by Devon Ashley
“Define okay.”
“Right. Coming.”
I hung up and headed off in the direction of the pond, trying not to twist my ankle as I stumbled along the bumpy ground. Once I topped the hill, I spotted him. He had dragged a bright yellow and black kayak to the bottom slope of the hill, just before the edge of the pond.
“Hey,” he mumbled as I approached.
“Hey,” I quietly said back. He was awkwardly positioned in the front of the two-seater, his legs bent and hidden inside. The way he was slumped down as far as possible looked incredibly awkward. Downright painful, in fact. “That looks really uncomfortable.”
“It kind of is,” he replied blandly, tipping a bottle between his lips. Once he finished the beer, he flung it through the air, allowing it to plop into the pond, where it floated for just a second before sinking into the murky depth.
Mesmerized by the moonlight shimmering off the dancing ripples, I was slow to turn my attention back. I heard the hiss of another bottle opening. “How many of those have you had tonight?”
“Probably more than you’d like.”
I absently nodded my head in agreement. But after the day I had, I was hardly going to lecture. “You got another stashed away?”
“Yep,” he answered with a little more oomph than I thought possible. He passed me the one in his hand, then reached over the side of the kayak to pull another out. Sitting down in the slot behind him, I stretched out as best I could. My hand ran along the edge of the fiberglass; it felt incredibly smooth. “This looks new. Like really new. Like hasn’t been in the water new.”
“Damn thing was here when I came home today. Brady and I ordered it last month.” There was a long pause on both our parts. The sound of his name still seemed to stop us in our tracks. Solemnly, he added, “I completely forgot. We were supposed to take it to the lake this month. Practice run for this trip we planned for the river.”
That must’ve been the trigger that led to the destruction inside his house. I matched the long sigh escaping his chest, but mine was silent. One more dream washed away.
“You could still go,” I suggested. His head tilted to the side, too lazy to completely turn my way to express what I assumed would be negative energy. The fact that this was a two-seater wasn’t lost on me. “I meant with someone else. Plan a different trip, maybe a different river.”
He practically snorted. “With who? Matt? I don’t think he’s going anywhere without Sarah these days.”
“I think Sarah would be willing to give you a guys’ weekend. They’re not tied at the hip.
“Yet…” I muttered beneath my breath. Even I had noticed the growing attachment through all the texts and phone calls. Sarah had it bad. Both of them it seemed.
“Speaking of couples stuck together like glue, what the heck was with you and Lis?”
Owen groaned and hung his head back. “Et tu, Tessa?”
“Getting that a lot lately?”
“Only from everyone I’ve spoken to.”
“Sorry. Guess we’re all wondering why the hell you stayed so long with a girl you were fighting with all the time. You looked miserable up at the lake.”
“I was miserable, but not for the reason you think.”
I was curious, but the way he said that told me he wasn’t going to elaborate even if I asked. So instead I went with, “Then why didn’t you leave her?”
Owen shrugged. As he pondered in silence, I sipped on my beer. Already warm, it was difficult to swallow. I preferred my fermented yeast to be ice cold, and this was just making me want to gag. I sighed long and deep, then scooted as low as I could to lay my head back like Owen was doing.
Wow.
No wonder he was putting up with this awful position. The night wasn’t that late yet, the sky more a light shade of dark blue. But still, the stars were bright enough to make their mark just fine in the vast space above us. Living in the big cities so much, I had long forgotten how distinct they could be when your view wasn’t ruined by smog or excessive lighting.
“I don’t know if this means anything to you, but Brady would be happy you finally let go. He always said you deserved better.”
“Then I guess it’s fitting that it was because of him that I finally could.”
“She shouldn’t have said those things to you. About your family just being ghosts who weigh you down.”
“Maybe, but it’s not like there’s not some truth to that. Lis has her flaws, but if she has one thing going for her, she can be blatantly honest at times. Really get you to open your eyes.”
