by Laura Beege
A small smile tugged at her lips. “Are you hungry?”
I hadn’t eaten anything yet but my mind hadn’t had the chance to even think about my bodily needs in hours. I wasn’t sure if I was hungry but I didn’t want to seem impolite when she practically invited me to have lunch with them. “A little, I guess,” I replied and drew my shoulders up.
“Aaron, my husband, is cooking. We’re vegetarians, though.”
“Okay.” I nodded and burrowed my fingernails deeper into my palms. “I don’t mind.”
“Come in then.” She stepped aside to let me get past her and watched me as I walked into her house. It was a short hallway, lined with bookshelves, all of which were filled with travel books. “How are you?”
I considered lying, pretending I’m just fine and let her believe I was not this fucked up daughter I had wanted to keep from her. I could let her believe I was a perfect girl, just like Theresa with her ringlet curls and her belief in the tooth fairy. Instead, I turned to her and pulled a shoulder high. “Strange, I guess. It’s weird to see you like this. You don’t look like the woman I remember, and then again, you do. Plus, I had a shitty kind of morning because of this guy who turned out to be a total jerk after all.”
She laughed and it sounded high and beautiful but nervous. “Well, if it’s any consolation, you don’t look like the little girl I remember either.”
I shrugged. “Thirteen years have that sort of effect.”
Mom stepped up to me and let a hand slide through my hair. “You’ve become a beautiful young woman, Annie.”
Why couldn’t I warm up to her? After that affectionate gesture, my heart should be wide open for her and I should feel the need to throw my arms around her. But I was still standing in a stranger’s house, talking to a woman I’ve never met before.
“It’s actually Tony,” I said, “Nobody calls me Annie.”
“Of course.” She blinked, irritated and turned towards the last door on the left, waving for me to follow her. I did and entered a large, light-filled kitchen that smelled like vegetables and curry. The counters and cabinets were all painted a faint turquoise that reminded me of those shabby-chic kitchens you saw in magazines, and the light wood kitchen table was surrounded by mismatched chairs in all colors of the rainbow.
A man, presumably Aaron, stood at the stove. He fit well with his daughter’s and wife’s put-together looks with his light blue button-down shirt, the black slacks and the white apron wrapped around his slim body. I wondered if I could be part of this. I had enough blouses to fit in but I had fallen back in love with my black, torn jeans lately. They were just a lot more practical than skirts.
My mother put a hand between Aaron’s shoulder blades, and he looked up from his pans, immediately zeroing in on me. “Honey, this is my daughter Antonia, Tony,” my mother explained and smiled at me. “Tony, this is my husband, Aaron.”
“It’s nice to meet you,” I said and stretched my hand out.
Aaron wiped his hand off on a dish towel, then put it into mine. “I thought I’d never meet you.” There was not a bit of joy in those words, he actually sounded disappointed that he had to meet me.
“Why don’t you sit down, Tony?”
I did as I was told, choosing one of the places that hadn’t been set. My mom quickly changed that and brought me a plate and a spoon. The next hour was madness. Theresa – the little one – asked dozens of questions and we tried to answer them when Aaron wasn’t quick to tell her that it was impolite to ask that. I didn’t know what was impolite about asking me why my dad wasn’t here but then again, I could avoid talking about him if Aaron shut those sort of questions down. And then my mother and I were trying to ask about each other’s lives without being too intrusive. Even after sixty minutes of questions and answers, the barista at Coffee Donna knew more about me than my mother did.
Aaron eventually excused himself and went to his home office, taking Theresa upstairs with him. My mother left the table, too, hurrying back and forth in the kitchen, cleaning the counter, filling the dishwasher, boxing up leftovers, cleaning the counter again.
I heard myself saying, “I really want to get to know you.” My brain hadn’t even been in that place just then, mostly being occupied by the freakishly neat kitchen. It could have been in a catalogue for interior design.
