Page 23 of How to Kiss a Hawthorne Brother
Even though I have no memory of life before my parents’ divorce, and I only saw my dad a few times a year, I’ve always felt more connected to him, which has only ever made things worse with Mom. She resents him, even all these years later, and she resents me fornotresenting him.
Still, she never stopped me from seeing him when I was growing up. Whenever it was possible, I spent holidays and summer vacations traveling with Dad, visiting all the far-off places his work took him. And I loved it. Lived for the weeks I was able to ditch small-town lifeandmy mother’s disappointment.
Because she wasalwaysdisappointed. Disappointed when I never chose to spend holidays with her. Disappointed when I chose dinner at the Hawthornes over dinner with her and Grandma Nora. Disappointed when I told her I never wanted to live in Silver Creek.
Silver Creek washertown. Not mine.
But all that prickly, uncomfortable baggage still doesn’t justify skipping out on Grandma Nora, and the guilt of that realization weighs heavier and heavier the longer I stand still.
Kristyn nudges me from behind. “You know, if my mother were here, she’d scold you for making her pay to air condition the outside.”
I chuckle and finally push my way into the house. “Grandma Nora always said the same thing.”
Everything is exactly like I remember it. The smell, the furniture, even the crocheted afghan draped over the back of the sofa in the living room.
Tears prick my eyes as I push further into the room. Memories are flooding back, but I can’t go down this road. I have a job to do. Standing around and blubbering won’t bring Grandma Nora back, and it won’t change the choices I made to keep me from being here when she needed me.
I take a deep breath. I’m okay. I’ve got this. I just have to keep breathing.
“Did your mom takeanythingwith her when she moved?” Kristyn asks as she slowly moves around the room.
“It doesn’t really seem like it, does it?” There are some empty shelves on the bookshelf and some pictures missing from the mantel above the fireplace, but those are the only signs anyone moved anywhere.
But that doesn’t surprise me. Even though we lived here for almost eighteen years—longer than that for Mom—it always felt more like Grandma Nora’s house than it did ours. My grandfather died when I was too little to remember, so it was just the three of us, and Grandma Nora was always the one in charge. She didn’t treat us like guests, but she always made it clear it was her generosity that put a roof over our heads.
IexpectedMom to gut the house and finally make it her own when her mother died. Instead, she moved to Florida with a man she met on the internet to live in a sand-colored condominium with shuffleboard courts and a community pool.
“Oh, hey. There’s a note from your mom,” Kristyn says, picking it up from the console table behind the sofa. She hands it to me. “And some car keys, maybe?”
“Thought you might need the Subaru while you’re in town. Freemont cleaned it and changed the oil for you, and we parked it in the garage,” I read out loud. I look at Kristyn. “She left me her car?”
“Sounds like it.”
“We also stocked the fridge and put some groceries in the pantry. Love you. Enjoy the house.”I shake my head. “What on earth?”
Kristyn moves into the kitchen and opens the fridge. “Dang. She wasn’t lying. There’s a lot of food in here. Maybe she just really wants you to enjoy your stay?”
“This feels more pointed than that. Mom doesn’t do stuff just for the sake of being nice. She has an agenda. She has to.”
“Maybe her agendaisto be nice. You guys have both been through a lot the past few years. You’re here, right? Because you feel like it’s time to do better? Maybe she feels the same way.”
“Yeah. Maybe,” I say, but I’m still not convinced. I know Mom. And there is something else afoot.
We wander through the rest of the house and catalog what I’ll have to do in each room to get it ready to sell. Mom’s bedroom is already mostly empty, but she was right about Grandma Nora’s room. It’s chock full of boxes, some looking like they just arrived in the mail, not even opened. “Oh my word,” Kristyn says from the doorway behind me. “Your mom wasn’t lying.” She steps up next to me. “Can we please open all these boxes before I go home?”
“It isn’t going to feel like Christmas,” I say. “You heard Mom earlier. She made it seem like Grandma Nora wasn’t in her right mind. There could be dolls made out of discarded baby teeth and real human hair inside those boxes.”
Kristyn reaches for the closest box with an overly exaggerated roll of her eyes. She rips it open, hiding the contents from me until she’s had time to inspect her discovery. Finally, she grins. “Or there could just be ceramic salt and pepper shakers that look like praying kittens.” She holds them up. “They’re actually kind of cute.”
I eye her. “Want to take them home with you? They’re all yours.”
She winces. “Not that cute.” She drops the box back onto the stack nearest the door and rubs her hands together. “But seriously, what should we do first?” Kristyn asks. “You might have managed to procrastinate for half my trip, but you’ve still got me for three more days. We should tackle the hardest project first, while I’m still here to help.”
We head back to the kitchen and I pull a bottled water out of the fridge, offering it to Kristyn before getting another for myself. “We should. Grandma Nora’s bedroom is obviously going to be the hardest. But...let’s go over to Stonebrook first.”
She lifts her eyebrows. “Right now?”
“Why not? I want you to see it.”
