Chapter Thirty-Eight
“I’m selling the house.”
I nearly choked on my mother’s declaration, or maybe it was the french fry I’d been swallowing that was now lodged in my thankfully unbruised throat.
Something that had taken three weeks to heal.
Which meant this was my first time seeing my mom or my dad post-Utah.
We talked on the phone like normal, but I’d used the excuse of having the flu, then having to work double shifts to make up the time I’d been down sick as to why I hadn’t been coming by to see my dad.
I’d talked to Ryan about this, as well as Cat and Calli, and they all agreed with me. The kind thing to do was not to tell her what had happened. It was done, it was over, and there was nothing she could do. But the knowledge of what had happened to me, her daughter, would cause her undue harm.
So I didn’t tell her, and I never would. Like Ryan said, we were moving on.
All of us, except Poppy.
She was hiding. Not hiding in denial. Just outright hiding. Beck said she was riddled with guilt. The problem was she wouldn’t talk to any of us so we could help work that out of her.
“Are you all right?”
With an impolite cough, I managed to get the fry down without needing the Heimlich and waved off the nursing assistant who looked like he was ready to swoop in to save me if my face started turning blue.
“What?” I wheezed.
“I’ve thought about it, sweet tart, and it’s time.”
It wasn’t time. It would never be time for my mom to sell the house I grew up in.
Never, ever.
“Mom—”
She held up her hand and gave me the patented parental stare that was a cross between listen to me and I know what’s best.
I’d listen, but then I’d argue she didn’t know best, not about this.
“We bought that house thirty years ago. It would’ve been paid off if we hadn’t borrowed against the equity for the new roof and updates. But even after I pay off the loan and the taxes and fees, there will be a substantial amount of money left over.”
I had no doubt. On more than one occasion—okay, on many, many occasions when houses in my parents’ neighborhood sold—I’d heard my dad crow about sitting on pile of gold.
Property values had only risen in the last thirty years.
But in their neighborhood, where the lots meant they had a nice-size backyard and their neighbors weren’t close enough to touch, they’d skyrocketed.
That also meant my mother would buy a new house at an inflated price.
“Mom—”
“And the house is simply too big for me. It was too big when it was just the three of us. But now, with just me in it, it’s not only too big, it’s lonely.
Then there’s the yard,” she went on. “I’m getting to be too old to be pulling weeds and trimming bushes.
We don’t have much grass, but what we do have needs to be mowed.
The driveway and walkways need to be pressure washed.
The back patio is fine for now, but in a few years the retaining wall will need some repairs. ”
“I could do the pressure washing, or Ryan would do it, and I’ll pay for a gardener. The brickwork that surrounds the back patio we’ll save up to get repaired.”
It was like I hadn’t spoken when she went on. “And the property tax on the house is breath stealing.”
Fuck.
I didn’t bother trying to interject again.
“My real estate agent has found a few places I like. I’m going to look at them this weekend.”
“Mom.” This time it wasn’t an interruption, it was a whisper—a painful one that felt like a knife to my heart.
My mom pushed her half-eaten sandwich off to the side and rested her clasped hands on the white tablecloth.
Then she looked around the dining room full of residents and families enjoying lunch together.
Clean. Upbeat. Nothing about the room screamed cafeteria or nursing home.
It looked exactly like what it was—a restaurant.
It was just the patrons happened to live either above in the apartments or off one of the hallways, depending on the level of care they required.
“It’s time, Chloe,” she told me gently.
“I can help more.”
A flicker of remorse flashed in her eyes.
“Sweet tart, you already help too much. I should be the one getting a second job.”
Over my dead body would my sixty-year-old mother get a second job when she and my dad should’ve been planning their retirement.
“Absolutely not. I can move in—”
“Absolutely not,” she parroted. “I love you more than breath, cupcake, but you are not moving in with me. You’re thirty-five, you have a life to live. And by that I mean live, not work yourself to the bone to take care of me and your dad. And I have a feeling Ryan would agree with me.”
Cupcake.
Shot to the heart.
My mom called me sweet tart and had for as long as I could remember. My dad called me cupcake. Ditto on the memory part.
And she was right about Ryan. I didn’t officially live with him, but I hadn’t spent the night in my apartment since that last night he’d spent the night there with me.
“I don’t mind helping.”
A sad smile quirked up my mom’s lips. “I know you don’t.
But that doesn’t mean I’m going to let this continue.
You’ve done enough—too much. I’m selling the house and downsizing.
The profit from the house won’t pay for your dad’s care forever, but with my cost of living substantially lower and the funds from the sale, I can pay for your father’s care by myself. ”
I shook my head, not willing to give up the fight.
“Please listen, Mom.”
“I’ll always listen to whatever you have to say.
But I’ll warn you now, you won’t change my mind.
” My mom paused and leaned in closer. “It’s just a house.
Selling it doesn’t mean we lose the memories.
It doesn’t mean we lose the love that was created there.
Those are ours, Chloe; we take them with us wherever we go.
And somewhere locked away in your dad, he still has them with him.
He no longer recognizes us, but I have to believe he can still feel our love.
The love him and I share and the love he has for you. ”
God, I wanted to believe that too. But it was getting harder and harder when I was on the receiving end of my dad’s blank stare.
