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“Congratulations.”
“I get that you must feel a lot of anger toward me—”
“You’re damn right I’m angry. How’d you expect me to feel? You’ve been gone over twenty years. You clearly didn’t care about me. How many times have we been here, where you tell me promises that go nowhere? You know what I learned in that twenty years? That I was too much effort to pick up a phone, send an email, write a letter. That I was nothing to you.” Frustration, hurt, and anger were working their way up Luna’s throat.
“It’s easy for you to sit there in judgment of me when you don’t know what it’s like. I thought maybe it would be fun to have a baby around, especially a little girl. But you were so difficult, you made everything so hard, and I was pretty much a kid myself. And then you hurt me. So, yeah, I made a lot of mistakes, but I was young, Luna.”
Luna was too tired for this. “What exactly do you want? Why are you here? Because so far none of this is making me feel any better.”
Her mother’s face softened. “I want things to be different. I really do. You’re right, I should have made more of an effort with you. I’m sorry I was a terrible mother. I want to be better. I have the time to be better. I’m just waiting for you to tell me whether it’s too late or not. What do you want?”
“I don’t know,” she responded, and she truly didn’t. She’d gotten the apology she’d always wanted but the surety she assumed that would come with it wasn’t there. This wasn’t going to be some happy reunion where she’d fling herself into her mom’s arms and they’d have the relationship young Luna had always dreamed about. The reason was because Luna was still Luna, with the same history—the same everything. “All I’ve ever wanted, for as long as I can remember, was having a whole family.”
Her mom leaned closer. “You can still have it. Come to South Carolina and stay with us, meet your sisters. Skylar is out of the house because she’s studying to be a fashion designer, but Sunny is still home, and you can meet my husband, Hank. He’s a really great dad. You can stay for as long as you want, make our house your home.”
Here was Luna’s chance to escape, maybe her chance to reclaim the family she missed out on because, all those years ago, she had told her mother she’d loved her grandfather more than Amy.
In spite of having the opportunity to start over, Luna hesitated. South Carolina was almost as far away as she could get. It was clear across the country, away from everything she’d ever known. And what was she running toward? Running away and running toward something were completely different, and she could no longer think of a reason to justify either one of these. Maybe she wasn’t exactly like her mother after all.
“I can’t,” she said.
“Just try it. What do you have here that you can’t find someplace new? Sometimes starting new can be freeing.”
Luna looked at her mother flatly, not sure Amy realized how the comment reminded her of her mother’s abandonment. But instead of swiping back, she decided to take a more practical approach. “For one thing, there’s our store. I have responsibilities to my family here. Ross is married. I’m friends with his wife and they have a baby. I don’t want to miss out on that.”
“That’s what social media is for. Do you think I haven’t looked at your photos?”
Luna had put her whole life on social media not caring if strangers viewed her posts, but thinking about her mom spying on her life over the years was weird. She shook her head. “It’s not the same. It doesn’t give you the whole truth. My posts tell you nothing about what I’m like or how I’m feeling. There’s this guy…” Sam hadn’t appeared in any of her social media posts and now it seemed wrong. If Luna ran away she’d never get the chance to show him something different.
Sometimes she swore his motorcycle would travel her street in the middle of the night or she’d find a small message lodged in her door.
I miss you,
Sam
Luna decided to give her mother the brutal truth. Not her typical type meant to strike a person down but one that struck herself straight in the heart. Staring her mother in the eye, she said, “What am I worth? Because I’m still difficult and I still mess up and say things that hurt people. And even though I don’t always deserve it, I’m lucky enough to have people here who stick with me and make me feel valued in spite of my deficiencies. And if you don’t think you can handle that, then let me go.”
Amy sat there for a moment before leaning forward on the table. “I want to try, Luna.”
“I don’t want to hear words. I need you to show me.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
“Iwas talkingto Benedict, you know the new kid in apartment number seven, and he said he’s never lived in a place with a pool either, and maybe we’ll save money on air conditioning because if it’s really hot, you can just jump in the pool and cool off. I can also help clean it if it gets things like leaves in it, just like I helped you water your plants. So can we get a pool, Sam, when the weather turns nice again?”
“Uh-huh.”
Zabe stopped organizing the items in Sam’s toolbox. “What? Really?”
He glanced at her from his job of moving the dryer out of the laundry room so he could finally give the area a good sweep. “What?”
The kid tilted her head, studying him. “Are you okay, Sam?”
He wiped a tired hand across his face. “I don’t know.”
“You can swear if you want. I won’t tell my dad.”
“Oh, thank you. Why aren’t you in school?”
