Are We There Yet?

by Kathleen West

  Evelyn waited. She felt her shoulders drop a bit, hearing Alice’s frantic tone, reminiscent of the times she’d missed curfew as a teenager, desperate for Evelyn to understand the one random and insignificant thing that had kept her from meeting her obligation.

  “I can’t believe I did that. It’s true I was angry that you canceled my Thanksgiving and that Julienne’s seemed to be the only place you were willing to go, but my behavior. The glass. I acted like a toddler.”

  Evelyn sat silent. She looked at the streetlight across from her car. Its brightness illuminated the lawns of the houses in which she could still see gatherings taking place.

  “Mom?” Alice asked. “Are you there?”

  “I’m here.”

  Alice sighed. “I wish you would say something.”

  Evelyn raised her hand and dropped it again. “You threw Julienne’s Waterford against the side of her house and tore off. You behaved ridiculously. Laura cried at the table because it was so awkward.”

  “I know—” Alice began, but Evelyn cut her off.

  “Alice, how is Teddy supposed to have a reasonable handle on how to behave, on what’s in bounds and what’s out-of-bounds, when his mother is throwing a first-class temper tantrum at a perfectly nice family holiday?”

  She could hear Alice suck in her breath. She saw her toddler face, indignant in the toy aisle about Evelyn’s refusal to buy her a He-Man action figure. She’d chucked that, too, in her toddler fury. Evelyn remembered having to jump out of the way, lest it hit her thigh. “A perfectly nice family holiday?” Alice’s voice rose.

  “Yes!” She remembered Alice’s screams then, the way Evelyn had had to carry her like a potato sack out of the Target, abandoning her cart. She’d had to send Frank for toilet paper and 2% milk when they’d gotten home.

  “Mom.” Evelyn could hear a door slam, and she imagined Alice leaving the mudroom to stand in the garage. Even that space was clean, bikes hanging from industrial hooks mounted on the walls. “You canceled my traditional holiday and forced me to have dinner at the home of some woman I don’t even know, claiming that she’s my sister. She’s not, in any way, my sister. You’re genetically related to her, and I get that that’s incredibly important to you. But honestly? I’m just not ready to join in.”

  Heat coursed through Evelyn, a fire that originated in her belly and raged through her limbs. Before she could form any words, her arm shot out toward the Bluetooth controls on the console and she hit the button to hang up. “No!” she shouted, not caring whether Alice heard it. After she’d ended the call, she leaned back in her seat and let the fire smolder. Once she could breathe again, she put on her turn signal and eased back into traffic.

  * * *

  ON SATURDAY, EVELYN felt the fire ignite again when Julienne suggested an uncharacteristic coffee. They’d been getting together on Mondays for lunch, but this was just two days after Thanksgiving. They’d meet for a quick latte in between Miguel’s indoor soccer games. Julienne had emphasized “quick.”

  “I’ll just meet you at the games,” Evelyn had suggested. She was an experienced soccer fan, after all, perfectly capable of chatting on the sidelines. Besides, then there’d be more time with Miguel and Laura. She was finding it hard to get enough of them. She’d made an Instagram account just to follow them, and she pressed the heart button on each of their photos, checking for updates between clients.

  But Julienne had insisted on coffee. “I think we should check in,” she’d said. And then she’d been quiet.

  Evelyn thought about the advice she sometimes gave clients who were prepping for difficult conversations. “Ask for a meeting,” she’d encourage. “Speak your truth.” And so her heart pounded as she waited for Julienne in the Caribou Coffee adjacent to the soccer dome. It wasn’t terrifically cold yet, but the indoor season had started. Kids and parents filed in and out of the pressure-controlled, inflatable structure. Julienne and Alice had probably passed one another there before, unknowingly. The thought of them brushing shoulders, not realizing their connection, gave Evelyn the chills. Evelyn herself might have been inside the dome at the same time as Julienne, watching on an adjoining field. She thought she might have known it if it had happened. An electricity crackled between them, Evelyn thought. They’d talked about it. Julienne herself described it as a force field.