I now introduced myself to my father—not as his daughter but as Chloe. I didn’t touch him lovingly. I didn’t hug him, unless on the rare occasion he offered one as a farewell.
Three times a week, the man who’d taught me everything worth knowing called me Chloe—not cupcake. I’d never again be that to him. But he was still and would always be my dad, it was just now I called him Hank.
Three times a week, I watched him shake my mom’s hand.
She was no longer sweet lips (a nickname that had never failed to make me gag when I was a teenager, which meant he used it more often than not just to tease me).
Now I’d give up everything I owned to see him swat her behind and call her sweet lips.
To see him twirl her around the kitchen—she’d feign annoyance for being interrupted while cooking, but she’d do it with a huge smile.
I’d sell my soul to the devil to buy back my father’s memory.
I was Chloe.
My mother was Andrea.
My father was Hank.
So, yeah, it was getting really hard to believe.
“And I say this with love,” she went on.
“But you’re a slob. You were one as a teenager.
You’re one now. If you moved home, we’d kill each other.
I’d complain about the mess you leave in your wake, and you’d be sick of hearing about it within a week.
And you know I’m a worrier. I’d constantly ask you where you were going and when you’d be home.
And don’t get me started on that car of yours and how fast you drive. ”
Ah, yes, some of the reasons why I’d been working myself to the bone.
I loved and adored my mother, but she was a ballbuster and had an opinion about everything.
I mean everything. And she was stubborn—case in point, she wasn’t going to budge about the house, no matter what I said.
Not that I had a say—it was her house, even though that house held all my childhood memories.
I had to dig deep to remind myself this wasn’t about me. As hard as it was on me, it was a thousand times harder for her.
“Whatever you need to do, Mom,” I told her with what I hoped was conviction and not dejection. “Do you want me to go with you to look at new houses?”
I saw the tears gathering and her lips wobble before she expertly recovered.
That was Andrea Baughman—at least it was the Andrea Baughman who no longer had her husband to lean on.
There had been a time when my mother would’ve allowed her emotions to sweep her away, knowing she was safe to do so, because my dad would stand tall and strong and hold her while she wept.
Now she sucked up every blow life punched her with.
I hated it. But I understood.
“I’m looking at condos, sweet tart. I want a pool and rec center and green spaces I don’t have to look after. And two of them even have tennis courts.”
Good God.
“Um, Mom, the last time you played tennis you came home with a black eye,” I gently reminded her.
One could say I got my coordination from my dad. It was unsafe for any flying objects to be sailing toward my mom.
“It’ll be fine.” She waved off my concern.
“Yeah, like the time you asked Dad to take you out on a paddleboard and you almost drowned—fine like that?”
Finally, a genuine smile graced my beautiful mother’s face.
“I see your point. No water sports,” she conceded.
Though it must be noted she hadn’t forfeited tennis. If she was serious about learning how to play, I was buying her a catcher’s mask.
“Let me know what time you’re going to tour the properties, and I’ll come with.”
“I’d like that.”
I wouldn’t like it one single bit. I was going to hate every second, but for my mom I was going to plaster a fake smile on my face and pretend I was happy she was learning how to play tennis.
When really all I wanted was my old life back.
Fuck neurodegenerative diseases, and proteins in the brain, and mini strokes, and damaged brain cells, and microglia, and astrocytes.
Fuck Alzheimer’s—the thief that had stolen everything.
“And please set up dinner soon. I’d like to properly meet the man who’s captured my daughter’s heart.”
“I’ll set it up.”
“Soon, Chloe. But now tell me everything. I want to know all about him.”
I spent the rest of lunch telling my mom all about the awesomeness that was Ryan Strong. Of course I left out big chunks of what made him the man who had not only captured my heart but had proven he was the man who kept me whole and safe and protected.
Behind the wheel of my baby, I headed out of the parking lot.
It didn’t take long before the nasty thoughts started to invade.
Selling the house. My dad no longer my dad in the sense he no longer knew I was his daughter.
The pain of that crushed me. I could feel the weight of it threatening to break me, and I was all out of mental stop signs.
Redirection was no longer working. Bits and pieces of my childhood floated through my mind like a beautiful mosaic of better times.
A montage of happiness that had turned into sorrow.
The slow destruction that was talked about, but pamphlets and doctor’s-office handouts couldn’t truly be understood until you experienced it yourself.
Nothing would ever take away this pain.
But I knew what would dull it.
I waited until I was at the stop sign before I grabbed my phone off the seat next to me.
He picked up on the second ring.
He always picked up. Even if he was busy. Ryan never left me hanging.
“Hey, baby, how was lunch with your mom?”
Some of the pain started to recede.
“Good. She wants us to have dinner with her. Is that cool with you?”
“Absolutely.”
I knew that would be his answer. More pain receded.
“I’m on my way to the bar now. Please tell me Pete hasn’t been shuffling shit around my desk again?”
“Nope. He’s been too busy with the liquor stock.”
“That’s good news,” I muttered.
I heard him chuckle before he worked his magic and completely dulled the ache in my chest. “See you when you get here. Love you, Chloe.”
“Love you.”
He disconnected the call.
I drove.
Then, since my thoughts were no longer heavy, I cranked up my music and sang along with this kickass new artist I’d just discovered.