My mother’s shoulders fell as she put the sponge back into the sink. “Every time I look at you, I feel guilty, Tony. You’ve grown up without me. I should have been there with you. Maybe then you wouldn’t have become…” She stopped herself and restarted her cleaning frenzy, this time re-sorting the spice jars by the stove.
“I take it you read some of the glorious headlines.” I stared down at my fingers, poking at the tiny crescent moons in my palm where I had dug my fingers too deep into the flesh.
“It was the only way I could check on you.”
“You could have called or mailed. My life wasn’t all paparazzi and scandals.” That had been right after word on Dad got out. I’d been at my worst when the life I used to know had collapsed around me. And of course, because Dad had been the center of the news’ attention, who I slept with, how much I drank and how many times a week I was wasted had suddenly become interesting. It’s funny, really, that the spotlight moved on so quickly after Dad was put away. I’d stopped flat ironing my hair and wearing close-to-nothing shorts and shirts, and nobody realized that the screwed-up girl from the papers back then was me.
I couldn’t manage to keep the bitterness bottled up when I said, “It’s not like Dad controlled every email I ever sent. I used to be on Facebook, too. Or MySpace, back when I was twelve. But you chose to believe the yellow press was a valid source of information.”
Shouldn’t I be happy that she didn’t burn me out of her life completely? That she at least cared enough to look at what I’d been up to? But that box I had kept hidden in the furthest corner of my mind had fallen to the front and everything I blamed her for spilled out.
“Antonia,” she sighed.
“Don’t call me that. Dad loves that name. He insisted everyone calls me that. But I don’t want to be the girl he raised. It’s Tony.” Or Darling, or Kitty. Even Annie. Everything but Antonia.
“Fine. Tony.” Gritting her teeth, she knotted her arms in front of her chest and stared me down. “What do you want me to say? I left you. I should have taken care of you. But I had to take care of myself, too. Even before you were born, you were the most important thing to your father. He would have made my life misery if I tried to take you away from him.”
“You could start by saying you’re sorry,” I suggested.
“I’m sorry for leaving you with that man. I am.” I realized she hadn’t said she was sorry for leaving me, and I wondered if she even regretted that or if she only felt bad about leaving her first child to become anything but perfect.
Tess wiped her hands over her skirt and all illusions of a happy family life with my mother were ripped from me. “Where’s your birthmark?” I asked, staring at her hands as if it could magically make the small spot appear on her skin.
“I finally had that ugly thing removed last year,” she said.
I got up and smoothed my hair back. “I should leave. You were right on the phone. You have stopped being my mom a long time ago.”
“Please don’t run away from me.”
“Actually, I’m not.” I picked up my backpack and slung it over my shoulders, looking at the woman, leaning against the shining kitchen counter. “I run away a lot. Not this time. I’m just… done with you. It took thirteen years but I just realized that I had unrealistic ideas what having a mother was like. I don’t believe I need you in my life and that’s why I’m leaving you here with your new family and I’m going… well, I’ll find a place to go to.”
A small part of me still clung to the hope that she could be my mom, the one I remembered, and run after me and protest, but I walked through the front door and left that part inside with her.
&nbs
p; Seventeen
London was as good as any big city when you wanted to hide from your problems. There were dozens of streets and shops and sights to be discovered. One could easily lose oneself in the midst of Camden Town. The edgy shops, the dozens of tattoo parlors, the giant horse market with its hundreds of booths, big and small… It was like a labyrinth and the perfect distraction. I pushed through the crowd and took my time to look at everything, even the stupid knickknack nobody spared a second glance once they returned from vacation, often attracting the very persistent venders. Only in the fleeting moments when I wasn’t buying a new pair of boots or an XXL Oxford hoodie, Poppy and Trace weaseled their way into my thoughts. Poppy creeped me out. I knew everyone was supposed to have a doppelganger but it was scary to think someone walked around with my face. Trace on the other hand made the anger boil in my veins. And then there was that sharp, cutting pain in my chest that made it hard to breathe whenever he came up in my thoughts. He was harder to wrestle out of my head than Poppy.
