Page 139 of Cashmere Ruin

One of the techniques Dr. Knox recommended was mindfulness: closing your eyes, meditating, the whole shebang.

I take a deep breath. Then I take three more, because one lungful of oxygen is not nearly enough to deal with the demonic spawn in front of me. “What are you doing here, Mom?”

Predictably, Eleanor pouts. “Is that any way to greet your mother?”

“My mother I haven’t seen for half a year?”

It’s not just that, of course. Everything I don’t say hovers in the air between us: how our last meeting ended, the vicious fight we had. The fightshebrought to my doorstep.

It makes me wonder what else she brought this time. I check discreetly for pitchforks, but find none, and the air smells more like lavender than it does sulfur and brimstone.

“Ain’t no busier job,” she sing-songs. “You know how it is, of course. You’re in the Mommy Club now!”

“The Mommy what? Wait—how did you make it past the guards?”

“I have my ways.” She then proceeds to push right past me. “Where’s my little girl? My cutesy-patootsie grandbaby?”

Here we go.“She’s in her crib. Don’t wake her.”

“Who do you take me for? I’ve had two, in case you—OW!”

Buttons hisses from the crib, his paw raised like a fluffy scorpion tail, claws in full view. “Mind the cat,” I warn belatedly.

“This ugly, mangy thing. I can’t believe you’d let it anywhere near the baby!”

“I’ve let worse things near the baby,” I remark. “Mangieranduglier.”

She pretends not to hear me, which is a pity, because that was really a high-quality burn. “Shoo, shoo!”

With a roll of my eyes, I pick up Buttons from the crib. “Run like the wind, boy,” I mutter into his furry little head before setting it free in the living room. He immediately dives under the couch.

I wonder if there’s room for two under there. Anywhere, really, to avoid the puppy-eyed look my mother is currently giving me.

I pick up the baby. Eleanor’s face goes bright, her arms stretching out immediately.

I settle May against my chest, ignoring her. “What do you want, Mom?”

“Is it so strange I’d want to catch up?” she bristles. “Meet my grandkid, see how my daughter’s doing?”

“Yes,” I reply immediately. “It is strange.”

I’ve been down this road before. I’m not doing it again: hoping she’s changed, seeing only what I want to see, too much wishing and not enough thinking.

I refuse.

Every time I bared my heart to her, I was left bleeding. No more.

“Is this about Charlie?” I ask—the only part of her life I still give a damn about. “Is he okay?”

“Of course he’s okay,” she says. “This isn’t about him, sweetie. This is about you.I just… wanted to see you, that’s all. To congratulate you.”

“You’re six months late for that.”

“Not on the baby.” She shakes her head. “I mean, yes, of course, the baby’s wonderful—but about the contest.”

“The contest?” I blink. “How do you know about…?”

“Never mind how I know,” she dismisses. “Mothers always know.”

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