AllFreeNovel
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Straightening my shoulders, I walk up the long driveway until I’m standing in front of the blue double doors that match the shutters. Grabbing the silver door knocker, I bang it twice and wait.
A woman in her mid-forties answers with a smile on her face. She is short and round around the waist, with long, jet-black hair and olive skin that makes her smile seem brighter. “Hello. How can I help you?”
It feels strange not to know this person who is answering the door to the house I grew up in. “Hi. Is Mrs. Wentworth home?”
She nods. “Yes, of course. Please come in and I will let Elaine know she has a guest.”
The woman pulls the door open enough for me to come through and closes it behind me. She walks off down the hall toward the direction of my mother’s office. I try to control my breaths as I wait for my mom to come out. I’m nervous to see her and not sure how we should greet each other.
The familiar sound of heels clicking on the tile gets louder as my mother approaches. She rounds the corner and the moment she sees me, she freezes. Her eyes widen and begin to fill with tears. Her hand drifts up to her open mouth and she covers it. “B-Blaire?” she stutters.
“Hi, Mom,” I whisper.
She starts walking again, this time slightly faster than before, until she is right in front of me. She hesitates at first, then pulls me into her arms. The moment I’m there, the floodgates release and I’m bawling like a baby.
I’m crying for the girl who has needed her mom for the last four years. The girl who has felt alone for far too long. The girl who hasn’t felt like she has had parents there her whole life.
I cry for myself because I didn’t know how much I needed this.
Several minutes go by as we cry and clutch each other. I have cried more in the last twenty-four hours than I ever have before. My mom pulls back and holds my shoulders at arm’s length. “Your hair. It’s gotten so long,” she says through tears. Her eyes take me in from top to bottom. “You have grown up far too much.”
I laugh. “A lot has changed in two years. I feel like a completely different person.”
A sad look crosses her face, and she quickly hides it. “I’m sure you do. Come in, come in. Don’t worry about your things. Layla will get them.” She smiles over at the woman who greeted me at the door. Unshed tears are in her eyes as she smiles at us.
My mother guides me toward the sitting room. While most families had rooms where they would hang out and play games or watch movies together, our family had a sitting room. No TV and no games. It was rarely used unless one of my parents was in there reading a book.
As we enter the room, I can’t help but stop and take it all in. Gone are the stuffy, uncomfortable chairs that were uninviting and replacing them are plush, leather sofas. Instead of the oil painting that was hung on the wall, there is now a large flat-screen TV. This room looks unrecognizable.
“What happened in here?” I ask my mother.
My mom smiles as she looks around. “A lot has changed, sweetie.”
She brings us to the large two-seater sofa, and we sit. My hands are grasped in hers and I take a moment to look at my mom. She doesn’t look like the woman I grew up with. Her usual perfectly curled hair is straightened and half up in a clip. While my mom typically wore either pantsuits or knee-length dresses, she is now wearing a pair of high-waisted white pants and a loose emerald green sleeveless blouse. Her countenance, which I had never seen without a full face of makeup, is mostly bare except for mascara and nude lipstick.
She looks younger and brighter. Like there is less stress overtaking her life. It seems a lot may have changed for both of us.
My mom reaches up and cups my cheek. “It’s good to see you, sweet girl.”
“I finally read your letters,” I blurt out.
She smiles. “I’m glad. I can’t tell you how sorry I am that it took me far too long to open my eyes and realize my mistakes.” Her smile drops and she looks down at her hands now in her lap. “I was never the mother you needed, sweetie, and I will be forever sorry for that. You deserved much better.”
“Why? Why, Mom? I still don’t understand it. How could you not care enough to stand beside me after what happened?”
The instant regret is evident on her face and my mom’s eyes well up with tears again. “For far too long, I failed at being your mother and it took me until losing you to realize how wrong I was. Never should I have put you behind my charities and functions. I was too wrapped up in our family’s image and connections that I did not see right in front of me how much I missed.” She strokes the side of my face as she wipes away my tears. “I’m so sorry, sweet girl. I can’t explain to you how sorry I am. While I can’t go back and change how absent and terrible of a mother I was, if given the chance, I would love to get to know this new Blaire.”
Never did I think this would happen. That my mother, a woman who felt more like a stranger to me growing up, would want to get to know me. Have a relationship with me. The little girl who grew up feeling more like a burden is crying on the inside, wanting her mom to hold her and tell her everything is okay, while the woman on the outside has tears streaming down her face at the change of the person in front of me. She yearns for a mom. Someone to go to for advice, someone to gush about boys with, someone to call when they don’t know what went wrong with the cookie recipe they made.
Nodding, I push away the last of the tears. “I would really like that,” I tell her honestly. She pulls me into a crushing hug, and I sink into her warmth.
After we both compose ourselves, I pull back. There is something, or someone, she seems to have left out of many of the letters and our entire conversation since I arrived. “Mom…where’s Dad?”
She takes a deep breath, and a strange look comes across her face. Worry maybe? “In all my letters, I wanted to tell you, but I couldn’t. This was not something I ever wanted you to find out that way.” Instantly, I’m nervous. “Honey,” she speaks in a soothing voice, much like someone does to a small child. “Your father, he passed away. The summer after your graduation.”
Of all the things I thought she would tell me, that was not one of them. Maybe divorce or he left her for a younger woman, but not…death.
My father is dead. Myfatheris dead.Dead. As in not alive.
