With all the time I lost yesterday, I immediately got to work when I realized I felt somewhat okay. The next big thing to go through is Ruth’s art room, which I’ve been holding off on. Even after weeks of reflecting, I haven’t been able to figure out why she wanted me to have this stuff. We never scrapbooked together, not even once. I did catch her doing it a few times, even watched her at one point, but that was it. While I had no interest in playing with different textures and papers, it was calming to watch her go through pictures and boxes of ornaments, kind of how it felt to watch Eli float on his surfboard.
After I ate a bowl of cereal—all the while dreaming of yesterday’s omelet—I steeled myself to walk in, but nothing could’ve prepared me for what I’d find in here. If she liked to collect random items throughout the house, it was nothing compared to all the elements she hoarded for her hobby. There are more feathers in her drawers than in a zoo. Long, short, wide, thick,brown, white… If there is ever a nationwide feather shortage, it's because Ruth collected them all.
I rarely saw all her scrapbooking things. Usually, she’d have them stored back in her art room by the time Keira or I came over. I did surprise her once when I walked in unannounced using the spare key. She screamed louder than I thought was humanly possible. “It’s as if you’re trying to kill an old lady, Cassandra!” She got so scared, she dropped an entire box of beads onto the ground. I spent the next two days on all fours, collecting the tiny beads back into their tray. They were apparently too expensive to vacuum.
I brush my hand over boxes and boxes of similar beads now, not knowing where to start. I don’twantthis stuff. However, I don’t think I could ever get rid of something she wanted me to have, so I sit down and get started.
I spend the next few hours going through materials and old projects. It takes even longer than I’d planned, simply because I get distracted by everything I find. One of her countless books is open in front of me, the pages thickened with paper mâché, stamps, embroideries, and—you guessed it—feathers and beads. The album I picked appears to be dedicated to Ruth and her friends, following them over decades. Eileen, Susan, Gertrude… They’re all there, sometimes dancing with huge 70s curls, sometimes sitting in a circle like they were during crochet club, this time with babies in their laps and glasses of wine in their hands. It’s precious to get this kind of bird’s eye view of their friendship.
I turn the page to find one where all the girls are now with their adult children, Mom and my father in the bottom cornerof it. Mom is sitting in his lap, his thick fingers pressed into her thighs. This was probably a few years after I was born. I recognize the bangs Mom wore for a few years during my childhood. She’s laughing, and he is watching her like she’s all that’s good in the world. I swallow and turn the page. It baffles me still how someone could look at her like that, then turn around and treat her like absolute trash. Things were already bad then, but you would never know based on this picture.
Even then, Ruth knew something was up with her son. I remember her inviting Keira and me over more and more often for sleepovers. She’d bring us to the zoo or the town fair. She’d step in as much as she could. My sister would often pass, but I never did, probably because I didn’t have a group of friends to rely on. And through it all, Ruth never said one thing about her son. I can’t tell how many times she listened to me talk about him, and while she nodded and sometimes cried, she never said what she truly thought of him. She stepped in to do damage control but was never able to truly let go of the boy she’d raised.
I turn the page to find a picture of Ruth with a sparkling cake in one hand and multiple Mardi Gras necklaces around her neck, wearing her usual wide-leg jeans and thick sweater. She’s smiling her carefree smile, like the world has stopped for the night. A knot forms in my throat as I trace her face with my fingers.
I close the book, and just as I leave the room, a feminine voice from the foyer calls, “Hello? Cassie?” I barely jump. As comforting as hearing Eli’s voice yesterday was, this one brings me right backto goodnight kisses and home cooked meals, no matter how long I’ve been away.
“Mom?” I ask as I make my way toward her voice. There, standing in front of the open front door, is my mother and Dottie at her feet, tail wagging. “What are you doing here?”
“I let myself in. I knocked but…”
“It’s fine,” I say. After all, she considered Ruth a mother as much as Ruth considered her a daughter. It’s as much her right to be here as it is mine. “What’s going on?”
She plays with Dottie’s leash, her gaze darting around me. During crochet club, it felt easier, being the two of us. Like having all these loud, boisterous women as a buffer eased all the tension between us. Now, we’re back to a gray zone of a relationship. “Keira called to say you weren’t feeling well.”
Warmth blooms in my chest. My sister can pretend she’s indifferent with me, but her actions speak louder than her tough front.
“This might be silly,” Mom says, and for a second, she reminds me of myself when I would ask if I could stay at Ruth’s for the night, all hesitant and hopeful. “But when you were young, you used to love to curl up with Dottie when you weren’t feeling well, so I thought I might bring her to you.”
Silence envelops us, and while I wish I could speak, I don’t trust my voice.
I’m not sure what makes me the most emotional. The fact that she thought about the best way to comfort me when we barely know each other anymore, or the fact that I so desperately wish shehadn’t waited so long to do so. When I was a teen, yes, cuddling with Dottie was what I did when I couldn’t leave home and felt so overwhelmed I thought I might burst, but the dog was not what I truly needed. It was a band-aid to the festering wound that would never heal until my mother decided to bring Keira and I somewhere else, where we’d feel comfortable to be home. Where I wouldn’t have to wonder which version of my father I would get that night. I spent years waiting, all the while my father’s addictions got worse and his behaviors became more senseless.
So many feelings battle each other. There’s my inner child who sees her wire-frame glasses and brittle hair and wants to go hug her and drain all the reassurance I can get out of her, and there’s the adult woman who thinks that, if I was able to have children, never would I let them feel afraid in their own home, even for one second. They would become my priority. I would never let my feelings come before theirs.
And yet the sight of her with my old dog at her feet makes the answer simple. She’s not a bad woman. She’s a woman who loved too much, and who couldn’t put anything above that love. Not even us.
“Thank you,” I say, leaning forward so I can pet my old dog on the head. “I appreciate it.” Even though my cramps do feel better, I wouldn’t mind spending more time with Dottie. She was the best heating pad, and after the next week and a half, I’ll probably never see her again.
When I straighten, Mom is staring expectantly, her fingers knotted in front of her belly. I also won’t see her for a long while after this is over.
“Would you like to come in? I was just about to make lunch.”
It’s as though a curtain has been torn open, allowing sunlight to seep through her face. It’s such a rare sight. How could I let resentment take this feeling away from her? “I’d love that.”
Chapter 19
“So? What do you think?”
Zoe chews one of the cookies I just pulled out of the oven, her gaze focused like a scientist wondering about a complicated theorem, and not like a five-year-old girl tasting what I thought was a pretty decent recipe. Her movement slows before she takes a deep swallow, closed eyes and all. “It’s…”
I widen my eyes expectantly.
She takes another bite and does the whole process again before concluding, “It tastes like the food I give Fish.”
Well, I have to give it to her, she’s honest.
“When did you taste Fish’s food, missy?”
