Page 56 of Bad & Bossy

“Costa Rica is its own country.”

“Whatever. Toe-may-toe, toe-mah-toe.”

“It’s perfectly safe,” I added. “We’ll be at an all-inclusive with everyone else from work. Why are you so concerned?”

“Because you don’t have to take him. You could leave him here with me and our parents, Dana,” she snapped, grabbing a bottle out of the fridge the second Drew began to make a fuss. “You act like you couldn’t possibly fathom them watching him, but they’re more than capable. Instead, you pawn him off on me or the fucking nanny.”

I stared at her in disbelief. She’d managed to keep her massive mouth quiet for a week about Mom and Dad, but now, on the same day that Lottie had berated me for my thought process when it came to Cole, Vee wanted to berate me for my thought process when it came to them. “I can’t do this with you right now,” I bit back, swallowing the horrible things I wanted to spit at her.

“I don’t care,” Vee said. “I mean, for Christ’s sake, Dana, take him with you. But keeping him from Mom and Dad is just fucking cruel at this point.”

“Cruel?” I laughed. I snatched the bottle from her hands before she could give it to Drew herself and plucked the plastic cap off. “You know what’s cruel? Fucking over your daughter so badly she had to repeat her sophomore year of high school.”

Vee’s brows shot up. “Don’t tell me you’re still mad about that. It was an honest mistake!”

“Sure. Believe that all you want,” I snapped, kneeling down on the carpet by Drew’s swing and switching off the motor that rocked him back and forth. He gratefully accepted the bottle. “But you and I know damn well Mom knew what she was doing. She told me she’d talked to the school!”

“She probably did and forgot what they’d said,” Vee countered, crossing her arms over her chest as she loomed over me. “How was she supposed to navigate that? Call them again?”

“She could have just listened to my protests when I told her I couldn’t go on a fucking cross-country road trip because I had exams! She could have trusted me when I said I’d fail if I didn’t turn up for them!”

“You know how much that trip meant to her,” Vee hissed.

“No, I don’t, because she was drunk the entire goddamn time.” I stood from Drew, taking a step toward my sister and forcing her away from us. “She was always drunk. Always relapsing. Anytime she told you she loved you, Vee, she was fucking wasted. At every soccer game of yours she attended, she had a flask in her purse. Every good moment of our lives was overshadowed by the goddamn demon hiding in the background. Do you not remember how many times she forgot to pick us up from school? Or how many times she passed out before making us dinner and Dad was on night shifts so we went to bed hungry?”

Vee’s face paled as she stepped back. “You have to learn to let it go. She apologized.”

“She never fucking apologized,” I laughed, the sound of it far too angry to be perceived as anything else. “Not really. She doesn’t give a shit, Vee, and I’m not letting her or our enabler father anywhere near my son.”

————

The autumn wind whipped against my cheeks as I pushed through my run, uninhibited from leaving Drew with Vee. I needed to take out my anger on anything but them, and my ankles were the nearest and easiest victim.

Panting and in pain, I slowed my pace until I was walking, barely reaching the bench I liked to consider my end point before heading back home. I collapsed onto it, winded and still filled to the brim with anger, and tried to catch my breath.

Why did it always come back to this? Why was every problem in my life, every argument, every horrible thought connected to my mother? Why couldn’t I have had a normal childhood instead of one where I had to worry for my imminent safety every time I got into a car with her, instead of one where I locked myself in my room every time a bottle was opened?

And why did it have to affect the swirling, confusing emotions I had for Cole?

“You okay there?”

Dragging my hands down my face and fully ready to tell the male owner of the voice to fuck off, I turned to my right, locking eyes with a man just a few inches shorter than Cole with shoulder-length black hair tied back in a ponytail. He’d been out running, too, based on his clothing. There was an unconventional handsomeness to him, an air of confidence I wished I felt. “I’m fine,” I sighed.

“You sure about that?” he said, coming a little closer. He held up his palms as I shot him a glare. “Sorry, sorry. I don’t really know what to do when happening upon a pretty girl that looks like she’s about to cry.”

“I’m not about to cry,” I shot back, relaxing into the conversation just a little. “I’ve had a stressful evening and I thought a run would help, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.”

“I’m sorry about that,” he offered. “I’m Robert. Just moved in down the road.”

I gave him a tight smile. “Dana.”

A grin spread across his lips as he offered his hand. “Nice to meet you, Dana. I think I’ve seen you out running before. You’ve got a kid, right?”

I nodded, shaking his hand. A creeping suspicion tingled in the back of my mind, a small, minor worry that maybe I shouldn’t have confirmed that to a stranger, but if he lived in my neighborhood, he was likely to know that anyway. “Honestly, I’m fine, but I appreciate you checking on me.”

“Of course. I hope whatever is going on for you gets better, Dana,” he said. “And at the risk of sounding too forward, I hope I get to see you around here again.”

I huffed out a little laugh. The attention was nice, even if it was coming from a stranger. But still, my thoughts filtered back toward Cole, to the feelings I knew damn well were building between us. I only wished that wasn’t the source of half of my stress.

---