“I haven’t exactly been doing much in the way of helping myself all these years, either,” I admitted with a grimace, then shoved the envelope back towards her. A nervous laugh escaped me when she made a noise of displeasure. My eyes didn’t meet hers. “Could say, serves me right.”
Sunny made an unhappy noise in her throat and pulled me close. Whether I wanted one or not, I was getting hugged again. Hard.
“Bull pucky! Don’t you listen to that nonsense for a minute,” she grumbled. Pulling back, she gave me a little shake that made me laugh, even as tears filled my eyes, and jerked me right back to her. Our height difference left me with a face full of her frizzy, wild blonde hair in my face. God only knows what she was squished up into against me— I was just glad that whatever part of my plushy person that might be, she was still able to hug me without threat of suffocation. Death by these titties was not something you wanted in your obituary.
“You were looking to find yourself and, Shirl and Garth, they knew that, honey.” Pulling away once more, she clucked her tongue. “They might have gotten a bit zealous trying to push you in what they thought was the right direction, but that doesn’tmean you can’t change directions and get yourself going where you need to be, hmm?”
“Thank you,” I said simply, because what else was there to say to that? The sympathetic look in her eyes and her words told me she was well aware of how… kindly pushy Shirl and Garth Dubois could be, and she chose to be polite about it.
Sunny knew my parents very well. She used to be Mom’s best friend until they too slowly grew apart. Come to think of it, her pulling back from Mom was about the same time Elm had begun to pull away from me.
I’d never thought about that before.
Poor Mom. Her and Sunny used to be inseparable.
Despite the fact I felt like warmed over dog poo, I found myself smiling a little. “They could be horrible when they wanted to be,” I said on a laugh.
Sunny laughed along with me. “Oh, but they could, couldn’t they. They really could be, god love ‘em.” Yanked into another bear hug, she murmured, “A fine pair they were, but they loved you something fierce, Pru-ru. You must miss them horribly. I’m so sorry, hun bun.”
“It’s fine,” I lied. Nothing was fine. Everything was complete and absolute crap.
There were so many times this last year, months, these past few weeks as Turkey Day drew near, I wished a hole would open up and just swallow me whole, take me away from all of this.
Clearing my throat, I gently extricated myself from her octopus-like grasp and took a few much needed steps back. Her sympathy, while very much appreciated, had the unpleasant benefit of making me feel doubly guilty, like I didn’t deserve it. Didn’t feel like I deserved much of anything right now, and that made it that much harder to accept.
“Listen, I’ve got to get going. Boxes to pack. All that. I really do appreciate what you’re wanting to do, I do, truly.” My hands lifted and I waved her and that dark blue envelope off. “I can’t accept that. I’m sorry. Thank you very much but I can’t.”
Sunny folded her arms over her chest and tried to give me a stare down that would probably work on her boys. Not me.
A laugh startled out of me.
Sunny blinked and her brow puckered.
Shaking my head, I fought the fit of sillies and the stupid smile threatening. I never thought I would be this overcome with emotions feeling mothered to death ever again. Leave it to Sunny, though, who had no issue mothering anyone.
The urge to hug her hit me but I knew her— she’d try to smuggle that envelope into my coat and rush off to close up the store and leave before I could blink, starting this madness all over again bright and early tomorrow, and I’m too tired and worried and about a million other things I really didn’t want to add envelope tag to my plate.
I don’t care if I have to mail that damn envelope back to her, it shows up at my place like a bad penny that’s exactly what I’m going to do, right before I leave town.
She was about as stubborn as I was, maybe then some, but I was firm on this.
No handouts. I needed to do this on my own for once, safety net free.
A part of me, that tiny little voice, whispered to me wondering if it was guilt money, like she felt guilty that I had absolutely no one now. I’d have had Elm, had he stuck around.
Those familiar pangs began to hit. I hated this feeling, loathed it entirely. If I could I’d shove it down hard, pain of holding it all in, ulcers on the horizon, be damned.
The phone rang in the office just then. Perfect timing.
Sunny, still frowning softly, held up a finger, motioning for me to wait, picked up the phone.
I waited until just then to toss her a wave and rush out.
The look she gave me said if she got off the phone in the next two seconds I was going to get an earful.
The sound of Sunny talking politely but quickly on the phone trailed after me as I hurriedly made my way down the hall, past a bickering Birch and Cy, who paused in whatever petty argument they were engaged in, tossing individually wrapped fruit leathers at each other as I passed, to rush out the back door.
Making a beeline for my car, I thought the coast was all clear until I heard Elm call out to me.
