Chapter 11
eleven
SOPHIE
My legs scream with each stride, lactic acid flooding my muscles as I struggle to match my mother’s relentless pace. Sweat streams down my spine, soaking through my sports bra, and my lungs seize with each desperate inhale, raw tissue protesting the cool morning air.
She’s fifty years old with a chronic neurological condition, and she’s absolutely destroying me on this trail.
But that’s not even the worst part. No, that award goes to the fact I’ve spent twenty minutes trying to corner her about her latest health scare, only to get twenty minutes of her deflecting with the practiced ease of someone who’s spent decades soothing terrified parents in the NICU.
“It wasn’t an attack or a relapse, Sophie.” Her breathing stays maddeningly steady while mine comes in desperate gasps. “Just a pseudoexacerbation.”
I have to stop, hands on my knees, gulping air. “ Just a pseudoexacerbation that left you on the floor.”
“Because I was stressed from picking up Hannah’s shift.” She says it casually, as if discussing weather patterns while I’m drowning.
The dismissal makes my ribs constrict, pressure building behind my sternum. “You shouldn’t have taken that shift.”
Mom’s gray eyes—the exact shade and shape as mine—sharpen to steel. “Hannah’s son had pneumonia. She needed coverage. End of story.”
“And it had to be you?”
“Yes.” No hesitation. No apology. Just that stubborn set to her jaw that means this conversation is over. “It had to be me.”
I want to grab her shoulders and shake her until she understands this doesn’t just affect her.
Dad finding her dizzy and disoriented on their bedroom floor.
Hazel watching her forget the name of her best friend mid-sentence.
Me getting texts full of “everything’s fine” when nothing, absolutely nothing, is fine.
“Enough.” She accelerates, as if physical distance can create emotional space. “Tell me about your semester so far.”
The dismissal stings, but that jaw says I’ll get nowhere. “Bio-Stats for Clinical Practice is already trying to murder me.”
“And?”
“Clinical Methods might be interesting.” I dodge a low branch. “The professor manages to stay awake while teaching, which puts him ahead of most.”
“What about things away from your classes?” That pointed look appears—the one that dissected my teenage lies about studying at Maya’s. “You know… fun?”
“I went to karaoke last night.”
Her entire body perks up, spine straightening, pace momentarily forgotten. “Karaoke? You ?”
“Maya dragged me.” The words escape before I can stop them, and her eyes ignite with maternal hunger for details.
“Anyone interesting there?”
My mind immediately supplies Mike moonwalking across that sticky stage, his gloriously terrible singing, the way he’d leaned close before Andy’s arrival shattered the moment. A smile threatens to appear on my face even thinking about it.
“Just Maya’s friends.” I force the smile away and keep my voice carefully neutral. “Some hockey players showed up.”
“Hockey players? At karaoke?” Her eyebrows climb. “And you stayed in the same room?”
“My friends were there.” I shrug. “Apparently they have hobbies beyond concussing each other.”
“Sophie.” But she’s fighting a smile. “Was one of them that nice captain your dad mentioned? Mike something?”
I nearly face-plant into the dirt. “How do you know about… never mind. Yes, he was there.”
“And?”
“And nothing. We talked. He murdered some perfectly innocent songs. Story over.”
Except the story includes my drunk ass agreeing to his poetry reading on Thursday.
I’ve mentally changed outfits seventeen times, typed and deleted three different bailing-out texts, and generally regressed to my embarrassing high school self.
The one who used to practice conversations in the mirror.
“You know,” Mom slows to a walk as we reach the park’s center, “it’s been a long time since you and Jimmy...”
“I’m aware.” The name still leaves an acrid aftertaste, disappointment mixed with relief.
“Maybe it’s time to?—”
“Focus on myself. Which is exactly what I’m doing.”
She studies me with that NICU nurse assessment that catches every microexpression. “Focusing on yourself doesn’t mean avoiding all human connection.”
“I’m not avoiding anything.” The lie sits heavy and obvious between us. I’m avoiding plenty—Mike’s eyes crinkling when he laughs, that flutter low in my belly when he grins, the memory of our almost-kiss replaying obsessively in my brain, each viewing revealing new details I’d missed.
“Sophie, if MS has taught me anything, it’s that time is precious.” She pulls off her headband, wringing out the sweat. “You have to grab life with both hands.”
“Like taking shifts that make you collapse?”
Her expression hardens to granite. “Like not letting fear dictate how I live my life.”
The words land with surgical precision. Thursday night looms: Mike reading poetry, me pretending it’s not a date while every cell in my body knows better, hoping desperately he’ll keep things platonic because anything else might crack me open in ways I can’t control, leaving me raw and exposed, dependent on someone who could walk away when things get hard.
“Look.” She points across the grass. “Ice cream truck. Split a cone?”
“It’s nine in the morning.”
“Perfect time for spontaneous joy.” She’s already jogging toward the truck.
I follow, watching her order two scoops of mint chocolate chip—my favorite since I was five and she’d sneak me tastes when Dad wasn’t looking.
I think about risks and fear and the way Mike’s whole face transforms when he laughs.
About setbacks and control being nothing more than tissue paper against life’s storms.
And, at some point between her cone being delivered and mine, I conclude maybe she’s right.
Maybe I’ve been gripping life so tightly I’ve forgotten how to actually live it.
Or maybe I’m just desperate for excuses to justify showing up Thursday in the outfit I’ve definitely already chosen but won’t admit to choosing.
