“But she’s already on her way. No worries, Mom, right? It’ll work out, right?”
“Of course it will.” But as she closed the door behind her and they drove away, I knew better. Some things you just knew in your bones.
I lay down on the bed fully dressed. Prepared. I hoped I would feel foolish yet relieved when my sweet Ellen walked in before midnight, her usual happy self.
My apprehension probably wasn’t even about Ellen but a result of the day’s accumulated stress. I felt the way an emotional punching bag might. Had it been only a couple of hours since Roger had come by and basically broken up with me? Is that what he’d done? Or was it a sort of ultimatum? Or simple honesty, maybe.
I hadn’t had the opportunity to process what he’d said before Ellen came home begging to know more about her father.
I sat up in bed, pushing the pillows back against the headboard.
How dare these people put Ellen on the spot? Shame on them.
Despite the worries running through my brain, I dozed off, upright and all. I awoke to the sound of rain and a very distant rumble of thunder. The only light was from my phone screen, and as I noticed the time was eleven thirty, it rang. Ellen’s ring.
She was either on her way home or telling me she’d be late.
I picked it up and answered.
“Mom?” she said. Her voice sounded wrong. Shaky.
“Where are you?”
“I’m walking home. Could you come get me?”
“I’m on my way. Tell me where.”
“A few blocks from Bonnie’s house. I walked up to the main road to 522.”
“Stay off the road and don’t look like you’re hitchhiking. I’ll have my interior light on so you can see it’s me coming. I’m on my way.”
The rain dotted my windshield. It was a warm night, and the rain was light, but whatever had happened to Ellen had resulted in her fleeing into the night, reduced to calling her mom to come get her. Unconscionable. Someone should pay for this. No one had the right to treat a young person this way, especially not my daughter.
Then the fear started. Suppose I drove and drove and didn’t find her? Young people vanished . . .
Not Ellen. I wouldn’t allow it.
If she wasn’t there, if I didn’t find her, there’d be no limit to what I’d do. I’d move heaven and earth.
Thankfully, she stepped onto the road and waved. She was near the tall neon sign at Dell’s Diner. I pulled into the parking lot. She’d walked farther than I thought. Sad. Bedraggled-looking. She seemed in control, though. For me, however, it was all about anger. Sometimes anger was hot, sometimes icy. Tonight it was both. I grabbed the blanket I kept in the back and wrapped it around my child and ushered her into the passenger seat.
“Are you all right?” I asked.
She nodded. “Just wet.”
“What happened?”
“Can we go home, Mom?”
“I want to know.”
“I want to go home.”
Once we were back on the road, I tried a different tack. “Is Bonnie OK?”
“She’s fine.” After several moments with her eyes averted, she finally said, “I didn’t know John and Braden would be there.”
“Braden . . . but he has a broken arm.”
“Yes, but he came with John anyway. Bonnie bought enough food for all of us, so she knew they were coming, though she pretended she didn’t. And then her parents got home early, and they got mad at Bonnie. And then, for some reason, Braden’s dad came over. He’d been drinking. I could smell it. And he acted like it. Next thing I knew he was saying stuff about Braden and me staying away from each other.” Ellen stared at me. “He said you told him we shouldn’t be together. Did you?”
I gripped the steering wheel so hard I was sure the dents would be permanent. “Sort of, but only in terms of not messing up your college plans.”
“Well, he made it sound like something else, something dirty. They all started talking about my father again. Like how they didn’t remember him being in high school with them. I told them. I told them what you said about his running track and all that. About how you met him at a party at the river.”
“Oh, honey.” I closed my eyes, but I couldn’t keep them closed. I had to focus on the road.
“Braden’s dad started laughing.”
“He’s an idiot. A self-important, drunken idiot. I’m sorry, Ellen.”
She was silent for a long moment, then she spoke softly. “I want to go home, that’s all,” she repeated.
As much as I wanted to punish Spencer, and Bonnie’s parents, too, this was my fault.
“At first, I didn’t understand,” Ellen said. “There was a lot of winking and laughter . . . You know the kind of laughter where other people know the joke, but you don’t? And you laugh politely because you don’t know that you’re the joke?”
“Yes.”
“Braden’s father was joking about how Braden and I were . . . might be . . . related. Like brother and sister, except we weren’t . . . Braden’s father said, according to you. He asked Bonnie’s dad if he was my father. Like it was a big joke. Because somebody was, he said, and nobody knew who the lucky daddy was.” She gave a sob and clapped her hand over her face while she regained control. “I wasn’t going to tell you all that, Mom. I’m sorry. Braden was embarrassed. He left with John. He left me there, Mom.”
Another long moment of silence followed, then she resumed. “Bonnie was going to bring me home, but her car was blocked in, and I wouldn’t wait because . . . I couldn’t. I’m so sorry.”
“You’re sorry? None of this is your fault. It’s my fault for my decisions. Spencer Bell’s fault for being the jerk that he is. Shame on Bonnie’s parents, too, for letting him say such things. They know you. They should’ve kicked him out instead of encouraging him.”
She shook her head. “I don’t want to be angry, Mom. Not at anyone. What they or anyone says shouldn’t, doesn’t change who I am. I know that. But I can’t help it, Mom. It still hurts.”
I reached over and stroked her hair. Ellen was now living with the results of the decisions I’d made fifteen years ago, and decisions made before that when I dated Spencer. If I hadn’t accepted the job with Babs . . . If Grand hadn’t passed . . . If I’d gone on to college after graduation.
If I had, I wouldn’t have Ellen, and I couldn’t regret that. But I would do everything I could to ensure she didn’t repeat my mistakes.
We pulled into the garage, and I helped her out of the car.
“I’m fine, Mom. Or I will be.”
“I’m sorry, sweetheart. I’m sorry I did things in the wrong order and that you lost your father and never got to know him. I’m sorry it’s made you uncomfortable, ever, even once in your life.” I opened the door into the house. “And I’m sorry that left an opening for idiots like Spencer Bell to intrude.”
“Mom. Please don’t say anything to anyone. Not to Braden or his father or to Bonnie’s parents. No one. I can handle this. If you get involved, it will be worse.”
“I hear what you’re saying, Ellen. I’ll have to think about it, though. I understand about not talking to your friends. I know it will blow over with them. But these adults? They should know better.”