Page 63 of Toxic Hope
“She is lucky to have friends like you.” When she steps aside, I could kiss her. “I’m sure she could use a reminder that she has friends on her side.”
That’s a nice thought. I have to wonder if she’ll agree. Now that we know she was deliberately ignoring and avoiding us, I’m a little unsure about what we’re going to find when we see her.
When we come to a stop at her bedroom door, I raise a fist to knock, but she’s too quick for me. “You might as well come in,” she calls out before I get the chance.
Easing the door open, I ask, “How did you know we were out here?”
“Because I have ears that work.” She doesn’t look at us, focused on her laptop. Instead of her wig, she’s wearing a knit cap, and she hasn’t bothered getting changed out of her pajamas. Is she too tired to worry about it, or is she depressed?
“We wanted to see if you’re all right. That’s all,” Preston says.
“Congratulations. Now you’ve seen for yourself.” Her fingers move over the keyboard, not skipping a beat. How she can type while she’s talking to us, I don’t know. I guess it helps that she’s not paying much attention. Because as far as she’s concerned, we’re not worth the slightest pause in her day, for some reason. What did we do this time?
“Could you at least take a break for a minute? For fuck’s sake,” I mutter. I don’t care if Grandma hears us. Maybe she needs to know how impossible her granddaughter can be. “What did we do that was so bad? I thought after we sat together on Tuesday, we got past all that shit.”
“All we’re trying to do is show you we care,” Preston murmurs.
“Could you please not?” she asks with a sigh before swinging around to look up at us. “Congratulations. You both discovered you have a conscience around the same time you discovered there are people in the world who have it harder than you do. Could you maybe take a break from patting yourselves on the back now? It’s getting old.”
Jesus Christ. “Maybe you should decide whether you like us or hate us, since this back-and-forth stuff is getting old.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” She touches her chest, and I notice she’s not wearing her necklace. Maybe she doesn’t wear it when she’s at home, kind of like her wig. “Are my feelings getting old for you? Maybe the way you suddenly show up at my home and act like I need to get on my knees and thank you is getting old,too. Did you ever think of that?” She’s keeping her voice down so her grandma won’t hear, obviously, but she might as well be screaming. She’s that intense.
“You know what?” Preston nudges me with his elbow and scoffs. “Fuck this. We came over here to try and cheer her up, and this is what we get.”
“Poor you,” she mutters nastily.
Preston nudges me again when I’m too stunned to react. “Let’s go. I didn’t come out here to get treated like the shit on the bottom of somebody’s shoe.”
I have to wave him off because, dammit, no fucking way. “That’s not what we wanted at all. I guess you’re not used to having people give a shit about you, but we do, and we wanted to make sure you were okay since we didn’t hear anything from you since Tuesday. That’s it.”
“Wow,” she whispers, wide-eyed. “You actually did something to be nice for once. Not because you wanted to get something out of it.”
“Is that what your problem is?” Preston isn’t in such a hurry to leave now. He sees how stupid this is, like I do, and neither of us has ever handled it well when people deliberately misunderstand us. “That’s what you think? That we wanna get something out of this?”
“Why would I not?” she whispers fiercely. “I mean, let’s be honest. Even the nice things you’ve done for me have all been a way of making up for the vile things you’ve done. And all because you want to make yourselves feel better. That’s all you care about. Yourselves.”
“Oh, yeah,” I mutter, staring her down until she looks away. “Sitting with you during your treatments. We definitely got something out of that.”
“Are you serious?” She blurts out a laugh before adding, “You had to be at the hospital either way. Sitting with me was nicerthan cleaning bedpans, remember? Please, don’t break your arms patting yourselves on the back. It’s pretty sad.”
I can’t believe this. How cold she can be. Obviously, she has spent some time thinking about this, too. She had all these thoughts going on in her head, and we didn’t know. There we are, worried about her, dying to be with her, and she was resenting us the whole time.
“Now, go.” Her chair squeaks when she swivels around to face the computer again. “I’m in the middle of actually caring about my coursework. Thanks for the visit.”
It’s like I woke up in some bizarre, parallel universe where nothing makes sense. She wasn’t like this on Tuesday. What changed? “Why are you pushing us away?”
Her hands slap the desk before she lets out a trembling breath. “You know what? I completely understand why your mom pops pills now. It’s because she can’t handle the two of you when she’s sober.”
If the room wasn’t so silent, I might not be able to hear Preston’s soft gasp. I know where he’s coming from, since she might as well have given us both a kick in the balls. That was low, cruel, and not to mention uncalled for.
And if we don’t get out of here now, this could all get a lot worse.
“Let’s go.” I grunt, giving her one last look before turning around to leave. “She can be miserable all by herself.”
“Don’t forget to shut the door behind you,” she snaps.
If Grandma Lois wasn’t here, I would slam the door—hard enough to break it—but she doesn’t deserve that. Her granddaughter does, but not her.
