My throat runs dry listening to the footsteps approaching us. Maybe we should have FaceTimed before this so it wouldn’t feel so blind date-like.
“Roland?” Nora, I assume, calls. Her voice moving closer. There are heavier, slower steps behind her. A silent Tim.
In a few short seconds, a long, lean-ish woman stands in front of me. Eyes identical to Roland’s—and mine, with sandy hair giving way to frosty white. I’ve seen her picture plenty of times at Roland’s place, but in the flesh her presence is even bigger than I imagined. If charisma is genetic, he got his from her.
After she hugs Roland, she steps aside and lets Tim in for a manly handshake-hug combo that always cracks me up among men. He’s shorter than Roland and, unless Nora is wearing heels, he’s about an inch shorter than she is.
Yep, he’s shorter. She’s wearing adorable suede moccasins that look incredibly comfortable.
And, here’s the awkward silence. Fidgeting, seemingly unable to decide where to put their hands, or their eyes, Tim and Nora look at Roland, then over to me. Nora’s eyes settle into mine and make a home there, like she’s trying to figure out if I’m going to fight, flee, or stay.
I’m wondering the same thing.
Looking at her, I see the woman who raised the now-amazing man next to me. The woman who took him back into her home despite his transgressions against nearly everyone he came in contact with for the better part of a decade. I see love as I stare into Nora Abbot’s eyes. A mother’s love. I recognize her, somehow. In the eyes, for sure, but there’s more. Something so much more there that it startles me for a moment while I decide what to do with it.
Being the eighteen-year-old I am, I wave first.
“Hi,” I whisper, then clear my throat to avoid sounding like a shy toddler. “I’m Kennedy.” Stating the obvious somehow makes me feel better. Or, the exercise of stating my name serves to remind me that I’m really standing here and haven’t yet gone insane.
“I’m Nora.” Her shaky voice gives way to her glistening grey eyes. “It’s so nice to meet you, Kennedy.”
Her emphasis chokes me up, causing me to drop my bag and take the three steps toward her that now seem like too much distance, and wrap my arms around her. I’m hugging this non-stranger. She doesn’t feel foreign to me. Even as her arms freeze before she settles into the hug, it all feels right, and I’m wishing I met Nora Abbot a long time ago. Inexplicably, I feel like I already have.
“It’s nice to meet you, too.” Stepping back, I offer Tim a hug as well. He’s much more rigid in this interaction than his wife, but hugs me just the same.
“Oh look at us,” Nora says, wiping tears from her cheeks. “Standing around here like a couple of weeping willows. Let’s get you settled into your rooms, huh?”
I follow Nora up the stairs since she’s already carrying my bag. Looking back over my shoulder, I see Roland wipe the back of his hand over his eyes before following his dad into the kitchen, his arm wrapped around his shorter father.
I feel at home here in this house I’ve never been to, in a state I never thought I’d travel to. It’s Nora. I know it is. I feel the same pull toward her that I felt toward my RA, Maggie, when we first met.
Keep your eyes and ears open around this one. And your heart, while you’re at it.
“Here we are.” Nora opens a door and sets my bag on a bed neatly made with pale yellow sheets and a matching thick comforter folded at the foot of the bed. “Bathroom is at the other end of the hall. You’ll have the room to yourself for the next couple of days, and then once Julia and Geoff get here with their kids, we’ll figure everything out.”
My instinct to panic and/or protest is snuffed out in Nora’s presence. I simply offer a polite smile and tell her I’ll be down to join the rest of them in a moment. I need to call my mom. Her eyes stay on me a moment, as if she’s afraid I’ll disappear into thin air. Soon enough, she reaches forward, gently grabs my hand—giving it a squeeze—and leaves the room. It doesn’t feel like she leaves completely, though. Kind of like Roland, I guess, where his presence hangs out long after he’s gone. Matt says the same thing about me sometimes, though I don’t have the energy to dig into all of the comparisons.
Speaking of Matt.
In favor of not ruining my current emotional high by calling my mother, who will undoubtedly shi—crap—all over it, even if she doesn’t mean to, I dial Matt’s number.
“Hello?” he says, like he doesn’t have caller ID. I like that.
I plunk down on the bed, kicking off my shoes before stretching out on the comfortable mattress. “Hey. You home?”
“Yep. You? Oh … wait … sorry.”
I wave my hand as if he’s there. “Eh, it’s fine. But, yeah, we just got here a few minutes ago.”
“Was it weird?”
You mean like me and you? What with you rejecting me and all?
“Not as weird as this conversation.” I decide to let it all hang out since we have a couple of states between us. I think. I need a map.