She swallowed hard, unsure why she couldn’t dislodge the knot in her stomach.
*
The coffee cups clinked loudly on the tray as Sylvie carefully made her way upstairs. She glared at the fine china and took a deep breath to try and steady herself—and her hands.
“Coffee is landing,” she called as she stepped through the door and into the hallway. It was what she always said to announce her arrival, giving her mom time to straighten up before she entered the bedroom. Today, though, it felt more like she was doing it for herself than for her mom. Like she was trying to reinforce the normalcy of the day.
“Come on in, darling,” her mom called.
Her mom had always been able to tell when someone was coming down the hallway, which made it incredibly hard to sneak out as a teenager, but looking back, that was probably for the best.
She paused in front of the wedding photo of her parents, which hung on the wall. The hallway was filled with familyphotos. Perhaps too many, an interior decorator might say, yet they had to fit an entire home’s memorabilia into one space. The wedding picture stood out among the decorations because of its frame. Someone had carved the wood by hand into a swirling pattern, and it featured a small bronze plaque at the bottom that read, “Proudly announcing Mr. Leon J. Sweet & Mrs. Annette S. Sweet” in flowing script.
Sylvie smiled as she entered her parents’ bedroom and stepped across the red-and-green rug that had always been there.
Her mom was sitting upright in bed, her cornflower-blue dressing gown wrapped around her, the duvet pulled over her lap as if she were cold.
“Good morning, Mom. You’re up early.” She set the tray down carefully on the foot of the king-size bed.
Annette turned to Sylvie and smiled softly. “Good morning, sweetheart.”
She poured the strong black coffee into the delicate cup and handed it to her along with its matching saucer.
“Wonderful,” Annette said, taking a sip.
“You seem bright this morning.” Sylvie pulled up a chair and took a seat next to the bed. “Brighter than the day.”
Her mom smiled at the reference to one of their favorite films and replied in character, putting on a thick British accent to match the part. “No brighter than your eyes, surely.”
The two laughed like they always did, but there was something different about her mom’s face.
“How are you feeling?” she asked. “You said yesterday that your hip was feeling better?”
Annette nodded. “Yes, well. The joys of getting old.”
“You’re not old,” Sylvie snapped. “Stop that.”
Her mom fixed her with a glare. If the woman ever wore her glasses, she’d be peering over the top of them to enhancethe effect. “Sylvia, while I admire your optimism, my birth certificate and yours conspire to provide irrefutable proof. I was three years older than you are now when I had you.”
“But somehow, you’re still twenty-one.”
“I am nearly seventy-seven,” Annette replied. “I’ve had a good, long life. A very happy one at that.”
“Mom, stop. Don’t be morose.”
“I’ll be as I like,” Annette said, her tone serious. “I’ve been meaning to speak with you about something, and it seems now has to be the time.”
The lead weight she’d had in her stomach all morning suddenly swelled to twice its previous size. Sylvie swallowed against the wave of nausea, “What’s going on?”
“How long has it been since you went on a date?”
Sylvie groaned, knowing what was coming. But when her mom raised her eyebrows, she sighed and relented. “I don’t know. Longer than the last time you asked.”
“It was before the accident, right?”
She flinched and glanced away, as if she wasn’t already feeling weird enough. But then, the car crash that killed both her dad and her brother came up in conversation twice on the same day. That hadn’t happened in years.
“Yeah. A while before,” she said. “Maybe a year or two.”