  The proximity of her daughter through all these years—just one suburb between them, a divide Evelyn crossed at least weekly—still took her breath away. She chewed a nail as she waited for Julienne to walk into the coffee shop. Fear prickled in her fingertips. She remembered snippets of Thanksgiving—the smashing glass against the side of the house, Laura’s wide brown eyes wet with tears. That gathering, Evelyn knew, had changed things.

  Just as she’d taken the top off her decaf latte and blown into it, her daughter walked in. Her thick hair swirled around her fleece jacket. Evelyn’s heart ached seeing her. Julienne’s smile was warm, but there was a hint of tension in her forehead, a wrinkle above her right eyebrow.

  “I’ll just order.” Julienne pointed at the counter. “And then I’ll be right there.”

  Evelyn took a tentative sip of her coffee and flinched against the heat. She blew on it again.

  “Hi,” Julienne said after she’d ordered. She unzipped her jacket and sat in the chair opposite Evelyn, one eye on the barista. “I’ll pick mine up in a minute.” They’d laughed at their first meeting about their identical orders. The decaf lattes with single pumps of almond syrup were one of many little things they had in common. They also shared a penchant for Uni-ball Rollerball pens, along with an extreme distaste for bacon.

  “I’m sorry again about Thanksgiving,” Evelyn blurted. This wasn’t how she’d planned to start.

  Julienne leaned forward and put her chin in her palms. She let her hands slide up, running her fingers through her hair. Evelyn could see gray roots at her temples, the same place she’d first gone gray, and the same spot where she’d noticed silver in Alice’s hair a few weeks before. “It was a little much, I think.” Julienne glanced at the counter. The barista poured milk from the silver pitcher, swirling it over the top of the coffee. “Hang on.” She stood to pick up her drink. Evelyn watched as she grabbed a sleeve and a top for the cup.

  “It’s too hot,” Evelyn warned her as she sat back down.

  Julienne shook her head. “I like it almost scalding.” She took a sip and closed her eyes as she swallowed. Evelyn forced herself to wait. She spread her palm on her jeans and pressed each finger into her thigh in succession, a silence strategy she’d developed in her clinic over the years.

  “So,” Julienne said finally, “I haven’t been able to sleep the last couple of nights.”

  Evelyn studied Julienne’s face. Now that she’d said something, Evelyn could see that the corners of her eyes drooped slightly. “I just think there are clear signs that we’re taking things a little too fast.”

  There it was. Evelyn wilted.

  “I mean, you could see it, right? The crystal shattered against the side of my house?” Julienne raised a palm toward Evelyn. If they were having a conversation about their clinical work, they’d be in agreement: The patient wasn’t ready. The patient needed more time.

  Evelyn felt her face flush. She undid the top button of her cardigan. “But this isn’t about what Alice wants.”

  “Not entirely, no.” Evelyn recognized the tone, the therapy voice. Julienne operated from a rational stance, and Evelyn had only a marginal command of her emotions. “But, Evelyn—” Evelyn winced. They hadn’t really come to an agreement on what Julienne would call her. Of course, it was unreasonable to expect that after all these years, “Mom” would feel appropriate, but her first name? It felt just somehow too distant, too impersonal. “I’m not comfortable with Alice’s discomfort. It’s too much. Let’s just take a step back.”

  Evelyn bit her lip and took another
sip of the too-hot latte. The sweetness of the almond syrup burned her throat on its way down.

  Meredith Yoshida

  Meredith drove Sadie to school on the Tuesday morning after Thanksgiving break. “Just so you know,” she said, “I’m not embarrassed by you.” She thought back to her stunned sadness in the kitchen of her mother’s house, the ache of listening to Sadie lay out her missteps to her grandmother.

  “It’s okay, Mom.” Meredith glanced at her but couldn’t read her expression. “Did you see the portal this morning? I’m rebounding in science already. Even Mr. Robinson held me after class yesterday to say my lab notes were good.”

  Meredith smiled and her chest started to hurt a little bit, the spot right beneath the necklace Bill had gotten her for Mother’s Day when Sadie was two, a silver charm engraved with an “S” hanging from a delicate chain.