At the end of the day I had spent too much money on clothes that were neither edgy nor lawyer-tame and sat in a sandwich shop with my five plastic bags, gobbling down a ham and egg sandwich, happily swallowing the meat.
I had gotten myself a National Express – which was the British equivalent of Greyhound – flyer and looked at all the destinations. I still had only the tourist visa, but I didn’t have the money for a plane ticket home. When coming here, I’d had a couple of fake documents to prove I was able to pay for my return to the United States. It had been cheaper to buy those from a first class forger than to buy the cheapest plane ticket back. I’d become an illegal immigrant.
I took out my pen and drew a fat, black circle around Oxford. I could pose as an exchange student. I might be able to work at a student coffee shop or a second hand shop that hired without asking too many questions once I found a way to get a fake student ID.
I could move on. I’d miss Wesley, Sierra and Alex. Maybe even Vince. I wouldn’t miss my mother. I wouldn’t miss the drunken pub patrons. And I sure as hell would not allow myself to miss the way Trace had cared for me.
I wouldn’t allow myself to miss Trace.
I’d pack my bags and leave first thing in the morning, buy a last minute coach ticket and never look back at the last few weeks.
Packed with a plan and new clothes, I made my way back to The Dirty Dungeon, facing the bus system like a real Londoner. If it hadn’t been for my accent, I would have blended in perfectly.
This time, I started taking long and deep breaths on the bus, so I’d be calm when I elbowed my way through the packed pub and relaxed if ran into Trace.
Against my expectations, however, the pub was empty. Completely. Jean wasn’t by the payphone. The bar had been abandoned. Something was very obviously wrong. The pub wasn’t closed on Monday nights. I took a few cautious steps inside and heard Alex’s voice from the office. He was angry, yelling at someone that it was not his fault, that this kind of thing just happened.
I stepped closer and heard Trace shouting back that no, those things didn’t just happen.
I had no idea if Alex would be around later or early tomorrow, limiting my chances to talk to him. They surely could continue their fight after I popped in to say I was leaving. I banged my knuckles against the office door and waited for an answer. Trace opened. I wasn’t able to meet his gaze. The sight of his broad chest already stabbed me in the stomach. Meeting his eyes would kill me.
“I want to talk to your father,” I said and heard my voice breaking.
“Kitty-”
“I don’t want to talk to you.”
Trace stepped aside, and I took great care to leave a vast distance between us as I walked into the trashed office. Alex’s desk had been wiped clean, the papers and pens and the computer screen scattered on the floor. His chair lay closer to the door than to the desk. My stomach twisted and that small voice of reason in my head told me to run and not get mixed up in this. But I still liked Alex. I cared about him enough to want to ease his problems. And I kind of wanted to take his side in a fight against Trace.
Alex stood by the window with his hands in his hair.
“What happened?” I asked, bending down to pick up the chair.
After several seconds of radio silence, Trace stepped up beside me and I made the mistake of looking his way, kicking my heart to the curb. I had to admit it. My heart. That’s where I’d begun to like Trace. That’s why it burned in my entire ribcage when he looked at me with his clear, green eyes and why it felt like he was cutting through my chest when I thought of that photograph.
“He gambled our lives away,” Trace said without breaking eye contact. “He promised he’d stop after the last time he almost ruined us. But this time he did it. He fucked up.”
“What?” This couldn’t be right. Alex was one of the most down-to-earth men I’d met. For a moment it didn’t matter that Trace had used me.
“Fifty thousand pounds,” Alex murmured on the other side of the room.
“You just said forty thousand,” Trace said.
“Yes, I lied. It’s fifty thousand, Trace.”
“You lost fifty thousand pounds?” I asked, unable to hide the shock. “How?”
“Does it matter? I have to sell the pub. Last time, we had to sell the house. This time, it’s the pub.” Alex pushed a book from the shelf he was standing next to and it landed with a loud thud.
“Stop fucking up your office,” Trace said at the same time that I said, “I can help.”
