“And I’m going to Paris.”
“Right. Have you booked anything?”
“Not yet.”
She arches an eyebrow.
“I will, though. Things with Carson are distracting me right now. But I do need to get my shit together and make some decisions.”
She nods. “Is it possible…” Her hesitancy leads me to believe she’s going to say something terrible. “…that you’ve been depending too much on others to make you feel happy or validated?”
Yeah, that’s not good.
“With all the things you do for everyone… I know it makes you happy to do that…”
“Yes…”
“But then you don’t feel appreciated.”
I nod.
“Giving up school for Nonna had to be hard. Did you ever resent that?”
I examine that. “Yeah,” I finally say. “I did.”
She nods. “Don’t feel bad about that! I think that’s totally normal. Most people wouldn’t have even done that.”
“I love her.”
“I know. Sometimes, you take on a lot. You also could have asked others for help. But you didn’t.”
My vision blurs and the world goes slow around me as I take that in. Is it true? Have I been depending on others to make me feel like my life has some worth?
That feels… huge. And unwelcome. Also, I want to cry.
I blink down as the server brings our food.
I never had big goals or any particular talent. It wasn’t that hard to give up college. When Carson and I met and fell in love, I was happy to be a wife and mother. And I do believe that being a mother is the hardest and most important thing a woman will ever do.
When I wasn’t a mother anymore… and then not a wife anymore… I felt adrift. And now seeing that it’s been onlymyselfholding me back is really fucking bleak.
“Are you okay?” Rachel asks once the server has left.
I look up and swallow. “I will be.”
26
CARSON
“I talked to Lenny.”
Ayla’s eyes widen. “Really?”
We’re sitting in the Nook, a little brunch place a few blocks from the house in Maplewood.
“Yeah.” I look down at my clasped hands on the table. Hands that have a faint tremor as I make myself vulnerable. “After I talked to Benny. He pissed me off but he made me think about a lot of things.”
“But not sex advice.”
