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Finally, exhaustion takes over, and I fitfully drift away.
Chapter Seventeen
Corrie
‘Sorry, what?’
I finally respond to Mom’s voice, the one she uses to attract her grandchildren’s attention, since her normal tone seemed to fail to drag me out of my daydreaming.
Her I know your mind was elsewhere smile brings me back to my teenage years, when I convinced exactly nobody that I was listening while my head was in the clouds—just like now. Just like two mornings ago, when I woke up to my two live alarm clocks rested, much to my surprise. I remembered calling Luuk, then saying goodnight. Only my phone, once I resurrected it, showed the call lasted a few hours. Which meant he heard?
Mortification doesn’t even begin to describe the agony of not knowing what happened. I can’t exactly share my thoughts with anyone—definitely not Mom. Certainly not my friends, even though the self-care bunny was their present after I said I’m sick and tired of on-and-off dating again, and they chipped in for a cute silicone companion.
And absolutely not Luuk, who never mentioned anything. What could he say, really? I listened to you getting off, then falling apart while crying and saying my name?
The only reason I’m not begging for the Earth to open and swallow me whole is that I have two little people to take care of, who have been dropped off at Oma’s while I’m about to go to work.
‘I asked how Luuk is doing,’ Mom repeats.
‘He’s doing… well?’
Why pose it as a question? I know how he’s doing. I saw him yesterday when we took the kids to the park for a picnic, because, ‘Gotta take advantage of that weather while it lasts, and finally drive the bakfiets.’ Nothing in his expression betrayed anything about the night before.
We loaded the cargo bike with the kids and the picnic blanket and snacks that were mostly healthy—but the promise of ice cream was given—and rode the short distance to busy Westerpark, where we managed to find a spot for the blanket. I was instructed to just sit while Luuk and the kids “set the table”, producing plates and cutlery, even a tablecloth, from a picnic basket that looked identical to Mom’s. It was all so natural, as if we had been doing this every chance we had. Which wasn’t far from the truth; only said chances are few and far between, just like Luuk’s visits.
As we were sitting there in a colourful mess of food and toys scattered around the bakfiets, an elderly couple walked by holding hands. They looked adorable, like Mom and Dad do when they hold hands, but God forbid I call them elderly. The woman smiled at us and said to her husband, ‘Wat een prachtig gezin!’
My immediate thought was to jump and tell her we were not a family, no matter how deceiving the beautiful scene was. But then Luuk thanked her, beaming at them. As the couple walked on, I splish-splashed in the illusion of a family including him, the bubble shiny and fragile as if made of soap.
‘And David?’ Mom asks. ‘Are you seeing him again?’
‘We… decided to just be friends.’
I found myself postponing to reply to his last text, even though it was by a day. Finally, I told him I couldn’t picture us as a couple. He thanked me for my honesty, and I hoped I let him down kindly and not like a downright bitch.
‘Hm.’
Mom is definitely dying to interfere without psychoanalyzing her daughter. I’ve always admired how she’s mostly managed to separate the therapist from the parent, or at least to hide the fact that she tried to dissect my every word. Which I’m grateful for, and struggle to apply to my kids, not always succeeding. While I dread the scrutiny, I also want her to elaborate.
‘Say it.’
‘Say what?’
‘Mom…?’
‘I don’t want to meddle in your life,’ she starts, ‘no matter how much I’m dying to.’
I press my lips together to not laugh, so I hum like her.
‘But I see you with Luuk every time. How your faces light up when you’re together. And I believe you deserve a chance. I know I will sound like a mom, but I want you to be happy. Not because you’re my daughter, but because you truly deserve it, my love. Not everyone is like Johan, who was a fool to not appreciate you. Luuk definitely isn’t.’
My tangled thoughts are interrupted by an incoming text.
Luuk
Have a good shift.
Luuk
