by Nella Tyler
“About what?” I asked.
“Your feelings about the wedding and adding John and Carter to our family. Your father. And, whatever else you want to talk about, like what’s going on in your life.”
“Okay.” I was a little uneasy at the sound of that range of topics, but I didn’t want to make it too obvious.
“I just wanted to share with you how I knew that I wanted to marry John. It was actually very similar to how I felt when I knew I was in love with your father. I was a lot younger then, of course, but my heart doesn’t seem to know the difference.” She added that last part with a laugh.
“I was sure in high school that your dad and I were meant to be together. We were only kids then, but the feeling was stronger than anything I’d ever experienced. My relationship with John is so much different. We’re both adults who have been through this before, raised families, and experienced loss.”
I nodded, not quite sure what she was getting at, but interested all the same at the mention of Dad.
“I’ve seen you struggling over the last couple of years to balance your personal and professional life. I just wanted you to know how I felt in the only two serious relationships I’ve had.”
I thought about that for a second, formulating questions from the mess of thoughts inside my head.
“How did you really know that Dad was the one for you? Or Mr., uh, John.”
Mom smiled thoughtfully, her eyes doing that thing they did when she was deep inside her bank of memories and sifting through good things. “Things just felt right. It wasn’t anything definite. But I knew it, like a feeling deep in my bones. It wasn’t a thinking thing. It was a feeling thing. You have to trust your heart.”
That was fantastically unhelpful. “But how did you know? Because I can’t get to the place you’re talking about. Nothing ever feels that way.” I slumped in my chair, not really pleased with how I was explaining this, but just needing to get the general idea out in the open so Mom could dig through it to find the important parts.
“I highly doubt that, Soph. Maybe the truth is more that you just aren’t listening to what your heart’s telling you.”
I gave her a look, but she kept a kind smile on her face, impervious to my overall glumness.
“I’ve watched you struggle in relationships over the last several years, and it seems like you might be single right now because you aren’t listening to what your heart has told you that you need. I’ve seen you unhappy, and that hurts because I only want the best for you.”
I thought about the few relationships I had in college, none of them happy, most of them strained or outright terrible. I didn’t like to look back on those times. And I was purposely staying single right now because I just didn’t want to deal with the mess every single relationship eventually turned into.
As for my heart, it wasn’t telling me a damned thing except to protect it from further harm, which was what I was trying to do. Still, it ached all the time. I had no idea how to fix that. I’d made too many mistakes and it just seemed an impossible task to undo them.
“It’s not magic or something that comes unlocked for you after a certain age when you’ve gathered some wisdom,” Mom continued, speaking gently. I was glad that Lacey had gone out for the morning, probably at Mom’s insistence so we could have this little chat. I didn’t really want her walking in on any of this. “I was sixteen when I met your dad, but by the time I turned seventeen, I knew he was the one for me. He seemed to feel the same way, so we got married before we even went to college. Everyone told us we were crazy, especially our parents, but we weren’t listening to them. We were listening to our hearts.”
“Do you think he was your soulmate?” I asked in a whisper. “Or that you were fated to meet when you did?”
She shook her head, her dark eyes never leaving mine. Dad had dark eyes, too, so, naturally, Lacey and I both got them, as well. But Dad’s hair had been much lighter than Mom’s. Her genes must’ve been stronger because both of their daughters had dark hair, too.
“I don’t believe in anything like fate or soulmates. Was your father perfect for me and vice versa? It certainly felt like it in a lot of ways, but we had our challenges, too. We were just lucky enough to meet each other when we did and to recognize that what we had was so special. There’s nothing wrong with waiting until you feel that compatibility with someone. That doesn’t mean perfection or that things won’t be hard.” She took a sip of her coffee, and I waited for her to continue, not wanting to derail her train of thought with one of my questions.
“After how well the stars aligned between your father and me, I never expected to find someone who made me feel like that again. And, I was fine with that. I accepted that I had my one amazing shot and would just need to count my blessings if I ever started feeling sorry for myself. I looked forward to you girls getting older and starting your own families. Just the thought of that filled me up with so much hope for the future. I didn’t need to date. I never gave it another thought.”
“You were going to just be alone for the rest of your life?” I asked in a whisper. Mom had been pretty young when Dad died. She was only forty eight right now.
She shrugged, not seeming overly bothered by the thought. “I wasn’t alone. It doesn’t feel like you father has ever left me. And, I had you and Lacey. I was okay with that.
“But then I ran into John at the store, and we really clicked right off the bat. We had such a nice chat and dinner that night rekindled our friendship. That blossomed into something more so quickly, it stole my breath away. And, all of a sudden, I was feeling those old stirrings in my heart, and I knew that this was the second chance that I’d never expected. I can’t tell you how grateful I am for it.”
I smiled at her description and, if I’d ever questioned it before, I knew she was making the right choice marrying John — I was getting better at calling him that! — even if he did happen to be Carter’s father.
