“You look wonderful. Not an ounce of baby fat.” Her eyes danced over my face much in the same way I knew mine were dancing over hers. “Oh, I wanted to show you!”
She reached into her purse and pulled out something small and shiny. “I got a new cell phone. It does a million things that I don’t understand, but I know how to answer it when it rings.” She laughed, then reached around me and found my phone in my bag. I watched as she added her number to my contacts. “There.” She slipped it back in my bag. “Now you can call me whenever you want.”
Whenever I wanted.
After a moment she said, “Anything else happen while I was gone? You didn’t get a tattoo, did you?” She bumped my shoulder with hers while she spoke, as if instead of leaving Dad and abandoning me, she’d gone on some kind of trip and now that she was back, everything could go back to normal. Except normal didn’t exist anymore.
And just like that, the spell of her being there again was broken.
“Don’t. Don’t do that.”
“Don’t do what?” Her smile was bright.
“Don’t act like nothing happened.”
Her smile faded but she tried again. “You’re right. We’ve got a lot of catching up to do. I want to hear all about your summer.”
Part of me wished I could pretend the way she did. Life would be so much easier if you could just wave away the parts you didn’t like with a toss of your hair.
“So much has happened.”
“Oh, just start at the beginning, then. And don’t leave anything out.” She scooted closer to me and I could feel her happiness radiating from her like the heat from the still warm engine beneath me.
I counted the seconds it took for her happiness to wither once I started talking. It took two.
“The night after you left Dad sat up until morning. I know because I heard him calling your cell phone over and over—the one you deactivated.” I watched her smile completely die before I continued. “I don’t think either one of us spoke for an entire week except to answer the phone.”
“That’s enough.” Her voice was low and firm, mine was calm and almost dreamlike.
“Why? You wanted to know what I’ve been doing all summer. I’m telling you. I wasn’t home when Aunt Jodi picked up the rest of your stuff, but I could tell just looking at Dad’s face the day she came.”
“Stop it, Jill.”
“He didn’t cry anymore after that.”
“I said stop it!”
“Why? That’s what happened. You should know what you did.” My calm snapped and I pushed away from the truck and spun to face her. “Why didn’t you ever come see me? You never even called me.”
“I wanted to call, wanted to come see you, but I couldn’t.”
I was nodding like an idiot and trying not to cry. I wrapped my arms around myself and held them there even though the movement pulled on my skin and hurt.
“I tried, Jill. I tried for so long. Your dad, he’s not the easiest person to love.”
Wrong. It was all wrong. Everything she was saying. “He’s the easiest person on earth to love.”
Her smile was patronizing. “I’m glad you see him that way, I really am.” She took in my sweat-drenched appearance and fanned herself with her hand. “Come on.” She held her hand out to me. “Let’s go inside. If I’m this hot I can’t imagine what the heat is doing to your sunburn.”
It hurt. A lot. But not more than the idea of her in our house. Dad’s and mine. She didn’t belong there anymore. “I’m fine.”
“You don’t have to be brave for me. You’ll feel better once you’ve cooled down. I’ll even make you a smoothie, hmm? Strawberry and banana.”
Strawberry and banana was my favorite. Had been since I was little. It was Dad’s favorite too. “No. I don’t want you inside.”
That stopped her. “Jill.” There was hurt in her voice. Reproach.
I felt the old inclination to obey, to cave. She was still my mom. But she was the mom who left me. In my mind, she’d abdicated her role long ago. I didn’t owe her anything anymore. Not obedience, not respect, not love.
