Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 77793 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 389(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77793 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 389(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
“You’ve done well for yourself. What a juicy piece of tenderloin he is.”
“Can you just…give me a minute?”
“Sure, sweetie.”
“Okay, thanks.”
I escape to the bathroom and lock myself in. My phone is in the kitchen, which is probably a good thing because not having it in my hand will stop me from texting Orion and saying that I’m so sorry, but I can’t go to San Diego with him. I don’t know if I want to stay here or even repair my relationship with my mom, but some of the things she said made me realize a few things of my own.
Things I knew but then temporarily un-knew. Anyway, all I can do is plead some sort of hopeful insanity. I want to be fine, and I want to be okay. I really do. I want to believe in a future with Orion and myself and his family, all of us doing what we can to help the world, but it’s obviously nothing more than just a dream.
I can’t just up and disappear because it’s not just me anymore. No matter what my mom did or how skeptical I am about her sincerity going forward, she’s still my mom, and I can’t abandon her. I can’t just go off the same way she did, chasing adventures until I come back years later, bogged down with regret. Years I can’t take back or undo.
My mom is the one person I wanted in the whole world, even if I told myself I wouldn’t let her in so I wouldn’t get hurt again. I can’t be the one who leaves her behind. Not when she needs me. Right now, I’m feeling sorry because it means choosing and hurting someone. If I choose Orion, I’ll very likely hurt my mom and lose her all over again. Choosing to stay here and let my mom back into my life to see if we can fix things means I’m going to have to disappoint and hurt a man that I let into my heart, which is the one thing I promised myself I’d never do. It might have just been a teeny, tiny little fraction of my heart. Or maybe just an artery close to it, but he’s still there.
Our relationship didn’t just start out very unnaturally. It would have continued that way. We could never have a normal life, and maybe I’m sorry about that, too, because I know better than to believe it could ever work out.
He’ll tell me that my mom isn’t my only family. That his family is my family. That he is family, along with his brothers, their wives and girlfriends, and his granny. And he’ll mean it. He’ll say that they’ll always have my back and be just a call away. He’ll tell me that all over again until I desperately want to believe it, and I’ll probably burst into tears. I’ll probably be so, so sorry too. It will very likely hurt me beyond comprehension, but my answer will still be the same.
I just can’t.
I’ve spent too much time in here already. I splash water on my face and compose myself before I exit, but when I get back to the living room, my mom still looks at me like she knows exactly what I’m thinking.
“Your boyfriend didn’t have to leave,” she says as she pats the spot on the couch beside her.
“He’s not my boyfriend.” That’s as much as I’m ever going to tell her.
She takes that in the kind of way that makes her smile and launch into a speech about how proud she is of me for keeping my options open and being empowered enough to experiment, and I let her talk, even though she’s not describing me at all because she doesn’t even know me.
I stand up and walk over to my printer, where the divorce papers from the night before are still sitting, and quietly turn them over. It might be years before I admit the truth to my mom. And maybe not ever. Just because she’s back and I’m choosing not to leave doesn’t mean our relationship will ever be the same. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to fully trust her, even if I want to. She’s my family, but can we learn to be happy again?
I guess that’s a choice we have to make.
But it makes me feel so, so much worse instead of better.
How can I be getting everything I ever dreamed about and losing something I never imagined would be possible, all at the same time? I have no idea how to even begin to process this. It’s going to take time, and all I can give myself is that small consolation that is no consolation at all.
I’m doing the right thing, the responsible thing. I spent a lifetime with my mom before she left but less than a week with Orion. The odds were always against us. It was merely a fluke that brought us together the first, the second, and the third time. I want to think of a way that this could work—all of it, all of us—but I already know there isn’t one, so what I thought in the bathroom still stands.