“Not like that,” he says.
“I know. I think I’ll go for the hot tub.”
“Great.”
“On my own,” I add.
“Yup.”
My phone rings the moment we step inside the villa. I look at the screen and am about to send it to voicemail when George says, “You should answer it.”
So I put the phone to my ear and say “Hi, Mom.” With those two words, any lingering sexual tension vanishes into the fog.
“Hi, honey. I’m just calling to see how you’re doing.”
“I’m fine,” I lie.
George is concentrating carefully on taking off his hiking boots. “And how’s George?”
“George is also fine.”
“Hi, Rebecca,” he pipes.
“I’ll put you on speaker so you can talk to him yourself,” I tell her, setting the phone on the kitchen counter.
I take off my wet shoes and socks and sit curled in the armchair by the fire, listening as my mother and George chat. I’m impressed by how normal he sounds. I feel like I’ve lost the ground beneath my feet. He fills her in on surfing and our meal last night, and not for the first time, I wonder if it could ever be that easy between her and me. She listens and laughs, and when she says “Oh, I’m so envious of you two. I wish I were there,” I know she means it.
After they say goodbye, George takes a yogurt from the fridge and eats it in three spoonfuls.
“You could try a little harder,” he says gently.
“Not this again,” I say. I don’t know how many times we’ve argued about my mom. It’s the same thing over and over. George defends her and reminds me how I’m lucky to have two parents who love me, and I feel like an utter wretch.
“Your mom is great,” George says, crossing the room. “She’sa good listener, and she makes the best desserts. That apple-berry crisp…”
“I know. The woman can bake.”
George sits on the coffee table in front of me, his knees bracketing my legs, creating a safe space. “I wish you could find a way to forgive her,” he says. “She loves you.”
During the year and a half that Mom was gone, she called and wrote letters. She sent presents. When she phoned, my brothers and I would line up to speak with her. First Darwin, then Moby, then me. She came back to visit at Christmas, and for ten days, I basked in her warmth. Everything was better when Mom was home. My dad smiled more, my brothers were nicer to me, and even the house smelled better, filled with the aroma of cinnamon buns and gingersnap cookies. I convinced myself that if I was on my absolute best behavior, she wouldn’t want to leave again. But she did. Watching her station wagon disappear down Old Stone Road was harder than when she’d slipped away at night. After that, I stopped talking to her on the phone, and when my brothers visited her out east, I refused to go. I wanted to punish her for caring more about whales than she did about us.
“I know you mean well,” I tell George. “But you need to accept that she and I are never going to be besties.”
When we were teenagers, there were a few years when I was an absolute asshole to my mom. The way I spoke to her was so full of loathing that thinking of it gives me a full-body cringe. George always called me out on it, and we fought about it regularly. My father shut me down when I went too far, but my mom never did. It wasn’t until Mimi gave me a lecture about myappalling behavior that I smartened up. But the eight-year-old girl who woke up to find her mom missing and the nine-year-old who screamed for her mother on her birthday still feel close to me.
“Who said anything about besties?” George asks.
“We’re fine the way we are,” I say, my face growing hot. “I’m over it. It’s not like I’m still angry.”
George leans forward, his elbows on his knees and his fingers linked, and he pins me with those steely blue eyes. Unable to look away, I tilt closer, as if I’m being pulled on a fishing line.
“I think you are angry,” George says. “I think you’re so angry, you might burst with it one day.”
My breath falters; my heart is racing. I keep trying to stamp down my emotions while George coaxes me to set them free. This is what it’s like to be truly known by someone. George sees me, even when I don’t want to see myself.
“It’s not just that she left,” I say quietly. She left me and she changed.
George looks at me, and it’s like he can read my mind because he says, “The woman who went away when you were eight and came back when you were nine will always be your mother. She’ll always love you.” George’s eyes flicker with sadness, and I know he’s thinking about his own mom. “If you gave her a chance—if youtalkedto her—she might not seem like such a mystery. You’ll never be able to forgive her, or have a real relationship with her, if you don’t discuss what happened.”
