The next morning, I wake at dawn in a stark raving panic. Because she can’t tell Dad. She has to promise me that. After fourteen years, I have a father, I like it. No, I love it. He finally thinks I’m a fully functioning umbrella.
I prowl through the dark house like a thief. The kitchen’s empty. I tiptoe to Mom’s bedroom door and sit down with my ear to it and wait for her to stir. It’s possible she already told Dad, though it was late when she left my room last night. Could she ruin my life anymore? First she destroyed everything with Brian. Now she’s going to do the same with Dad.
I’m falling back asleep, Brian’s lips on mine, his hands on my chest, all over me, when the sound of Mom’s voice jolts me. I shake off the phantom embrace. She must be on the phone. I cup both hands around my ear and place it against the door—does this actually work? It actually does. I can hear better. Her voice sounds strained like it gets when she talks to Dad now. “I need to see you,” she says. “It can’t wait. I’ve been up all night thinking. Something happened with Noah yesterday.” She is going to tell him! I knew it. Dad must be talking now, because it’s silent until she says, “Okay, not the studio, at The Wooden Bird. Yes, one hour’s perfect.” I don’t think she’s ever even been to his studio. She just leaves him at that hotel to rot.
I knock and then swing open the door after I hear her say come in. She’s in her peach robe, cradling the phone to her chest. Mascara’s smudged all around her eyes like she’s been crying all night. Because of me? My stomach rolls over. Because she doesn’t want a gay son? Because no one does, not even someone as open-minded as her. Her face looks old, like she’s aged hundreds of years overnight. Look what I’ve done to her. Her disappointed skin is hanging all over her disappointed bones. So she just said what she did last night to make me feel better?
“Morning, sweetheart,” she says, sounding fake. She tosses the phone on the bed and walks over to the window, opening the curtains. The sky has barely woken up yet. It’s a gray, homely morning. I think about breaking my own fingers, I don’t know why. One by one. In front of her.
“Where’re you going?” I manage out.
“I have a doctor’s appointment.” What a liar! And she lies so easily too. Has she been lying to me my whole life? “How’d you know I was going out?”
Think of something, Noah. “I just assumed because you weren’t up early baking.”
This works. She smiles, walks over to her dressing table, and sits down in front of the mirror. The Kandinsky biography she’s reading is facedown beside her silver brush. She starts rubbing cream around her eyes, then takes cotton and wipes off darkness.
(PORTRAIT: Mom Replacing Her Face with Another)
When she’s finished doing her makeup, she starts sweeping her hair up into a clip, then changes her mind, shakes it back out, picks up the brush. “I’m going to make a red velvet cake later . . .” I zone out. I just have to say it. I’m the expert blurter too. Why can’t I get the words out?
“You look so upset, Noah.” She’s staring at me through the mirror.
(PORTRAIT, SELF-PORTRAIT: Trapped in a Mirror with Mom)
I’ll tell the Mom in the mirror. It’ll be easier. “I don’t want you to mention to Dad what you saw. Not that you saw anything. Because there was nothing to see. Not that it means anything anyway . . .” Mayday, mayday.
She puts her brush down. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Absolutely okay. It’s your private business. If you want to tell your father what I didn’t see, you will. If what I didn’t see ever actually does mean something, then I encourage you to. He’s not really the way he seems sometimes. You underestimate him. You always have.”
“I underestimate him? Are you serious? He underestimates me.”
“No he doesn’t.” She holds my eyes in the mirror. “He’s just a little afraid of you, always has been.”
“Afraid of me? Sure. Dad’s afraid of me.” What’s she saying?
“He thinks you don’t like him.”
“He doesn’t like me!” Well, he didn’t. Now he does for some reason and I want to keep it this way.
She shakes her head. “You two will figure it out. I know you will.” Maybe we will, maybe we are, but not if she tells him. “You’re very much alike. You both feel things very deeply, too deeply sometimes.” What? “Jude and I have quite a bit of armor on us,” she continues. “It takes a lot to break through it. Not you and Dad.” This is news. I never thought I was anything like Dad. But what she’s really saying is that we’re both wusses. That’s what Brian thinks too. I’m just someone who “draws pictures.” And it burns in my chest that she thinks Jude’s like her and I’m not. How come everything I think about our family keeps changing? How come the teams keep switching? Is this how all families are? And most importantly, how do I know she’s not lying to me about not telling Dad? She just lied about the doctor’s appointment. Why is she meeting him then? And hello? She said: Something happened with Noah last night.
She absolutely is going to tell him. That’s why they’re going to The Wooden Bird. I can’t trust her anymore.
She walks over to her closet. “We can talk more about this later, but I really do have to get ready. My doctor’s appointment’s in less than an hour.” Pinocchio! Pants on Fire!
As I turn to leave, she says, “Everything’s going to be okay, Noah. Don’t worry.”
“You know what?” I say, bunching my fingers into fists. “I really wish you’d stop saying that, Mom.”
Of course I’m going to follow her. When I hear the car back out of the driveway, I make a run for it. On the trails, I can get to The Wooden Bird almost as fast as she can by car.