Chapter 4 Lurielle
Lurielle
Love that was conditional was not love she needed to make room for. Approval that was conditional was not approval she needed to seek. Affection that came with strings attached was something she was better off without.
They were good affirmations.
She’d come up with them on her own, an exercise in her workbook.
She had practiced them in the mirror, written them in her journal, put them on sticky notes around her laptop so that she would see them and remember.
Despina had applauded her efforts at her next therapy appointment, and Lurielle was satisfied that she was doing the best she could to internalize the reminders.
She wasn’t sure why, then, when the phone buzzed on her bedside table at 7:20 a.m., she even entertained the thought of answering it at all. Morning light slid in through the pulled-open curtains, soft and slanted and making her wince. She liked a dark room, but he’d been adamant.
“Darlin’, I know gettin’ you up and moving in the morning is like askin’ a hound to make nice with his fleas, but we need to start developing better habits. You’re not gonna have a choice soon.”
She knew he was right. He was gone most mornings before the sky had even begun to lighten, his commute into the city one long backup on the highway. Ris had commented on it more than once since she’d moved, saying she didn’t envy Khash having to sit in it twice a day.
“I’ve got it easy. There aren’t nearly as many people going into the suburbs for work.”
Lurielle usually careened into the office bleary-eyed and five minutes late, but soon she’d need to be up for crack-of-dawn feedings, daycare drop-off, life beyond her third cup of coffee.
That didn’t mean she had to like it, and she liked it even less when it came with a side of her mother before 8 a.m.
Her insides tightened with familiar dread, a curl of nausea making her eyes pop open. Just answer it. Throwing up is a good reason to disconnect quickly.
“Hi, Mom.” Her voice was flat. She didn’t care.
“Good morning, sweetheart!” her mother trilled, voice bright and syrupy-sweet, a voice normally reserved for the club. “I was just thinking about you.”
Of course you were. The daughter who had always been too little and far too much was suddenly relevant, now that she was expecting. “This early?”
“The early bird has the first pick of the worms, dear. And you should be keeping a regular schedule now. It’s so important.”
Now. The word landed softly, even though Lurielle knew how much weight it truly carried.
“Anyway, darling, I was reading an article this morning about how important it is to incorporate grapefruit into your morning routine as early as possible,” her mother went on, evidently uncaring that Lurielle hadn’t solicited diet advice from her in more than two decades.
Not ever, actually. “It’s so good for the little one!
It’s important to start your day with fiber, and there’s nothing better than vitamin C for staying healthy! ”
Lurielle squinted as she listened, wondering what the angle was. Her mother had never cared about her getting enough vitamin C a single day in her life.
“Plus, it’s full of water, so you won’t want to snack mindlessly.”
There it is. She suddenly remembered breakfasts at the club from her childhood.
Silver platters of eggs, stacks of stuffed French toast, and there she sat in the midst of it with her mother, each of them with half of a grapefruit and a sad little cherry.
She wants to put you back on the fucking club diet from 1999.
“I’m sure your doctor would agree that controlling bloat is going to make you feel worlds better than if you —”
“Actually,” Lurielle interrupted, wondering what possessed her to answer the phone in the first place, “it’s really important to start my day with protein.
Fiber, too, but protein is what my doctor is having me track.
Because I’m growing a baby. Not getting ready for swimsuit season.
” Her words were needlessly pointed, but her mother was the one who’d sharpened the blade over the course of the first thirty-five years of her life.
Lurielle pressed a hand to the swell of her belly, a tautness beneath her skin that already felt like it belonged to someone else.
She’d spent the bulk of her life trying to hide her body, being applauded when it was smaller, when she took up less space.
Now, though . . . now her moreness was the star.
Pregnancy had turned her body into a conversation she hadn’t started, one she couldn’t seem to exit.
Everyone had an opinion, and they never held back on sharing.
What she should be eating, how much she should be resting, how much weight she should gain, what shoes she should wear. How big she would get, once they learned she was carrying an orc, discussing the state of her vaginal elasticity as if they personally owned a stake in it.
