Lashes cast faint shadows when she blinked. Her lips were slightly parted, still glossy where she'd just pressed them together, and I couldn't seem to look away.
The thought came uninvited—simple, raw, and disarming. I wanted to close the distance. To know what it would feel like to be closer than this. To find out if she still carried that faint traceof vanilla, or if that was just my mind trying to turn her into something it could understand.
Something safe.
"Everything alright in there?" The sales clerk’s voice came from outside the fitting area, bright and oblivious, and the moment broke apart.
She stepped back and cleared her throat.
The sales clerk appeared around the corner, clipboard in hand, asking about alterations, and I answered her questions while my pulse came back down from wherever it had gone.
"I have to make a call," Anna said, holding up her phone. "Give me a minute?"
I nodded.
She walked toward the entrance, phone to her ear, her flats quiet on the polished floor. I watched her go. The way she moved, her curls bouncing. She didn’t look over her shoulder.
But I wished she had.
The sales clerk asked if I needed anything else. I told her no.
I didn’t need anything else.
My mom had another episode that evening. Not a heart attack, the cardiologist was clear about that, but chest pains and shortness of breath.
Her medication was adjusted again. Higher dose. She was resting but she wanted her children, all three, which is how I ended up sitting at her bedside at eight in the evening.
She was propped up on pillows, pale but alert. Probably checking her children’s faces for signs of distress she could worry about later when we were gone. Mona was cross-legged at the foot of the bed, eating grapes from a bowl. Miles leanedagainst the doorframe with his arms folded, doing his job, which was making sure nobody got too sad for too long.
"I’m fine," Mom said for the fourth time. "Stop looking at me like I’m dying. I had a bit of chest pain. It’s not the end of the world."
"Your cardiologist disagrees," Miles said.
"My cardiologist is a pessimist."
"Your cardiologist went to Harvard."
"Pessimists can go to Harvard, Miles."
"You know what would make me feel better," she said, staring at me, and I knew what was coming before she finished the sentence. "Grandchildren."
Mona pointed at me. "Wrong person to ask, Mom. He probably thinks the entire process of making children is disgusting. He’d need to sanitize the whole situation from start to finish and honestly the logistics are impossible."
Miles laughed. Mom swatted Mona’s ankle. "I can’t exactly put my hopes on you either, can I?"
Mona grinned. "My future wife might have something to say about that. Don’t count me out."
"I don’t care who gives me grandchildren," Mom said. "I just want someone to. Soon. Because my cardiologist says stress is bad for my heart and the absence of grandchildren is very stressful."
"That’s emotional blackmail," I said.
"Forget the kids, just bring someone home. I’ll be happier knowing you all have someone looking after you. Especially you, Jace." She said it looking right at me.
Mona snorted.
After she fell asleep and Miles went to call her doctor, I walked through the gallery with Mona. The hallway was lined with paintings, Mom’s work from another life. Seascapes, mostly. Oils on canvas, the blues deep and layered, the kindof paintings that made you feel the salt air if you stood close enough.
She hadn’t picked up a brush in years. The last one hung at the end of the hall, a storm rolling in over water. She painted it the year after I came back from London. I’d always thought it looked like the inside of her head during that time.