  “You don’t need to have a good grade in science,” she said. She was surprised to find that at least on some level, she meant it.

  “What do you mean? I’ll totally have a good grade in science.” Sadie hugged her backpack to her chest in the back seat.

  Meredith flashed to her own report cards, the straight As she’d gotten in the sciences all the way through college, the scores in the 98th and 97th percentiles respectively on the quantitative and analytical sections of the GRE. And she did love her career in physical therapy. She loved working at the clinic, a position she’d gotten in part because of her long history of hard work and obsessive studying. But had those grades made her parents love her any more than they already did? She thought of her mother in the kitchen with her dishwashing gloves. She visualized that ridiculous turkey sweater-vest. Meredith’s mother didn’t care that she’d aced her GREs. She only cared that she came to visit and brought Sadie with her.

  Meredith was surprised to find herself choking up. “It’s not that you can’t have a good grade in science,” she said to Sadie. “It’s just—” She swallowed. “I’ve been thinking since your conversation with Grandma.”

  “Mom,” Sadie said again, as she had twice already when Meredith had tried to talk with her about it, “I’m sorry for bringing up everything to Grandma. I know I should be careful about who I tell. I get all of that. I just—”

  “Hey.” Meredith kept her eyes on the road. “You’re in charge of your story.” For the first time in Sadie’s life, Meredith wished she sat in the front seat. She wished she could touch her just then and squeeze her forearm to let her know she meant what she said.

  She glanced at Sadie in the rearview mirror, and the two made eye contact as Meredith pulled into the turn lane near the school. She was grateful for the red light. Maybe Sadie would say something before they got to the car pool circle. Meredith held her breath. “Mom?” Sadie’s voice was small.

  “Hmm?” Meredith tempered her anticipation, not wanting to force the moment. Let your child lead, all the articles said.

  “I’m sorry about the picture.” It was a whisper, almost, and Meredith felt a tear crest the lower lid of her eye. “I’m sorry I disappointed you.”

  “It’s not about me,” Meredith said. She grabbed a tissue from the travel pack she kept in the cup holder. “It’s about who you are and who you want to be.” She dabbed her nose and tried to take a cleansing breath without letting on to Sadie that she’d started to cry. The light turned green, and Meredith turned into the school drive. Why couldn’t they have a few more minutes?

  “I won’t do it again.” Sadie’s voice was steady. “And I know I can get a good grade in science.” Meredith peeked at her. Sadie squared her shoulders. Her chin bobbed as she nodded to herself.

  “Honey?” Meredith pulled up next to the curb and waved at the school security guard, a corpulent guy in a blazing orange security vest. Bob, Meredith thought his name was. Sadie moved to open the door, but Meredith reached back for her, not quite touching her arm. Sadie stopped, surprised. “Nobody gives a shit about your science grade,” Meredith said.

  Sadie’s eyes widened and she blinked twice. Meredith could see the corners of her mouth turning up. She had never once sworn in front of Sadie. Meredith and Bill had decided when she was a toddler that they wouldn’t ever swear, actually, within earshot of their daughter. Sadie had spent most of elementary school thinking the s-word wasn’t “shit,” but “stupid.” “Mom.” She laughed. “I don’t know what this is. I mean, I appreciate it? But let’s be real. You’ve always, always cared about my grade in science.”

  She moved again to open the door, but Meredith said, “Stop.” The security guard motioned her forward. She pulled the car up, but then braked again, twisting her body so she faced the back seat. “I’ve changed my mind.” Meredith opened the center console and pulled her cell phone out. “Your grades are your grades.” She held the icon for the portal app. She turned the phone, so Sadie could see it wiggling, primed for deletion.

  Sadie’s mouth dropped open. She looked in that moment just exactly like Meredith’s mother used to when she came home with a funny story from work. Meredith laughed, and then she clicked the “X” on the portal app decisively with her index finger. “Done,” she said. She showed Sadie the screen. The icon had disappeared.

