Chapter Thirty
Reese
Iwas folding my laundry in my mom’s living room when she came out of her bedroom, sleep heavy in her eyes.
“I’m sorry.” I glanced at the clock and saw that it was two in the morning. “Was I too loud?”
After sulking for a month, I had talked my agent into getting me a travel assignment in Salt Lake City, and therefore had been living with my mom and Paul ever since.
Unfortunately, this assignment was a night shift, so I tended to be up late on my nights off.
In the past, I had never had a problem transitioning back and forth, but I had found myself easily sleeping during the day and doing chores at night.
“Do you have to do laundry in the middle of the night? The laundry room is very close to our room, and I’m a light sleeper.
” Her sharp tone didn’t surprise me. Mom has always needed her full beauty rest.
It was snowing tonight, and the house felt colder than usual. I was hiding my pale skin under a large hoodie, having lost my golden tan a month after returning to the mainland. Mom’s tone made the room feel even colder.
“I’m sorry,” I apologized quickly and made a mental note to do some of the louder chores when she was awake.
I moved to grab the next shirt, but paused for a second as I saw the Oregon State hoodie I had stolen from Kelly.
I’d never had the chance to give it back, and I shamelessly wore it to bed from time to time.
“Do you work tomorrow...or I guess tonight?” Mom yawned and tried to cover her mouth.
“No, but I couldn’t sleep.” What I’d been suffering from was technically classified as depression, but my mom didn’t need to know that.
“Honey,” she came to sit down next to me, “when are you moving on to your next assignment?”
I was taken aback by this and suddenly felt angry. “Do you want me to leave?”
“No. That’s not it.” She put her hand on my back like I was a child.
I hadn’t lived with my mom since I was in high school, but it hadn’t taken long to start feeling like I was a kid all over again.
“Paul and I are just worried about you. You’re sleeping all day, up all night.
I haven’t seen you leave the house once, except to get gas or pick up food from the grocery store. This isn’t like you.”
“It’s just the night shift life,” I tried to brush it off, but I couldn’t get the smile to appear on my face.
“That!” Mom pointed at my face. “That right there! That is not my little girl.”
“Well, have you ever thought that maybe I’m not your little girl anymore?” I said harsher than I intended, and instantly regretted it the second the words left my mouth.
“You were always such a happy child. What happened to you in Hawaii?”
I wanted to scream. I wanted to throw the pile of clothes on my lap across the room and yell at her. Instead of doing what I wanted, I stayed quiet and kept folding.
“You have nothing to say about this? I don’t understand you.” She crossed her arms and stared me down.
This time, I couldn’t control the words that escaped my mouth. “You don’t understand me? I don’t think you’ve ever known me.”
Mom physically shuddered away from me. Never in my life had I raised my voice at her.
“You’re my daughter, Topanga. I know you better than anyone.”
“The fact that you call me Topanga still tells me you don’t,” I bite out.
“What has gotten into you?” She straightened up, clearly wide awake now.
“What has gotten into me? This is who I have always been. You’ve just never bothered to get to know me. You don’t even call me by the name I prefer.”
“What, Reese? I thought that was just a cute nickname your friends called you. You’ve always been my sweet Topanga.”
“Well, I hate that name.” Memories of trivia night came running back to me. I didn’t hate my name. I just hated that Mom never noticed I avoided going by that name.
Mom gasped, covering her mouth with her hand.
The verbal diarrhea unleashed, and there was no stopping it. “And what friends, Mom? I never had friends.”
“That’s not true! You were very well-liked. You always made friends when we moved.” Her eyebrows scrunched as she stared at me like it was the first time she was truly seeing me.
“No, I didn’t. I stopped making friends after the first two moves. Why do you think I never wanted a big birthday party? I never had friends to invite.”
“I just thought you were on the shyer side, and just wanted to celebrate with us.” Her tone had turned defensive.
“Wake up, Mom! I didn’t have friends, and it’s all your fault.
I was never around long enough to keep a friend.
And that’s all I needed, just one friend.
You could have even been my friend! But you guys were never around.
You made me move year after year. Then Dad abandoned me to take care of his real family. I needed you!”
