Page 144 of When Fate Breaks
“I’m driving.”
“Blake.”
“What?” I ask, turning my head in the opposite direction of her to examine theveryinteresting trees on the side of the road.
Suddenly, fingers wrap around my chin and my mom is yanking my face around. My foot slides off the gas in surprise and I jerk the wheel to the side. “Jesus, Mom!” I yell, luckily coming to a stop safely on the side of the road. I shove the gear control into park without looking down at it and try to peek around to make sure there were no witnesses to this ridiculous scene, but I can’t, because my chin is still in my mom’s hand. I try to pull away, but her fingers remain firm. I finally resign, letting out a heavy sigh and looking at her.
Her blue eyes search mine for several seconds. As the time ticks by, the crease between her brows gradually flattens out and her expression slowly softens. I see the moment some sort of realization hits her.
“Annie,” she whispers.
“What?” I question, pulling back and freeing myself from her grasp.
“My God, Blake, what is wrong with you?” she asks, her voice strained.
I shake my head, putting the truck back into drive and getting back on the road. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Blake, I haven’t seen that look in your eye since you came home from the city six years ago,” she frowns. “Annie Jacks. You were with her.”
I run a hand over the top of my baseball cap. “No, Mom. I couldn’t possibly be with her.”
I see her head tilt in my peripheral vision and feel her stare burning into the side of my face. She doesn’t believe a word I’m saying. She still doesn’t, a full minute later when we’re pulling into the parking lot of The Olive Pit.
I take the keys out of the ignition and let out a shaky breath. There’s no point in trying to lie. She’s not gonna let it go.How could she?
“I couldn’t possibly be with her,” I repeat, slowly turning to look at my mom. “Because she’s with someone else. For the rest of her life.”
I push open my door, walking around the front of the truck to open my mom’s door for her. She slowly slides out, pushing her purse up further on her shoulder as we make our way into the restaurant.
“I think you’re leaving out a few key details, hon,” she says, a sad smile on her face.
We sit down at our usual table.
“It doesn’t matter,” I mutter.
“Of course it does,” my mom says, reaching out and grabbing one of my hands. “Tell me everything.”
“There’s nothing to tell.”
“Try me.”
I open the menu. I only look at it for approximately three seconds before I close it. I don’t need to look at the menu. I always get the same thing here. And Mom knows that. She’s eyeing me expectantly when I set the menu back down. We have a stare-off for several long seconds. I tell myself I’m not going to say anything. That I don’t need to say anything. None of it matters now. Talking about it won’t change the past or improve the present. I just have to move on. There’s nothing my mother can do to help me with that. The stare-off continues.
I lose.
I sigh, staring down at the table and picking at my fingernail.
“So, there was this greenhouse,” I begin.
My mom’s chair squeaks against the wood floor as she moves closer to hear me.
The floodgates open. Over the next ten minutes, I tell her everything.
We are both silent for a few minutes once I finish, the noise from the now arrived lunch rush filing the space. I’ve managed to destroy my napkin, straw wrapper, four sugar packets, and one and a half breadsticks in the process of recounting the events of the last few weeks, along with some of the events of the lasttwenty yearsthat my mom never knew about.
It turns out Dad never told her about the night of my birthday. The night he caught us in the rain.
Thanks, old man, I think, smiling to myself.
