Page 156 of Falling Backwards
It distracts me from my old friend.
On one hand, I still feel frustrated with my aunt.On the other, I’m revisited by the thing I was just thinking about having grown up.
I have to ask myself: is it really worth it to me to cling to being upset with her?
I know Maggie said recently that I’m allowed to feel however I need to feel about my family, and it meant a lot to me.Obviously, it’s something my mom has said about my dad before, but I haven’t told Mom what happened with Aunt Joni.Maggie is the only person who knows I’ve been upset at all, and even she doesn’t know details.
Now, though, I abruptly feel like I want to be done holding this little grudge.It doesn’t seem as important as it did before.
Also feel kind of bad about how long it took me to be done.
But better late than never, right?
ME:Hey, I love you too.I’m doing great.How are you?
We catch up a bit while Maggie finishes up in the bathroom.By the time I hear the door opening, things with Aunt Joni are much more friendly than they’ve been in a while, and it feels good to me.I don’t feel like I’m forcing anything.
In fact, after regularly-dressed Maggie sets her purse and my folded sweatpants on the big chair, I’m filled fast with the urge to finally tell her, “I haven’t wanted to talk to my dad in years, but my aunt gave my address to him without asking me.That’s why I was mad at her.”
Maggie looks at me with surprise.Then disbelief.Then great sympathy.
Quietly, she asks, “How could she do that to you?”
I lift my shoulders.“She didn’t actually know it would bother me.She thought he had my address and lost it—she didn’t know I never gave it to him.I’ve never told her how I feel about him.”
For a suddenly heavy moment, I believe we’re both remembering me trusting Maggie with how I felt about my dad.
Part of me is afraid of how I feel compelled to trust her with another little bit now.
But the heaviness and fear don’t win out.I can’t stop myself.
I tell her, “Since she gave him my address, he was able to send me a holiday card.The kind with the family picture on the front.”The sharp sting of it comes back to me like the card is in my hands now.“It was a picture of him and his new family.They were all together and they looked happy.And it felt like….”
I swallow back the many ways I could end that sentence.Swallow back the emotions I could talk about in a messy flood like a spilled well of ink.
She understands, though.It’s emanating from her as her eyes cling to mine.
I wonder if they’re really a little bit misty or if it’s a trick of the lighting.
“That would’ve hurt me too,” she says, her voice still low.“Would’ve made me feel like I’d been slapped.”
Lowly, too, I say, “That’s exactly how I felt.”
Her eyes are definitely misty.
She crosses her arms…and uncrosses them…and crosses them again.It looks like she has something else to say but doesn’t know how to say it.
I wonder if she’s thinking about the present or the past.
I don’t find enough courage to ask.
She finally says, “Thank you for telling me about her.”
I give a slight nod.
“Are you still mad at her?”
“No.I, uh, decided a minute ago that I was ready to move past it.”I hold up my phone.“She texted and I decided to be done with the grudge.”
