Chapter Two Welcome to Cherrybridge
Mom’s pretty quiet on the drive to Cherrybridge the next day, which suits me perfectly.
I don’t have much to say to her anyway. When she got to Toronto in the morning, I tried again to convince her to let me stay, but she replied with an emphatic no.
She also said I could sulk as long as I wanted; she would not change her mind: I was going to live in Cherrybridge all summer.
Jason’s big house is in a new subdivision full of more big houses.
The house is gray brick made to look like stone and has an arched doorway and black windows.
This is southern Ontario. Why is this house contemporary Tuscan style?
I cringe as we exit the car. Mom uses a key to open the front door, disables the alarm system once we’re inside, and then casually drops her purse onto a table.
I’ve only been inside Jason’s house once before, right before their wedding at a posh country club here in Cherrybridge. Mom’s Toronto family felt so out of place. My poor Rashida Aunty had no idea why there were so many forks on the table.
It’s so weird to see Mom treating this enormous mansion like it’s hers.
The house is ridiculous. Four bedrooms and six bathrooms. Mom’s closet here is bigger than my bedroom in Toronto, and Jason has his own closet that’s just as big.
It’s wild that Jason lived here alone until Mom moved in three weeks ago.
What’s the point of having all this space by yourself?
If I ever become this rich, I’m getting a condo in downtown Toronto with spectacular views of the skyline.
Something modern, built with a focus on sustainability and multi-use public spaces.
I’ll make it colorful with art and photography on every wall, instead of this beige minimalism.
“Let me show you your room,” Mom says. She sounds like she’s trying to be cheerful. “You’ll love it. It even has its own bathroom!”
“I’d rather be back in the city than have my own bathroom,” I say, voice flat. It’s the first thing I’ve said in half an hour.
Mom looks like she’s not sure if she should snap at me or ignore me.
And I get it. I’m not fun to be around right now.
But why should I be? I don’t want to be here.
Mom drops the cheerful tone. “Why don’t you go upstairs and see it alone.
At the top of the stairs, turn right. It’s at the end of the hallway.
” She turns her face away from me and shuffles to the kitchen.
I exhale. She’s never been a tough mom, so why is she punishing me for something that isn’t my fault?
I could easily do my community service in Toronto…
Heck, Nanabapa would probably drag me to the site and stand over me every day to make sure I did every second of my sentence.
In fact, if Mom really wanted me to stay out of trouble, leaving me with my grandfather would have been the way to do it.
Is this because now she’s married to someone rich? Before she forced me to move here, I actually didn’t mind that she was dating Jason. He’s a bit of a dork, but he loves Mom. I didn’t expect her to turn into a completely different kind of mother after her wedding, though.
I take my backpack up the dark wood stairs toward what will be my room for the summer. The hallway is painted beige. But when I walk into my room, my breath literally catches from the shock of it.
The room still smells faintly of paint, so I know this was done recently. The walls are a dusty teal color, the exact shade I painted my walls last year in Mom’s condo. But other than the wall color, this room looks nothing like my old bedroom.
The bed is bigger—and higher, too. The headboard is ornate white wood, and there’s a textured cream bedspread.
On top of the bed is a pile of cream-and-pink pillows, and a long white bench sits at the foot of the bed with some boxes stacked on it.
There’s a white dresser that matches the bed and the bench, and even a vanity table with a round mirror and a little seat in front of it.
On the dark wood floor is a pink-and-cream patterned rug.
The room has a huge bay window, and I can see the perfect green grass of the backyard and the bright blue pool through the gauzy pink curtains.
The room seems familiar, but it takes me a moment to realize why.
Last year when Mom said I could redo my room in the condo, I went through all these design magazines and websites and printed out my favorite looks and put them on a big corkboard in my room.
This is almost an exact replica of one of those pictures, the one that inspired my color scheme.
While I loved the magazine shot, I couldn’t recreate it because I’d had to make do with hand-me-down furniture, and it’s really hard to find decent throw cushions in thrift stores.
But I wasn’t disappointed about it because in the end, I built a room that felt like me.
This room, this recreation, does not.
I sit on the bench to look at the stacked boxes.
