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“Right. I know exactly the one you’re talking about.” We both chuckle. “I wish I was there watching it with you.”
“Why, pretzel?” she says, playfully using the ridiculous nickname. “Are you not having a good time on your fake honeymoon with your ex-boyfriend?”
“That’s the problem.” I whine like I would never whine to anyone else but my mom. I’m safe to be absolutely obnoxious with her. “It’s getting complicated because I’m having too much fun. And just now…”
I launch into a lengthy explanation of every single detail of the last twenty-four hours. Even the parts a daughter would normally leave out from telling her mom, I tell mine because I’m not kidding when I say my mom has become my best friend. Partly out of necessity because either I tunnel-vision on work too much or I’m simply too much for people, and both options leave me pretty lonely at the end of the day. But also because my mom has always given me room to make mistakes and tell the truth without fear she’d use it against me. We’re genuine friends, and her opinion is the shiniest gold in my eyes. Which is why it’s a little unnerving that she’s completely quiet during my story.
It’s unlike Pam to be silent. By now there should be a hundred different gasps, andhe didn’t!comments.
After I’ve finished, my mom asks me one question and one question only. “Nora…is your silverware drawer stocked?”
My mouth falls open, but it takes me a second to form any words.“Is my…? What? Mom, I just told you my ex-boyfriend-slash-fake-husband-slash-client wants to woo me and all you can ask is if my silverware drawer is stocked? You’re giving off one-fry-short-of-a-Happy-Meal vibes right now.”
“Well, honey, I’ve seen the state your spoons are in,” she says emphatically, like that explanation is reason enough. “Those things have gone down the garbage disposal more times than any spoon should, and I’ve personally thrown a few of them away—so I’m worried that there won’t be enough utensils for two people.”
Movement by the ice machine catches my eye and I spot a woman approaching the reusable water bottle filler station. She has five water bottles in her arms and can’t figure out how to get the tap to turn on.
“I have two spoons and three forks and one knife,” I tell my mom while watching the woman wave at the dispenser like it’s motion activated and requires an interpretive dance to work. Solid logic, honestly. Everything seems to be motion activated these days. I often wonder how many hours of my life I’ve lost while waving at hand-drying machines until they turn on.
My mom hums knowingly. “Thought so. I’ll stop by the store tomorrow and restock them for you.”
I laugh like she’s finally cracked. “Mom! Why are you going to restock my silverware drawer?”
Pushing off the floor, I walk over to the woman and gesture for her to let me have her water bottle. She eyes me up and down speculatively because in my ratty old sweatshirt, and seemingly nonexistent short-shorts underneath it, I must look like a failed influencer who just lost all her money on a shampoo pyramid scheme and is trying to secretly live within the resort.
The lady reluctantly hands over her empty water bottle and I hold it under the fountain, pressing the little pedal on the floor to releasethe stream of water. The lady gasps and smiles wide. I feel like a top-tier magician. How glorious. Maybe a change of professions is in order.
My mom continues while I work to fill this lady’s water bottles one after the other. “Because, Nora, my only daughter just got married. And I want her new husband to be able to eat cereal with her in the morning without cutting his mouth.”
“But Mom—right now it’s fake. F. A. K. E. You understand that, right?” I say, and then remember the woman beside me and hope she has no idea who I am. I smile awkwardly at her as she hands me another bottle. I’m no longer a magician to her—she thinks I work here. “We haven’t even talked about what will happen when we go back home. All he said is he’s going to woo me on this vacation.”
The lady beside me waggles her eyebrows and nudges my shoulder. “That sounds fun,” she whispers. I nod several times because it really has the potential to be a good time.
“Darling, I love you with every fiber of my being, but I’m angry at you for thinking any of this is fake. Or even has been fake since the beginning. And since I happen to know with all my motherly wisdom that it’s not fake and that that boy will be sleeping over at your house before you know it, I want to restock your silverware drawer. Don’t worry, I have a key to your apartment.”
“I do worry, Mom! I worry about the state of your comprehension skills right now. You’re not listening. This could go badly a thousand different ways. And besides, where is my fiercely feminist mother who usually tells me to consider my career first?”
“Now I worry about your comprehension skills. Have you not been listening to me all these years? Feminism, my love, is about uplifting women and fighting for our rights to equality and choice. If your choice is to follow your career, I will fight for that until my dying breath. If your choice is to be married and become a mother,or even a combination of both, I will fight for that until my dying breath too. It’s not about what that choice is, it’s about your freedom to make it. All I’ve ever wanted—and continue to want for you—is a partner who is going to uplift you as much as I know you will uplift him—and to cut loose anyone else who would dare do otherwise.”
The lady beside me must be able to hear my mom’s voice through the phone because she gives me moony eyes as she covers her heart with her hand. She shoos me away from the fountain to finish up her remaining water bottle herself and signals for me to go talk to my mom.Take the day off from your water bottle job,her eyes say. And this is what I love about women. Movies prefer to portray us as catty—but I know better because of moments like this. And moments where complete strangers have banded together in the bathroom to find me a tampon when I started my period unprepared.
“And Nora, my little butternut squash, you don’t make rash decisions. Everything you do has a motive and reason behind it. Even when you’re drunk. Honey, remember last year when we accidentally drank a little too much at that wine tasting and then you ordered your pink couch online. You laughed it off later as a frivolous drunken mistake, but you forget that I follow your Pinterest boards and I happen to know you had been pinning pink couches for a month before that. Youwantedthat couch.”
I did want that couch. I wanted it more than anything.
My bare feet pad back down the hallway toward our suite before I even realize what I’m doing. “What are you saying, Pam? That Derek is my pink couch? You think I’ve been nursing a broken heart all these years and pining for him? I’m the one who broke up with him because I wanted to pursue my career, if you will remember.”
“I think you already know the answers to those questions and don’t need me to point them out.”
She’s right. I have been nursing a broken heart, I’m justembarrassed to admit it to my strong mom. And it doesn’t matter that I ended it with him—my heart was still broken. The only difference is that I’m the one who shattered it myself.
“Nora, you are so excellent at thinking with your head. I’ve always admired your ability to look at life ten steps ahead and maneuver yourself in the safest most efficient route.”
“Thank you. You should see me play checkers.”
My mom doesn’t stop for my quip. “It’s worked for you because you really needed that stability and self-preservation from the way your dad has always come and gone from your life. But now, my darling goddess…you’re standing on your own two feet. You know who you are and what you want out of this life, and I think it might be time to think with your heart a little bit and give your brain a rest. And if your heart wants Derek…well then, my sugar plum fairy, as of tomorrow, you’ll have enough silverware to accommodate him.”
I’m silent for a minute, digesting everything she said in little bite-sized lumps. And when I can’t think of any adequate or profound ways to tell her I love her more than the ocean or rainbows or Sprite from McDonald’s after a stomach bug, I settle for a fact. “You know Derek has a mansion, right? Full of spoons.”
