Is that why I couldn’t see it in myself?
Fuck. Had I really been that lacking in self-awareness?
The idea that I was the reason Heather was so distant and angry … I couldn’t stand it. My son and daughter were my whole world.
Bracing myself, I took the stairs down to the ground floor. Heather’s bedroom was the only room on this level. She’d wanted it that way for privacy. I found myself outside my daughter’s door.
I knocked. “Heather?”
There was a heavy sigh on the other side and then footsteps. The door cracked open and Heather’s face appeared. She’d scrubbed off her makeup, and I felt a pang in my chest because bare faced, she looked more like my wee girl. “What?”
Ignoring her snippiness, I kept my tone soft. “Can we talk? Please.”
Up until the divorce, I’d been my daughter’s hero. There was nothing like that feeling, knowing that in her eyes, I could fix all her hurts and aches. That I protected her. I was her rock.
Failing Heather had been the second-hardest moment of my life. Even harder was watching her try to blame her mum about the end of our marriage and then having to explain to a twelve-year-old that no one was to blame for the destruction of her family. That the writing had been on the wall from the very beginning. She’d veered between hating us both for a while. Eventually, we found our way back to each other. However, the move to Oban had reignited Heather’s resentment and, unfortunately, I’d borne the brunt of it.
I felt helpless, watching her pull further away from me.
But was I to blame for that too?
I had a rising panic within me that if I didn’t try to fix things between us before she left for university, this would be our relationship—this strained, unfamiliar thing that fuckinghurt.
Whatever my daughter saw on my face, it made her frown. Her shoulders slumped and she stepped back, pushing her bedroom door open to let me in.
Even her bedroom at my place seemed to be an act of protest. Heather was going to Glasgow to study architecture. She’d always been creative, and I’d spent many years redecorating her bedroom to reflect her likes and personality. Her room at her mum’s was styled in what she called Hygge.
Her room here was blank. Her duvet set was a generic one I’d bought because she’d told me to buy anything. There was no personality in the room. She treated it like a temporary base, making her point, taking her hits, and unbeknownst to her, hitting right on target.
“Can I sit?” I gestured to her bed. She had her e-reader out, so I’d obviously interrupted her nightly reading.
“I’m at a really good bit in my book,” Heather impatiently confirmed my thoughts.
“It won’t take long.”
“Fine.” She sat down on the stool at her dressing table. It was the only thing that even looked remotely like it belonged to her—all her makeup and perfumes scattered across it. “Is this a lecture about something?”
“No. No, it’s not.” I sat down and leaned forward, resting my elbows on my thighs. “I just … I want you to know that I’m here. If there’s something bothering you, I am here. You can talk to me.”
She lowered her lashes. “I’m fine.”
Definitely not fine. “Is it about uni? You know as excited as you are for it, you’re allowed to be nervous too. It’s a big thing moving away from home.”
Her gaze flashed upward with anger. “Well, I’ve done that a few times now, so I’m fine with that.”
I hated to bring it up because I didn’t believe in rehashing past actions for the sake of holding on to resentment. I was a believer in moving forward and working on a solution to our problems. But I needed to figure out why Heather had reverted to being so angry at me again. “Is this about your mum and me?”
Her chin jerked, like she was surprised. “Nah.”
“Are you sure?”
She crossed her arms defensively. “Look, I’m well over it. Mum is happy with Gary. Gary is nice. End of.”
“But you’re mad at me.”
“I’m pissed off because I’m here instead of in Paris.”
My philosophy with my kids was always to hold back my feelings because I believed I was supposed to be strong, unchanging, and not let my emotions breed fear or insecurityin them. But Heather was almost eighteen, and maybe I needed to start treating her like the adult I kept telling her she was. “It hurts my feelings when you keep saying you don’t want to be here.”
