After I append my signature, my song will belong to her. I’ll receive a lump sum as an advance on royalties. If it does well, I’ll earn more. A couple of cents on the dollar for each listen.
“I’m jealous.” Mona crosses her legs. Like me, she wears jeans, but her jeans are adorned with grommets and mine are as plain as they come.
“Jealous?”
She hooks her hands around her knee, her plethora of rings spangling the contract before me. “I choked during my first performance. I was the openin’ act for Shania and got so nervous I forgot the lyrics. I ended up hummin’ the rest of that song. I thought that would be the end of my career. My agent was furious, but Jeff said it was the best darn hummin’ he’d ever heard.”
A smile bends her lips—not for long, but long enough for me to see affection existed once between Mona and her ex. I’m not sure why I find this surprising. After all, they had children together. Two of them. One could’ve been a mistake or an accident, but not two.
“You’re a very passionate girl, Angela.” She glances over at the buffet, at Ten and Nev and my mother. “Passions can be devastating. Especially when you’re a woman. While men are forgiven for not tuckin’ their kids in at night, women aren’t. Just like we aren’t always thanked for bringin’ home the bigger paycheck.”
Is that what happened between Jeff and Mona? He resented her for prioritizing work and earning more than him?
“A few weeks before I gave birth to Nevada, I was offered my own show in Vegas. I couldn’t turn it down. So I signed on the dotted line, and then her daddy signed on another dotted line, decreeing I was unfit to be a mother and took both my kids away.”
I’m utterly confused. I can’t pick apart the lies from the truths. Mona makes herself sound like the victim, but is she?
“Did you fight for them?” I find myself asking.
She returns her gaze to me. Although her face glows from the rose-gold powder dusted on her lids and cheeks, her eyes are somber. “Divorces are messy and painful. Fightin’ means makin’ it all harder and more painful. For everyone. Besides, Jeff was right in a way. I preferred being on a stage in front of thousands than sittin’ at a dinner table with my babies and husband.” She gazes around the auditorium. “So I let them go, and it tore me apart, but at least it kept them together.”
Her sincerity thrusts me back to that deserted, dusky classroom where Ten cracked the pedestal on which I’d placed Mona. “Do you regret it?”
“I could never have gotten to where I wanted to go if I’d stayed.”
“But do you regret it?”
She tows a hand through her hair, rings sailing over the golden-brown waves like twinkling ships. “You want me to say yes, but I’d be lyin’. Just like you said in your song, I chased my dreams. And people tried to pull me back. Some even made me stumble.Onemade me fall.” She glances at Ten, though I doubt she means her son. I think she’s talking about the man who looks so much like him. But maybe I’mwrong. Maybe it was Ten who made her fall. “But I got back on my feet. Fallin’ hurts, Angela, as does lookin’ back, but only stoppin’ will truly harm you. I’m very curious to see what you’ll do. You have what it takes. Talent. Looks. Presence. You owned that stage.”
I hate how deep her praise reaches within me.
“You need a little more trainin’ and a lot more opportunities, which are two things I can provide.”
Weeks ago, I would’ve squealed, but that was weeks ago.
“You don’t have to give me an answer now. Take some time to think it over.”
“What about Nev?”
She frowns. “WhataboutNev?”
“Are you going to offer to train her?”
Mona stares at her daughter. “No.” Her answer is short, devoid of doubt. “My daughter doesn’t need a mentor; she needs a mother. And I’ll never be that for her. If I offer to mentor her, lines will blur and hearts will break, because she’ll expect more than I can give her.”
“Will you give hersomething?”
“My time. I can give her some of my time. If Jeff will allow it.”
“She’d like that.”
“You think so?”
How could she doubt her daughter’s hunger for her attention? “I know so.”
Mona nods.
Ten shifts, flicks his eyes to me, then to his sister, then back to me. I sense he’s getting antsy. I lower the pen to the paper and etch my name on the line, then off the line, the letters taking up more room than they’re given.
