Page 151 of Things We Burn

“And you took him back,” I said numbly, trying to reconcile a man who left his wife and newborn baby with the man who coached my soccer team, who read to me nightly, who gave me my love of food.

“Of course, I did,” she said. “I loved your father. Even if I hated him for a while for doing that. And of course, I loved you more than I could’ve hated him. The reality was, I needed him. His help, his support, his financial contribution to give you the life you deserved.”

I tried to digest all of this. Tried to put myself in my mother’s shoes. If Kane left me and Mabel because it was too hard for him… My blood sizzled at the mere thought. Panic clutched me at how deeply that wound would cut me.

Kane would never do that. But if he did, there was no way I could take him back. Though I was financially solvent, had a profession, a name for myself. My mother had been a stay at home mom since I was born. She hadn’t had anything to fall back on.

“I didn’t tell you this for many reasons,” she said after a long sigh. “First, because you were too young, and maybe because I was trying to forget myself. And because your father was your hero, I would never take that from you, never take him from you.”

I stared at my mother. I took in the softness to her eyes, the delicate lines on her face. The kindness that she had never let the world carve from her.

“You let me believe he was the hero when it was really you,” I choked out. “Youare the hero, Mom.”

She smiled back at me, and the emotion between the two of us was almost impossible to handle. I couldn’t go from being Avery Hart, ice queen, childless and loveless to Avery Hart mother, in love with Kane Rhodes, to also having somewhat of an emotionally healthy relationship with my previously-estranged mother.

Too much.

Way too much.

Luckily, my sister was the queen of timing, the thump of her music as she pulled up the driveway announcing her arrival.

“That’s why there’s such a big age gap between me and Maisie,” I realized, hearing the closing of her car door.

Mom looked toward the door, nodding. “I wanted another child, but I couldn’t do it alone. It took a long time for me to trust him again.”

“Does she know?” I asked quickly, knowing Maisie would be in the room in moments.

My mother shook her head. “I didn’t think she needed to, that she should. You’re both strong in different ways. Maybe it’s a mistake telling you this now, maybe it’s a mistake keeping it from her. I’m just doing my best.”

I saw it then, the look I saw in the mirror every day, what I’d never recognized in my Mom. Doubt. Fear over failing as a mother.

I reached over to squeeze her hand. “You’re doing great.”

The moment lingered between us, and I felt the connection between us grow, something that was just ours. It always felt like her and Maisie had things I couldn’t have, but now we had this.

The front door slammed shut.

“I come bearing sugar!” Maisie cried. And thankfully, the moment was broken.

Twenty-Four

Kaneand I didn’t have much time to talk those days. Well, we talked plenty. We talked about Mabel’s bowel movements, the amount of diapers we needed, bath time, wake windows, naps, when her last feed was, how long a particular bottle had been left out. I primarily breast fed, but Kane urged me to pump every now and again to get a break. Not that it was a break. My breasts would get engorged if I missed a feeding.

We didn’t have conversations like we used to. Long, soulful discussions about our dreams and our demons. He didn’t wax on about his feelings for me, though he still made a point to tell me he loved me at least once a day.

Our relationship was different, there was no way around it. Our chemistry still lingered, at least a whisper of it. But both of us were too tired for much else. When I had the energy, I mourned that, worried if we’d get it back since we hadn’t been together long enough to create a foundation to come back to.

The worry was exacerbated by the news of my father. That pulled the rug out from under me. I had to reevaluate the man I’d loved so fiercely. And whatever Freudian bullshit was at play, it made me rethink things with Kane.

How my feelings and past with my father were tied to my present with Kane was anyone’s guess. But my father was the man I/ trusted most in the world, and to learn that had been built on a lie shook me.

I told Kane about it, even though part of me wanted to keep it hidden, bury it back down and pretend my mother had never told me.

But already, the knowledge was corroding my insides, and the thought of keeping something like that from Kane, when he hadn’t kept anything from me, felt wrong.

I told him in whispers, after the baby was put down, glancing back at her, trying to fathom my father walking out on a baby that small.

His baby.

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