Page 55 of SEAL's Doorstep Baby
“They are all okay. They are doing good.”
That’s not a lie at least.
“Then why do you sound like your house burnt down, sweetie?” She asks seriously, but the image of me crying because my house has burnt down is so far from the reality of what is really happening that I can’t help but snort out a laugh.
“My house didn’t burn down, Mom. And there’s been nothing bad. I actually have good news.”
“You’ve got my attention now, sweetie. What is it?” She is much more relaxed now. Good. I can just talk about the only good news I have to give now, and she will focus on that instead of the tears in my voice.
“I got the job. The botanist job at NYU, and it comes with a tour, even if I don’t take it.”
Her squeal down the phone is enough to wake up the dead. I take the phone away from my ear so she doesn’t rupture my ear drum. “You don’t sound excited enough.” I mutter sarcastically.
“I can celebrate any way I want to. My baby just got her dream job, so excuse me if I want to celebrate that.” A stranger would think her offended huff conveys annoyance, but I know my mother; her theatrics had birthed mine after all.
“I know you can. And that’s why I called you to tell you.”
Her hum is doubtful. “Hmmm. I bet you didn’t tell me first.”
My mother has always had the added gift of being exceptionally perceptive when it comes to some matters, and anything concerning my love life is crystal clear to her, no matter how much I might try to keep it under wraps.
“You were literally the first person I called to tell this, Mama.”
“That might be true, but you said ‘called’, not told. I know you. Who did you tell first?” Right when I think I have managed to outwit her while saying a half truth, she comes right back with facts I can't deny. “It was Maddie’s uncle, right? The marine.”
It is amazing how she can still speak with authority about my behavior and thoughts and be right.
Maybe it is a mom thing. Would I be able to do the same with Maddie by the time she is twenty? I wonder, and the answer is one I can deduce immediately.Not if you don’t raise her, you won’t.
“Mama, I’ve said it before, it’s SEAL, not marine.” I correct with the patience born of a thousand reminders.
“Same difference…”
“It’s not. But that doesn’t matter anyway because we aren’t exactly talking anymore, and I’ve moved out.”
“Oh sweetie!” She gasps, and the pity in her voice is almost painful to hear. “You two had a falling out?”
“Yeah.” I don’t know if I want to tell her about it or if I would rather not discuss it, so I find myself in this awkward valley which is neither.
“What happened, sweetie?”
I am already shrugging before I realize that she can’t see me. “I think his ex-flame moved back to town and they hit it off. I don’t know how, or why exactly, but when this job came up he basically saw it as a reason to move on, I guess.”
Immediately after telling her this, guilt hits me so hard that I feel the need to clarify everything. As mad as I am at him, I can’t badmouth Jacob, even to my mother.
“He didn’t say much about the ex, really. But she’s in town, and she’s ready to fight for him—in her own words—and I don’t know if I want to be a part of that. I mean, I shouldn’t have to fight for his attention, right? And then there’s this job and everything coming with it. Jacob wants me to leave, he says it’s so I can do something important, something I like, but I don’t know, Mama. My heart is being pulled in two directions.”
She waits until I am done pouring out my heart to her before she starts speaking. “What does your heart want, sweetheart?”
“I don’t even know, Mama. I don’t have a clue. I hate being alone in this apartment and a part of me wants to go back so I can be with them. Maybe I just don’t want to accept that it’s really over, even though Jacob and I aren’t speaking. The other part of me is excited about everything else. I mean, who knows what is waiting for me in the big apple of all places?”
“And it’s hard to make a decision.”
“So hard. So frigging hard.”
“Then I’ll ask you a question a wise woman once asked me, too. What do you think or fantasize about that makes you smile just from imagining it? I don’t want you to answer this question. You are the only person who knows it—and it should remain that way—but that feeling is the direction your heart wants to go in, and sweetie, the heart is never wrong.”
“What about when we follow our hearts and then it does go wrong?”
