Chapter Thirteen
Mila
My mother is in a suspiciously good mood when I pick her up from the salon. We eat lunch at a new farm-to-table vegan cafe called Heirloom Root, where the owner hugs my mom and tells me how loyal she is. “She got so many people to come in here and try us,” the woman says.
Mom shrugs, but her smile tells me she’s pleased. “It’s so delicious, and it’s healthy. Everyone should eat here.”
As always, I’m amazed at the gap between my mother’s public and private personalities.
After lunch, we go to the grocery store, where she hums along to the music as she fills the cart with cheese and crackers, dried fruit, and wine. In the frozen food aisle, I’m reaching for a carton of ice cream when I hear my mom greet someone.
“Catriona, hello! It’s been ages!”
Catriona? As in Catriona Hart?
I turn around and see my mom air-kissing Rachel’s mother on each cheek. The freezer door thumps shut behind me.
“Hello, Eliza. You look well.”
“Thank you.” My mother glances at me. “Mila is home for a couple months to help me recover from hip replacement surgery.”
Catriona looks at me and smiles politely. “How nice.”
She looks the same. Dark hair coiled into a bun.
Tawny golden skin. Matching Chanel handbag and flats.
I don’t know whether it was her regal bearing or her strict parenting, but I was always intimidated by her.
“Hello,” I say, adjusting my hoodie to cover a spot of mustard I got on my shirt at lunch.
“Are you heading back to Florida soon?” my mother asks.
“Yes,” Catriona says. “Monday.”
“The day of my surgery. I’d much rather be going to Florida!” My mother’s laugh tinkles like a bell—like her upcoming surgery hasn’t filled her with even more spit and vinegar than usual. Catriona places a sympathetic hand on her arm.
“Poor dear. Thank you again for the free dance classes you provided in the Hart pediatric wing,” says Catriona. “The children just loved them.”
“Anytime. Once I’m all healed up, I’d be glad to do it again.”
Catriona checks her wristwatch. “Well, I’d better get going. Good luck on Monday, Eliza.” A short glance at me. “Nice seeing you, Mila.”
“You too.” I fidget with the zipper on my hoodie. I’m still a little afraid of her, but I can’t resist asking about my old friend. “How’s Rachel?”
Already walking away from me, Catriona speaks over her shoulder. “She’s well. Living down in Florida and working for the company.”
“Please say hello for me.”
If she replies, I can’t hear it.
“I haven’t seen Catriona Hart in a long time,” my mother says on the ride home.
“Me neither. Is she living in Florida now?”
“Mostly, yes. I think she comes up here for a month or so during the summer. She’s never been a particularly outgoing person, but I think she became even more withdrawn after her husband died.”
I nod. Mr. Hart had a massive coronary when we were in middle school. Rachel had been devastated.
“Of course, you can’t blame her for being embarrassed,” my mother remarks.
“About what?”
“You were probably too young at the time to pick up on the gossip, but he had the heart attack in bed…with another woman.”
I gasp, realizing a moment too late that this is precisely the reaction my mother was trying to elicit. “He did?”
“Oh, Philip Hart was a ladies’ man, and everyone knew it. But no one talked about it because he was such a pillar of the community.” My mother sounds slightly gleeful that that particular pillar was knocked down.
“I never heard any of that. I wonder if Rachel knew.”
“I’m sure her mother tried to protect her. If there’s anything the Hart family is good at, it’s burying things they don’t want coming to light.”
When we get home, my mother asks me again to move the furniture in the living room back to where it was. “Just for this evening,” she pleads. “So it looks nice for your guest.”
I don’t feel like arguing, so I drag everything back into place, arranging it the way she wants. Afterward, I retreat to my little art studio and spend a couple of happy hours in my creative zone.
Until my mother opens the door, knocking after the fact. “Can I come in?”
“Sure.”
“What are you working on?”
I show her preliminary sketches I’ve made for Ivy & Stone.
“Mmm,” she says. “What’s this for again?”
I try not to be hurt that she doesn’t remember. “Their fall collection next year. The designs will be on wallpaper, bedding, and bath wares for sure, and maybe tabletop or kitchen, too.”
“Seems like things are going well for you.”
“Yes. This collaboration is a huge deal.”
She places the drawing on the table. “You get this from him.”
“Him?”
“Your father.”
My heartbeat slams on the brakes. “What? What do I get from him?”
“Talent, I suppose. He was an artist, too.”
I force myself to speak calmly, as if she hasn’t just dropped a bomb in the room. “You never told me that.”
