3. TWO
TWO
Eden
The door slams behind me as I step into my one-bedroom, one-bathroom apartment in downtown Seattle, and lean my back against it with a sigh.
Thankfully, he never lasts very long, which isn’t an ideal piece of information to have about my boss, but it’s one that I’m grateful for, nonetheless.
“Shit day?” My younger sister looks up at me from where she’s curled on the futon, a fuchsia throw blanket wrinkled on her lap. The sun wanes through the mesh drapes behind her, casting a halo around the back of her head.
“What’s worse than shit?” I toss my bag toward the tiny, circular dining table. It skids right across the surface and tumbles to the floor on the other side.
“Bullshit?”
“That works.”
I lose my coat next, just shuck it off and kick it toward the front door, then fall to the futon beside Aspen with a sigh of despair and self-pity.
“Jesus.” She fakes a cough, thumping her chest. “The vibes in this room are so bleak I could choke.”
That earns her a death glare.
“I’m kidding.” She holds her hands up in surrender, her eyes softening. “Well, sort of. Wanna tell me what happened?”
I pull my knees to my chest and rest my chin on them, tilting my face to look at her. “Anderson is cutting my pay by fifteen percent.”
“What?”
“And he threatened to fire me.”
“WHAT?”
She vaults off the futon and starts to pace.
Here we go. Aspen pacing tends to lead to colorful threats of physical violence that, despite her enthusiasm, hardly ever come to fruition.
Except that one time she crushed a laxative in my ex-husband’s drink and made him shit his pants on the drive back to his place (Macon told us).
Oh, and that time in middle school when she punched a boy in the dick for stealing my cardigan.
(I was in middle school. She was seven.)
Where I am ice, my little sister is fire.
I like to solve problems with calm, well-guided conversation, whereas she will choose violence every single time.
“I will slice off that man’s dick while he’s sleeping and feed it to him for breakfast.” She rolls up her sleeves, as if preparing to perform the surgery. “Scratch that. I will cut a tiny hole in his testicles, string him up to a tree and drain him like a cow.”
Gross.
“As much as I appreciate the sentiment, you can’t murder my boss. I need him to sign my paychecks.”
The wildness in her eyes dims a little at that.
Folding herself back onto the futon beside me, she huffs in disappointment.
“I’ll curse him with a long, relentless cold, then.
One that forces him to breathe through his mouth, so he’ll spend the rest of his days regretting ever taking for granted what it’s like to have clear, unobstructed nostrils. ”
“How do you plan on doing that?”
She shrugs, pulling the blanket back over her legs. “There'll be a spell for it on Etsy, I’m sure.”
“Well, can we figure it out another day? I’m too tired for hexes right now.” Stretching behind me, I flick on the wicker lamp resting on a side table that I thrifted from a market and painted pastel pink. It sits beside a faux bonsai tree and a candle shaped like a Highland cow.
I’ve gone to a lot of effort to turn my measly apartment into something that feels like home—for Macon’s sake more than my own. The pastels, maximalist details, and warm lighting usually do something to keep my spirits high, but tonight, even my cheese plant looks dejected.
Any other day, I could push the bleakness of my job to one side, but Macon’s dad will be coming by soon to pick him up for his court-ordered one weekend a month. And if there’s anything worse than being apart from Macon for two days, it’s knowing how much he hates it more.
But I don’t have the money to hire a lawyer and contest the agreement. Besides, as much as I can’t stand it, I’d never get in the way of Macon spending time with his dad, even if, right now, he doesn’t want to.
The point is that he might want to one day. And I want to be able to tell him that I supported it from the very start.
Where is the little guy anyway?
“Is Macon in his room?” I ask Aspen.
She picked him up from school today, since I had to work late.
At twenty-two, my sister is still in college.
She’s knee deep in her final year at the University of Washington, studying comparative history of ideas (not that I know what that is), and is drowning in papers and exams. Yet, she dropped everything to help me when I needed her.
I may have a shitty job, no money, and have to sleep on a futon every night so my son can have the only available bedroom, but at least I have my sister.
