Complicated. That was exactly what my mom had said.
“She got in touch with me around the same time she started getting tested. She knew she was sick, just not with what, and I think she had a feeling. Anyway, I want you to know I would have been there. If I’d known. I just . . .” He rested his hand on the table, palm-side up. “I guess I just want a chance. I’m not expecting miracles. I know this is hard. Your grandmother told me you really didn’t want to come here, and I understand that. I just want you to know that I really appreciate having this chance to get to know you.”
He met my eyes, and suddenly I wished with all my heart that I could evaporate, like the steam still curling off my pizza.
I pushed away from the table. “I . . . I need to find the bathroom.” I sprinted to the front of the restaurant, barely making it inside the restroom before the tears started rolling.
Being here was awful. Before today I’d known exactly who my mother was, and she certainly wasn’t this woman who loved violets or sent her daughter mysterious journals or forgot to tell the father of her child that—oh, by the way, you have a daughter!
It took all three minutes of “Here Comes the Sun” to get myself under control, mostly deep breathing, and when I finally cracked the door open, Howard was still sitting at the table, his shoulders slumped. I watched him for a moment, anger settling over me like a fine dusting of Parmesan cheese.
My mother had kept us apart for sixteen years. Why were we together now?
Chapter 7
THAT NIGHT I COULDN’T SLEEP.
Howard’s bedroom was upstairs too, and the floorboards creaked as he walked down the hall. I didn’t know about you. Why?
The clock on my bedroom wall made an irritating tick-tick-tick. I hadn’t noticed it the night before, but suddenly the noise was unbearable. I pulled a pillow over my head, but that didn’t help, plus it was kind of suffocating. There was a breeze blowing through my window and my violets kept swaying like Deadheads at a concert.
Okay. Fine. I switched on my lamp and took the ring off my finger, studying it in the light. Even though my mother hadn’t seen Howard in more than sixteen years, she’d worn the ring he’d given her. Every single day.
But why? Had they really been in love, like Sonia had said? And if so, what had torn them apart?
Before I could lose my nerve, I opened my nightstand drawer and felt for the journal.
I lifted the front cover:
I made the wrong choice.
A chill moved down my spine. My mother had written in thick black marker, and the words sprawled across the inside cover like a row of spiders. Was this a message to me? A kind of precursor to whatever I was about to read?
I mustered up my courage, then turned to the front page. Now or never.
MAY 22
Question. Immediately following your meeting with the admissions officers at University of Washington (where you’ve just given official notice that you will not be starting nursing school in the fall) do you:
A. go home and tell your parents what you’ve done
B. have a complete panic attack and run back into the office claiming a temporary lapse in sanity
C. go out and buy yourself a journal
Answer: C
True, you will eventually have to tell your parents. And also true, you purposely timed your appointment so the office would be closing as you walked out. But as soon as the dust settles I’m sure you’ll remember all the reasons why you just did what you did. Time to walk yourself into the nearest bookstore and blow your budget on a fancy new journal—because as scary as this moment is, it’s also the moment when your life (your real life) begins.
Journal, it’s official. As of one hour and twenty-six minutes ago I am no longer a future nursing student. Instead, in just three weeks I will be packing up my things (aka, whatever my mother doesn’t smash when she hears the news) and boarding a plane for Florence, Italy (ITALY!), to do what I’ve always wanted to do (PHOTOGRAPHY!) at the Fine Arts Academy of Florence (FAAF!).
Now I just have to brainstorm how I’ll break the news to my parents. Most of my ideas involve placing an anonymous call from somewhere in Antarctica.
MAY 23
Well, I told them. And it somehow went even worse than I expected. To the casual observer, The Great Parental Fallout would have sounded something like this:
Me: Mom, Dad, there’s something I need to tell you.
Mom: Good heavens. Hadley, are you pregnant?
Dad: Rachelle, she doesn’t even have a boyfriend.
Me: Dad, thanks for pointing that out. And, Mom, not quite sure why you jumped straight to pregnant. [Clears throat] I want to talk to you about a recent life decision I’ve made. [Wording taken directly from a book called Savvy Communication: How to Talk So They’ll Agree.]
Mom: Good heavens. Hadley, are you gay?