She had no doubt she’d be able to sell tickets to the delivery to pay for all the nursery furniture, certain that wagers would be placed.
Whether she’d be able to push on her own, whether the baby would split her in two, whether her episiotomy incision would be from her navel to the crack of her ass.
Could probably pay off the mortgage if you got a cut of the action.
She had enough on her mind as it was. Diet tips from her mother were hardly new or useful, and she had far less tolerance for the bullshit these days.
“Plus, too much citrus gives me heartburn. I don’t need to worry about dieting right now. I need to worry about eating enough for two.”
“Well, no one said anything about dieting, Lurielle.” Her mother’s tone was peevish. “Only that bloat is going to make you feel terrible. But I’m sure your doctors are doing everything right, dear. Just make sure you’re actually listening to what they tell you.”
“I am,” she assured, if only to end the call a little faster.
“I just wanted to check in,” her mother continued, ignoring the cue. “Make sure you’re resting. You know how important it is to take care of yourself now.”
There was that word again. Now. Now that you’re worth thinking about. Now that you’re worth mentioning. Now that you’re worth loving.
“Well, I’d be resting more if I could sleep until my alarm. I need to get ready for work.”
“Oh, well . . .”
Lurielle could hear the soft cluck of disapproval through the receiver. She closed her eyes, stretching her back until it popped. She was starving.
“You shouldn’t be running yourself ragged, darling. You have different priorities now.”
She sighed. No one even pretended it was a suggestion. Khash’s sisters had done the same thing. It was a foregone conclusion that she’d be staying home with the baby, for at least a few years.
Never mind that she’d had to fight her way up the STEM ladder inch by inch, always one of the only women in the room, always talked down to, always underestimated — until she had proved her worth, over and over again.
But that doesn’t matter anymore, evidently.
She was a senior engineer, and everyone from the cashier at the Food Gryphon to her clutch of sisters-in-law simply assumed she’d be walking away from it all once she’d traded in her work lanyard for the coveted role of motherhood.
Meanwhile, she’d already looked up the company policy on hybrid work, hoping to be included in the team meetings as quickly as she could.
“I should get going, Mom. I’m going to be running a bit behind now.”
“Of course, darling,” her mother said quickly. “I don’t want to stress you. We’ll talk later. I love you.”
Her breath caught, heat rushing across her face, the threat of tears right beneath the surface. “I love you too.”
She was slow to pull herself from bed. Her mother didn’t need to know that technically she wasn’t behind at all.
After several unending weeks of projectile vomiting, she was easing back into the office, coming in at 11 a.m. Her supervisor had been the one to suggest the delayed start her first day back, as if her morning sickness was something she could put on a schedule, getting it out of the way before she came in.
It wasn’t, but Lurielle had readily agreed.
She was halfway there.
Six months in, six months to go. Three months left at work, the past two weeks notwithstanding.
She wasn’t looking forward to the bed rest her doctor had all but promised was coming, but she was looking forward to this being done.
She’d spent too many years being uncomfortable in her own skin to relish all these rapid changes now.
She’d only just arrived at a place of being happy with the sight of the elf in the mirror in these last few years, and now .
. . now there was a stranger looking back.
A stranger with her face, with her freckles, her eyes .
. . but a stranger with a body that didn’t belong to her anymore.
And now her mother.
Up until last year, Lurielle had been able to count on one hand how many times her mother had called her out of the blue, because she was thinking of her.
Her back hurt. Her jaw ached. She had a headache and she was exhausted, and all of those were the status quo when one was gestating a new life .
. . but a tiny corner of her brain wondered if this was because she had tentatively opened the door to let her mother back in, her trauma responding from all the corners of her body in which it lived.
That’d be fucking typical. And now you really do need to get up before you eat the phone.
Padding down the hallway, once she’d used the restroom and slipped on the threadbare robe she refused to get rid of, Lurielle paused in the doorway of the kitchen.
There was already a plate on the table.
He had placed it atop one of the mug warmers, just enough heat to seep through the plate without being a fire hazard, covered with the splatter guard from the microwave.