After the way things ended with Declan, I vowed to be alone. Maybe it was pride, but I spent most of my childhood believing I could prove my mother wrong.All men leave at some point.It was the motto I spent countless nights overhearing her preach during late-night conversations on the phone or with Lottie in the living room when I was supposed to be sleeping. “It’s just not worth it,” she’d say, clucking her tongue. “All men leave or fall out of love at some point. You just have to accept that and move on.” She would say it flippantly, like becoming a single mother was just something to be expected.That’s not true. It can’t be, I remember thinking as a naive child. But my absent father and ghost of a childhood friend would beg to differ. She was right, and I felt stupid for ever believing I could prove her wrong.
After I vehemently shut Roshi down, removing her hand from my wrist and explaining my vow of boy-dating celibacy, she stopped.
“Okay, Blink… no worries. Honestly, that’s kind of a power move with the whole short-haired, doe-eyed beach-girl look you’ve got going on,” she responded, leaning backwardwith her hands up. The movement made me chuckle.This girl is going to be trouble, I remember thinking. “I’m Roshi, by the way.” She stuck her hand out for me to shake, which was oddly formal in this environment.
I hesitated, then smiled and took her hand, shaking it like it was an oath.
“I’m Blair.”
“Cool name! Noeat the end like inGossip Girl?”
I nodded my confirmation.
“Sick.” She nodded, satisfied. “Mind if I still call you Blink, though?”
That was four years ago. We’re no longer the tiny, fresh-faced freshmen bopping around Pepperdine like scared chihuahuas, but she never stopped calling me “Blink” after that first night.
“Okay, welp. I’ve gotta go bury my face back into these law prep books,” Roshi says from the screen in the present, holding up a thumb and smiling with dead eyes.
“Yeah, I’ve gotta go too. I have a chicken potpie to toil over before Stephen gets home tonight. And before you roll your eyes, Rosh, it’s harder than it seems. Making sure the filling cooks without burning the crust is no joke,” Faye whines, lifting her eyebrows to indicate her sarcasm.
“Alright, guys. Talk soon,” I respond.
After our FaceTime ends, my lock screen illuminates. The image stares up at me, taunting. It’s a screenshot from one of my favorite movie scenes at the end ofLady Birdwhen she’s walking down the streets of New York City. She has tears streaking down her face, but she just keeps walking, not really sure where she’s trying to go.
She turns onto Waverly Place and Washington Square Park and then is lured into a cathedral from hearing the choirinside. After a moment, she leaves the church and calls her mom. Her relationship with her mom couldn’t be more different from mine, but there’s something about the way that movie captures the city. She’s young, confused, still unsure of where she’ll go, but she’s there, and she’s ready.
That’s how I always pictured New York would be for me. A clean slate. An objective bystander with open arms. Uninterested in where you came from or why you had come. Just a place to be alone, unbothered by the disappointments of relationships, giving you the space to find independence for yourself. A guaranteed way to ensure my mom’s future. I let myself stare at the phone for another beat before slamming it facedown on my desk and standing to leave. There’s only one reason I’m here instead of New York City right now.
I knock on the door of her bedroom before coming in. She smiles up at me. It is weak, but her joy at seeing me is apparent all the same and I feel bad for the mental debate I had a moment ago.
“Hi, Lottie,” I whisper, smiling back at her and bending to give her frail frame a hug. Her cashmere sweater is soft on my cheek, and I breathe in her scent as deeply as I can. It’s been consistent since my childhood, and I’ve never found one more comforting.
It’s the smell of her skin, maybe the detergent on her clothes. The tiniest bit floral, bold and warm. Impossible to re-create. A dose of panic seizes me at the thought of her scent disappearing with her.
“Guess who I just ran into at the coffee shop?” I wag my brows up and down, hoping to make the mood feel jovial. Asif I were coming home and catching her up on my life like nothing was abnormal.
“Who, baby?” She croaks out the nickname I’ve always had in her deep smoky voice.
“Declan freaking Renshaw. He’s the manager of the place apparently.” My lack of curse words is habit from my mom telling me it was “unladylike” to swear.
My great-aunt gasps. It’s the largest reaction I’ve seen her capable of since laying in this hospital bed. “Oh, honey,” she says, a mixture of hope and empathy in her eyes.
“Mm-hmm,” I nod as she reacts.
“What did you say to him? How long has it been?”
“It’s been”—I look up at the ceiling as if I’ve lost count—“about four years now. But I was trying to apply for a job there, you know,beforeI realized he was the manager of the place. And then he was the one who interviewed me and I lied to him in every interview question just to see how he’d react.” I roll my eyes. “He already knows the answers. And they seemed a little personal anyway. Something tells me he got to choose the questions himself as manager.” I try to joke, but Lottie’s demeanor turns serious.
“Did you ever apologize to that boy? You two should have a conversation about why he stopped speaking to you, sweetie.”
“Oh, Lottie. It’s not that simple.” I brush the hair off her forehead and continue stroking her head gently in a manner I hope is comforting.
She continues looking at me and it bores into my soul. Despite being unable to get out of this bed, she is not going to let me off the hook. There is not a single emotion I could hide from this woman.
“Isn’t it a little ironic to try and have a conversation withsomeone about why… they didn’t ever want to involve themselves in conversation with you ever again?” Lottie looks unfazed by my attempt at avoidance.
“Con,” she says in her lovingly stern voice. “How old were you when that happened?” She says it as a question, but it lands more like a statement. A reminder made to communicate the irrationality of the teen years.