I owed him. I had sworn on the very first day that I would somehow repay Alex for his help. He took me in and made sure I was cared for, when I needed it. He needed help now. It was time to return the favor. If I’d learned one valuable thing from my father’s scheming, it was that you didn’t leave debts unpaid.
“You can?” Alex’s eyebrows shot up. “No. I can’t take your money, Darling.”
“It’s not mine. It’s my father’s. He’s full of it. I can get fifty thousand if you need me to.” I hated the idea. I hated myself for coming up with it. I hated that I couldn’t leave Alex and his sons to fight for themselves.
“Hell no.” Trace grabbed my shoulders and made me face him, slicing me open wider as I took in his chiseled jaw and straight nose, the piercing in his eyebrow and his killer eyes. “Kitty, this isn’t your problem. It’s ours. You wanted to leave that life behind for good, and I’m not throwing you back into it just because my father is an idiot. We can get the money elsewhere.”
I looked at Alex. He dropped his gaze from mine in an instant. They wouldn’t get that amount of money anywhere. I had a feeling Alex wouldn’t get a loan with any bank.
“I’m not going back. I’ll just wait for my father to call and ask him for the money. It’s not that big of a deal.” It was a big deal. My Dad’s help came with a price that wasn’t necessarily money. “I can do this for you.”
“We’re not taking her help,” Trace pressed, talking to his father now.
Alex had already made his mind up. I could see it in his eyes. “Do you want to be homeless?”
“I’d rather be homeless than throw her into that shark tank.”
Stupid heart, forgetting so fast that Trace hurt me and jumping up and down because he seemed to care. What my heart forgot, I had to hold onto with every bit of common sense I still possessed. “You don’t get a say in this. Your father lost the money and I’m asking him if he wants my help.”
Alex worked his jaw. Trace must have gotten that from him. He flexed the same muscles when he was thinking really hard about something or when he was frustrated about something. “I don’t want your help, Darling. Especially when it comes at a price for you. But I need it.”
“Then it’s decided.”
“Kitty, don’t.”
“Shut up, Trace. You don’t have to pretend you like me anymore. I am doing this for your father because I owe him, and then I’m going to leave.” I wrapped my arms around myself and turned
to Alex and ignored that he was trying to puzzle out what had happened between Trace and me. “I’ll get back to you as soon as I talked to my dad.”
“Thank you,” he whispered, lowering his eyes.
“I hope you stop gambling. I won’t make it a condition because that stuff never works, but I hope you realize that you have a problem and you have to change if you want to keep your pub and your family.” I stole another quick glance at Trace – big mistake because he was watching me intently. “I should go upstairs. Make sure my phone is charged.”
Of course he followed but I didn’t have the power to run. My muscles stung and my mouth was as dry as if I’d swallowed sand. It had been a long day.
“Please, don’t,” I said as I walked up the stairs, not turning around to him. “I’m too tired to listen to any kind of explanation.”
“Poppy and I weren’t together,” he said anyway and I rolled my eyes, although he couldn’t see.
“Right. You just like taking intimate pictures with strangers and having their eponymous flowers tattooed.”
I thought I’d proven my point because he didn’t reply, but he still followed me when we reached our floor, and when I kicked my door shut, he caught it and closed it behind him. “Look at me.”
“I can’t.” I really didn’t feel able to withstand that sort of pain again, so I kept my back towards him as I dropped the shopping bags on the bed and dug through my backpack for my phone.
“Fine. Just listen.” I couldn’t just do that either, because I sensed him moving behind me as I plugged in the charger for my phone. I heard the rustle of his jeans and I smelled his unique scent and I felt the warmth rising from his skin when he came so close I could easily lean back against him. “I killed her. That’s why I never mention her. It’s been 17 months and I have barely talked about her or what happened.”
My throat was clogging shut, cutting my breath short. He must be kidding. I knew people who were as close to murderous as you could get. Trace wasn’t like that, was he? They said women choose to be with men like their fathers, but Trace… he couldn’t be like Dad. I sucked a shaky breath into my lungs and tried to get the plug into my phone, but my hands were trembling so bad, it took three attempts before I pulled it off.
