Chapter 11 #2
Every single time they took me away, I'd think: This is it.
This will be her wake-up call. She'll get clean now.
But she never did. Yet here I am, watching her sob in my living room, and some stupid part of me wonders if this time might be different.
If maybe she's finally ready to get clean, to return to the piano, where her fingers used to make magic before the drugs stole everything. I’m thinking this time is it, that the last pill she took is the last pill, period, but how goddamn naive is that?
I lean toward her. "Mom? You ready to quit?”
She shakes her head, tears spilling down her cheeks. "Oh, Tally. I've been clean six months now. But something's wrong." Her shoulders heave with each breath. "I'm seeing things—people. They talk to me. I don't recognize them, but they're always there."
"Wait—six months clean?" I blink, trying to process this. "When did this happen? Why didn't you tell me you were getting help?"
Her face hardens. "That's your response? Not concern about the strange voices and phantom people?"
"Well, that's probably just withdrawal after all those years using."
"Fuck you, Tally." Her eyes flash.
And we’re off. "What? What did I say now?"
"You clearly know jack shit about addiction. I only ever took pills—Oxy, that's it." She wipes angrily at her face. "You never even bothered to learn the first thing about what I was going through, did you? Or you'd know hallucinations aren't part of it."
"I don't understand?—"
"I'm telling you I've been clean half a year," she cuts me off. "So explain why I'm suddenly seeing things that aren't there."
"I'm pretty sure long-term use can cause—" I stop myself. Who am I kidding? I don't know the first thing about this. She's right—I never looked into it. Too much baggage there.
"No, it can't," she says quietly. "My counselor at the halfway house explained all this. Some addicts get psychosis from quitting cold turkey, but not these specific hallucinations." She looks up at me, suddenly small. "Tally, I'm terrified."
"Well, what's your theory?"
She rubs her temples. "Grandpa Jim had bi-polar disorder.
Ended up in a psychiatric facility, completely detached from reality.
" She winces. "God, I shouldn't talk about him like that.
Mom always said he was 'off his rocker,' but now that I'm facing similar symptoms, I see how cruel those descriptions were. "
I lower myself onto the chair. "Grandpa Jim? Was I ever around him?"
"Never," she says, her eyes fixed on the floor.
"He became this family ghost after they committed him to a mental health facility.
Not a 'loony bin' or 'funny farm' or whatever awful nickname people use.
I didn't learn the truth until Mom finally opened up after his passing.
" Her gaze meets mine, vulnerable and frightened.
"bi-polar disorder can jump generations, Tally.
Like a stone skipping water." Her fingers flutter between us.
"My grandfather suffered, his children escaped it, and now.
.. me? I'm terrified I'll slide further away until I'm trapped in some hallucination where you can't reach me in.
" She clutches my hands. "Promise you'll get me help if I disconnect completely.
I've survived homelessness before, but wandering the streets lost in delusions?
" She swallows hard. "That possibility terrifies me more than anything. "
Just then, Cameron shows up. My phone's been buzzing all night, but I've been too wrapped up with.
..Mom? I shake my head. Who am I kidding?
I'm already building walls. Better to fortify them now than watch them crumble when he meets some gorgeous Italian doctor in Sicily.
She won't have a maybe-bi-polar mother with a rap sheet of addiction.
No, this woman—Gia, let's call her—will have glossy dark curls, espresso eyes, and a laugh that makes everyone turn.
While I'm here trying to figure Mom out, they'll be saving lives together.
Bonding over crashed patients and diseases that Americans pretend don't exist anymore - tuberculosis, typhoid fever, cholera, malaria.
They'll stumble out after grueling shifts, collapse at camp with wine and war stories, and the rest writes itself.
Ridiculous? Maybe. Inevitable? Feels that way.
So I need to cut the cord now. Focus on Mom instead.
If she's really clean, that's huge. The bi-polar disorder thing needs professional eyes—I'll book something tomorrow.
Maybe if I can get my mother back, it'll soften the blow when Cam's "Sorry, I met someone" text finally comes through from halfway across the world.
Mom gazes at Cameron, her eyes practically sparkling. “You’re the doctor at Cedars,” she purrs, batting her lashes. “Excuse me.” Then she leans in and whispers, “Tally, can I borrow your foundation, concealer, mascara, and eyeliner?”
I can’t help smiling. For someone who struggled with addiction for so many years, she looks astonishing.
She’s a bit thinner—thankfully I learned to cook just in time, so I can put some weight back on her with some healthy food—but her blue-green eyes still shine, her smile is as radiant as ever, and her thick chestnut hair hasn’t thinned a bit.
Still, I know her: she’s trying to doll herself up for Cameron as if he’s one of her conquests, which, of course, he isn’t. I go along with it.
“Sure, Mom.”
Cameron watches her head into my bathroom.
I hear drawers clicking open and closed until she locates my makeup stash.
While she rummages, I stare at him, trying to memorize every detail of his face.
I might never see him again—and I have this urge to paint him later, because apparently I’m a glutton for punishment.
“Is that?—”
“Yep. It’s her,” I say, shaking my head. “That’s why I said ‘sure, Mom.’ And…tonight’s off. I can’t trust her not to bolt the minute I step out, and an underground art exhibit isn’t really her scene.”
“That’s fine,” Cameron replies. “Do you mind if I stay here with you two? I’m leaving early tomorrow, so…”
Dammit. He’s stunning, kind, brilliant—and unforgettable in bed—but I know this is goodbye waiting to happen.
