Intuition Seventeen Years Old, Tennessee
Intuition
Seventeen Years Old, Tennessee
Thanks to Paloma, Meagan, and Sophia, the first few weeks of senior year aren’t so bad.
But then, a day I’ve been dreading: Beck’s birthday.
It’s the hardest I’ve had in months. I’m planning to bury myself in bed as soon as school’s out, but my friends talk me into a trip to Buttercup Bakery. Once we’ve ordered drinks and a quartet of lavishly frosted cupcakes, we squeeze into a corner booth and Paloma toasts Beck’s nineteenth, because even though I mentioned his birthday to her in passing just after we met, she remembers.
Last year, Beck spent his eighteenth birthday in Rosebell, his first trip home since he’d moved to Charlottesville the month before. His mom and I fixed a lunch of his favorites: brats in buns, homemade macaroni and cheese, caprese salad, and the peanut butter sheet cake Bernie makes for special occasions. We hung out in the Byrnes’ backyard with his family and mine, then ducked out to spend the rest of afternoon, just the two of us.
Together, we went to the stables at Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall to sneak apples to the horses that pull caissons for military funerals at Arlington National Cemetery, then walked The Mall, finishing at the Jefferson Memorial, where we watched the sun sink spectacularly below the horizon.
I miss him, and our easy assumption of forever.
I miss his family too. Our gatherings, the food, the laughter, the affinity.
“I’m thinking about reaching out to Beck’s mom,” I tell my friends, swirling the tines of a fork through my peanut butter cupcake’s frosting.
“You should,” Meagan says. She’s beside me, so it’s easy to catch the take it easy glower Paloma aims across the table. Meagan shrugs, unapologetic. “I’m just saying, today’s probably been a bitch for her too.”
Remorse hits me square in the chest. All my life, Bernie’s been an ally, this cool bonus mother, a proxy on the rare occasions my mom’s been out of commission. Yet I’ve abandoned her during the worst year of her life.
I must look every bit as guilty as I feel, because Soph swoops in with damage control. “What Megs is trying to say is that when your gut speaks, it’s usually for a reason.”
I look at Paloma, her kind eyes lined in black, lashes miles long. “What do you think?”
She smiles. “There’s something to be said for honoring your intuition.”
I set my fork down and make a shameful admission. “I’ve barely managed today, and I’m pretty sure talking to Bernie will break me. That’s what’s holding me back…fear. Is that the most selfish thing you’ve ever heard?”
“No,” Paloma and Soph say in unison.
“Yes!” Meagan squawks. But in her brusqueness, she abandons her cupcake to squeeze my hand. “I’ve seen this shit play out, Lia. Like, after my mom passed, my gran started coming over all the time. She cooked our dinners and did our laundry. She cleaned our bathrooms. She got in my dad’s way. Irritated the hell out of him. That first Christmas we spent without Mom, Gran insisted on doing all the cooking. She wouldn’t even let Dad roast the turkey. When we sat down to eat, he looked at my mom’s empty chair and lost it. Told Gran she was out-of-bounds, trying to take over. Gran stormed out, leaving my dad, my sisters, my pop, and me at the table. I thought Pop was going to blow a gasket, but he just started carving the bird, totally chill, talking about how Gran was super sad, and how trying to fill in for Mom was part of her grieving process.”
“That makes a lot of sense,” Paloma says.
Meagan sends her a smile before looking to me. “People cope with loss in different ways. You want to deal on your own, but maybe Beck’s mom needs connection. It’ll cost you, letting her in, but imagine what you’ll be giving.”
Soph reaches across the table to link hands with her. “Smart girl.”
Megs is smart: Bernie’s love language is quality time. She’s a talker and a listener. She’s bolstered by eye contact and shared laughter. Beck was the same.
He must be so disappointed by how I’ve shut his mom out of my life.
I spear a bite of cupcake and look at my friends. “I can do better.”
Paloma gives me an encouraging grin. Soph nods, eyes bright.
“Hell yes, you can,” Meagan says.