Page 9 of Until I Found You
Four
Graham
Knocking on the door twice, I turn the knob and push it open a crack. “Mom, you home?” I don’t know why I bother asking if she’s home. I saw her car when I pulled around the back alley, and I can hear the TV on in the living room, but I ask anyway.
“Hi, honey,” she sings. Her voice doesn’t sound the same as it once did when I was growing up. There is a harshness to her tone, a sad realization every time I hear her that I’m losing another person I love. It makes me feel terrible when I see her, knowing she had been living through this and didn’t want to burden me with her health concerns.
I slip off my shoes near the door and take the steps two at a time until I reach the landing in our old split-foyer home. The smell of my childhood home still hits me and just like that I’m seventeen years old, living life without a care in the world.
Except things are so different now than they were back then. Life isn’t as easy in the real world as it is when you’re living at home with your mom and she does everything she can to keep you safe from the reality living outside your window. As much as she tried, she couldn’t protect me from everything though. Death doesn’t discriminate, and karma has a way of sending you your dues when you least expect them.
Stepping into the living room, I see the shadow of my mom’s hands on the carpet of the rug in the middle of the living room. The sunshine peeking in through the window add light to where she sits in her recliner focusing on another one of her knitting projects.
“Hi, sweetheart. I didn’t expect you today. What are you doing here?” she wheezes.
“I was going to stop by and get the yard mowed for you and wanted to check on how you were doing on food in the house. I was gonna pick up some groceries for the weekend, and I thought I could pick you up a few things too.”
Her scoff comes out more like a cough as she peers up at me. The tubes wrapped around her face helping her to breathe leave me with a weight on my chest realizing once again how different things are.
“Oh honey, you didn’t have to do that. I still have leftover casserole in the freezer that will get me by for the next couple of days. I don’t want you fussing over me.”
“I’m not fussing over you, Ma. I’m just making sure you’re taken care of. I’m in town now and I’m going to keep taking care of you, so please let me. Okay?”
It’s been a constant back and forth between us getting her to accept any help.
“Okay, dear, I’m sorry. It’s an adjustment seeing you come around so much. I know you’re busy getting things up and running over there at your new business. I don’t want your old ma to be a thorn in your side. How are things, by the way? I heard you on the phone the last time you were over here; sounds like there were some troubles.”
Her hands continue to shake as she glances back down at the needle, wrapping another piece of yarn around it before doing the same to the other side. My eyebrows pinch together listening to her talk.
I know if I don’t tell her what’s going on, she’ll only push me to tell her. If I’m talking, that means she’s quietly listening, so I take a seat across from her on the couch and tell her everything that’s going on.
We are only a couple weeks away from our opening and we’ve already managed to land several large clients, leading to us opening another branch in the Chicago area. Dean and I both agreed with my mom’s health declining, it only made sense for me to run the Everton branch while he stayed back in Chicago and worked with Craig to get the Chicago location off the ground.
“You’ve accomplished so much for yourself. Your aunt Samantha and I are so proud of you. I know Gage would be proud of you too.”
It’s the first time in a long time I’ve heard her say his name out loud.Hearing her say his name brings me back to all those years ago when we would sit right here, playing Grand Theft Auto on my PlayStation.I would give anything, even my very own life, to have him here today.
“Thanks, Mom. Means a lot,” I say, choking out the last part. Her praise is hard to hear and even harder to accept with the weight of Gage’s memory associated to it. He wanted to protect people, so in my own way I like to believe I’m giving back what he didn’t have the opportunity to give himself.
“Have you spoken to Halle since you’ve been in town?”
As if feeling the whiplash from Gage’s name a moment ago, hearing her mention Halle feels like my heart was ripped from my chest.
There are a lot of things I regret when it comes to me and Halle, especially how I ended things with her. She didn’t deserve for me to treat her the way I did, but I also know there would have been no easy way for me to walk away from her. I deserved for her to hate me just the same as I hate myself.
“Nah,” I say, my own word coming out hoarse. I want to end this conversation as quickly as possible. Talking about Gage and then Halle is not something I’ve mentally prepared myself for, so I do my best to change the subject.
Pressing my palms to my knees, I move to stand.I can feel my mom’s eyes on me as she follows me into the kitchen. I busy myself with looking through the cupboards, making a mental list of all the things I want to pick up for her. I’m so lost in my own thoughts I don’t even hear the back door open until the soft echoing of her voice floats through the room.
“Good afternoon, Sandy.”
Her voice sounds like a song. It’s like I’ve swallowed a bag of cotton, trying to force myself to breathe as I squeeze my eyes closed. My entire body is tense, my shoulders and back straight like my spine was replaced with a metal rod.
I force my feet to move, shuffling enough for me to glance over my shoulder toward the direction of where her voice came.
When my eyes fall on her, it’s like I’ve taken a heavy shoulder to the chest in football. Only this time, there is no pads covering my body. She knocks the wind right out of me with her beauty, just like she did all those years ago.
Her blonde hair is curled in soft waves, pulled over to the side, hanging over her shoulder. I notice the length, how much longer it is since we were younger. I used to pull up her profile on Facebook, but after the last time when I found she removed me from her friends list, I chucked my phone against my dorm room wall and couldn’t bring myself to pull it back up.
