Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 89012 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89012 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Unless you break up with them first, which is what I do.
I’m pretty certain that it would be impossible to end things with Ashley and that’s why we can only be friends.
I sigh, drop my hand, and head to the shower … and I will absolutely not think of Ashley Thompson there.
Liar.
FOUR
Ashley
“I love this bowl.” I set the mustardy-yellow Pyrex dish on the counter. “It reminds me of the potato salad you used to make every year at our big Fourth of July parties.”
My mom hands me a plate. “Those were good times, weren’t they?” She shuts off the water and picks up a hand towel. “I used to love having everyone come over. Making the menu, getting the pool ready, all of you kids running wild …”
Our eyes meet and she gives me a sad smile. The pain in her eyes, the same shade as mine, is fleeting.
“And then those parties you’d have as a teenager with all your friends,” she says, drying her hands. “I don’t think we had a night where it was just us throughout your whole high school life.”
“Do you remember the night that Sara told her dad that she was staying here?” I know this memory of the time Sara was fifteen will make her happy. It wasn’t Sara’s first time staying over, but it was the first time she actually wasn’t staying over. “When you found out about that, you took off in your pajamas to her boyfriend’s house and put her in the car like she was your own kid.”
“Oh, I remember. She didn’t speak to me for two whole weeks after that. She’d just show up for meals, give me a look, and then walk out.” She leans against the counter. “That girl just about made me grayer than you ever did.”
“She loves you for it.”
Mom nods. “And I love her. She’s still a wild child, but she’ll always be my child. Even though she’s not.”
Her gaze settles on something in the distance.
My mom and Sara’s mother, Kathleen, were best friends throughout their lives. When Kathleen was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and died with Sara was only three years old, Mom promised her friend that she would always watch over Sara.
And she has. Because Mom is one of the good ones.
How my dad had a plethora of affairs for so many years will never be something I understand. She never deserved that. No one does.
“How is it going at Rebecca’s?” Mom asks.
“Good. It’s cramped—but with two bedrooms,” I add quickly. “I have the privacy I wouldn’t have had here sleeping on your sofa like a child.”
She huffs. “I still think it’s a bunch of baloney that you aren’t staying with your mother after such a … a big life event.”
“Pretty sure going through with a wedding that would’ve ruined my whole life would’ve been a bigger life event than saving myself.”
Mom beams, smiling smugly at me. “You did save yourself, and I’m damn proud of you.”
“Thanks, Mom. That means a lot.”
She goes back to wiping down the kitchen, lost in her thoughts. I work with her side by side, scents of rosemary and thyme perfuming the air.
I want to tell her that I’m proud of her too. That her choice to leave my father over his unfaithfulness helped me realize that it’s not wrong to put your heart first. To prioritize respect in relationships. But I can’t say that. If I did, I’d have to tell her that Eton was doing the same thing to me that Dad did to her, and I think that would break her heart.
I remember the exact moment at the age of sixteen when everything changed. When Dad stumbled into the house, reeking of whiskey, and had faint red lipstick all over his face and neck. He was casually cruel about it, so utterly brazen that my mother was forced to acknowledge his infidelities—something that I think she knew about and had chosen to ignore for a while.
Over the next two years, my father’s drinking showcased a manipulative and degrading part of his personality that I’d never known. One that I never forgot. I’d also never be able to truly rectify the juxtaposition between the sweet, tender man from before and the manipulative monster that I knew when he died.
If I told my mother that she was the role model for my choice to leave Eton—because she left my dad as soon as I turned eighteen—she would put two and two together. She’d figure out how to blame herself. Because that’s what mothers do.
We fold our towels and drape them over the edge of the sink. Then she leads me into the living room. I flip the kitchen light off as we pass.
“I picked up a couple of things for you today.” She pauses by the table in the small entryway and gathers a stack of magazines. “No pressure, but I just thought you might find these helpful.”