“Hi, Jo! How was your day, Jo? Oh, it was fine. What about you?” I ask dryly, another misplaced attempt at levity. I’m too out of practice.
Paige makes acut it outgesture, slicing her hand back and forth in front of her neck. My mom shoots her sister a look, but in an instant her ferocity returns to me.
“We came to pick you up from the store, but Nora said you left early. You weren’t answering your phone.”
Ah, my phone. Probably still in my bag on the kitchen counter. And on vibrate, like always.
“I’m sorry. I was going to text you as soon as I got home, but I…” I trail off. I don’t have a great answer, and I don’t want to admit it was the piano that distracted me. As little as I enjoy an overexaggerated parental response, it’s at least normal. Butmentioning the piano, after so many months avoiding music, would shift the anger to pity. I prefer the normal parental reaction to the one I’ve been stuck with for months. “What’s the big deal, anyway? It was like three blocks.” This is hardly the first time I’ve walked home alone from somewhere, especially this year. I walked the half mile to and from my old school every day after the accident.
“Big deal?” my mom echoes. Paige, momentarily meeting my eyes, winces. The overdramatics rub me the wrong way.
“I swear, if you mention a sasquatch—” I start.
“That’s not funny, Joanna.”
I hold my hands up in surrender.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t realize it was that big of a deal. But I’m fine.” I gesture to myself. “See? Not a scratch.”
Mom deflates. Whether she’s giving in or decided the fight isn’t worth it, I’m unsure. But she looks tired. I hadn’t noticed until now how tired I am, too.
My mom spent years vowing she’d never move back home, back to her tiny town full of tiny people and big beliefs. But this was a last-ditch attempt at keeping me above water. She’d exhausted all her options back in the city. We’re here because of me.
“It won’t happen again,” I say. “I swear, if I even think about leaving work early or whatever, you’ll hear about it.”
“Good,” my mom says.
“That’s all we’re asking,” Paige says. “If I walk into the bookstore and see your face on one of those posters, I don’t know what I’d do.”
I almost call her out on her melodrama. Almost.
But there is a palpable fear in both their eyes. There were traces of it on their faces when I grew up, when we stayed out too late onsummer nights or strayed too deep into the woods, but it always seemed overblown.
Now I wonder if there’s something I’m missing. Something both women have gone to great lengths to protect us from.
—
An hour later, I’m doing the dishes and fixated on a piece of cheese crusted onto a plastic plate. Someone charred what may have been nachos and left the evidence for at least two days.
I don’t see my mom come in, popping open the fridge and grabbing a can of cola, until she sidles up beside me. I nearly chuck the plate onto the floor.
“Did you switch that?” she asks, gesturing to the radio.
I frown. I hadn’t even noticed the channel had changed. Sure enough, the rock station is on. I’ve started to wonder if there’s some glitch in the old thing, if its dial’s default station is this one. Or if Margot or Paige are playing some long prank on the rest of us. Maybe they’ve gotten Jasper in on it; he’s small and quick. I swear I’ve heard conversations through the vents, not loud enough to be discernible.
“I think we need to call time of death on this thing,” I say, stretching over to flick the dial back. A soft guitar and the honey voice of a folk singer replace the harsh rock.
Mom reaches for the dial and I scoff, nudging her hand away. I want her seventies music as much as I want the rock station right now.
“Uh-uh. She who does the chores gets to pick the station,” I say.
“Fine, fine,” she says as she loops her arm through mine and squeezes once before releasing.
As soon as her touch is gone, a familiar tightness returns to mybelly. Breathing already feels like a betrayal, and anything more is rubbing dirt onto Harper’s gravestone.
I clear my throat, shifting away. The moment dissipates, and Mom clears her throat, popping the top on her can.
“Thanks for cleaning up,” she says.
