Marlana looks at me. “Girl, I got you.”
She is the one person keeping me vaguely sane in this insane moment.
“I worship you,” I say.
“That’s because I’m worshipable,” she replies with a giggle. “I get it.”
When we each have a coffee in hand, I groan and tell her about my texts.
“Ah. I vaguely remember those. Very truthful, but…sorry, Ididencourage you.” She sips her coffee and is way too calm. “Yet I don’t regret anything, neither should you. You want to go to Vermont, Callie. You want to go home. To yourrealhome.”
Groaning sounds escape me before I admit, “Maybe.”
The coffee-IV combo is seemingly serving her better than it is me because she’s sitting up and more vocally assertive than anyone should be after our night. “First of all, you’re an adult, and you can do whatever you like. Why would it hurt to go out there and at least check out the house? It’s not like you’re happy here. Go to Wake. Organize some repairs, whatever. Get the hell out of LA. You hate it here. Admit it.”
“Can I get another coffee if I agree that this city is drowning me?”
“You can get a double espresso.”
“Fine. I hate it here.”
“That’s my girl!” Marlena nods to navy-shirt boy, and then he gives me a thumbs-up. “And, Callie? Despite the radical consumption of booze and inhaling of some super-strong weed last night? All that talking about Vermont wasn’t random. There’s a reason you were recalling those memories. God, areasonyou want to go back. So, do it. And, shit, you’ve got that shitpile of inheritance money from your dad that you haven’t touched.”
We let a long pause hang.
“Then, I could ignore her orders and do what I want,” I finish.
She’s right.
It feels gross and weird to think about, but my dad did leave us all money. While he didn’t have the most lucrative career as a professor, his father had made a significant amount of money as a top distributor of Vermont maple syrup, so our inheritance is substantial.
It hasn’t crossed my mind to touch that money. Not until now.
Maybe I am ready for a major change. Maybe I deserve this.
Maybe I am ready for snowmen and leaves and creeks.
It takes another large coffee for me to work up the nerve to leave. The texts that my mother has been sending me every half hour this morning have not exactly been enticing me to venture back to the condo, but while I’m slumped against the window as I drive back, I’m flooded with memories of my father. And I think about what he would have wanted for me.
My mother is waiting when I amble into our condo. And she is visibly riled up. “I canceled two showings, Callie. Those insane texts? Why haven’t you called me back? And what in the hell is going on with you?” Then, she looks me up and down. “Oh. Well, I can see now—not to mention, smell—that you were drunk-texting a bunch of nonsense. Let’s forget last night.” She takes a deep breath, obviously try to relax. “There’s an open house in an hour that I can make—”
“I want to go back to Vermont.” The unfamiliar calm that takes over me as I blurt out the truth is so foreign and also so stabilizing. I inhale and exhale hard.
“Those were just late-night ramblings.” She brings herself to look me dead in the eye, her voice soft now as she asks, “Why would you even want to go back there?”
“Because I do. I do, Mom,” I confess. “It was the last place I was myself. And the last place that I wasn’t miserable.”
I follow her as she carries a load of clothes to the laundry room, and I say nothing as she unloads the dryer. Until I do.
“You don’t need to worry about the house. I can handle it. And I’d like to help. I know how much you’ve done for me, and it’s not your fault that I’m”—my voice breaks—“a mess. That I’m a failure. That I fail at every goddamn thing.” It’s a needed release to say this out loud. To acknowledge it. “Put me in charge of our Vermont house. It will take a weight off of you, and it’ll give me something practical to do.”
“Stop. You are none of those things.” She throws a pile of dark clothes in the washer and brushes her hands together before slamming it shut. “I know there’s a lot of work has to be done in order for that place to sell. And I haven’t been able to deal with any of it. If you want to tackle this house stuff, I’d be grateful.”
The nod and small smile she gives me don’t exactly reek of confidence in my ability to do more than sweep a front step, but she finally leads me to her office and begins going through drawers, pulling files and printed documents, and amassing papers.
“Look, all you have to do is connect with Paul. He’ll arrange everything.” It takes her no time to find a weirdly giant clip to secure the many papers she now has in her hand. “I’ll be in touch with him, and you can figure out the specifics. Basic renovation stuff, okay? Get in and get out. Simple.”
It’s hard not to feel as though I’m a spy, given a short tactical assignment.