“Yeah. He’s supposed to be packing, but I’m pretty sure he’s in there performing the Hamilton soundtrack.”
That sounds like my son.
I find him standing on his bed, wearing a gold-buttoned tailcoat and a pair of long boots he must have stolen from my closet. He brandishes a cucumber like a pistol, flawlessly rapping the words to “My Shot’ without once taking a breath.
Just the sight of him causes the day’s heaviness to finally lift from my chest. It’ll return the moment his dad picks him up, I know, but for the moment, I cherish the lightness in my heart as I step farther into the room.
He clutches his side with a silent scream and launches himself backward onto the mattress.
His stuffed hippo goes flying into the wall from the force, limp gray limbs flailing in the air.
Macon jumps to his feet and points the cucumber at his stuffie on the floor.
“Fire!” He mimics the sound of gunshots, popping the vegetable back to mimic a recoil.
“Poor Mr. Snuggles.” I sweep the hippo off the floor and look at my son with wide eyes. “Quick, Macon. He needs CPR.”
He doesn’t waste a second. Springing off the mattress, he lands in front of me and steals his stuffie from my hands.
Laying him on the floor, he presses two fingers to Mr. Snuggles’ chest, pumping up and down until he finally leans back on his heels with a dramatic sigh.
He swipes his floppy bangs off his forehead and declares that Mr. Snuggles will live to see another day.
“Well, thank goodness for that.” I grin at him, ruffling his hair.
He turned ten six weeks ago, early December, and already he looks like a miniature man.
I home in on his tailcoat—a leftover jacket from last year’s Halloween costume—that swamped his little frame just three months ago but now hangs from him as if it was tailor-made.
My son is growing up. And there isn’t a damn thing I can do to slow it down.
“Your dad will be here soon, buddy. How’s the packing going?”
His brown eyes flick to the empty bag left abandoned by the hat stand that holds his fedora collection. “Ummm…”
I know his game. It happens every month. He thinks that if he doesn’t pack, then he doesn’t have to go.
Unfortunately, it’s one of those unchangeable facets of life. Like a thunderstorm on his birthday, or a fifteen percent pay decrease, or the dreams I had to give up at eighteen to take care of a newborn baby. His father and I have a mandated custody agreement, and we have to abide by that.
“Are you taking Mr. Snuggles?” I ask, my voice gentle.
He turns the hippo over in his hands, frowning down at it. “Dad says I’m too old for a stuffie.”
Fuck you, Sebastian.
If Aspen decides to slip him another laxative or, hell, tie him to a tree and drain the lifeforce out of his cold, serpentine body, I wouldn’t stand in her way.
Sebastian Hague can rot in Hell for all I care.
“You’re not too old for Mr. Snuggles, Macon.” I reach for his hand and tug him toward me. He perches on the edge of his space-themed bed. “Lots of kids your age still have a bedtime buddy, and your dad shouldn’t make you feel bad about it.”
He still looks unsure.
“You wanna leave him here?”
He nods, crawling to the top of his bed, where he tucks Mr. Snuggles under the covers and kisses the top of his head…exactly the way I do when I put him to bed.
“Will you sleep okay without him?”
He nods again, but I see the lie in it. I won’t push the issue, though.
Sometimes, like now, he still seems like the tiny human who would crawl into my bed when he had a bad dream, who would present me with a tiny scratch on his finger for me to kiss better, and sit on my lap to watch TV at the end of the day with Mr. Snuggles under his arm and his thumb in his mouth. Other times, he’s desperate to grow up.
Parenting a ten-year-old is a game of push and pull, and it’s one I haven’t quite mastered yet.
“Is your phone charged?”
“I think so. Aunt Aspen plugged it in when we got home.”
God bless my little sister. Macon’s phone is the only reason I can sleep while he’s away.
“You wanna call me before you go to sleep tonight?”
“Yeah.” He scooches off his bed and walks toward me with his arms outstretched.
I fight to hide a smile and hold him to me. More often than not recently, it’s been me initiating hugs, often to total rejection. So, it’s like Christmas morning when he comes to me first.
