Then the tears come.
I sink down onto one of the terrace chairs, pressing my hand over my mouth to muffle the sounds. I've never spoken to my mother like that. I've never challenged her, never pushed back, never done anything but nod and smile and be the perfect daughter she demanded.
And now I've burned that bridge. Set fire to it. Watched it crumble into ash.
It feels like freedom. It feels like loss. Mostly it feels like both at once.
"Iris?"
Cat's voice comes from behind me, hesitant. I try to pull myself together, to wipe my face and straighten my spine and pretend I'm fine, but I'm too far gone. The tears won't stop.
"Hey." Suddenly she's there, kneeling in front of my chair, her hands on my knees. "Hey, what happened? What's wrong?"
"I called her." My voice comes out broken, jagged. "My mother. I confronted her about Hélène."
"Oh, Iris." Cat's face is soft with understanding. "It didn't go well?"
A laugh that's more like a sob escapes me. "She called Grand-mère's relationship a 'sin.' She said Hélène 'manipulated' her. She—" I shake my head, unable to continue.
Cat doesn't say anything. She just shifts, rising from her crouch to sit on the arm of my chair, pulling me against her side. Her arm wraps around my shoulders, solid and warm, and I turn my face into her neck and let myself fall apart.
It's not pretty crying. It's the ugly kind, the kind that leaves you gasping and hiccuping, the kind that feels like it's being dragged up from somewhere deep and wounded. I cry for Grand-mère, who lost her daughter over something as simple as love. I cry for myself, for all the years I spent trying to be enough for a woman who would never accept me if she knew—
If she knew what?
The thought stops me cold. I pull back slightly, looking at Cat through blurred eyes.
"What is it?" she asks.
"I just—" I swallow. "I just realized. If my mother reacted that way to Grand-mère... if she couldn't accept her own mother loving a woman..."
"She won't accept you either."
The words are quiet, matter-of-fact, and they land in my chest like stones.
"I don't know what I am," I whisper. "I don't have a word for it yet. But whatever I'm feeling, whatever's happening between—" I stop, suddenly aware of what I'm about to admit.
"Between us?" Cat's voice is careful, neutral.
"Yeah." I meet her eyes, and the vulnerability of this moment is almost unbearable. "Between us. And if my mother found out... if she knew I was even thinking about..."
"She'd react the same way she did to Marguerite."
"Probably worse." I laugh, and it sounds hollow. "At least Grand-mère was already grown when she fell in love with Hélène. She'd already given my mother a childhood, a stable home. Me? I'd just be another disappointment. Another thing she couldn't control."
Cat's hand comes up to cup my face, her thumb brushing away the tears on my cheek. "You're not a disappointment. And you're not a thing to be controlled."
"I know that. Rationally, I know that." I press my cheek into her palm, seeking comfort. "But she's my mother. And even now, even after everything, some part of me still wants her to love me."
"That's not weakness, Iris. That's human."
"It feels like weakness."
"I know." Cat's smile is sad. "Trust me, I know."
We're quiet for a moment. Cat lost her mother to death; I'm losing mine to something that might be worse.
"My mother never told me why we stopped coming here," Cat says softly. "But I think... I think part of me always knew it was something about Grand-mère's life that she couldn't accept. Something that made her uncomfortable."
