I reach for some chips. “I don’t know. I was tired of the uniform.”
I guess that’s a good enough reason for El because she’s quick to change the topic to something much juicier. “So when’s your date?”
“Tomorrow.”
“You nervous?”
“I guess? But not really.”
“Mitch. I never would have guessed,” she says. “You really like him?”
“Yeah. I mean, I guess I needed something new.” I pull one of her pillows over my head, muffling my words. “I wouldn’t have said yes if I didn’t like him.”
“New? You’ve never even been kissed.” She ties my shoelaces together in a sloppy knot. “He doesn’t seem like your type.”
My insides are swimming in guilt. I can’t tell her about Bo now. It’s too late, and there’s nothing left to tell. “I don’t have a type.”
“Not yet you don’t.”
Later, when I pull up to my house, the first thing I notice is the glowing square that is Lucy’s room.
I should sit here for a moment and prepare myself for whatever it is my mom is doing to that room, but I don’t. Instead, I tear my keys from the ignition and storm up the walkway to the back door. Riot is rubbing the length of his body against the sliding glass door. The first thing I hear is Olivia Newton-John blaring from the second floor.
I drop my purse on the counter and Riot runs up the stairs, a few steps ahead of me.
I don’t know what I expect to find, but it’s not the sight of my mother seated behind a card table with all of Aunt Lucy’s furniture pushed up against the walls.
“What are you doing?” I spit at her. The framed Dolly Parton records that had lined these walls for my entire life are stacked at the end of the dresser, and sitting on top of Aunt Lucy’s pastel-pink record player is my mom’s iPod.
This is the worst-case scenario.
“Well,” says Mom, squinting over her sewing machine as she runs a seam. “I’ve always needed a craft room. We’ve talked about this. And my bedroom isn’t cutting it anymore.”
“Your bedroom? You have the whole house.”
She pushes her reading glasses up the bridge of her nose. “I know you’re upset, Dumplin’. I do. But we can’t let this room sit here like a tomb. We’ve got to move forward. Luce would understand.”
I don’t understand. “But you moved everything. Can’t you work in here without changing everything? You even took down her records. Why would you do that?”
“Oh, baby, those records are so old. We’re going to have to take down this wallpaper because of the squares those things left on the walls.”
I pick up as many records as I can carry and take them across the hallway to my room. If I had any free hands, I’d be slamming doors, too. After leaving the records on my bed, I go back for more.
“Dumplin’—”
I whirl around, the musty records pressed against my chest. “It’s like you’re trying to get rid of her.”
“You know that’s not true,” she mumbles, holding a needle between her teeth.
“What are you even working on?”
“Backdrops. This year’s theme is Texas: Ain’t She Grand?” She marks the red satin with a pencil. “And aren’t you supposed to be at work?”
“I quit.”
“You quit?” Her voice is higher than normal.
She straightens a long piece of satin through her sewing machine with her foot hovering over the pedal.
All my life, the pageant has invaded every facet of my world, except for this room. Because in the world I lived in with Lucy, no one cared about crowns or sashes. “It feels disrespectful for you to be up here making your dumb costumes. I mean, what could be so hard about a Lady Liberty costume? Just throw some fabric over your shoulder.” My voice is breaking. I hold my eyes open wide, scared that if I blink a whole river of tears will come splashin’ down my cheeks.