There are new purple platform Converse sneakers, fancy noise-canceling earbuds, and the newest iPhone, still sealed in its box.
I exhale. I cut out a picture of these exact shoes and stuck it onto my bulletin board a few months ago, but I never thought I would actually own them.
Suddenly the bedspread moves. Or rather…
“Oh! A cat!” I grin widely. It has long cream-colored fur, with a pale-orange-point face and tail. No wonder I didn’t notice it right away. Its fur is the same color as the bedding. “What a cutie!”
“That’s Rosie,” Mom says behind me. I didn’t notice that she followed me upstairs. “Jason picked her up from a shelter a few days ago to surprise you. She’s about seven. She’s made herself comfortable in this room. You’ll have to share it with her.”
“She’s adorable,” I say as I move to the bed to pet her soft fur. She immediately rubs her face on my hand. “Jason got her for me?”
“For the family. I told him you’d always wanted one. He had cats growing up.”
Rosie rolls onto her back. She has the sweetest face. I scratch under her chin the way my friend Keeley’s cat likes it, and Rosie starts purring. I have always wanted a cat—any pet, really—but Mom always said no because she worked such long hours, and I was at school or work every day.
“I suppose the cat and the new stuff are a bribe?” I ask. I’m not really mad about the cat, though.
Mom’s shoulders drop. “No. I just… I’ve never been able to spoil you before.
It took me three days to clean out all the stuff Jason had stored in here.
Three carloads donated to charity. And I remembered that you loved those purple shoes.
” She’s rambling, something she does when she’s nervous. Like me.
It’s true she’s never been able to spoil me. I’ve never had expensive earbuds, and my current phone used to be my grandmother’s. “Do you want my old phone?”
She shakes her head. “No. I bought myself a new one too.”
I look down at the cat’s sweet face. I kind of do want to gush and thank Mom for all this effort. Maybe even apologize for being such a brat today.
But her forcing me to be here means she doesn’t trust me to stay out of trouble in Toronto. And that hurts.
Mom might not have been able to spoil me, but she always trusted me and—I thought—respected me.
She wasn’t home that much since she worked long hours, so I was closer to Nani than to her, especially when I was little.
I guess Mom and I did get closer when I grew up a bit, but still, we’ve never been super tight like everyone assumes we are since Mom’s so young.
But that doesn’t mean she was a bad mother; she was supportive and proud of my achievements.
I always felt like she’d be on my side if I needed her to be, even after she started dating Jason.
But now, she’s the furthest thing from on my side.
I let the silence stretch between us and focus my attention on Rosie instead of looking at Mom.
“She’s sweet,” I finally say, running my hand across the cat’s soft belly.
Mom smiles a little and puts her hand on my shoulder. “I know you don’t want to be here, Meera, but this is your home now too. Maybe you’ll grow to love it.”
I shake my head. I feel the corners of my lips pull down into a determined line. “I doubt that. And I’m only staying for the summer.”
Mom sighs, stepping away from me. “Settle in and rest as much as you can. Your community service starts tomorrow.”
She leaves me alone.
The next morning on his way to work, Jason drives me to the park where I’ll be doing my community service.
Even though a good night’s sleep in a cozy bed with a cat sharing my pillow took some of my bitterness away, I’m still pretty quiet.
But Jason doesn’t seem to notice; he talks about his house, this subdivision, and this side of town.
He points out his brother’s house a few blocks over.
It’s even bigger than Jason’s house and is in a modern Victorian style, complete with dormer windows and a tower.
“That’s where Sadie lives,” Jason says, “You remember my niece Sadie from the wedding, right? She’s excited you’re here this summer.”
“Yeah, Sadie seems great,” I say mildly, not mentioning that I only hung out with her at the wedding events because we were the only two teenagers. Her two twelve-year-old brothers didn’t count.
“My brother bought in the subdivision first,” Jason says.
“Then my parents bought a house here. They’re not here now; they spend their summers in Spain.
I don’t normally like new builds, but these houses are so unique, and since the rest of the family was here, I jumped when the next phase opened up.
I had the pool put in right away—swimming is the best exercise.
Clears my head, you know? But I like the house so much better now with more people in it. ” He turns to me and smiles.