Sisters in Bloom

by Melissa Foster

  “No, she’d feel empowered. Kaylie likes to be the one calling the shots, the center of attention.”

  “No, that’s where you have her wrong.” Her mother sat back in her chair and gave Danica a matronly, stern look. “Your sister may be a lot of things, but she thinks the world of you. And she worries about you not having a life. I might not have seen her for a year, but those things don’t change.”

  “Not having a life?” I have a very nice life, thank you very much. “Why would you think she worries about me? She’s too busy having everyone else worry about her.”

  “Trust me. I know. Before your father and I separated, she’d call home from college almost every week, just to tell me that she worried that you were studying too much or not having enough fun. That I should talk to you about dating. She loves you, Danica, and she wants the best for you. She’s just scared to allow it for herself.”

  Danica wanted to tell her mother that Kaylie’s insecurities were driven by the divorce, but she didn’t have the heart to. Instead, she just nodded, taking in what her mother had said and hoping that she was right.

  “I think your father’s leaving did a real job on her,” her mother said. “I tried to keep the marriage together until you girls were old enough to understand, but Kaylie...” She shook her head. “She was so mad at me.”

  “She wasn’t mad at you, Mom,” Danica lied.

  “She wasn’t at first, but when she found out I’d stayed with your father even after I knew about the affair, she called me one night, stone drunk, and she told me exactly what she felt. In no uncertain terms.”

  “She did? She was drunk. She didn’t mean it,” Danica offered.

  “When Kaylie is drunk, she tells the truth. I learned that when she was fifteen and she’d come home from a night out with Tommy Rose.” She raised an eyebrow and nodded.

  “I totally forgot about that night.” Tommy Rose had been the first guy Kaylie had slept with, and she’d done it as a rebellious act against her father’s punishment. Danica covered her eyes. She laughed and looked up at her mother, who was also laughing.

  “Your poor father. Kaylie looked right at him and said, ‘I’m not sorry, Daddy, and I liked it.’ She was a spiteful little firecracker.”

  “She threw it in his face because Dad grounded her, remember?”

  “I have no doubt that she also slept with Tommy only so she could throw it in his face. She showed him,” her mother said with a shake of her head.

  As they left the restaurant, Danica couldn’t help but wonder if she was trying to show someone something now by not accepting Blake’s proposal. Was she trying to prove something to herself? Her independence? Could she be trying to show her father that he ruined the idea of marriage for both of his daughters? Or was she just trapped in the same worries that Kaylie had about marriage and using taking care of Kaylie as an excuse?

  Chapter Thirty-One

  After band practice, Kaylie cleaned the house from top to bottom. She half expected to find more paraphernalia from Max, but she didn’t. She pushed the little nagging voice that wondered if it was really Max’s stuff from her mind. The nagging that she knew was driven by her father’s affair brought her thoughts to her mother. She did want to make amends and move forward, and she was trying to figure it all out. It had been easy not to think about her anger toward her mother when she was just starting out with her career. Between marketing herself and actually working, she barely had time to think about the rift she was creating or the hurt it was causing. Now, after seeing her mother again, she realized how much she had missed her. Maybe the baby would be a good way to ease back into that relationship.

  When she was satisfied that the house was spotless, she went out to the backyard, where she and Chaz had planted flowers beside a wooden swing built for two. She sat down and swung in the warm summer air, letting the breeze tingle her sweaty skin. The sun had begun its descent and the sky was a glorious mix of purples and pinks.