If you say so…
I caught a single star in motion, slowly falling away. If I were a kid I could be naïve and wish upon it to fulfill my deepest desire. But sadly, what was done could never be undone, so that wish would’ve been wasted on me. And it only made me think of Brady, and then of Mom, who I was having difficulty shaking free of my mind.
I took a long sip of beer before saying, “So my mom came by the shop today.”
His head sort of jerked before he rose and completely twisted his body to face me, eyebrows arched suspiciously.
“Yeah, I know.”
“What did she say?”
I shrugged noncommittally and began peeling the label off my beer. “I was too chicken shit to talk to her. Nana threw her out.”
“Does your mom know that Louise knows she told you she was dead?”
“I’m sure she recognized the hostility in Nana’s voice enough to figure that out. It’s not like I’m going to lie for her anyway.” Not after everything she’d put me through.
“Was she drunk?”
“Always.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Me too,” I mumbled wearily.
“So why is she here?”
“Money probably.”
“From Louise?”
“Not sure yet. She’s leached off me ever since she put me to work at sixteen. It’s been harder for her to do that since I left for college. We’ve had issues for years, but I was more forgiving before I knew she lied to me. I pretty much cut her off in every way when I reconnected with Nana this year.”
“So she’s here for you.”
“Nope. Just any amount of money she can con out of me. Which will be zero. But now that she’s here I’m sure she’ll try to guilt Nana too.”
Owen repositioned in his seat again, settling down to enjoy the night’s sky. “Your mom’s a real piece of work.”
He had no idea. Simply hearing about it was nothing compared to experiencing it. It killed me that a beautiful, loving mom like his was lost to cancer while mine continued to willingly poison herself and would probably outlive us all. Sometimes I just didn’t understand the way life played out.
Mid-August humidity in the northernmost part of the Bible Belt wasn’t doing my hair any favors in the frizz department. These days I mostly had to keep the unruly curls pinned back, lest they sop up the moisture off the back of my neck and make a real mess of things. Why in the heck I chose to walk to the pharmacy on a cloudless day instead of taking my beautiful air conditioned Jetta was a moment of stupidity I couldn’t take back.
As I made my way down the sidewalk, I literally paused mid-step, wondering if the insufferable heat was making me hallucinate. Standing underneath the awning of the home store was the back of a woman who gave me chills. Her hair was pale blonde, but stringy and limp straight. Her body was stick thin and almost gangly, the cotton tank and denim shorts both inappropriate in size and age. Unfortunately, there was nothing wrong with her eyes, and the ice blue pair lit up when she turned and caught me. She’d been smoking a cigarette, but threw it to the ground as she hurried towards me, her steps swaying a little.
Her and those stupid cigarettes.
Memories flashed through my mind. Anger. Resentment. Regret. I was suddenly eight years old again, being picked up early from school. My clothes were dirty, the top a little too snug, my jeans a little too short. We were moving, and once again she took
only the time necessary to collect the things that mattered to her. She rarely did it for me, disregarding most of my belongings as silly little girl things.
Yeah – how dare my eight year old self insist that the doll I couldn’t sleep without make it into the car instead of her carton of Virginia Slims? When I was a kid I saw the ads running for that particular brand in magazines. Even then I understood Mom wasn’t what they had in mind when they catered their fancy brand to professional women.
Long story short: this was the move that made it clear I had to be there for myself. From there on out it wasn’t school books I carried around in my back pack all day. It was everything I didn’t dare leave behind should my mom decide to uproot us by the time school let out.
And seeing her throw another cigarette carelessly to the ground instead of disposing of it properly, stoked the fire within me already burning out of control.
“There’s my baby!” she cried.
She moved in to hug me faster than I thought her body could move. I didn’t embrace her back, and turning my head to the side was all I could do to keep from gagging over the foul stench of nicotine and what was surely basement bargain vodka spilled on her clothes. Her body looked disgustingly thin and frail, like there wasn’t any meat on her bones because she’d chosen to drink rather than eat for so long.
