41. Motherly Advice
forty-one
Liz
Twenty-four hours.
That’s how long it’s been since Jack left me alone at the inn. I’m no closer to figuring out what I want to do.
I’ve thought about going over there a million times, but I don’t have anything to tell him yet.
I decided that maybe going for a run will help. I’m so lost in my own thoughts that I don’t even pay attention to all the dirty looks I get from most folks I pass in town.
I let my legs carry me until they feel like at any moment, they could turn into jelly. I have no rhyme or reason as to where I’m heading, but I find myself finally stopped in my parents’ driveway.
Truthfully, I have no idea why I’m here. Since I’ve gotten back, I’ve basically avoided this place like the plague. Yet, right now, the sense of home is all I crave.
Walking to the door, I know it’s probably too early for them to be home from the bar, so I grab the key hidden under the frog statue and let myself in.
“Hello?” I call.
When I get no answer, I make my way to the kitchen to grab a bottle of water. I have no idea how long I will stay, but right now, the smell of vanilla in the air and all of the photos on the wall are oddly comforting.
The moment I step into the kitchen, I scream at seeing my mom over at the sink, doing dishes. My scream makes her scream and turn around, holding a butter knife toward me.
“Mom!” I squeal.
“Eliza!” She cries, yanking an earbud out of her ear. “Announce yourself!”
“I tried! You didn’t hear me. Do you think maybe you could put down the knife?”
She looks at her outstretched arm before lowering it. “Sorry. I’m listening to some true crime podcast, which I’m sure doesn’t help with my nerves.”
She turns off the water at the sink and wipes her hands on a dish towel. “What are you doing here? Is everything okay?”
“I just…Well, I…I mean.” I search for the words.
“Eliza, spit it out.”
Without warning, I start uncontrollably sobbing.
“Oh my gosh! What’s wrong?”
She walks over to me and embraces me in a warm hug. She may be petite, but the woman gives excellent bear hugs.
“Come on. Let’s go in the living room and talk.”
When my sisters and I were growing up, our mom could see through our crocodile tears in a heartbeat. She would tell us to buck up and stiffen that upper lip. But when we were in serious pain, she always knew.
And she was always there.
“Lizzie, I need you to calm down enough to where you’re able to breathe.”
She finally gets me calm enough to where I can talk.
“Mitch showed up at the inn yesterday,” I begin.
“I’m sorry. What? Does Jack know? Did he kick his ass? Did you videotape it?”
I let out a soft laugh. “Nothing quite like that.”
I spend the next couple minutes explaining to her the whole sordid mess and finally finishing with, “So, now I have to decide what I want to do. I have a huge chunk of money that I don’t even know if I want. I have a job back in LA that I’m also not sure that I want. And then, I have Jack who tells me he wants me to be happy, but I need to figure out what that is on my own.”
“That Jack is something else,” she says.
“Yeah, yeah. He’s the best of all of us.” I say it sarcastically, but after getting to know him, I honestly believe it. “What should I do, Mom?”
“You think that I’m going to make this decision for you?”
“Well, you’re good at telling us what to do. Can’t you just do that again? Just this once?”
She pokes me in the shoulder. “Not a chance. But I’m going to give you a few more things to think about.”
“That’s literally the exact opposite of what I need.”
“Oh, hush. When you saw Mitch yesterday, did it make you nostalgic?”
I think for a moment. “No, it actually made me a little sick to my stomach.”
“When he mentioned the job in LA, were you excited to go back there? Did you think suddenly all of your problems were solved?”
“No.”
“What did you think?”
“Honestly? I thought about telling Jack. I texted him almost immediately when Mitch walked in.”
She readjusts on the couch. “Now, you know I will be the first woman to tell you not to do anything just for a man. You need to make your own decisions in life. But I also think that when you have something good, maybe you shouldn’t be quick to let it go. I know that a lot of people think that I gave up any dream of mine to open a bar just because your dad wanted to. But I did it because it was something I wanted to do. I wanted to go to work with him every day. I wanted to build something with him. To me, that sounded better than any dream that I had ever had.”
“And you have no regrets?”
She shakes her head. “Not a single one. Now, I’m not going to tell you it hasn’t been hard. Some days were harder than others, and my brain would spin. But ultimately, I found my place here. With him. I’m not saying that has to be your choice, but I’m saying that there’s nothing wrong with including other people in your plans.”
I pull the check out of my pocket and hand it to her. “What do you think I should do with this?”
“Well, first of all, I don’t think you should be running around town with this in your pocket, Eliza.” She narrows her eyes at me. “But why don’t you use it to do something that you’ve always wanted to do?”
I try to think of what that would be, and honestly, I have no fucking clue.
“I”ll ask you again. Do you want to go back to LA?” She asks.
“I don’t know. I’m probably pretty hated both places, but at least there, there are more people to thin out the mob mentality a little.”
“Take all of that out of the equation. Do you miss LA?”
“If you would have asked me that a month ago, I would have said yes. If I was the same person that I was when I lived there, then, yes. But I don’t feel anything like that woman anymore. When I was there, it all seemed to fit. But now that I’m here, this seems to somehow fit too.”
“It’s okay to change. And it’s okay to decide that maybe something you wanted before isn’t something that you want now. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“Yeah, I know,” I agree.
“You have to think about what makes you happy now and then just go after it, kiddo. I wish there was some sort of magic potion I could give you, but this is all I’ve got.”
I think about what’s made me happy since I’ve been back. Jack is obvious. He’s made me happy. But that doesn’t really give me any other goals. Lord knows I’m way too stubborn to ever be a trophy wife or something.
What else has made me happy?
I think for a moment. And as if I pluck the idea right out of the air, I exclaim, “I know what I’m going to do!”