Chapter 19 #2
“What, she didn’t say? She told me how I was… I don’t know,” she scoffed, looking down at the table. “Emotionally neglectful. How maybe things would have turned out better if I’d told you growing up that I love you.”
“I—I don’t know if that’s…” I forced a nervous laugh while, underneath, my insides churned. Bridget had talked to her? About that? She’d just gone and tried to face the biggest and scariest thing I’d ever known, and apparently it was… working?
“Are you going to sit down, or what?”
“We only have cinnamon rolls on Christmas morning,” I said, breathless and weak. I was panicking over a cinnamon roll. What was wrong with me?
She made a face, looking away. “That’s… it made sense as a tradition when you were younger, but roles change as we grow older. You’re going away again soon. And you always loved cinnamon rolls. So this seems like as good an opportunity as any for a special occasion.”
Slowly, shakily, I eased myself down into the chair, sitting rigidly as Mother set a plate down in front of me with a roll. It was probably… gauche, if I started crying right now. “When did you… talk to Bridget?”
“We talked about it on Christmas,” she said. “And I suppose I hid from it, and she brought me up on it when she came to see me on Sunday.”
“On Sunday,” I repeated breathlessly. Well after our… breakup, if you could call it that. Even with everything I did—everything I didn’t do—she was still going around trying to make my life better.
“Yes, well, she came around and told me about how she… er… well…” She tented her hands. I waited for her to finish. When she didn’t—seeing her no longer a terrifying authority figure but just an awkward middle-aged woman looking for words—the tension left my abdomen, just a little.
“About how she… what?”
“She gave me a little more insight about her… career.”
I blinked. “How… much… insight?”
“Oh, all of it, I’m inclined to believe, unless there’s something else hiding.”
I laughed awkwardly, the tension diffusing more. I took my coffee cup in both hands. “I see,” I said.
“Have you… ever…” She cleared her throat hard. “You haven’t, say, contributed, have you?”
“Mom… are you asking if I’ve shot porn with her?”
She went scarlet, sitting up taller. “I just don’t think that’s the best career choice for you,” she said, words carefully chosen.
“She mentioned me a couple of times to her audience, but she’s very respectful of my privacy. Nobody knows my name or face. Or… body.”
She let out a long whoosh of air. “So, you, er, knew about it when…”
“When we started seeing each other, yes.” I had been refusing to ever acknowledge it that way, but I was tired of pretending. It felt so much easier just putting the words together.
“You don’t think it’s a problem.”
“No, of course not. If anything, I think she has the more honest job. I help big companies convince people to give them more money. She provides something people want.”
“I—I see.” She processed about a hundred different thoughts before she said, “Aren’t you just a bit worried about… you know, if other people have seen your partner…”
“They’re just looking. And only in ways she lets them. It doesn’t take anything away from her, from me, from us.”
“Right. Yes. I see.” She let out a long breath, looking down at her plate, her hands folded in front of it. I almost thought she was being uncomfortably stuffy about this before I realized my hands were folded in front of my plate too, in the exact same way.
“It’s a bit moot right now, isn’t it?” I said. “I mean… things went the way they did.”
She sighed. “I still have my reservations about Sam, but I’ve… invited him and Kevin to dinner with me on Friday. Do you want to come?”
“Er—I mean, I suppose I… could.”
She hung her head. “Maybe it’s because your Nan has been beating it into my head that Bridget is right, but I just…
want to… try to do a little bit better. I love you.
I just wanted you to grow up capable and respectable.
And I guess I was trying to be… serious and respectable with it too.
But maybe that wasn’t the approach you and Kevin needed. ”
I felt like I was going to be sick. And probably cry at the same time. I wasn’t… accustomed to… losing my cool like this. “I… okay,” was all I managed.
“I’m sorry,” she said, the words clearly agonizing for her to say.
“There’s—there’s nothing to apologize over,” I laughed nervously. “I’m perfectly fine. I mean, we’re all just doing our best. Parenting a child isn’t easy.”
“I wish I could do it all over again,” she said. “Since Bridget told me how… obviously… hurt you are, I haven’t been able to stop seeing it.”
“Mom, you don’t need to worry about…”
“I just want to do well. So I’ll try to be better about Sam. And I’ll try to be… easier for you to talk to.”
“Mom.” I was definitely crying now. I thought I was better than this.
I wanted to curl up into myself, slump onto the floor, and cry and cry and cry until there weren’t any tears left to cry out, but I wasn’t going to do that.
God willing, at least. “I don’t… know what to say. I’m sorry I’ve been… in a bad state.”
“What are you apologizing for?”
“I don’t know. I feel like I have to.”
“Oh, listen to yourself. Do you need therapy?”
“I don’t know. Maybe,” I laughed thickly through tears. “Actually, let’s adjust that to probably.”
“Well, it doesn’t sound like the Seattle office gives you enough free time to attend therapy sessions, so you might as well stay here and find a good therapist in the area. And if you’re staying around and seeing a therapist too, then there’s no reason not to start seeing Bridget again.”
“Mom—” I shook my head. “Are you… telling me I should be dating Bridget?”
She sat up taller. “I don’t believe I’ve made it a secret that I think she’s right for you.”
“You… I mean, it’s not like I’m upset to be wrong, but I sort of… expected… you to change your opinion once you learned what she did for a living.”
“I do not think I would want to date somebody whose entire body is on the internet for strangers to see. But I also do not want to date a woman. We clearly have different feelings on what works and what doesn’t.
The important thing is that she’s intelligent, respectful, hardworking, diligent…
and I suppose she must be very.” She gestured vaguely.
“Creative. Entrepreneurial, as Grandma put it.”
“Oh, god. She told Nan too? What did she say?”
“I think I will not be repeating it. How about we eat our cinnamon rolls before I lose my appetite?”
That sounded really lovely. I took a bite of mine—soft and buttery with a rich spiced character.
Tasted like Christmas. Even eating them not on Christmas.
“I do… really… care for her,” I said, voice wavering.
“She’s so good. I just don’t see why she would…
possibly… give me another chance after everything that happened. After everything I did.”
She sighed. “Victoria, I think you’d be surprised how many people out there are waiting to love you. They just need you to accept it. And to show them how.”