Total pages in book: 73
Estimated words: 67465 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 337(@200wpm)___ 270(@250wpm)___ 225(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 67465 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 337(@200wpm)___ 270(@250wpm)___ 225(@300wpm)
But I’m not making any excuses. What happened happened. My mom fought hard to keep me safe for as long as she could and then to keep Kimmy safe. She’s lived with her mistakes, shame, guilt, and a man like my father. She was trapped in a loveless marriage for years. I know she could have left and maybe made it on her own, but that’s probably where her fears kept her paralyzed, and it was a decision she made long before I was born. I can’t imagine how hard it would be to leave with a newborn and no money. Yes, she could have done it. I’m not saying she made the right choice, but I don’t get a say. The past is the past. And when she had Kimmy, there was truly no way to leave. She was my dad’s child. If she’d taken her, she would have been hunted to the ends of the earth, and when he got Kimmy back, my mom would never have seen her again.
My mom and dad met in college. She didn’t come from money, so she was working two part-time jobs and going to school full-time. My dad was studying business, and she was also studying business too. Not because she wanted to, but because she thought it gave her the best options after graduation. He noticed her. She was stunning—a goddess who shone brightly. She was funny, and he was charming. He stole her heart, and I guess they were happy for a while, even after they got married when they both graduated.
I can see all the steps he took in making her dependent on him. He didn’t want her to work, but he came from a family of money. He didn’t want her to have friends unless they were his friends too. She could only go to socially approved events and do things that contributed to his image. His family didn’t like her. They hadn’t wanted them to get married, so they offered no support. Maybe he’d stolen her ability to make a decision to leave long before she ever had to make one. My dad was like the tides, I guess. The same kind of furious tide that wears on a beach, taking it grain by grain until there isn’t any sand left, and eventually, there isn’t a beach at all, and the shorefront is forever changed.
I sat there and listened to it all, and I couldn’t pass judgment. I didn’t come back here for wrath, for justice, or to condemn my mom. I came back because I love my family, and I spent a lifetime trying to make up for not having them. I made myself rich, but it didn’t matter. I tried to save my marriage, yet I failed. I thought I knew what I wanted. I thought I’d be okay. And then I finally realized, after it all fell apart, that my heart wasn’t in Europe. It never truly was. It was right here. Always.
It’s still right here, and I refuse to let the mistakes that any one of us made in the past dictate how we’re going to be a family in the future.
I flat out refuse.
“Oh good, Kimmy’s here,” I hear Nanny say, all proud and resolute as if she didn’t doubt for a second that she’d actually come, and I realize I’ve been in a world of my own for the past five or ten minutes. I have a drink in front of me. Lemonade, because mom learned from Nanny how to make it the best way, with real lemon slices and not so much sugar, so that it makes you pucker. I didn’t even see her set the glass down.
“Have a drink,” mom coaxes me while Nanny races to the door. “Your blood sugar is off. You’re white as a starched sheet.”
“Starched sheets.” I shudder. They seem like they’d be prickly and uncomfortable. She’s right, though. I’m back to being two seconds from passing out. I feel like a starched sheet, except I’m damp and prickly under my T-shirt. How a cotton shirt can be prickly, I have no idea.
I can feel the beads of sweat trickling from the back of my hairline to soak the shirt. It’s nasty. Mom waves her hand in front of my face, fanning me. “It’s going to be fine, Sullivan, I promise. You can believe me because I’m your mother, and this time, I’m not going to stop until it’s fine and our family is back together. You’re both my children, and I should have protected you both so much better than I did. It’s not happening again. No one is leaving this house until the truth is out there, and we learn how to take the first steps in loving each other again.”
My stomach twists, but so does my chest. “I already love you, Mom,” I tell her, and by sweet buckets of whatever gravy Nanny cooks up, I mean it. “I love you so much.”