  The baby moved, and Kaylie rubbed the crest of her belly where an elbow or knee elevated a little circular bump. She’d been thinking about Chaz all day, and she realized how childish she’d been to run out on him. She was going to have a baby. She was almost twenty-eight years old—an adult. She knew she could no longer pull the kind of crap she did with him, or he’d leave her for sure. Love and beauty took you only so far. She knew that. Even though everyone else thought she didn’t, she did. Kaylie was well aware of the way others saw her. She was the pretty one, not the smart, dependable one, not the girl anyone would turn to in a crisis. And if there was one thing she wanted right now, as she felt her baby’s life beneath her palm, it was to become that person. She wanted—no, she needed—to become that girl whom people could count on. And she didn’t need to do it for her mother or father, or for her friends or acquaintances. She needed to be that person for herself, because she was going to be a mother, and that’s the kind of mother she wanted to be. She’d be pretty and fun; that part was easy. The rest would take some help.

  She picked a few flowers and took them inside, still thinking about the changes she wanted to make. She took a glass vase down from a shelf in the kitchen and arranged the flowers just so. As she took one last look around, a sense of pride took hold. She’d made a pretty home for Chaz. That was something, right? She grabbed her cell phone from the counter, her purse and keys, and headed out to her car.

  Kaylie stood in the waiting room of the therapist that Danica had recommended to Sally. She didn’t want to ask Danica for help this time. She had to take this step on her own. If she could become the person she wanted to be, and if she could find a way to deal with her father’s leaving and her mother’s weakness… no, not weakness… her mother’s what? She wasn’t sure what it was, but if she could deal with it, then maybe, just maybe, she’d have a chance at being a really great wife. She knew that Chaz loved her as she was. He loved her personality and her looks—and her body—and she knew he’d love her even if all those things went away. Even if she lost her energetic personality to some awful disease, she knew he’d still love her, and she knew how rare that was. She had no doubt about any of that. But she wanted to be a wife who was confident and wouldn’t flee. She wanted to be the kind of mother whom a child took for granted, and how could she do that if she needed to be the center of attention. Well, maybe not as much as she’d taken her mother for granted over the past few years, but in the general way kids take parents for granted.

  Dr. Marsden came out of her office and she looked exactly how Kaylie had imagined. She was not a tall or pretty woman. Her short gray hair looked more like an old man’s coif than a woman’s. Her face was stern, even with the smile plastered across her thin lips. She wore a pantsuit that must have been made in 1977, and she held her thick arm out to shake Kaylie’s hand, the same way Kaylie had seen her father do too many times to count. The entire package made her feel safe, like she was in the hands of a well-experienced teacher.

  She shook Dr. Marsden’s hand. “Thank you for seeing me so quickly.”

  “You said it was urgent, and I had a cancellation. Danica’s family gets my full attention.” She motioned for Kaylie to follow her into a small, window-lined office. “Did you complete the intake paperwork?”

  “Yes, ma’am. I put the papers on the reception desk.”

  “Perfect. I’ll take care of them later. Your sister was the best therapist in Allure. Next to me, of course.” She let out a little laugh.

  Confident. I love that.

  “The profession could have used her, but she’s doing good work at the youth center.” Dr. Marsden settled herself into a leather chair and motioned for Kaylie to do the same.

  “Thank you,” Kaylie said, and she sank into the leather as she imagined hundreds of people had done before her.

  “When is your baby due?”

  “Three and a half weeks.” Can it be that soon? Kaylie put her hand on her belly. “Wow, I haven’t said that out loud lately. That’s really soon.”
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  “Are you happy about it?”

  Dr. Marsden didn’t have a pad of paper, a pen, or anything in her hands. Doesn’t she need to take notes? In the movies, therapists always take notes. Kaylie imagined that she’d been doing this work for so long she’d trained herself to remember every little detail of her sessions. The question brought her nerves to the surface. She fiddled with the edge of her top. “Yes, very.”

  “And your husband?”

  “We’re not married yet. We’re waiting until after the baby is born. But he’s happy, too.”

  “Okay, so we’ve got a happy family welcoming a baby. Tell me what you’re here for.”

  Kaylie tried out answers in her head. I suck as a wife. I wanna be more like Danica. I’m afraid my fiancé will leave and I don’t want to feel that way but I can’t stop myself. Before she could find the right words, Dr. Marsden spoke.

