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“Some good, some bad,” Erin said honestly.
Good, in terms of texts from Cassie. Bad, given that Erin had spent most of it worried her daughter was never going to speak to her again. So good won out, Erin supposed, now that she was on the phone with Parker.
“Anything interesting happen since we last talked?” Parker asked.
Erin almost laughed. The question sounded like how she used to question Parker when she was in trouble.Is there anything you want to tell me?she’d say, holding the broken vase she found under some strategically discarded paper towels in the kitchen trash. It was probably her guilt, warping a genuine question into suspicion in Erin’s mind.
“Just the usual,” Erin said. “We’re trying to agree on a time line for the opening of the clinic and it’s a lot of back and forth.”
“Sounds fun,” Parker said like she hadn’t heard anything Erin said. “But actually, I gotta go, I’m meeting Acacia for lunch.”
“Oh, okay. Have fun! Tell her I said hi.”
“Talk to you later.”
“Bye, love you.”
Parker hung up.
Which was fine! It was a good conversation. It didn’t matter that she hung up without sayinglove you.Erin didn’t need to let that undo how the rest of the call eased her anxiety.
She was grateful to have to get back to work instead of allowing herself to spiral.
After work, though, she went straight to spiraling.
What if Parker knew? What if that was why she hadn’t called for so long? What if that was why she didn’t say she loved Erin on the phone?
Carolyn would lecture Erin for ascribing judgment where there was no proof of it. Last week, she’d told Erin to just ask Parker what was going on. The thought was still petrifying.
Erin shouldn’t be doing what she was doing with Cassie for a lot of reasons, but if she was going to be this neurotic after every phone call with her daughter, shereallyshouldn’t be doing it. Surely this anxiety canceled out some of the happiness that seemed to crop up every time she got a text from Cassie.
Removing Cassie from the situation altogether—what would Erin do if Parker hadn’t called her in a week and a half if Erin had never done anything with Cassie? She’d ask probably. She would press. If she thought something was wrong with Parker, she’d want to know. She’d want Parker to know she could talk to her about it. They could talk about things that mattered.
They hadn’t lately, though, had they?
Parker hadn’t even told Erin what she wanted to study. She loved art, obviously, but whenever Erin brought up a future in it, Parker shut her down. And while Parker knew how Erin’s life had changedwith the divorce from the outside—Adam had moved out and Erin worked more—they’d never talked about howshehad changed.
Pushing wasn’t going to make Parker open up.
Erin had to open up herself. Carolyn had said maybe it was time to have the conversation with Parker about the divorce more than a month ago. Erin couldn’t do it then. Maybe she could now.
She wanted to talk to Cassie about it. She’d told Cassie things Parker didn’t know: how important the clinic was to her, how she felt like herself for the first time in more than a decade.
But they didn’t talk about Parker. They’d never explicitly agreed not to; they just never had. Like if they didn’t mention her, they could pretend they weren’t doing anything wrong. So Erin didn’t say anything about her decision to talk to Parker. She didn’t admit to chickening out the next time Parker called, finally on a Sunday.
But by the Sunday after that, when Parker called, Erin had built up her nerve. They did the usual weekly catch up, and Parker was more loquacious than she’d been their last two phone calls. She talked about Sam, a quiet smile in her voice.
“Does she know that if she hurts you, your mom is gonna fly down there and hurt her right back?”
Parker laughed. “I think Acacia would get to her first.”
“That won’t stop me,” Erin said. “Seriously, though, sweetheart, she sounds great. I’m glad you found someone who treats you right.”
“What about you?” Parker said. “Anyone treating you right nowadays?”
They’d never talked about Erin’s dating life after the divorce. It’d taken Erin more than a year to give in to Rachel’s desire to set her up, and she always did it when Parker was with her father.
“Actually,” Erin said. She swallowed. She could do this. “There’s something I’ve been wanting to talk to you about.”
