Pearl eyed her. “You don’t look so good.”
“Back to bed,” Mia said calmly. “You’ve been through a lot today.” In the bedroom, she settled Lexie onto the mattress again and spread the comforter over her and patted her back gently, as if she were a child. It was oddly soothing.
“Shit,” Lexie said. “The robocall. My parents will know I cut.” Shaker Heights took attendance seriously: at the start of each class, a teacher filled out a Scantron marking anyone absent. Back in the main office, a secretary ran the attendance sheets through a machine and a recorded call went out to the parents’ home phone, alerting them about their truant children.
“I called you in,” Mia said. “After you and Pearl got here. I said you weren’t feeling well today and you’d be out all day and tomorrow.”
Lexie felt as if her head were made of wood. “But you need a parent to excuse you,” she mumbled, pushing herself up on her forearms. The room began to wobble.
“I told them I was your mother. How would they know the difference?” Mia put a hand on Lexie’s shoulder and gently pushed her back down. Her voice, Lexie thought, was so calm. As if she knew how to get away with anything. “Rest,” Lexie heard her say, and she was asleep almost at once.
When she woke again, it was late evening. She lay in the dimness, watching the sky darken, until Mia knocked on the door carrying a steaming mug of tea. “I thought you might be thirsty,” she said, and Lexie accepted the cup and took a grateful sip. Peppermint. Under her fingers the mug was comfortingly solid, like a warm, strong shoulder.
“I called your father,” Mia said. Her mother, Lexie remembered suddenly, was supposed to arrive home the next afternoon.
“Shit,” she whispered. “Did you tell him?”
“I told him you were staying over here tonight. That Pearl had asked you to sleep over.”
After a moment, Lexie said, “Thanks.”
“You can stay as long as you need to. But I’m betting you’ll be ready to go home tomorrow.”
Lexie turned the mug around slowly between her palms. “And then?”
“Then it’s up to you what you do. Who you tell.”
Mia got up to leave, but Lexie, in a panic, grabbed her hand.
“Wait,” she said. “Do you think I made a huge mistake?” She gulped. “Do you think I’m a terrible person?” She had never given much thought to Mia, but suddenly it felt crucial to know if Mia disapproved of her. In the face of Mia’s kindness, she could not bear it if Mia disapproved of her.
“Oh, Lexie.” Mia sat down again, still holding Lexie’s hand. “You were in a very hard situation. A situation no one wants to be in.”
“But what if I chose wrong?” Lexie paused, closing her eyes, trying to feel that spark of life that she’d been so certain was cartwheeling inside her before. “Maybe I should have kept it. Maybe I should have told Brian. We could have made it work.”
“Would you have been ready to be a good mother?” Mia asked. “The kind of mother you’d have wanted to be? The kind of mother a child deserves?” They sat in silence for a few minutes, Mia’s hand warm on Lexie’s. Lexie felt an overwhelming urge to lean her head on Mia’s shoulder, and after a moment, she did. For the first time, she wondered what it would have been like to grow up as Pearl, to have Mia as her mother, to have this life as her life. The thought made her a bit dizzy.
“You’ll always be sad about this,” Mia said softly. “But it doesn’t mean you made the wrong choice. It’s just something that you have to carry.” She sat Lexie up gently and gave her a pat on the shoulder, then bent to pick up the empty mug.
“But do you think I made the wrong choice?” Lexie persisted. She felt sure Mia would know.
Mia paused, one hand on the doorknob. “I don’t know, Lexie,” she said. “I think you’re the only one who can know that.” The door closed softly behind her.
When Lexie opened her eyes, it was early morning. There was no sign of anyone, but someone had turned the lamp off, and someone had set a glass of water at her bedside.
Pearl was in the kitchen, eating a bowl of cereal.
“You look better,” she said to Lexie. “You okay?”
“Getting there.” Lexie settled herself gingerly onto the other mismatched chair opposite Pearl. “Where’s your mom?”
“At your house. She went over to clean early. She’s doing lunch shift at the restaurant today.” Pearl suddenly remembered Lexie’s views on the McCullough case and decided not to mention the reason for the unusual schedule: Bebe was meeting with her lawyer to prepare for the hearing, which was starting in less than two weeks, and had asked Mia to cover for her at work. Instead she nudged the box of cereal toward Lexie, who tipped it toward her and took a handful.
“Did she sleep on the floor?”
“With me.”
“Sorry.”
Pearl shrugged. “It’s okay. We’re used to it. Sometimes we don’t have space for two beds.” She slid a bowl across the table. “Don’t eat it out of the box, pour some out. Freak.” Lexie seemed much younger somehow, and she couldn’t tell if it was the morning light, soft and pale yellow, or Lexie herself—no makeup, hair loose around her face—or the strangeness of this moment, of Lexie breakfasting in her kitchen, of what they’d been through together the day before.
“Your mom was really nice to me last night.” Lexie stirred the cereal in her bowl.
“My mom is nice,” Pearl said, with a prickle of pride.
“I always thought she didn’t like me.”
“Well.” Pearl considered. She, too, had had this feeling, but could sense now that something had shifted. “I don’t think you knew each other.”
“You think she likes me now?” Lexie asked at last.
“Maybe.” Pearl grinned, and Lexie got up, slung an arm around her, and kissed her on the cheek.
The night before, as they lay side by side in Pearl’s little twin bed, Mia had reached out to rub her daughter’s back, something she hadn’t done in years. When Pearl had been young, they had often shared a bed: it was easier to find one mattress than two, of course, but there had also been an intense comfort in being close together, like small animals sheltered deep in their den. As Pearl had grown taller, sharing a bed became less and less feasible, and it had been a long time since they’d lain together this way.
“Poor Lexie,” Mia murmured. “Such a hard place to be in.” There was something she felt she needed to say, but she wasn’t sure how, and after a moment she simply plunged in. “Are you—do you—” She paused. “We’ve never really had this talk before.”
Pearl pulled away and flopped abruptly onto her back. “Oh my god, Mom. Let’s not do this.”
“I just want to make sure you know how to be careful.” Mia rubbed a scratch on her thumbnail. She’d nicked it the day before, working on something. “I know you and Moody are very close.”
Beside her she felt Pearl’s whole body go very still, then, just as suddenly, relax again.