  “Pretend I’m not here. What were you thinking when you were in the waiting room?”

  Kaylie took a deep inhalation of breath and blew it out slowly. The words tumbled from her lips. “I want to be a better person. I want to be stronger, less self-centered. I want to be counted on. I want to stop running when things get bad.” There, she thought. That’s the hardest part. She admitted the faults she’d been hiding her whole life. “Oh, and I don’t want to be my mother.”

  “Okay, so we’re looking at small changes?” Dr. Marsden’s joke lightened the air that had become too thick for Kaylie to breathe. “Can you tell me a little about your mom?”

  She promised herself to be honest. If Danica had taught her one thing, it was that honesty was the only way a person could really get help when they were in therapy. No matter how painful it might be. “She’s a good mom. But I think she’s weak, and I don’t want to be weak.” I’m sorry, Mom. “I feel really guilty saying that out loud.”

  “There will be a lot of things that you’re uncomfortable saying out loud. Some will make you mad, some sad, some guilty. That’s the only way to get to the heart of things. But as I’m sure you know, what you say in here stays within these walls.” She motioned to the walls around them.

  “Okay. Well, then, she’s also never expected much from me, and I’m a smart girl. She should have. And I’ve always been second to…” Crap.

  “Danica?”

  Kaylie nodded.

  Dr. Marsden motioned to the walls again.

  “Second to Danica. We’re very different, but I’m not any less…I don’t know…capable than her. She’s just smarter, more determined, more efficient at everything in her life.” Oh, God. I am less capable. Danica isn’t the one in therapy. She braced herself for Dr. Marsden to confirm her worries.

  “What makes you think she’s smarter?”

  Really? She held back her expression of disbelief and said the obvious, “She was a therapist. I’m a singer. It doesn’t take much to know there’s a difference in intelligence.”

  “Did you want to be a therapist and fail?”

  “What? No. I could never be a therapist. I’m more…I’d feel caged, being in an office all day.”

  “So, it’s not that you failed, or you couldn’t be a therapist. It’s that you didn’t want to be a therapist.”

  “Right. Yes. Danica and I both graduated from college with high honors, but her degree was in psychology and mine was in music.” She felt the same feeling she’d felt—and hadn’t put a name to—every time she mentioned their degrees in the same sentence. Shame. It was definitely shame.

  “Do you enjoy what you do?”

  Kaylie felt her cheeks spread with a familiar smile. “Immensely.”

  “So, why compare yourself to Danica?”

  Why compare? Because everyone my whole life has compared us. I know no other way of life. She didn’t answer.

  “Have other people compared you? Has your fiancé? Have your friends? Family?”

  “Yes, no, yes, yes.” The truth hurt, and Kaylie wondered if she’d made a mistake by coming to see her.

  “So, your friends and family compare you to Danica, and you feel like others do as well. That must hurt.”

  Kaylie nodded, feeling guilty for whining about being compared to Danica. Danica was a strong woman. There could be less flattering people to be compared to.

  “Your fiancé doesn’t compare you.”

  It surprised Kaylie that she wasn’t asking a question, but stating a fact. It reiterated the pride she felt in who Chaz was as a person, and how he treated her. Maybe therapy is good after all.

  “What is his name?”

  “Chaz. Chaz Crew.”

  “Sexy name.”

  Kaylie smiled. “Sexy everything.” She laughed. “He doesn’t compare me to anyone.”

  “Does he demean you, or make you feel like you can’t do things? Not outright comparing you, but making you feel the distinction without words?”

  “Never. No.” Does he? No, never. After the initial jolt of wonder, relief at the truth she’d just acknowledged swept through her. She’d always known it, but saying it to someone else somehow drove that knowledge home. “I know you’re going to ask me how it makes me feel to be treated like Danica’s shadow, but I really want to know how I can stop feeling like I do, and more important, not be the person who people want to compare to her, or anyone else.”

  “Okay, we have an uphill battle ahead of us.”