  “I don’t know what to say.” The security guard motioned for a car behind Meredith to go around. She was holding up the line, obviously, but she didn’t care. “Maybe I should say, ‘Who are you and what have you done with my mother?’” Sadie opened the door, and Meredith let her. She dropped her phone back into the console.

  “Have a good day,” Meredith said. And then, because she couldn’t help it, “Make good choices.”

  She felt liberated as she drove to the clinic that morning, and not even a fresh penis painted on the dugout of the school’s baseball diamond could ruin her mood.

  Teddy Sullivan

  On Tuesday morning, Teddy’s mom interrupted the easiest, most boring online lesson on quotation marks. The English class was taught by a white lady with a pixie cut who preferred that the kids call her “Tawna,” and Teddy barely had to pay attention to get ninety percent or better on the assessments.

  “We’re leaving in fifteen minutes for a tour at a charter school,” his mom said.

  “Are you going to wear that?” Teddy asked. She hadn’t been putting on real clothes since Thanksgiving. She was wearing black leggings and the same Elm Creek Soccer Association sweatshirt he’d seen on her every day since she’d smashed that glass at Julienne’s house, but at least she turned his texting app on for a couple of supervised hours each evening, a success of his argument about isolation, he’d guessed. Miguel had texted him after the dinner. “Dude,” he’d written, “see you tomorrow on the field.”

  “Sorry about my mom’s anger management problems,” Teddy had texted back.

  “Epic,” Miguel had answered immediately. “I’ll remember that Thanksgiving for a long time.” He’d added soccer ball and martini glass emojis. The drink made Teddy feel a little uneasy.

  “I’ll change,” Teddy’s mom said. She brushed at what Teddy assumed was a tea stain on her stomach, but he realized it could also have been a food item from any of the dinners or lunches they’d had in the last four days. If she would change, Teddy thought, he’d be happy to visit whatever school she wanted. Also, he’d get a legitimate break from Tawna. The kids in the radio ads for Twin Cities Online Academy seemed happy, but who were they kidding? This shit was bleak.

  By the time Teddy buckled his seat belt fifteen minutes later, his mom had not only changed her clothes but also showered. She hadn’t washed her hair, but she smelled like his dad’s soap. His dad, for his part, had headed back to Cincinnati on Sunday night as usual. That was bleak, too.

  “What is this school, and do they have sports?” Even though online school had made him a little desperate, Teddy still had standards.

  “It’s called Echo. It’s an environmental charter,” Alice said. “It l
ooked cool, and Milo recommended it.”

  “An environmental charter?” Teddy thought about the gardening beds at Eastwood Nature Center, the winter wheat stalks that had sprouted so quickly after he, Donovan, and Eddie had planted them at their last nature therapy group. “Like science?”

  “That, and going outside every day and experiential learning,” Alice said. “For wellness. And other stuff.” She rolled her wrist around to indicate the other stuff.

  “I’ve never heard of it.” No kids in the Elm Creek Soccer Association and no kids at any summer soccer clinic or any camp he’d ever gone to had mentioned “Echo” as the name of their school.

  Maybe, thought Teddy when they arrived, that was because the school was tiny. It was one of four schools inside a building that used to be a high school when his mom was a kid. His mom pulled the door open for the Echo office. Through the glass, Teddy watched a guy at the desk who looked like he’d barely graduated from high school. He wore a rumpled flannel and looked like a younger version of Milo. As they approached, Teddy could see sweat beaded on his forehead.

  “Welcome!” He looked up, and Teddy read “Jasper” on his name badge. “I see we’ve got a tour this morning. Are you the Sullivans?”

  Jasper stuck a hand out toward Alice, but then pulled it back. “Sorry,” he said. He flipped his palm over, looked at it, and then offered it again. “Dirt check. I just came in from the garden. I was helping the fourth graders harvest the last of their spinach. They’ll have salad for lunch.”

  Jasper offered his hand to Teddy, too. “It’s clean,” he said when Teddy hesitated. “You’re good.” Jasper’s hand felt damp. He’d definitely washed after doing whatever he was talking about with the spinach.

  “Is it only salads here for lunch?” Teddy asked.

  Jasper laughed much harder than Teddy expected.