She shook her head slowly as my words crashed into her. “No, you were always so happy. I had no idea you felt this way about your childhood.”
“You never asked me. Not once was I okay with all the moving. You never checked in to see how I was doing at a new school. It was just assumed that I was supposed to be okay. We never talked about Dad. We just moved on.”
“You should have told me!” Her voice rang out and echoed against the walls. We were sitting on the same couch, but we might as well have been miles apart.
“You never asked!” The words I had wanted to say for years finally escaped me.
We were both breathing hard, and I could see the tears forming at the edges of my vision. I hadn’t been able to muster any tears since I left Hawaii.
Paul peeked his head out of the hallway, looking between Mom and me. “Is everything okay?” He looked nervous, like he had been listening for a long time and didn’t want to get involved.
Mom shook her head slowly. “I’ve got this one.
” Paul didn’t wait for her to change his mind as he scurried back to bed.
“Topanga...I mean, Reese, I worked hard to provide you with everything. Things I never had growing up. Did you know that my father used to beat my mother? Every night, if things weren’t right, he would beat her right in front of us. ”
I was shocked into silence. I didn’t know this. My grandpa on that side had died before I was born, and Mom never talked about him.
“We didn’t have a nice house to live in...Reese.” She said the name as if it burned her throat. “He spent everything he earned on alcohol and gambling. I grew up in a trailer without indoor plumbing, wondering if I was going to eat that night.”
“I didn’t know any of this.” All the anger in me left.
“You never asked,” she spat my words back at me. “I’m sorry you feel like you had such a terrible childhood. We raised you the best way we knew how. And I didn’t want to burden you with the problems with your father. I didn’t want to taint the relationship you guys have.”
I swallowed the enormous secret she had given me. I could feel empathy for my mother, but that didn’t make my problems any less true. “You really thought the best thing for me was to constantly move? To not talk about the fact that Dad abandoned us?” I shook my head in disbelief.
“I was eighteen when I married your father and ran away from my home. We were poor, with no college education. Did you know I was only twenty when we had you? And then your dad left. I was a single mom, working full-time and raising you. What were you doing at twenty?”
I was living in an apartment near campus that my parents were paying for. Guilt bubbled in my stomach.
“One day, you’re going to realize that no one knows what they are doing when they are raising kids.
Hell, I was still a kid myself. You and I were growing up together, but I knew one thing.
That I loved you. I knew you weren’t going to grow up the same way I had.
You might not approve of how we lived, but the bills were always paid, you never went hungry, and you were always loved by us.
You still are. We did the best that we could.
I’m sorry that wasn’t good enough for you. ”
Mom rose suddenly from the couch, wiping her eyes as she walked back to her room.
She paused for a moment before turning back to me.
“You’re thirty-one-years-old. If you have problems with your dad, then you need to work it out with him instead of blaming me.
I made my peace with him, and you can choose if you want to make yours.
” She opened her door and disappeared. I could hear Paul’s soft voice on the other side, comforting her.
I had envisioned that confrontation with her a thousand times before. In my mind, she always walked away with a new perspective, and we hugged, agreeing to work on our relationship. Instead, I was frozen in place, truly thinking of how hard it must have been for my mom.
I couldn’t imagine the responsibility of having a child so young. How horrible the pressure she must have been under had felt, especially after Dad left.
Had I been living my life with this crutch, believing I couldn’t make friends?
Thinking my family didn’t love me? Feeling that my dad had left me and not my mom?
I knew in my heart I had made friends in Hawaii.
So why was I running away from that? When Kelly told me he loved me, I believed him.
Did I walk away from him because I didn’t think I was capable of loving him back, or because I was scared his love for me would fade?
Did I love Kelly Iona?
Yes, my heart didn’t hesitate to answer.
But things were so complicated now. Kelly had begged me to stay, and I still left. I had taken his biggest insecurity and thrown it in his face. Every day, there had been a part of me hoping he would reach out again. That I would get one more chance to make us work.
It had been radio silence, though. I had hurt Kelly. He wasn’t going to try again. At that moment, I missed his warm embrace, and it felt even colder and lonelier knowing I was at rock bottom. I had no one else to blame but myself.