“What do you want, Mom?” I asked with a little hostility. “Why are you here?”
She flashed me her best attempt at a warm smile as she reached out to caress my outer biceps. “I just wanted to see my baby, that’s all. You haven’t been home in over a year!”
And by that she meant her latest troll of a loser boyfriend ousted and left her penniless. And without me living with her and working a job, she had nothing coming in to buy her next bottle. Made me wonder how she afforded a bus ticket to get here since she’d hadn’t had a car in years.
“Home? Where exactly is home these days?”
With a carefree swing of her arms, she lightly shrugged. “Maybe I’ll stay here awhile.” Her clammy hand cupped my left cheek. “Stay here with my baby.”
“What? No!” My words stunned her. But because I wanted that horrible idea to fall right back out of her head, I compassionately added, “You hated it here, remember?”
She probably didn’t... Her ability to retain memories seemed to go down the toilet with each bottle of alcohol she peed out. And sadly, my words did nothing to deter her. “Besides, I’m about to leave for school.”
All lies. But I’d pack up and leave tomorrow if it was necessary to get my mom the hell out of Campbellsville.
“Well, where are you going? Maybe I’ll just come and live with you for a bit.” She did this awkward little dance that was downright embarrassing to be around. Then her glassy, reddened eyes burst open and she exclaimed, “We could be roomies!”
All of a sudden her goofy ass started jumping in place, as if Taylor Swift herself just announced she’d give her a million dollars. Getting more annoyed with every single jump, I sternly said, “No, Mom. No,” but her goofiness continued, because unfortunately, she was lit up brighter than a Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center.
“Mom!” I cried, grabbing her arms and pulling down to keep her grounded. Her smile finally waned when she took in the seriousness of my expression. “I’m staying in a dorm and I already have a roommate. You can’t stay with me. It’s too small and you’re not allowed.”
Her mood did a complete one-eighty in less than two seconds. One moment she was ecstatically irrational, the next ready to go nuclear on my ass. Her arms twisted and whipped free of my grasp just as she yelled, “Why are you so ungrateful? You can’t live with your Momma for a while and let her take care of you?”
“Take care of me?” I blurted, all aghast. Fuming, I added, “Exactly how have you ever taken care of me?”
“Why you little brat, I have always taken care of you! You wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for me!”
“Actually, it’s because of you that I wasn’t here. How could you? How could you lie and tell me Nana was dead?”
She waved me off out of annoyance. “Oh, I didn’t do nothing. You were young. You misunderstood.”
“Don’t even. You know damn well you did it. Because of you I grew up without anyone to lean on. Nana was there for me. She had my best interest at heart. You took that away from me.”
“She was going to take you away from me!”
“Well maybe she should have!”
People were beginning to give us a wide berth as they passed us on the sidewalk, but I was beyond caring at the moment.
“I’m your Momma. I had your best interest at heart!”
“You? When? When we had no place to go and had to live in the car? Or when there was no money for dinner because you had to have your alcohol? Or how about when that asshole guy of yours forced his way into my room one night and I had to jump out the window and sleep under the neighbor’s car to keep him from finding me? I had to booby trap every room I had after that with bells and furniture in front of the door just to be able to sleep, and I still woke up in a panic over every little noise!”
“I told you Chuck wouldn’t have done nothing. He was just checking on you!”
“He was drunk and woke me up out of a dead sleep! I had to kick and squirm just to get out from underneath him! To this day my body freaks out when someone touches me in my sleep!”
She waved me off again. “Stop being so dramatic. He did no such thing.”
“Unbelievable. You didn’t believe me then and you still don’t believe me now. I am an adult and I am standing right in front of you.” I minimized all space between us, subjecting myself to a stench that was probably strong enough to get me second-hand drunk. Vodka wasn’t that abrasive in the scent department. Had she spilled the entire bottle on herself? “Look at me when I say this. He was forcing himself on me.”
