AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Pissed at whatever my mom said to ruin it.
But over all that, just this pure hit of love for my girl.
I sit on the unmade bed.
“What?” she says.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You’re looking at me funny.”
“I was just thinking how much I love you,” I confess.
Her eyes dart away, guilty.
This is how it is with us now. I keep reaching for her, but I never seem to catch her. She doesn’t want me to. “What’d Mom say?” I ask.
“Nothing.”
“It wasn’t nothing. You talked for a long time.”
“We just talked about Christmas and presents and stuff. She’s living with Bo again.”
“I know. She told me.”
“She asked did I want to come home.”
“No.” The word is out of me before I know what’s happening. I’m standing, towering over Frankie. “No fucking way.”
She shrinks back. I have to calm down, I know I do, but what the fucking fuck? What kind of person would do that—just ask Frankie does she want to come home, a casual question dropped into a Christmas phone call without checking with me first, without fucking asking whether I thought it would be a good idea?
Who does she think she is?
That I know the answer only makes me angrier. She’s Frankie’s mom. I’m just a fraud.
“Tell me what she said,” I demand. “Every word.”
Frankie eyes me skittishly. “She said I could come home if I wanted. She said she misses me, and you probably …”
“I probably what?”
Frankie shrugs at the floor. “You have Caroline.”
“And that means what, exactly?”
Another shrug. “You don’t want me anymore.”
“Did I say that? Did I ever fucking say that?”
“No, but you don’t have to. You hate me!”
“I don’t hate you!”
“You’re yelling at me. You’re mad, you get mad, you never used to but you do now, and I hate you! I want to go home. I miss Mom. I miss Dad.”
“You don’t fucking miss Dad.”
“I do, too! He loves me!”
