Page 24 of Chasing Your Ghost

Edith’s lips pursed. “I don’t want talk of it in this house. My husband doesn’t know, and it needs to stay that way.”

Riley had been lifting a spoon of Corn Flakes toward her mouth but slowly lowered it back down as she considered the woman in front of her. “Why are you so scared of him finding out?” she asked, her voice quiet but cold. “Do you think he’ll want me gone if he finds out the truth? Do you think he’ll react the same way you did?”

Edith flinched. “Hugh is extremely religious,” she explained carefully. “But he’s also very closed-minded about things like this. He won’t believe that you can see ghosts.”

“I think you’re underestimating your husband,” Riley retorted, her hands shaking as her fingernails dug into her palms.

“I will not have a debate with you about this. We’re not telling him, and that’s final.”

Riley let out a humorless laugh. “And you wonder why I didn’t want to see you anymore and why I refused to come here until now. You still think of my abilities as a curse. You’re still scared of what I can do, and you’re terrified of what your new family will think of me because you can’t even begin to imagine that my gift is anything but unnatural and evil.”

“I’m only trying to protect you,” Edith argued, falling back on her same old tired excuse. “If they found out and couldn’t handle it or if they don’t believe you, how would that make you feel?”

“It would probably be less painful than finding out my mom left me when I was only a baby because she couldn’t handle the way I stared at people that she couldn’t see,” Riley hissed through gritted teeth.

Edith was staring at her, speechless and misty-eyed, when Hugh came back into the room with Olivia trailing behind him.

“What’s going on?” he asked.

Edith straightened in her seat and cleared her throat. “I was just explaining to Riley that we will not tolerate any underage drinking,” she lied in the most fury-inducing manner possible. “After the way I found her in New York, I thought laying some ground rules would be necessary.”

Riley hated the shame that coursed through her when Hugh’s eyes moved to rest on her. Edith had found her in a moment of weakness, and it was just Riley’s luck that the first and only time she’d decided to drink had coincided with Edith’s early arrival. But it had been a mistake she’d made after saying goodbye to her dad. It had been the act of a grief-stricken daughter who’d wanted to numb the pain. It had been a momentary lapse of judgment, and Riley didn’t deserve to be judged on that alone.

“That was the first time I’ve ever had a drink,” she defended herself now. “I don’t do that sort of thing.”

“We understand how hard it must have been for you,” Hugh replied gently before his attention shifted to his daughter, who was listening in with unveiled interest. “Olivia, go wait in the car,“ he said, taking a pair of car keys from his pocket and handing them to her. “Now,” he added when she didn’t immediately move.

“I’m going,” she retorted in that annoyed voice that teenagers around the globe had perfected over the decades.

“I can’t imagine how difficult it was for you,” he began again once the sixteen-year-old was out of earshot. “But Edith is right. It needs to be made clear that we won’t accept that kind of behavior in our house under any circumstances.”

“In case you didn’t hear me the first time, it was a one-time thing,” Riley said, regretting her words and her tone almost immediately. Hugh had been kind to her— it was Edith who she was truly angry with. And speak of the devil…

“Riley,” she sighed.

“Edith, why don’t you go wait with Olivia in the car,” Hugh suggested. “I’ll be there in a minute.”

Edith nervously looked between her husband and Riley. “Alright,” she replied after several seconds of tense silence. “But don’t be long. We’re already running late.”

Her heels clicked on the tile, the sound changing as she moved onto the wooden floor of the entrance hall, and the smell of her floral perfume wafted behind her, lingering in the room even after she’d closed the front door behind her.

“I’m sorry,” Riley whispered, unable to meet Hugh’s eyes and the disappointment they probably held.

“It’s alright,” he replied. “This is an adjustment for all of us, but we’ll figure it out. It just might take some time.”

An adjustment was a vast understatement. “I don’t want to be here,” Riley said bluntly. “I don’t think time will help with that.”

“I know you’re angry with your mother, but I hope you know how much she regrets leaving you.” Hugh ran a hand through his graying hair and sat across from her. “Did you know I met her when she was still trying to convince your father to give her another chance with you?”

Riley shook her head.

“I’d seen her at our church once or twice before we officially met, and she’d always looked so sad and lost. It’s why I approached her. I wanted to help her with whatever she was going through that made her look so hopeless. I know you don’t believe it, but that woman loves you with everything she has. She would have done anything to see you again, and every day that your dad made her wait was like torture to her.”

Riley’s back straightened. “My dad was doing the right thing,” she said, not appreciating the implication of her stepfather’s words.

“I’m not saying he wasn’t trying to do what was best for you, and I don’t blame him for being hesitant to let Edith back into your life. All I’m trying to say is that there wasn’t a day that went by that Edith didn’t miss you. She’d been sick, but after getting help, all she wanted was to see you and hold you again. And once she was allowed to see you for short visits, her parents and I watched her die a slow and agonizing death every time she came back without her daughter.”

“Seeing me for even a few hours was more than she deserved,” Riley muttered, refusing to feel pity for her egg donor. If the story had ended there, she could have found a way to forgive Edith, but after what her mother had put her through with that priest, Riley couldn’t see her as anything but the enemy.

---