“Yeah?” I answer rudely, rolling my eyes when there’s a hesitation. “Look, I’m not interested in whatever you’re selling.”
“Jordan?”
I don’t recognize the voice, but it’s female and doesn’t seem to be a spam call.
“This is Jordie.”
“Oh, Jordan. Hiiiiii.” The woman’s tone brightens, and spikes of unease prickle the back of my neck.
“Who is this?” I demand.
“Baby, it’s your mom.”
I’ve never seen Delphine Caldwell-McNamara-Ward-Something-Something-McNamara-Whatever in person. At least, not that I can remember. When I was thirteen, I asked Dad what she looked like, and he pulled a shoebox from the back of his closet and unearthed a photo of a pretty blonde holding a baby… me.
So I’m not exactly sure what to expect when I enter the café near my campus, but I spot her immediately. She’s sitting in a padded booth near the back, and she stands immediately when she sees me. Despite over twenty years passing since that single photo I saw, Delphine looks much the same. Blonde hair, aqua eyes, and full fuchsia lips. Her resemblance to Juliette and me is astonishing. She’s definitely our mother.
“There’s my baby,” she coos, throwing herself at me. If I didn’t have so much muscle tone, she probably would have knocked me over with the force.
I return her hug tentatively and with much less fervor than her embrace. I’m still not sure what I’m doing here, but whenyour long-lost mother calls out of the blue and says she wants to see you, well… Shit. What else was I supposed to do?
“Um, hi,” I say, extricating myself from her arms. The top of her head comes up to about my nose, and she tilts her face up to beam at me. From this distance, I can see the signs of aging creasing her forehead and around her eyes.
“Look at you,” she croons, placing a cool hand on my cheek. “So beautiful.”
My emotions are all jumbled up, and I’m not sure if I welcome her touch or if I'm repelled by it. Maybe a little of both.
“You, uh, look good too,” I say, feeling awkward because that sounds like something you’d say to someone you’ve actually… you know…seenin the last twenty two years.
“Let’s sit down and chat, honey. I can’t wait to catch up with you.”
Catch up. Like it’s been a month or so since we last met.
“Okay,” I agree, sliding into one side of the booth and realizing there’s a man across from me. “Oh, hi.”
Delphine scooches in next to him, so close she’s practically in his lap. “Jordan, this is Willie, my fiancé. Willie, this is my baby girl. She’s twenty-one.”
“Twenty-two,” I correct, taking in the man who has a possessive arm around the woman who birthed me. He looks… smarmy, for lack of a better word, his hair thin and slicked back against his head, leaving a few spots of scalp showing. His nose is slightly crooked, and one of his front teeth is chipped.
“Nice to meet you, Jordan.”
“You as well,” I tell him politely. “And I go by Jordie.”
Delphine rests her chin in her hand and stares at me with glittering eyes. “I’ve been seeing you on the television, and I just knew I had to see you.”
“You’ve watched my games?” I ask incredulously, somehow feeling touched by that fact. I’ve never even thought about her maybe being out there somewhere, watching me play. She’s just been kind of a nonentity my entire life.
“Of course,” she exclaims, like it would be the craziest thing in the world for an absentee mother not to keep up with her kid. “And we’veseen all the talk about the draft coming up in the spring. I can’t believe there’s an actual league for women’s football. It’s just so exciting.”
A burst of happiness bubbles up in my chest, and I nod. “I’m hoping to get drafted.”
“Pshh,” she scoffs. “Of course you will. You’re one of the best… what’s it called? A fast end?”
“Tight end,” I say with a laugh.
Delphine snaps her fingers and points at me. “Yes. That. Well, you’re one of the best tight ends in the whole country. At least that's what the sports people are saying on TV. Tell me all about it.”
I begin talking, detailing how there have been women’s leagues for years, but they haven’t been taken seriously, most of them playing at high school football fields and drawing tiny crowds.