  Maybe you could tone down your straight shooterness a little. Kaylie’s hopes deflated.

  “Don’t give up on me yet. All I meant was that you’re her younger sister, and unfortunately, there’s a pretty strong draw for connections among family and friends. I’m sure they compare her to you, too.”

  Kaylie laughed. “No way.”

  “I know Danica pretty well, and she’s a very determined, headstrong, focused individual.”

  “Yup, that’s her.”

  “And how might you describe yourself?”

  “Now, or before I was pregnant?”

  “In general,” Dr. Marsden answered.

  “Well, before I was pregnant, I was pretty, fun, spontaneous. Now I’m big, tired, and probably cranky is a good word to use sometimes.”

  “That’s to be expected.”

  Kaylie shrugged. “I’m also a good singer, and it turns out I’m a good songwriter, too.”

  “Okay.” Dr. Marsden looked at Kaylie expectantly, and when Kaylie said nothing more, Dr. Marsden added, “I didn’t hear you say smart, efficient, organized, or any of the terms you might use to describe your sister.”

  Kaylie wondered where she was going with that comment.

  “If you don’t see yourself as those things, why would anyone else?”

  “But—”

  “Before you answer, I have a few more things for you to think about. When you sing, do you have to go out and find each singing job?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is it easy to do? I mean, I’m not a singer, so I have no idea how difficult or easy it might be.”

  “It’s vicious. There are fifty singers for every job.”

  Dr. Marsden nodded, leaving Kaylie in silence for a beat too long.

  “And when you sing, do you have to coordinate anything? A band? Music?”

  “Yes, I sing with a band and we have sets that we sing—different ones at each event, which we mix up. I take care of those. And we make these great flyers for each event so that the crowd knows who we are and can hire us in the future if they want. Oh, and I contact the media to make sure that the newspapers and radios knows where we’re playing. We don’t always get a mention, but mostly we do.”

  “Would you say that an unorganized, inefficient person could do all of that?”

  Kaylie felt her heart swell with pride and her cheeks flush. “No, I guess I wouldn’t.”

  Dr. Marsden nodded. “And do you think your mother might have been able to do those things?”

  “Oh, goodness yes. She could bake with one hand, while talking on the phone and sewing a button on with the oth
er. Well, not really, but you know what I mean.”

  “Do you think this could be more of a case of you not believing in who you are?” She didn’t wait for Kaylie to answer. “Maybe you should think about that.” Dr. Marsden changed gears before Kaylie could even begin to process her thoughts. “Tell me how your mother is weak.”

  Kaylie dropped her eyes. A protective tug pulled at her heart and told her that she was about to expose something private, and she wasn’t sure she should. The desire to be a better person was stronger than the concern over her parents’ divorce. She blurted out how she felt about her mother staying with her father even after she knew about her father’s affair.

  “Kaylie, what would you have liked her to do?”

  “Leave him. She didn’t need to be second fiddle to some other woman.”

  “And where would that have left you and your sister?”

  Kaylie thought about the timing. Her mother had admitted to knowing about the affair when Danica was fifteen and Kaylie was fourteen. “We were teenagers when she found out. We would have been…” She shrugged. “I don’t know. We’d have been fine.”

  “Do you really think so? Maybe you would have, but many teenagers whose parents split up go on to rebel, angry with both parents. Some get into drugs and drinking, while others run away or lock themselves in their rooms. Some never graduate high school. And some do just fine.”

  Kaylie dropped her eyes.

  “You could have been two who did just fine. But you’ll never know, because your mom was weak enough to stay and protect you from all of that hurt. She protected you from knowing that who you thought your father was, wasn’t really true.”

  “She never even let on. All those years, she supported him, and she’d tell us how wonderful he was. I remember.” Kaylie closed her eyes against tears that had welled, then blinked them away. “She never let us think anything less of him. Even when he punished me and I said I hated him, she never let on. I wish she would have.”