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“Well, he can’t be ordinary messed up, or he would be too smart to make you so sad. He would be here, treating you like a princess.”
She thought about saying that he had treated her like a princess, but she was afraid her mother would ask how, and she didn’t think cock jokes and orgasms were her mom’s idea of the princess treatment.
But they were Amber’s.
He’d made her feel as though she could say anything. Be anybody. That she could be who she was inside her heart, inside her head, instead of who someone else wanted her to be.
He’d made her feel amazing. And then he’d left.
She understood what he was doing. When she’d looked him up in the phone book and called his home number, she’d done it knowing that he wouldn’t pick up.
Just in case you change your mind, my number’s 427-7786. Call me if you want to talk. I’m here.
She’d listened to herself leaving the message, fully aware that he wouldn’t call back. That she probably sounded weak and desperate in exactly the way he’d predicted.
But damn it, she wasn’t weak and desperate. She just really, really liked him, and she refused to let him slink off without at least having to hear her voice again in the daylight. He shouldn’t get to drop her without having to make the decision one more time.
Apparently he’d made it. He
’d had all day Saturday to return her call, and he hadn’t done it.
Resulting in more crying.
“The damage is done,” she said. “I’m in the ice-cream-eating phase. Give it back.”
Janet passed the carton over with her lips pursed like she was trying to keep herself from saying something. It was rare that her mother tried to keep herself from saying anything. Amber tried not to be curious but gave up almost immediately.
“What?”
Janet sighed. “I was only going to say that if he’s the ordinary sort of messed up, and he’s a man, he’s probably just being an idiot. And if you like him, it doesn’t have to be over unless you want it to be. But then I remembered that you invited him up to your apartment and his truck was still there when I went to sleep at twelve, and I thought, Why am I encouraging this kind of monkey business?”
Reluctantly, Amber smiled.
Her mother touched her hair. “Maybe you should talk to him,” she said.
“It wouldn’t do any good. It’s not really about me. It’s just … him.”
“Definitely being an idiot.” Her mom glanced out the window. “If you do talk to him, be sure to make him grovel. They’re always better in bed after a good grovel.”
Shock forced the laugh out of her. “Mom!”
Janet gave her an amused sideways look. “You’re old enough to bring men home and too sinful for church. Doesn’t that mean we can do girl talk?”
“You’re my mother.”
“Of course I’m your mother. I’ll always be your mother. But you’re such a good girl, you hardly need any mothering. You need cheering up.”
Janet leaned toward her, plucked the ice cream out of her hand, and scooped out the last good marshmallow stripe. “Isn’t it better than getting a lecture?” she asked.
“Yes,” Amber said, with some trepidation.
“You don’t sound so sure. Haven’t you ever done girl talk before? You dish, and then I give you all kinds of useless advice, and then we mock him for a while until we’re giggling and you go home and take a shower and pull yourself together. You’ll feel better after, I promise.”
She looked at her mother, dressed in those impractical clothes, with her sympathetic eyes and mischievous smile.
Why not? She thought. Why the hell not?
“Okay.”