Mom hands me the cone, and I take a tentative lick. “You’re going to have a stomach ache during your shift.”
“Worth it.” She grins, looking more like eight-year-old Hazel than a woman who scared us all senseless four days ago. “Always worth it.”
I want to argue the logic. Want to point out that some things aren’t worth the risk, the pain, or the loss.
But watching her attack that ice cream with the same intensity she attacks life—fearless and fully committed—I know I’ve already lost this battle.
Just like I’ve probably already lost the war against Thursday night.
The ice cream melts faster than we can eat it, dripping down our hands in sweet, sticky streams. Mom laughs, catching drips with her tongue like a kid, and for this moment I can pretend we’re just normal people on a normal morning run.
Pretend my chest doesn’t seize with dread every time my phone rings.
“So.” She wipes her hands on running shorts that cost more than my textbooks. “This hockey captain.”
I inhale ice cream and nearly choke. “I never said anything about?—”
“You got that look.”
“There’s no look.” I focus intently on my rapidly melting cone. “And there’s definitely no guy.”
“Sophie Pearson. I changed your diapers. I know your lying face.” She stretches against a bench. “You don’t have to tell me, but maybe it’s time to try again.”
Try dating. Try trusting. Try not protecting myself with walls so high even I can’t see over them anymore.
“It’s complicated,” I mutter.
“Simple is boring. And you, my brilliant, anxious, wonderful daughter, are anything but simple. Maybe you need someone who can match you.”
“I don’t need anyone.” The words come out sharper than intended. “Except you, Dad, and Hazel, anyway.”
“No,” she agrees, voice gentle. “But maybe you want someone. There’s a difference.”
The truth of it hits with physical force, a splash of ice water down my spine. I’ve been so focused on need—stability, predictability, control—that I’ve ignored want. And what I want, apparently, is to watch a hockey player butcher poetry while pretending my heart isn’t trying to escape my chest.
“I should head back,” I say. “Hazel has dance at eleven, and then I’ve got classes.”
“Always taking care of everyone else.” She starts jogging back. “I’m officially giving you permission to be selfish, Sophie, just once.”
I follow, though it’s my thoughts racing now. This loop trail carries us right back where we started—safe, controlled, achingly predictable. I’ve been running the same emotional circuit for months.
Maybe it’s time for a different path. Or maybe the mint-chip sugar rush is affecting my judgment. Thursday will tell. If I go. Which I’m definitely not planning to do, despite already knowing exactly which earrings I’ll wear.
“The world won’t end if you go on one date,” Mom says, derailing my spiral.
“I know that.”
“Do you?” Her smile turns knowing. “Because you look afraid of feeling…”
“I feel plenty.”
“Feeling and letting yourself feel? Two different things, OK?”
We pass morning joggers who wave cheerfully, their easy grins a stark contrast to the weight pressing against my ribs. Mom waves back—she’s never met a stranger she can’t connect with—while I manage something that might generously be called a smile.
“What if I’m not ready?” The question escapes before I can swallow it back.
“Ready for what?” She’s being deliberately obtuse now.
“Any of it. Dating. Trusting someone new. Getting my heart stomped on again.”
Mom stops completely, turning to face me. Morning light catches the silver threading through her hair and illuminates the fine lines around her eyes that weren’t there five years ago. In that moment, she looks beautiful and fragile and fierce all at once.
“Oh, honey. Nobody’s ever ready. That’s the whole point.” She reaches out and squeezes my shoulder with hands that have comforted countless terrified parents. “Was I ready for MS? For another baby at forty-two? For any of the curveballs life’s thrown?”
“That’s different?—”
“Is it?” Her thumb rubs gentle circles. “Life happens whether we’re ready or not. The only choice is how we meet it.”
We run in companionable silence for five minutes, our footfalls creating their own rhythm against the packed earth. When we’re almost back to the parking lot, I blurt it out.
“He’s doing a poetry reading,” I say.
“A what ?”
“Poetry reading.” I can barely believe the words coming out of my mouth.
Mom stops mid-stride, delight spreading across her face. “The hockey captain is into poetry ?”
“He likes to try new things, and he invited me.” I’m babbling now, my mouth working faster than my brain. “And I said yes, but I was drunk, and what the hell am I going to tell Dad when he finds out I’m—” I stop myself before saying ‘dating.’ “Going out with one of his players?”
“Your father doesn’t need to know immediately.” She grins wickedly. “And if the poetry’s terrible, you’ll have a hilarious story for Maya.”
“But what if it’s not terrible?” I whisper, both of us knowing I’m not exactly talking about the poetry. “What if it’s wonderful?”
“Then you’ll have a different kind of story.”
That’s the fear that keeps me awake—not disappointment, which I’ve catalogued and analyzed and built fortresses against, but the possibility that Mike might actually be different. That Thursday could crack something open I’ve sealed shut. That I might want things I’ve trained myself not to want.
“Come on.” Mom links our arms the way we used to when I was little. “Breakfast. Real breakfast, not just ice cream.”
“I have to get Hazel ready?—”
“We have time.” Her smile softens. “There’s always time for pancakes with my daughter. Time to pretend we’re normal people who don’t overthink everything.”
“You don’t overthink anything,” I point out.
“No, but I didn’t want you to feel alone in your neuroticism.” She bumps my hip gently. “It’s OK to want things, Sophie. Even scary things that might hurt.”