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“But you don’t need that money, Mom.” I swatted her hand away from my pocket. “Stop it. This is ridiculous.”
“What’s ridiculous is turning your nose up at money that’s already ours!” my mom exclaimed. “What is this?”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Mom, I flew across the country to help you get everything in order for your retirement.” Not to mention I didn’t want to be back in Windover County, California—something my mom wouldn’t understand. “Not to help you relaunch your career after your doctor told you it was time to step back.”
“I’m sure that’s something we can work out,” my mom said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “Heather, three million. Three. Million. Dollars. And Collins is a sweet little girl. Mr. Hilborne has always been good to me, and I know it would help him out tremendously.”
I turned away from my mom to try and collect my composure. I loved her. I did. She was my mom, but this was ridiculous. She was being manipulated by a man who ought to know better. If this guy was as good as what my mom always said, he should know when it was time to step back and do things for himself. Or, barring that, find someoneelse—someone not my mom, who had spent her entire life doing things for other people.
“Graham Hilborne is a billionaire, Mom,” I finally said, turning back to her. She was still making grabby hands at the phone in my pocket. “Three million dollars a year is nothing to him. If he were serious about getting you out of retirement, he’d offer you a hundred million. Or more.”
My mom gaped at me. “Do you think he would?”
I shook my head at her. “No, but that’s not the point. The point is you had a heart attack.”
“A tiny heart attack.”
“A heart attack,” I repeated, ignoring her. “And you are nearly seventy years old.”
“Heather, now you’re being rude.”
“I’m being honest. Plenty of people your age have been retired for years. And you deserve that.”
My mom scoffed at me. “You think I’m ready to curl up and die, don’t you?”
I took her hand, squeezed it, and mentally begged her to understand what I was trying to do here. “I want you around for a lot longer. And the doctor said if you keep subjecting yourself to the stress that comes with raising other people’s children, you will suffer much more serious consequences. I’m just trying to keep you safe.”
“This is what I’ve done my entire life,” my mom said, her hand dropping from mine. “Heather, I don’t know what else to do with myself. I’m sure you’ve heard the stories—people dying as soon as they retire. I don’t want that to be me.”
“It’s not going to be you,” I insisted. “Look, I’m here for a whole month.”
“You still shouldn’t have done that.”
“Enough. I did it. It’s fine.” It wasn’t fine. The only reason I was able to step away for a whole month from my practice in New York City was because of the tiny percentage of patients whose parents had agreed to let them meet with me virtually. It wouldn’t be the same; I understood that completely. But at least it’s something while I tried to get my mom situated in something she never had for herself: time off.
And if we were being perfectly honest here, another reason I was able to spend a month in California was thanks to the fact that I had sublet my apartment. But my landlord didn’t need to know that.
“We’re going to be fine,” I said. “You’regoing to be fine, I promise. That’s why I’m here. I want to be here. All I want you to worry about is what your next hobby is going to be.”
“I’m going to go lie down,” my mom said. I knew she wasn’t excited about this, but it was past time to worry about that. All I was focused on was her health. “Can I have my phone back?”
“Are you going to use it to call Graham Hilborne?” I asked. It was a fair question.
“I’m going to use it to play Jewel Match,” my mom said, naming her favorite app as I gave up her phone. “Thank you.”
I knew the app helped her relax while giving her something to do, and I really believed she was going to use her phone for the reason she gave me. I certainly didn’t think she was going to try to sneak around with it.
When she shut her bedroom door, I let out a long breath I hadn’t been aware I’d been holding. This was all so difficult. There wasn’t a single easy part, especially helping my mom decide what she was keeping and getting rid of as she downsized from the house I’d grown up in to a condo in a building that specialized in services for the elderly.
Wow. It was hard to think of my mom in those terms. Elderly?
She had always seemed like such a superhero. She’d been a nanny all my life, often taking me along with her when she cared for other children. It was fun when I was younger, like a built-in playmate in my life. But when I got older, I resented being roped into babysitting when I had so many other interests I wanted to pursue. Plus, most of the kids were so bratty that I couldn’t stand it. The utter entitlement made me want to gag.
Notably, one little boy had thrown a full-out fit that nearly ended in hospitalization when he screamed and held his breath because my mom failed to put him in the sneakers he wanted to wear to the park. The sneakers in question? Designer and custom made, at that. They had a price tag equal to several months of my mom’s fees, and the boy’s parents had told her he wasn’t allowed to wear them outside of their supervision.
Maybe that little episode was what inspired me to go into child psychology. Or perhaps it was the whole experience of growing up around ill-adjusted rich kids whom my mother tempted, treated, and cajoled into behaving for her. I’d always thought there was a better way for everything, even as I strove to get as far away from my childhood home as possible.
I thought I’d found myself in New York City. I’d done well enough, graduating and completing training and establishing my practice. I’d made friends—real friends, not the ones I’d been forced to put up with because of what my mom did for a living. And I’d fallen in love. Charlie. We’d agreed to get married—a ring on my finger, the beginnings of planning a wedding. And then. Well.
