refined facades begin to fade around me? Maybe I’m just more observant now.
“I have something else to tell you,” Mom says, already pouring herself another flute full. Her hands can’t seem to be idle even for a second. “I made a…mistake.”
My stomach sinks. “What kind of mistake?”
“Less of a mistake. More like…” She’s doing what Grandma does, searching for the right word around the room. Their similarities have never been this striking. “An error of judgment.”
“Anna, tell him,” Dad says.
She’s balling her napkin like she balled her clutch the night of the gala. “It’s about the island-story leak.”
Hope instantly ignites in me. “You got the name wrong? It wasn’t Hector?” I’m pitched forward, impatient.
“Something like that,” Mom says. Dad chides her again. I’m growing agitated the longer she draws this out.
“So?” I ask.
“So, I lied,” she says quickly, head bowed. “There was no young man. I made that up in the heat of the moment based on your assumptions. Hector reached out to Sarah about an unrelated matter earlier. He had informed her of your charitable work with the gala, thinking she could sprinkle out some goodwill for you in the press, but he had nothing to do with the island-story leak. I fabricated that as a cover.” Her truth nearly topples me right out of my chair.
“Wh-what?” I’m dumbstruck. Stuttering. Confused beyond belief.
“An anonymous source came forward saying they had proof your father and I were divorcing and would run the story unless we gave them something more sensational. We sent you away and tried to snuff it out, but their insistence and the pressure kept mounting. Sarah said we had no other choice…We gave them the island story in exchange for our privacy. I’m sorry, Matthew,” she says, apology profuse and unrehearsed. I haven’t heard her say that in so long. It’s strange that it’s coming now and not for any of the other times she’s put her needs before mine. “Things got out of hand and, well, you have to understand that these matters are delicate. Our careers hang in the balance of…the image we sell.”
“Why did you wait so long to tell me? And why today? Whyhereof all places?” I ask-shout, an anxiety attack nearly as big as the one from the night of my almost-escape shimmying up my spinal cord.
Everything I said to Hector in the basement comes rushing back to me. None of it was true, and all of it was cruel. He’ll never forgive me for not letting him speak. I can’t believe I silenced him when I should’ve taken his help.
“Because…well, because we knew you wouldget like this.” Mom’s tone is tart.
Like this.It’s practically code for anxious, a kind way to tiptoe around the fact that I have a GAD. Her fingers drumming on her forearm are sending a telepathic message to my father.
“Which I know you get from my side of the family, from…” Mom’s flabbergasted voice grows more frog-like. I have no idea what she’s hinting at but, in a second, she’s off like a speeding train in the other direction. “I–I–I panicked, okay? I panicked when you asked who did it. I was so impressed by the Matthew I met in Wind River and all you did for that town.” She holds her heart right below her necklace. “Myold town. I was riddled with guilt. The source wasn’t supposed to run the island story until the New Year. We were going to contain it. The number of outlets that picked it up the other day blindsided us. Can’t you see?”
Icansee.
I can see how one person’s heated, selfish, spur-of-the-moment action can cause a domino effect of destruction. Something I’ve done a time or twelve million in my twenty-one years. It’s just a shame I’m sitting in the rubble of someone else’s right now. That I hurt someone I care deeply about because of it.
“So, that’s what all this was? The movies, the cinnamon buns, the show, this tea?” I push my plate away from me, stomach burrowing into the depths of the earth. “This was all some big show to assuage your guilt? One last hurrah before we break apart?” It’s almost evil, downright diabolical. Show me what I had, let me revel in it, and then snatch it away again, all the same. I wish they’d just been straight with me. It would’ve saved me the second heartache.
Mom sits up taller. “No, Matthew. No. We wanted to make one last family holiday memory together. We thought that’s what you wanted.”
“You have no idea what I want,” I mutter.
Dad chimes in. “Matthew, your mother’s indiscretion aside, you must see that we’re letting you off easy.” His volume lowers, and his tone becomes piercing. “That island could’ve cost us a lot. We cleaned up your mess for you. Yet again, I might add. You’re seeing a lucky payday off a massive misstep.”
I squint at him, hoping if I distill him into something smaller he might make more sense to me. He’s crunching everything into facts and figures, blacks and whites. If I was expecting emotional honesty, I don’t think there’s enough champagne in the world to make that happen. He’s a walking, talking calculator. And missing the point entirely. I don’t care about the money anymore.
I only care about Hector.
