Unflinching, Mom shook her head and stirred honey into her mug. “No, we’re okay. We’re all okay. It’s hard when they go to their dad’s, but we’re okay.”
Daniel was the one to flinch, and he did it every time she said the wordokay. I hadn’t told him about my parents’ separation, but he seemed to take that revelation in stride. He’d liked my dad fine, but Dad moving out wouldn’t necessarily affect him the way it did the rest of us. I would guess it meant something to him only because it hurt her.
“I meant to come by sooner. I must have driven by a dozen times.”
Mom focused on the swirling liquid in her mug. “I’m sure you were busy.”
“I wasn’t,” he said, his bluntness catching her off guard so that her spoon clinked against her mug. “I thought you wouldn’t want to see me.”
“No.” Mom squeezed her eyes shut before opening them. “That’s not true.”
“I didn’t want you to have to see me.”
She didn’t react to that, as if she’d been expecting him to say something along those lines.
Daniel lowered his arms under the table. “I didn’t want you to pretend to smile at me and tell me it was okay when we both know I’m the reason he’s gone.”
She sucked in a breath that was mostly a sob.
“Anyway, I’m leaving soon. My mom will be getting out of the hospital next month, and I’ve already got most of her stuff packed.”
Her watery eyes focused on him. “I’m so sorry, Daniel.”
“It’s gonna be better, a new start...without him.”
Mom reached out a hand, and her fingers lightly tapped the table, asking for his. Daniel kept his hands in his lap. “No, that’s not why—” He lowered his head. “I never told you why I didn’t come that night.” Mom’s fingers curled back, and I felt mine mirroring hers. “I never told you, because I don’t have a good reason. He wasn’t drinking or mad, and she wasn’t scared. I just didn’t want to leave her when she was happy.”
Mom’s shoulders shook, and Daniel’s voice broke.
“That was a night Icouldhave left her. I should have been here. Greg should have been in his house, and you wouldn’t be sitting here now, crying. My mom, she’s hurt so bad now, and I—”
Mom pushed back her chair and walked to him. At first she just put a hand on his shoulder, and then the other came up to grip his arm. I could tell it was hard for her.
“I’m sorry,” Daniel mumbled, so quietly that I had to lean forward to hear. “I’m sorry he’s gone, and I’m even more sorry that you’re hurting when I could have stopped it.”
It looked like it killed her to fall into the chair beside him and wrap her arms around him. Her whole body was shaking.
He struggled at first, and he was big enough that he could have pushed her off if he wanted to, but he didn’t. He let her hold him and press his head to her shoulder, heedless of her own tears.
“It’s okay,” she said. “I love you, and it’s going to be okay. It’s not your fault.” Her gaze lifted to the ceiling. “It’s going to be okay.”
My fingers felt stiff when I pried them free of the banister behind me, and it wasn’t until she said, “I’m going to try to be okay, too,” that the tight coils of his body and mine began to loosen.
Adam:
How is it only Monday?
Jolene:
Because yesterday was Sunday?
Adam:
I was thinking maybe we could ditch school again this week. Your friend still dating that guy?
Jolene:
I honestly don’t know. We’re not talking.
