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“I know you are her daughter, but I don’t get how it will affect her position at all. I mean, shouldn’t you only affect yourself? One person can’t be judged on the behavior of another person, can they?”
She rolls her eyes and mutters something under her breath about my life being unique and not how most people can cope. But I don’t see what is wrong with that, why is it an issue for me to do something new? I have had to defend myself a number of times, a lot of times against my brothers, but I haven’t ever felt quite as defensive as this. With Kayla, there is an intense need to prove myself and the way that I live, I need her to see that it’s good.
“Well, unfortunately, they are, which is what the issue is here. I’ve caused more damage than I should.”
Kayla is silent, but it’s a weird kind of quiet that has me very confused. It’s almost as if I can hear the cogs ticking in her brain as she tries to work out what to say next to me. Probably because we are worlds apart and she can’t find a way to make me get her either. It’s frustrating, we are from opposite ends of the scale and neither of us know how to budge to explain ourselves in a way that the other person can understand.
“Why are you doing all of this, Kayla?” I finally need to ask her. “Why are you trying so hard to be something that you aren’t? Worrying about the reputation of other people so much that you will throw yourself in to a job that you don’t want? Because it really doesn’t look like being a lawyer will make you happy. I’m sorry if I’m over stepping the mark here, but I feel like this is something I need to say. There are other ways.”
“Because not everyone can focus on happiness, Tim. Some of us have to worry about success and money. Most of us, in fact, that’s the way of the world. That’s the way life is.”
“Hmm, yeah I guess that is one way of looking at it. I just couldn’t ever be that way myself.”
Her face falls and I can almost see her thought pattern. I’m not even trying to understand her, am I? I’m just rolling my way of thinking on top of her, basically steam rolling her as if she doesn’t matter.
“Sorry, I can see that I’ve upset you,” I continue. “I don’t mean to come across as a massive dick…”
“No, it isn’t that.” She shakes her head hard. “I just… I don’t know, I’m frustrated that I’m not on the path that I should be on and I’m taking it out on you because I can’t make you understand.”
We smile at one another, acknowledging our differences, and I have to admit that she has my heart racing at the speed of light. It doesn’t even matter that we can’t seem to agree on anything, that ever red flag is waving in our faces and telling us to keep the hell away from one another, there is a strange connection sizzling through the air anyway. There is a bond between us that over shadows everything else.
Eventually, we arrive and it’s time for us to get out the car to wait in the little waiting room with a terrible coffee machine while Kayla’s car gets fixed. The intense conversation from the car is over, we are now more embroiled in small talk, but the effect that it’s had on me remains. I still feel the magnetic pull between us, and I know for sure that I don’t want to break it. I’m not ready to quite yet. I want to dig deeper in to it, to see what it could be, how deeply it sinks in to me, and where it could lead. The more time that passes, the deeper the sensation goes, until it gets to the point where I know that if I don’t do something it will swallow me up whole.
***
“So, I have your cell phone number.” Kayla nods sharply. “Not that there is much point in ever calling you because you could be anywhere in the world and you don’t always have your phone charged…”
She lets out a little laugh trying to show me that she’s joking, but it doesn’t quite land. I really hope that she doesn’t mean it, I would hate it if we went our separate ways and never spoke again. She makes the idea of being on the grid appealing, I know that I’m going to be interested to find out what she’s doing all the time too.
“Well, I hope you do because I want to know what happens with your job search.” I pat the bonnet of her now fixed car. “I will be cheering you on from wherever I am, thinking about you wherever you are.”
