Page 22 of A Very Miller-Cooper Life

“I feel like my soul has been sucked from my body.”

Reagan laughed as she continued to hold my hand tightly. “I'm not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.”

“Honestly, me either.”

“It’s fireworks time,” my mom practically shouted into my ear as my dad guided her in the same way Reagan was guiding me.

I pointed my thumb between Reagan and my dad. “We’ve got some good ones here, don’t we?”

“We sure do,” my mom said with a wink.

I smiled in satisfaction until it hit me what she had just said, then my jaw fell to the ground. “Wait. Do you really mean it?”

“Of course I do.” My mom pulled away from my dad to put her arm around Reagan. “Reagan is my girl.”

Reagan put her arm around my mom as well. “Yeah, Charlie. We’re girls.”

I watched as my mom and wife walked together with their arms still draped over each other’s shoulders. Reagan leaned in and whispered something to my mom that she threw her head back in laughter in response to. It was like watching what my life could be like if my mom actually acted like a normal human, and I loved it. There was a pull in my chest as I longed for this to be my reality.Who knows? Maybe I’ll wake up tomorrow and it will be.I immediately laughed at myself. Even high, I wasn’t naive enough to believe that would be the case.

Reagan looked over her shoulder and smiled at me. “Everything okay back there?”

“Everything is great.”

“Get up here.” My mom waved her hand at me. “I want to watch the fireworks with my two daughters.”

I did as I was told, a smile forming that was so big, it made my face hurt, as I skipped to catch up to Reagan and my mom. While I would never encourage anyone to purposely drug their mom, I couldn’t help but be thankful for this night. It was, by far, one of the best nights of my life.

***

“Charlotte, please come out here.”

At first I had no idea why my mom was lightly tapping on my door and insisting on seeing me before the sun even came up. I was certain I would have heard if my kids were awake, which meant it was even too early for them.What the hell?

All at once, it hit me. The memories from the night before flooded my mind and played out in front of me as if I was watching a movie. It honestly would have been a pretty funny movie if I didn’t have the impending conversation with my mom.

“Coming,” I said as calmly as possible, even though, in reality, my heart was beating out of my chest.

I am a thirty-four-year-old woman with a doctorate, a wife, and three children. Why am I still terrified of my mother?

When I opened the bedroom door, my mom was standing outside of it tapping her foot on the ground. Gone was the carefree woman from the night before. Back was the uptight mom I was all too familiar with.

“About last night…” I started.Might as well get this over with.

“Yes. That’s why I’m here. To tell you that we will not be speaking of last night.” She paused for a moment then cleared her throat. “Ever.”

I could feel my body relax. This really was the best case scenario. I was expecting much worse from her. “That works for me.”

“Good.” My mother nodded toward the doorway, her body rigid and mouth in a straight line. “You may go back to sleep now.”

As I began to walk back into the bedroom, I could feel my relief mixing with something else—disappointment. Even though I knew it was for the best that we didn’t talk about it since I was sure it wouldn’t be a positive conversation, there was part of me that didn’t want to forget last night. I wanted to grab onto that side of my mother and never let her go. I wanted to know if she really meant everything she said last night. Maybe underneath all of her deep-seated homophobia, she was actually a human who wanted a real relationship with me and my wife, not just the surface-level bullshit from the past few years.

I guess I would never find out. Still, I couldn’t stop myself from turning around to look at my mom once more. Even though I knew all of our problems couldn’t be solved by one night of debauchery together, the woman standing in front of me still appeared different somehow. I didn’t know if I would ever see my mom the same again, and in this case, that was a good thing.

“I know you’ll probably get mad at me for saying this, but for what it’s worth, I had a really great time with you last night.”

My mom’s face remained serious as she pointed a finger at me.Great. Here comes the lecture.

“I will deny ever saying this, but,” her face softened and a smile parted her lips, “I had a really good time, too.” She winked at me then turned around without another word, leaving me to wonder if the past fourteen hours had been one prolonged dream.

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