“I want you to be happy, too, Sophia. I want you to look at your life and feel so grateful for the blessings you’ve received, even with all the heartache. It’s all your dad wanted, too.” She reached across the small table for my hand and I gave it to her. We squeezed each other’s fingers, never breaking eye contact. “Listen to your heart. It knows what you need. Mind your head, but not so much that it keeps you from what you need most in this world. You deserve to be happy and so much more, Soph.”
I nodded, wiping at my wet eyes with my free hand. “It’s just so hard.”
She squeezed my fingers again, her eyes glassy, only she didn’t wipe the tears away when they began to fall. She just kept smiling right through them.
“Nothing worthwhile in this life comes easily,” she said. “But that’s what makes it so sweet when you finally get it.” She released me and used a napkin to wipe her eyes, laughing at how silly she was being.
But I didn’t think she was being silly at all. I knew what she was saying was the truth. I just didn’t know if I could trust my heart after spending so much of my adult life listening to the constant warnings my head had to offer. There was a good chance that I’d already burned through all my chances at happiness, which was why my heart was so sick all the time. What then?
But I couldn’t even voice that question to Mom. It was hard to even consider it myself. I’d find a way to survive. I always did, even if it meant giving up on the idea of happiness for something safer and less satisfying, like contentment.
Carter
Later that Evening
I waited until Dad went to bed around nine before I left the house to meet up with Jake for a few drinks at a bar around the corner that advertised it would be having a bunch of drink specials all night on Christmas Eve — come get drunk and forget how terrible your relatives are for the night, their ads had said, which was pretty damned funny.
I’d joked with Dad about taking him out to get wasted the night before his wedding, but he didn’t seem too excited about any version of a bachelor pa
rty that involved alcohol or him leaving the house after dark. He just wanted to rest and mentally prepare himself for the following day. It wasn’t like I’d planned to take him out to a strip club or anything — those places didn’t really appeal to me, not that I’d gone more than once — but he said he was exhausted from being so busy over the last few weeks between work, normal Christmas stress, and the added pressure over the wedding planning.
Jake was waiting for me at the bar. It was quiet, only about ten people scattered around the bar and high top tables, with Christmas carols playing in the background and lots of green and red decorations all over the place. Jake had a beer in front of him and one in front of the empty stool to his right, waiting for me. I sat down, slapping hands with him the way we had since middle school.
“Thanks for the beer,” I said, and took a deep sip.
“You can pick up the next round,” he replied with a smile. “So are you ready for the big day tomorrow?”
I shrugged. It wasn’t like I had a choice. Dad was doing this. I could either pretend anxiety wasn’t slowly devouring my insides or destroy the entire day for him and Alice. For obvious reasons, I was going to go with the first option.
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Your excitement is inspiring,” he said, grinning again. “What about your dad? Is he ready?”
“He’s good. I mean, he’s been married before. It’s not like this is his first time doing all this.” I took another deep swallow of my beer. “The wedding’s pretty straightforward, anyway. Just a small ceremony and reception with people who don’t mind not being at home with their own families on Christmas Day.” That was exactly the reason Jake wouldn’t be there; he had plans with his family that he couldn’t break to attend, though he’d bought a gift for Dad and Alice.
“You know what he could’ve done to liven things up at the reception?” Jake’s smile was slyer and there was a spark glimmering in his dark eyes that I didn’t quite like.
“What?” I asked, knowing he was laying the groundwork for a smartass joke, but helpless to do anything but bring on the punchline.
“Invite your mother.”
I stared at him for a second before we both busted up, laughing so hard we leaned over onto the bar. By the time I was done, I was wiping tears from my eyes and clutching a sore stomach.
“Jesus, could you even imagine?” I asked, and we started laughing again. But as soon as the chuckling died down, a more thoughtful mood fell over me. Jake seemed to feel it, too. Without meaning to, we’d steered the conversation onto a more serious topic.
“I don’t even really hear from my mom that much anymore,” I admitted. We’d been friends when all the shit went down with Mom, but I hadn’t talked to him about it until years later when we were in college. Even then, I didn’t really discuss it in depth. The only person I’d done that with was Sophia.
I’d broken down a few days after Mom left, sobbing in Sophia’s arms while she just cradled my head and hurt with me, not trying to make it better, just letting me get it all out. I’d let her in on all that misery, all those feelings of not being good enough to keep Mom from wanting to leave. I understood divorce and adults not being able to stay together anymore — hell, Jake’s parents were divorced, too. But I could never understand what made Mom think she needed to leave me behind, too. Over the next few weeks and months, Sophia held my hand, both literally and figuratively, and walked me out of that darkness, assuring me I hadn’t done anything wrong, that I was special and worthy of love, that Mom was the one at fault, not me, never me.
And then she ended up leaving me behind, too, in a way that reminded me so much of Mom I found it difficult to breathe for the first few weeks after the death of our friendship. No one was there that time to walk me through the darkness and out into the light at the other side. I was still in the dark at this very moment, hoping for sunshine, for a flashlight, even. I was stuck there, unless and until I could find a way out on my own.