“He’s not someone I enjoy talking about.” With a quick pivot, she gives my clothing a once-over. “Have you decided what you’re wearing tonight?”
“Not yet.” I’m still trying to wrap my head around what I’ve just learned about my father. In twenty-eight years, she’s only mentioned him a handful of times, never revealing anything more than a stray detail.
He was young.
He had no money.
He spoke two languages.
He was a beautiful liar.
As a kid, I hoarded those morsels like a squirrel hiding acorns for the winter. I formed an image in my head of a dark-haired man in his twenties with an accent, and turned “beautiful liar” into something more palatable, even glamorous—a handsome actor.
I concocted a completely fictional account of their love story.
He was a graduate student working as an usher at the theater where she danced.
Every night, he watched her from the back of the house and fell more deeply in love.
They had a whirlwind affair and she got pregnant, but his semester ended and he went back to his native country before she could tell him about the baby. But someday, somehow, he would find me.
I clung to this delusion well into my teens, until I overheard my mom telling my aunt that he’d abandoned her twelve weeks into her pregnancy. Just up and disappeared one day. Left a note saying it was too much, too soon.
At that point, I stopped fantasizing about him. It’s been years since I felt even a glimmer of desire to meet the man who behaved so cruelly.
But it’s hard not to be curious.
“So what kind of artist was he?”
“If you didn’t pack anything appropriate for dinner out, you can always borrow something of mine.”
“Thanks, but I have things I can wear.” I try again. “Did he paint? Draw?”
Instead of answering, she turns toward the mirrors, smoothing her blowout and checking her neck for tautness. She leans closer to inspect her forehead. “Catriona’s skin is incredible, don’t you think? I wonder who she sees. Probably someone I can’t afford.”
“Did you ever see any of my father’s work?” My tone is tight with desperation.
Facing me again, she starts fussing with my curtain bangs. “How will you do your hair tonight?”
“I haven’t decided,” I reply. My shoulders sag with defeat. If I keep asking questions, she’ll only accuse me of trying to upset her. And, all things considered, we’re having a good day.
“It’s still so nice and thick.” She gathers my hair in her hands. “Mine thinned out so much after I had you. It’s never grown back the way it was before.”
“It looks beautiful, Mom.”
“Thank you.” She smiles at me. “Have I told you I’m glad you’re here?”
Guilt gnaws at my belly. I should be more generous toward her.
She did her best as a mom, didn’t she? All alone, abandoned by the man who’d gotten her pregnant.
The beautiful liar who betrayed her trust. Maybe he took advantage of her.
Maybe she loved him truly. Maybe her broken heart has never really healed.
Maybe her unhappiness isn’t all my fault.
“I’m glad to be here too,” I say, feeling shitty that it’s only half true.
She yawns. “You know, I’m feeling a bit fatigued. I might just lie down for a bit and rest my eyes.”
“Good idea.”
I try to go back to drawing, but I’m too distracted to work.
My father was an artist.
It doesn’t change what he did to her, to us, but somehow, it affects me. No, it explains something about me. It’s like a window has opened up onto my soul, and light is pouring in. I don’t have to admire him to appreciate what he gave me. I wish I’d known sooner. Why did she hide it all this time?
She had her reasons, says a voice in my head. She thought she was protecting you. Maybe she didn’t know how much it would matter.
How could she not know?
My concentration is clearly shot, so I give up working and take a shower.
Upstairs in my bedroom, I audition ten different outfits before settling on the long, clingy black dress.
I do my makeup and hair just like I used to as a teenager, listening to music and sitting in front of the mirror on the inside of my closet door.
At one point, my friends and I wrote all over it with dry-erase markers.
I can still see the ghostly lettering of graffiti I didn’t wipe off right away.
McKean #15
Rachel + Chad
Yasmine 4 Pres
Ladybug was here
I run my fingers over the glass. Maybe it’s this room, maybe it’s this town, maybe it’s just nostalgia, but I miss my old friends more than I have in years.
I’m spraying on perfume when I hear Everett’s knock.
My mother answers the door before I can get to the top of the stairs. “Well, good evening, Mr. Mayor!” she says brightly.
“Hello, Ms. Ferguson. How are you?”
“I’m just fine. And please, call me Eliza. Mila is still getting ready. Would you like to come in and sit down?”
“Sure.”
I hurry over to my dresser and choose earrings, a few bracelets, and some rings. I wish I still had my ladybug charm necklace, but I lost it the night of the fire.
A final look in the mirror, just like old times.