“Come on. We can pack your bag together.”
“I’m thinking we should go out,” Aspen exclaims, setting her empty bowl down on the small coffee table.
She stayed with me after Macon was picked up, citing that she didn’t want to go back to her dorm because she was craving pasta, and her roommate is a fitness fanatic who judges her for eating carbs. But I know Aspen. And I know that she didn’t want me to be alone tonight.
I grimace. “Really? At this time?”
The sun has long since set, the apartment awash with a muted, golden glow seeping from the table lamp in the corner and the bathroom light that Aspen left on. Macon called at eight for me to tell him goodnight, and my plans for the evening revolved around a long bath and a nine o’clock bedtime.
I’m all about the rock-and-roll lifestyle.
“Yes!” She bounces in her seat, her long braid whipping against her shoulder. “We should go to a bar. It’ll be fun, and you need fun. Seriously, when was the last time you actually had any?”
“I took Macon to the zoo last week. That was pretty fun. There’s a gorilla there who can do sign language, and Macon…” I laugh at the memory but trail off at the pitying look on her face.
“I meant fun without Macon. Without being Eden the Mom. When was the last time you had fun as just Eden?”
I can’t blame her for the intervention.
My life has become a conveyor belt of school drop-offs, work, and laundry. But I don’t think she can blame me for not finding time for fun in between all of that.
Truth is, my identity is so tied into being a mother that it sometimes feels like there’s no room for me. Having a baby at eighteen will do that to a girl, I guess. I’ve been a mother all of my adult life. Who even am I without it?
After dropping out of high school, losing all my friends, and being corralled into a marriage I never wanted as damage control for my family’s shame over my teenage pregnancy, I never had the opportunity to learn.
“I mean, when was the last time you had something stronger than soda to drink?”
Last month, actually. I sank a bottle of rosé while trying to predict the asking price of listings featured on Selling Sunset. See? This girl still knows how to live it up.
My sister sighs. “Look, I love you, but whenever Macon’s not here, you wallow on your shitty little futon for two days, bingeing Netflix reality shows about realtors in LA.”
“I watch other things,” I huff. “There’s a show about realtors in the OC as well.”
She stares at me like I’m proving her point.
Then she takes my hand, as if it will help soften the blow of whatever she’s about to say next.
“I get that you never had the chance to be young, but, dude, you’re not dead yet.
You’re still in your twenties. You get one weekend every month where you could be getting out there and actually living a little, and God fucking knows you need to.
If I have to spend one more evening helping you clean melted Cheeto dust out of your hair, I will file for emancipation. ”
“I don’t think you can emancipate your sister.”
“Respectfully, Eden, you are a twenty-eight-year-old woman with the life of a retired spinster.” She crosses her arms. “I will find a way.”
“Ouch.”
“The truth hurts sometimes, Edie, that’s why it’s called tough love.” She slaps her knee. “Now, go take a shower.”
I resist, even though I know she’s already won this battle. “What about money?”
“Pick out an outfit hot enough that other people will pay for your drinks.”
“But I’m tired.”
“So what? You can sleep when you’re dead.” She stands and hurries me off the futon, pointing a manicured finger toward the bathroom. “Go.”
It’s an hour later when I emerge back in the living area, dressed in a little white dress that has been collecting dust in the back of my closet.
I’ve showered and blown out my hair so that it hangs in loose waves over my shoulders.
My eyes are dusted with pink glitter, my lips painted the shade of cherries.
“Look at you, hot mama.” Aspen whistles. “Who knew you had legs like that hidden under all your sweats?”
Heat burns my cheeks, but there’s a lift to my shoulders that wasn’t there before. A warm sensation in my chest that I haven’t felt in years.
Because I don’t look like Eden the Mom right now.
I just look like Eden.
Aspen jumps up from the couch. Dressed in a brown cow-print tube top and white bell-bottom jeans, she looks the absolute antithesis of me. And though her outfit shouldn’t work on anyone, she manages to make it look incredible.
“Come on.” She takes my hand, pulling me toward the door. “I’m counting on those legs to score me some free margaritas.”