Mom rolled her eyes. Defiant as always, she mumbled, “He was not.”
“Oh yeah? Then why did he do a permanent disappearing act the next day?”
“Because you made him uncomfortable. All’s he wanted was to be a daddy for you and you wouldn’t let him!”
“I was thirteen! And if that was his way of being a dad, then hell yeah I’m glad he ran! And you know what? I want you gone too. Go!” I shouted, pointing down the street, stunning a woman who thought I was violently pointing her way. “Go and never come back. I don’t want you in my life anymore.”
“You need me!”
“Like I need a fungus! Go! You leave me and Nana alone. You’ve had twenty freaking years to get your shit in order and you’ve failed miserably. You want to keep living this way? Living off booze and one loser of a guy after another? Fine. But we don’t have to stick around and watch it anymore. Get the hell gone!”
She stood before me like a bull, snorting in and out through the nose, growing angrier by the breath. “You’re going to regret this. For turning your back on me. Both of you!”
“No more than I already do, I’m sure.”
She stomped off, rudely bumping into a guy with enough force to knock him sideways, completely unapologetic.
My insides were on fire, every nerve screeching and firing with anger, pent up for so long it just couldn’t keep from raging anymore. I yanked on my hair and reveled in the burning sensation across my scalp.
How could she be like this? My own mom!
I spent a lifetime putting up with her bullshit, and the one time I put a stop to her leaching ways, she…she… Arrgghh!
My feet fell into heavy steps that stomped all the way to The Donkey’s Tale. I worked up a sweat this time, my clothes feeling damper by the block. The pub was mostly empty, a few tables occupied for a late lunch. Only one guy was sitting at the far end of the bar drinking, and by the looks of him, his sully ass wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon. He reminded me too much of my mom. Skin prematurely wrinkled from dehydration, circles under his eyes, miserable expression. Made me miserable just watching
him. Still, my insides were flaring so much my skin felt more heated by the rage inside than my walk under the midday sun. I dropped my bags on the floor and took up a stool at the bar. Rory smiled when she spotted me. “Hey, Tessa. What’s up?”
“My fucking mom,” I bit venomously, digging my fingers into my hair.
“Whoa.” Rory’s hands went up in defense. “Why so explosive?”
“Just give me a shot. Of anything, I don’t care.”
“No,” she replied firmly, her body stiffening to match. She did grab a glass, but she filled it with ice and a soda. “It’s the middle of the day, you’ve probably got to go back to work and you’re so effin’ pissed right now alcohol is the last thing you need.”
“Where’s Sarah?” I snipped when she put it down in front of me.
“At school. And she wouldn’t have given you a shot either, so get over it.”
Annoyed, I locked my jaw and shook my head.
Being slightly nicer, Rory added, “You’ve never mentioned your mom before, so what’s up?”
“She’s just a fucking bitch. She’s used people all her life, then gets pissed when you won’t take it anymore.”
“All right, she pissed you off. But come on,” she tried to say soothingly, “she can’t be all bad, right? I mean, she’s your mom.”
Unamused, I stared her down with a look I knew was nasty. She hardly seemed fazed. “When I was thirteen, she told me Nana was dead.” That silenced her for a moment. I mindlessly sipped at the soda, not even wanting it but drinking it nonetheless.
“Why would she do that?”
“Because Nana was going to try and have the courts take me away. The government would’ve stopped the free handouts if that happened.”
“Okay…but how would telling you that stop the courts from taking you?”
“My mom is really good at disappearing. She basically lives off the grid. No credit cards. Stays in the kind of places you pay cash weekly. If no one could find us and I thought Nana was dead–”
“You’d never try to call her again, right. But if she was getting assistance, wouldn’t they be able to track her down that way? She was collecting that money somehow.”