His face scrunched up. “How?”
I dabbed my eyes with a Kleenex from the coffee table “Never mind. Thank you. That’s a very nice thing to say.”
Dash beamed and went back to his movie. I sat on the couch, my delicate shawl and my ugly raincoat on my lap. Waiting.
And waiting.
The country club party started at six o’clock.
At six fifteen, I made Dash dinner, trying not to get any mac and cheese on my dress. I texted Orion that my mother was running late so I was running late, but I’d be there in a few.
Grand entrance??, he texted back.I can’t wait to show you off.
My stomach rolled. The last thing I’d wanted was to show up when everyone else was already there. And Orion’s swoony words would’ve sent my heart fluttering, but they couldn’t defeat the ugly coil of fear that was taking hold.
I texted my mother.Where are you? I’m late to the party.
No answer.
The storm outside was a wild beast, trying to get in the house, rattling the windows and howling in the trees. Rain pelted the glass like pebbles, and Dash’s eyes went wide as the house shook at a particularly gnarly boom of thunder.
“Harper…?”
“It’s okay, buddy.” I stopped pacing and sat with him on the couch. “Just a bad storm. Mom will be here soon.”
It’s getting rough out there, came a text from Orion.Maybe I should pick you up.
Guilt whipped me. I hadn’t been exactly looking forward to driving in this mess, even if the country club was a short five minutes away. But the dentist office was farther. Maybe Mom ran into some trouble. I texted Orion that I couldn’t leave Dash, and then texted Mom.
Are you okay? Getting worried.
No answer.
At seven p.m., just when I was about to start calling hospitals, headlights splashed the front windows with glaring light. It wasn’t Mom’s old SUV, but a car I didn’t recognize.
Oh God.
“Stay here,” I told Dash and went on leaden legs to the front door, to greet the cops that were there to tell me there’d been an accident. That Mom was gone…
I opened the door to find my mother trying—unsuccessfully—to jab her key in the front door with one hand while holding a raincoat over her head with the other. The car idling in our driveway wasn’t apolice cruiser, but a dark sedan. I could just make out a man in the driver seat. Mustache, glasses. Dr. Hensley, I presumed.
“Harper! You scared me to death.” Mom laughed nervously, stepped inside, and my heart cracked in half.
She was drunk. Not falling-down drunk, but more than tipsy. More than “a glass of wine or two.”
Instantly, I was three years old and listening to her cackle at the moon while lying on her back on our front lawn.
I was six years old, covering my ears as she screamed and hurled beer bottles at a faceless boyfriend.
I was ten years old, poking her passed-out body, thinking she was dead.
I was thirteen years old, hiding in the closet with Dash as a different drunk boyfriend slammed around the apartment like the storm outside, howling and thrashing to get in…
I shut the door behind her as she came into the house and started for the stairs, giving Dash’s cheek a pat on the way, and mumbling something about having to pack. He stared at her, confused, scared, and my heart cracked again.
“Mom,” I said. “Mom.”
She pretended not to hear me.
