Her mother frowned. “I’m not being critical.”
She pointed at the old-fashioned grandfather clock against the far wall. “Fifteen-minute rule.”
“You’re impossible.”
“She gets that from you,” Milton teased.
Ava sighed. “Very funny. Fine. Fifteen-minute rule.”
Victoria had started the practice during high school at a time when she and her mother agreed on nothing. Tired of the constant criticism, she’d refused to come down to dinner unless her mother promised not to be critical for fifteen full minutes. Her dad had been an unexpected supporter, and the fifteen-minute rule had been born. If Ava didn’t comply, Victoria was free to leave the table and not return until her mother apologized. Nothing that thrilling was enforced now, but when she’d been a teenager, that kind of power had been exciting.
Ava poked at her avocado jicama salad. “I’ve noticed many young women your age are ready to find someone special and get serious about a relationship.”
“Really? News to me.”
“We only want you to be happy.”
“I am.” She was. Sort of. Mostly. “I just wish you could believe me. I feel no compelling need to pair-bond. It’s too soon.”
Which was an easy way to shift the conversation because the statement implied that one day shewouldbe ready to hand her heart over to a man. Only that was never going to happen. She knew she had trust issues, but her wariness went way beyond that. She lived her life in a constant state of self-protection. Exhausting but necessary. Of all the memorable lines from the classic Disney movieFrozen, the one that had resonated with her wasConceal, don’t feel. It kind of summed up her personal philosophy.
“So I shouldn’t talk to you about the cute new guy in the front office,” her father said, his voice teasing.
“Does he have big feet?”
“Victoria!” Her mother stared at her. “This is the dinner table.”
“Thanks, Mom. I wasn’t sure what we were doing here.”
“You’re impossible.”
“I know.”
Conversation shifted to safer topics, but right at the sixteen-minute mark her mother said, “I want to make an appointment for you with Dr. Stern.”
For a second Victoria couldn’t remember who that was, then figured it out and groaned. “No. I refuse to see a plastic surgeon.” It took all her willpower not to reach up and touch the scar on her cheek. Yes, it bugged her, and time was not improving it at all. She probably would have agreed to go see someone if it had been her idea, but once Ava had started mentioning it, well, she had no choice but to refuse.
While she didn’t enjoy acting like a six-year-old, around her mother she couldn’t seem to help herself. They’d always been in opposition. Ava wanted her to act a certain way, and mostly she resisted. She hadn’t wanted to dress in frilly clothes, hadn’twanted to sit quietly and read, hadn’t been interested in crafts or not talking or cleaning up her room. There were always so many more interesting things to be doing. Perhaps trying to paint a bouquet of flowers on her parents’ white silk bedspread hadn’t been her best idea, but she’d meant the soggy watercolor to be a gift, not an act of rebellion. And she could admit that jumping off the railing from the second floor to the first, with only a bath towel as a parachute hadn’t been clever, but she’d survived and had barely been injured. Not counting her twisted ankle and broken arm.
“I’m not like you, Mom,” she said, speaking what they both knew to be the truth. “The same things don’t bug me that bug you.”
Ava smiled at her. “On that we can agree.”
When it came time to clear the table and clean up, Victoria was shooed out of the way and told to rest. She hop-stepped to her father’s office and stretched out on his cushy leather sofa. A few minutes later, he joined her and pulled up a club chair.
“How do you feel for real?” he asked, watching her carefully.
“Crappy. Stuff hurts.”
“Are you taking your pain meds?”
“At night. I don’t like feeling dopey during the day.”
“Honey, you need to take them. If you’re fighting pain, your body can’t focus on healing. You know this.”
She did. “I can’t help it. I’m stubborn, Dad. I am what I am. You can be as logical as you like. I’m not going to listen.”
He smiled at her. “There’s my girl.” The smile faded. “Your mother loves you.”