Mom emerges from the bathroom, her face perfectly made up, and Cameron’s eyes go wide. “Your mom looks just like you,” he whispers. “She could pass for your sister.”
I nod. My mother has always been beautiful, so it’s a compliment he thinks we resemble each other. “Thanks, Cam.”
I still haven’t answered his offer. He could stay, but Mom will flirt nonstop and make him uneasy, and I’m not sure what the three of us would even do—watch a movie?
Or maybe he’d play chess with her, and knowing him, he’d crush her just like everything else.
Whatever happens, there’s no chance of anything happening between us tonight.
Our bedrooms are too close, and the thought of Mom overhearing… makes me shudder.
I plaster on a fake smile. "Actually, Cam, Mom's reappearance has drained me mentally and emotionally." Not entirely a lie. "And you probably need your sleep. Your flight leaves at 6, after all."
He nods slightly, his eyes dimming like someone just turned down his internal brightness.
The words bubble up in my throat—how I know I’m just keeping his bed warm until he finds some perfect doctor in Sicily with olive skin and a tragic backstory, or return to the states and find a country club princess who his family would approve of.
Someone who makes sense on paper. Someone who isn't covered in ink with a mouth like a sailor and mommy issues deeper than the Mariana Trench.
I swallow hard. Better to rip the Band-Aid off now than watch him slowly realize I was never enough.
“Okay,” he says, hanging his head. “I get it.”
I punch his arm, my knuckles grazing the crisp white cotton of his sleeve.
"Knew you would." My throat tightens like someone's wringing it out.
"So. Yeah." I swallow so hard it echoes in my ears, blinking back the hot sting behind my eyes.
"Um, have fun in Sicily." The words hang between us, pathetic as a deflated balloon.
Have fun in Sicily? Jesus Christ, Tally.
I can practically see him wading through refugee camps, stethoscope around his neck, sweat darkening that perfect hairline while he diagnoses Ebola, Typhus, Malaria—all those diseases Americans think disappeared with polio. Yeah. Real fun.
He lets out a long breath. "Don't worry about me.
I've got sixteen hours to Rome to catch up on sleep," he says, running a hand through his hair.
"Was actually planning to pull an all-nighter with you at the exhibit so I'd pass out the minute I buckle in.
Beats staring at the seat-back screen for half a day. "
I toss my hair back, flash a smile that doesn't reach my eyes.
"Well, Cam, if you're pulling an all-nighter, you're doing it solo.
Sorry." My voice doesn't crack, thank god.
My fingers grip the doorframe so hard my knuckles go white, but he can't see that.
Who am I kidding, though? Whether he stays tonight, wrapping those arms around me in a way I never thought I'd allow, or leaves right now—the end result's the same.
He'll find someone else eventually, and I'll be gutted either way.
But maybe—just maybe—shoving him out now will dull the edge of what's coming. A little.
My mother's jaw drops, her eyes wide as dinner plates. I just shrug.
"Oh! Cameron, right? Please, don't mind my daughter—she doesn't know what she's saying. I insist you stay. I'll grab my things and find a nice hotel nearby?—"
The word bursts from me like a thunderclap.
"NO!" I catch myself, but too late. Cameron's just an excuse for her—a convenient escape hatch.
If she walks out that door tonight, that's it. Game over. She won’t be back.
And after all this time maneuvering to get her here, under my roof.
.. Christ, I'm not letting her slip away again.
I eye Cameron, mentally calculating the fastest way to get him out of my house.
“So, Cam,” I say. “I guess this is goodbye.”
His brows draw together in a tight line, and his eyes—those damn blue eyes that got me into this mess—cloud over with hurt.
I watch confusion ripple across his face, then settle into a quiet sadness.
No flash of anger, though. God, I wish he'd just yell at me, call me names, storm out.
A shouting match would be so much cleaner than this silent collapse of everything we might have been.
“Okay,” he says quietly. Then he produces something out of his pocket. A jewelry box. “Here. I was going to give this to you so you can remember me. You might as well take it.”
I nod and take the box, keeping my eyes fixed on a spot over his shoulder.
Looking inside the box would crack me open, and I can't afford that—not when he needs to walk out that door.
"Thanks," I manage, my voice flat as week-old soda.
Better he remembers me this way: the tattooed ice queen shoving him toward Sicily with both hands.
Let him hate me a little. It's a gift, really. The last one I can give him.
The door clicks shut behind him and I'm left alone with the jewelry box, a lump rising in my throat. Holy shit. He remembered. That day he was over and I'd circled this exact necklace in the magazine, drooling over something I couldn't justify dropping that kind of cash on.
I lift it from the velvet, watching light dance across the different colored stones.
Ruby bleeds into topaz, sapphire is nestled against emerald.
There’s also deep purple amethyst, and that perfect beryl that's not quite blue, not quite green.
In the bathroom mirror, I fasten it around my neck with trembling fingers.
It settles against my collarbone like it was made for me, and fuck, I'm actually tearing up over jewelry.
Mom always said I could spot beauty a mile away, and this thing is practically screaming it.
My phone's right there, and my thumb hovers over Cam's name.
But Mom's sudden appearance—and her bombshell about possibly being bi-polar—has thrown my world sideways.
Tomorrow's a marathon: I need to make doctor appointments for Mom, and help her shop for her now-skeletal frame, basic necessities, go on a Sephora run.
I need to lock this place down so she can't vanish on me again.
So tonight, it's just Mom, me and my new necklace. Mom needs me focused on her, not on Cam—especially when I'm pretty damn sure he's already forgotten about me.