Page 120 of Every Chance After

“It feels important.” I lean forward, locking in her stare. “I want toknowyou. Better than I know myself. Your loves. Your hurts. All of it. I want to be the one whotrulyknows you. More than anything. Starting withThe Sound of Music.”

Her apprehension melts under my gaze. “Fine, if you promise to tell me about the piano.”

I hide an internal cringe but nod. “Fair enough.”

“The Sound of Musicwas the first school activity I ever tried to do,” she says with a weak smile. “It was just me and my mom. We moved frequently, always searching for Mom’s version of the perfect place to call home. Seagrove came closest. We were here a year, longer than we’d ever stayed anywhere. She’s a hairstylist and had a great job at Mel’s—they were good friends. Still are, I think.”

She moves her rook—a bad choice. But I say nothing, fixing my eyes on her as she tells her story.

“I’d just gotten the job at Sunny’s. I remember Cora saying, ‘Welcome to the family,’ when she hired me.” Her smile returns, but only for a moment. “Things were the best they’d ever been.”

She sits up, twiddling her fingers as she tries to talk, nerves growing as her memories pain her.

“Mom taught me games. That’s what we’d do when money was short—it wasalwaysshort. She taught me to read and do math through games. She was a good mom. I loved her. But she struggled.”

“With what?” I make a quick, throwaway move.

“Bipolar disorder. She called it upsies and downsies. I didn’t understand it growing up. She’d bounce off the walls one minute, excited to take me on some wonderful adventure. Then, she’d crash. Spend days, weeks, in bed. It was… day to day, I never knew what mom I’d get.”

“Fuck, that must’ve been hard. How did you handle that?”

She shrugs lightly. “I made the best of it.”

“How? You were just a kid.”

“Kids adapt, don’t they? I adapted to whatever she was and learned to care for myself. It wasn’t that bad. I had freedoms most kids didn’t. She taught me to be creative and independent. When she was up, she was so fun.”

“But when she was down?”

She lets out a resigned sigh and refocuses on the game like she’d rather forget the rest and certainly doesn’t want to discuss it. Her brow scrunches in contemplation, but she’s lost the game already and can’t figure out what to do.

So, I lean forward, swiping the chessboard with a hard forearm. The pieces clatter to the floor, and surely people look. But I fixate on her and reach for her hands across the empty board.

Her hands find mine but hesitantly. “How romantic,” she says.

“I forfeit. Finish your story. Tell me about when she was down.”

“It was like she wasn’t there at all,” she says in a breath. “She spent nine days in bed once, only getting up to go to the bathroom. Nine days, barely eating. Nine days, no shower. Nine days, no groceries or money coming in. That was the worst time. I was… twelve.”

My hands tighten over hers. I’m heartbroken for her. “You must’ve been… terrified.”

She gasps, looking up at me, and admits in a whisper, “All the time.”

“Did she ever seek treatment?”

“Yes, on and off. Mel helped her find a good therapist, and she got on medication. It helped. That’s why we stayed put in Seagrove.”

I recall what Mom said about Marina bargaining for extra pills.

“But she’d forget to take them,” she continues with a wry smirk. “Or she’dthinkshe took it, but we couldn’t be sure. Or she’d lose them. She’d miss appointments. And not pick up her refills. When she felt better, she didn’t think she needed them.”

“Even though she felt betterbecauseof them,” I breathe out.

“Exactly. We tried to make Seagrove work, but then,The Sound of Music. I didn’t tell her. It was the first thing I’d kept from my mother. I stayed after school every day, designing gorgeous sets and, I don’t know, having fun. People were kind to me, like Gil. They loved my work. I wasseen. So, I made excuses, trying to keep her out of it. A week before the performance, she became depressed, and I was actually…glad. I wanted her pain to last, for her to be stuck in bed so that I could get through it without her blowing it up. I wanted somethingfor me. It was selfish and wrong?—”

“No, it wasn’t.”

“Yeah, it was, and it backfired. She found out,” she says, her beautiful face tainted with disgust at herself. “She showed up duringAlleluia,off her meds and self-medicating. She came onstage, shouting,‘Where’s my daughter? Where’s Marnie?’No one knew what to do. She wasn’t herself. She made this huge scene, talking about how great I was and how, if she’d known, she would’ve been here, too. Helping.Proper momming, she called it. She melted into tears and apologies on stage. It took me twenty minutes to talk her down—a performance everyone got to see. Finally, I took her home.”

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