I fall into his arms and he squeezes me tight. Then he pulls away and kisses me lightly on the lips.
As I walk away from him through the small crowds of people in the terminal, I want to look back not only because I feel his eyes on me, but because I’m not ready to let go. Because I’ll never be ready to let go. And as I slip around the corner and out of his sight, in an instant I feel his gaze disappear. Tears stream down my cheeks all the way onto the plane. And when it takes off, I look out the window, not with fear but with a broken heart.
THIRTY-TWO
Sienna
Your father is really upset, Sienna,” my mom tells me as she comes into the living room with an envelope in her hand three days later.
She sits in her recliner and places the envelope, tattered at the top indicating it’s already been opened, down on the end table between us. With my legs drawn up on the sofa, I glance over at her casually, my eyes skirting the envelope.
“I know he is, but he’ll get over it.”
“You know how your father is,” she says, “and I can’t say that I disagree with him. You should’ve come to us first.”
“I did,” I tell her. “A few times actually, Mom, and you both always shoot me down when I try to help.”
“Because our bills are our responsibility,” she says. “How do you think it makes us feel, Sienna? We worked so hard to give you a good life, saved up every extra penny we earned to put you through college. We didn’t spend our lives working so hard just so you can spend your savings to pay our bills—we don’t want you to struggle like we did.”
I glance over.
“I appreciate everything you and Dad did for me, but if you want to know the truth, you gave up too much.”
Her brown eyes slant with confusion behind her thin golden glasses.
I sigh heavily and turn around more on the sofa to face her fully, dropping my feet on the floor.
“Mom, you and Dad never saw each other. My childhood was nights with Mom and days with Dad. The only time I ever remember seeing you two together was on a holiday every now and then.” I lean forward on the sofa, interlocking my fingers and dropping my hands between my knees, my elbows propped on the tops of my legs. “I love you both for giving up pretty much everything for me—I couldn’t ask for better parents—but you and Dad missed so much of each other. Even now, when you don’t have to support me anymore, you still struggle to pay your bills, and when I talk to either of you on the phone, or in person, you sound … tired. I’m gone and you still never see each other.”
I stand up and begin to gesture my hands as the gravity of their situation hits me harder.
“How often do you and Dad go out on that boat?” She starts to answer, but I cut her off because it wasn’t so much a question as it was the beginning of me making a point. “Once, twice a year, maybe?” I say, pacing the carpeted floor. “Uncle Stevie talked Daddy into buying that boat. Took you five years to pay it off and he hardly ever uses it—talk Daddy into selling the boat, Mom.”
“But he likes to go out on the water, Sienna,” she says from the recliner. “When we do get a chance to use it, what will we do when we don’t have it anymore?”
“Rent one for a day,” I tell her without flinching. “You could sell that boat and pay off the car at least, and then that once or twice a year he wants to go out on the water, rent a boat for a day—if it’s not something you do every day, you don’t need it.”