“When was the last time you talked to her?” Jake asked. All the amusement had drained from his features, leaving a somber expression behind, the same one he used whenever a heavy situation came up.
“On the phone?” I had to think about that for a moment. “Right after college graduation. I talked to her for about five minutes before she had to go, not that we really had that much to say to each other. We’re fucking strangers.” I spat out that last part and had to take a second to calm down. Talking about Mom either made me depressed and later pissed or pissed first and then depressed once the anger burned off. “She emails every so often. And, we’re friends on Facebook.” I snorted a laugh at that. Talk about meaningless. “I get the occasional like or comment on a post, but mostly she just leaves me alone.”
“That’s rough, man,” he said, shaking his head, his eyes pinned on his beer. His parents had split up when he was eight. But his dad only moved across town, and Jake bounced back and forth between their houses with his older sister, Karen. They still had holidays together, and his dad actually was invited to his mom’s wedding when she remarried right around the time my mom decided to blow town for good.
“Is she still in the same place?” he asked, and I shook my head.
“No, she’s in Seattle now.” For a while, she’d lived in Colorado, but she was back on the west coast with me, though there were hundreds of miles between us. Though, honestly, we could live in the same town and we still never see each other. That was just how she wanted it. After so many years of nonstop dismissiveness, it was how I wanted it, too. “Not that she’s ever invited me out there. I really don’t think she gives a shit about me.”
Jake didn’t argue the point. The evidence was pretty ironclad, and it hadn’t just been gathered from the time she’d left until now. I could remember how resentful she’d been of her duties as a mother going way back to when I was just a little kid. There were good things, too, but being a wife and mother was clearly not part of the dream she had for herself. Now she was working some bigtime job at an advertising firm. So far as I could tell from her pictures of glamorous parties and expensive-looking vacations, it didn’t look like she’d remarried or was even dating.
I finished my beer in a few swallows and motioned to the bartender for a second one. “You know, looking back over the years since I became an adult, I think that watching her relationship with Dad completely screwed me over. I can’t go out with a girl more than a few times before I start pulling away. The thought of committing to anyone long term gives me the shakes. I can’t see myself trusting anyone the way you have to in order to get married or start a family together. The thought of ending up with someone who would do to me what my mother did to my father terrifies me.”
Jake took a deep breath, letting it out slowly as the bartender came over to give me my second beer. I needed to stop here if I wanted to be able to drive home tonight. Getting an Uber wasn’t an option, as I wouldn’t have time to get a ride out here tomorrow morning to pick up my car, not with all the wedding stuff going on. Jake waited until the bartender left to answer.
“I think that if you weren’t careful about relationships, given what you grew up around, you would be pretty foolish. But that doesn’t mean you won’t ever find love for yourself. That shit had to be hard on your dad, too, but he’s getting married again. And from what you said he seems pretty happy with Sophia’s mom.”
I nodded. “He is happy, almost annoyingly so.” I tried on a smile that didn’t fit quite right, so I let it drop off my face again.
“If he can find a way to put himself out there after everything your mom put him through, you can do it, too.”
I looked up at him, blurting out the next question before I thought about whether it was something I should even say out loud.
“What if I end up with someone exactly like my mother?”
He didn’t skip a beat before saying, “What if you don’t?”
Unlike him, I didn’t have an answer to that. It had honestly never occurre
d to me. I just honestly figured any relationship I started would eventually sour like old milk.
“Thinking about finding some great, unending love is way too much pressure to put on yourself. We’re in our early twenties. We have time. You should be putting yourself out there and having fun while you get to know what kind of woman you want in your life.”
I gave a noncommittal shrug.
“Look, you’ll never be a positon to hit a homerun if you never go up to bat.”
That was true, but Mom wasn’t the only reason I hadn’t put myself out there. The crumbling of my friendship with Sophia had been even more painful in a way than what had happened with my mother. And what was killing me even more was that I couldn’t cast her out of my thoughts. I couldn’t stop wanting her as part of my life.
I’d loved her for as long as I could remember, and even her casting me out hadn’t killed that love. Oddly, it had only strengthened it. It was aggravating. I didn’t know what to do about it. Until I could get out from under that crushing love that had been building since childhood, I’d never be free to love anyone else. The worst part was, I didn’t want to be free. I wanted to stay bound to Sophia forever, but not if she didn’t love me back. Then it was just self-inflicted torture.
“You look like you’re about to scream, man,” Jake said, tugging my attention outside of my own head and putting it back on him. “It can’t be that bad. You’ll find what you’re looking for. Just give it time.” But he didn’t look sure, and neither was I.
He held up his beer, which was less than half full. “Here’s to the women of our dreams being out there for us somewhere.”
It took a great effort, but I managed to force a smile as I lifted my glass. “Here, here.” We clinked glasses and drank. I didn’t mention that I already knew where the woman of my dreams was, and that, in a few short hours, we’d be brother and sister.
