Chapter 8 Mothers
MOTHERS
“Where were you this morning?” my mother asked, drying her hands. “You need to strip your bed and get your sheets in the wash. I also noticed your bathroom is disgusting. And why did I wash Tristan’s…”
She might have said something else, but I couldn’t hear it.
This was it. While Anna took a test to decide her future, I held the key that would determine mine.
I had already been accepted into Mankato and St. Cloud.
But the University of Minnesota was my dream college.
It was in St. Paul a city that didn’t run on rumors.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“I got a letter from the U.” I handed her the rest of the mail, not sure if I wanted to open the letter. If I didn’t open it, I still had hope of being accepted. The dream wouldn’t die here in the late morning sun.
“Well, what does it say?” my mother asked, sorting through the mail.
“I don’t know.” It was a plain white envelope. A label with my name on it. Nothing to hint what was written inside.
“Why not?” My mother reached for it.
“Because.” I turned away, flipping over the letter, hoping there would be a hint as to what it said.
“Oh, open it.” My mother tossed the rest of the mail in the small trash can next to the side table.
I slid my finger under the lip and peeled it away.
The letter was printed on nice paper. The type we were given in school to write pretend resumes that we would never use.
I unfolded the letter. The words blurred together, nothing standing out, and yet every word held a promise and disappointment.
“Oh my god. I got in. I got in!” I reread the words. We are happy to…
“Oh honey, that’s good news.” My mother smiled. “How will you pay for it?”
“What?” I looked at her. “I’ll get financial aid, and I have my college savings.
” This meant that Tristan and I could leave.
We could start fresh. I didn’t dream of having kids with Tristan, but I did dream of what our apartment would look like.
It would be small. The walls would be painted a warm color.
There would be large floor-to-ceiling windows that at night we’d lie under and talk.
We’d spend Friday nights playing board games with friends, and Saturday mornings, I’d watch him make blueberry pancakes.
I’d fall asleep next to him every night. There would be no James. No Anna.
“Yes, about that. We had to tap into that for the roof and then a few other things. We were going to replace it, but then your father died, and, well, things have been tough.”
“How much is left?” The money in that account wouldn’t be enough to pay for school, but it would get Tristan and me that apartment for a few months. Until we could find jobs.
“Between four and five thousand.”
“There was almost fifty thousand dollars in there.” Five thousand wouldn’t be enough for even a month. Rent ran almost a grand, and we needed a security deposit and food. And all the other shit that went with an apartment.
“Things have been tight since your father’s death.” My mother wrung her hands.
“Oh my god. I… I…” The letter crumbled like my hopes. “When were you going to tell me?”
“Well, now, I guess. Evan, we will figure this out. If Harold and I get married—”
“I don’t want Harold’s money. I want the money Dad saved for me!” This was another way she had erased him from my life.
“Yes, well, he also left me medical bills, a mortgage, car payments. Not to mention all the other bills that need to be paid. You have no idea how expensive things are.”
I scoffed, looking her up and down. She was dressed in another new outfit. This one a pair of light-colored dress pants with a billowing shirt. “Bills? You playing dress-up for Harold isn’t bills. I can’t believe you. That was my money.”
“I didn’t spend your money on these clothes. I have worked too, Evan.”
“When?” I yelled at her. My mother hadn’t had a steady job in years. She worked at a gift shop last summer for a few weeks. But Harold’s visits got in the way, so she quit.
“That’s enough, young lady. You will not talk to me like that.”
“You’re right, because I’m done talking to you.” I stomped up the stairs to my bedroom.
“Where are you going?”
“I have to get ready for work so I can pay for your new wardrobe.”
“Evan Michael Blu, you get down here right now—”
The rest of her words were cut off with a slam of my door.
I paced the room, knocking the clean sheets off my dresser.
How could she spend my money? The money my father and his parents had put away for me.
Not her. She was doing this to get back at him for dying.
She donated all his clothes and tools. Sold his truck, all his fishing and hunting gear.
All the things he had loved, she had gotten rid of. I was next.
I flopped down on the bed and reread the letter.
It was the key to a door I had only dreamed of opening.
My parents hadn’t gone to college. My father got his job with the Parkfield Parks Department when he was sixteen, and he kept working his way up to maintenance supervisor.
My mother hated working and did everything in her power to not have to. But I wanted better.
I wanted to go somewhere where my life didn’t revolve around small-town politics. A place where people didn’t judge you by your last name or by the church you went to. Some families were proud that they had been here since the city had been spat out of a train car. Not me. And not Tristan.
“Evan?” my mother shouted up the steps. “Your boss wants you to come in early tonight. Something about a party.”
“Perfect since you spent all my money,” I shouted back. I texted Tristan I would meet him at Chelsea’s when he got off work.
I got dressed in my dark jeans and hunter-green Main Street Café polo. I hadn’t bought a car because I had been saving that money. Now I wish I had. “I won’t be home after work.”
“You better not be going to see that Anderson boy.”
“Why do you care?” I asked, grinding my feet into my tennis shoes. “I have five thousand dollars to my name. That should get me a nice trailer at Highway 71 Mobile Home Park.”
“Oh, stop being so dramatic. You can apply for financial aid.”
“Whatever.” I rolled my eyes.
“Are you pregnant?” she blurted out.
“What?”
“Answer me. Mrs. Peterson called me this morning. She saw you at R&R and said you were looking at a pregnancy test. I swear to all that is holy, Evan, I will not give up my life to raise your child.”
“Don’t worry, Darcy, you are free to run after your cash cow. I was buying lube. The kind that heats up when you blow on it.” I grabbed my jacket and left her standing in her fake designer clothing.