I shook my head, trying to clear it of Noah. “Iwantedto do this, Mom. I wanted to find out about O’ma’s past. So I got a little hurt—it’s worth it. I wish you couldgetthat.” I could feel the tears welling up. “I wish you could be proud of me for finding out everything I did, instead of thinking it was messed up. I found out where O’ma was from! I found out who her parents were, and got their records. I found out about O’ma’sentire childhood. I found a family heirloom from Germany.”
“I am proud of you!”
“Are you? Because all summer all you cared about was about whether or not I was interested in Noah.”
“Well, Abby, that feels a lot more real. That’s thefuture. O’ma’s history is the past.”
Her words rang in my ears.
I swallowed. “Well, I care about the past. I wanted to know aboutit. Besides,” I said, setting my jaw. “Now this is the past, too. So can we move on? I don’t want to talk about Noah.”
She studied me. “Okay, honey.”
The worry in her voice effectively deflated my anger.
She forced a smile. “Do you want to show me this necklace, then?”
I did. I hadn’t looked at it since I’d come home from Golden Doors, when I’d stashed it in a sunglasses pouch, but I’d put the pouch in my purse this morning. I’d always intended to show it to Mom today. Now I pulled the pouch out and handed it over.
Mom loosened the drawstring and poured the necklace into her palm. It landed in a pile of glittering rectangle stones. She held it up, her brows raising. “It’s very pretty.”
“Right?” The sunlight glinted off the cut pendants.
“What are these? Glass?”
“Probably. Or what’s it—cubic something?”
“Cubic zirconia? That’s synthesized—I’m not sure they’d even figured it out in the thirties.” Her eyes twinkled. “What if they’rediamonds?”
I laughed, relieved our tension had dispersed. It was always like this with Mom; highs and lows, anger, then calm. We were cyclical tides, the two of us—or maybe the ocean and the moon, tided together, eternally inseparable even when out of sight of each other. “They’re not diamonds.”
Except.
I cleared my throat. “I mean—Edward Barbanel, Noah’s grandfather, did say they considered selling the necklace for money.”
“He did?” Mom turned the necklace over, peering at the main pendant—twice the size of the others, and oval in shape. “How do we even tell what it’s made of?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know, try scratching something?”
We looked around. There was nothing to scratch, except the glass tabletop of a coffee table. I didn’t think the hotel would appreciate such a choice.
“I’ll google it.” A moment later, I read from my phone: “‘Breathe on it—a real diamond will fog only briefly, then disperse the heat instead of remaining misted like glass would.’”
We looked at each other and shrugged.
“Here goes.” I took the necklace back from her, raised it to my mouth, and exhaled.
The pendant misted over. The mist immediately vanished.
A shiver went down my back.
I swallowed and looked at Mom. She turned her hands, palms out, eyes wide. “Maybe you didn’t breathe hard enough?”
I breathed again. Hard. Still the fog barely lasted.
Mom coughed. “Well, I can certainly tell you had those garlic knots.”
“You’re hilarious.”
