Page 57 of Christmas at the Ranch
It’s mymother.
Twenty-Seven
So many things are happening at once. My mother is still calling my name from down the stairs. I can hear her and her voice coming closer.Shit.
My phone, on the kitchen counter, is lighting up. I can see Lani’s name, and the wordsI AM SO SORRY!!in all caps.
Tate is staring at me with alarm, and although we keep telling each other we are adults now, I feel very much like a teenager. I hustle him into my bedroom, tossing his flannel and T-shirt at him as he goes, then slam the door.
I pull my sweater back on and fix my hair, then call out, “Mom? I’m up here. Hang on, I’ll be right down.”
She looks so out of place standing in the middle of theEvergreen Enquireroffice, taking it all in, a surprised look on her face. Then she sees me, and her face falls.
“Oh, Emory. You look terrible.”
I almost laugh. It’s so typically Cassandra Oakes to say that to me, when just moments before, the man Istill love after all these years was telling me how beautiful, how perfect he thinks I am.
“Lani told me where you were. Don’t be mad. I dragged it out of her. I’m sorry, Emory, I know you don’t want to see me—but it’s almost Christmas and I’m all alone.”
“Oh, Mom. It’s not that I don’t want to see you. I got scared, of so many things, so I left. I don’t think that was fair to you and Dad, but it felt like what I had to do.”
She shakes her head. “Of course you did. I can’t imagine how you must have felt. I could barely process it myself, and I did nothing to help you do that, the way a good mother should.”
“Mom, I’ve been doing that a lot lately, placing all the blame on myself. But it’s not right, and it’s not healthy. So don’t do that to yourself, either. I’m almost thirty years old. You don’t need to mother me.”
“What if I still want to?” she asks me—and it’s so out of character for her, I find myself at a loss.
I swallow, clear my throat. “Dad called me,” I say. “We talked. He sounds like he’s feeling really awful about things.”
“He’s so sorry. You have to believe that. He is.”
“I do, Mom.”
She sits down in my desk chair and I try not to think about how, just moments ago, I was standing in front of that very chair, running my hands through Tate Wilder’s hair, kissing him. And he’s still upstairs. I need and want to talk to my mother—and I’m trying hard to focus despite being overly aware of every creakfrom overhead. Then my mom starts to panic. I can see it happen, because it’s happened to her before. She, who has always worked so hard to keep up a perfect façade, has faltered a few times. And it’s happening now. She’s struggling to breathe, gasping for air. I go to her, tell her to take deep breaths.
“Oh, Emory, it’s so awful,” she says when she can speak again. “Every single person I invited to our holiday party declined. Every single one.”
I wince. “Is that what you’re most upset about? The holiday party?” I know she’s in distress, and I don’t want to call her out—but I can’t help myself.
She closes her eyes for a moment, runs her hand over her face, smearing her makeup, which is not something she has ever done. She always looks perfect, but right now, she’s a wreck. Still, I think she’s about to deny it all, the way she did the last time we spoke.
“I know,” she whispers. “It’s awful. We’ve ruined lives.”
The “we” is new. I didn’t think my mom had it in her to admit that she, too, may be culpable. It makes me feel a wave of tenderness toward her I haven’t felt in a long time.
“You know your father,” she continues. “You know what it has always been like for him. Always striving for more, because that’s how he was raised. The stakes always getting higher, the goalposts always moving.” She pauses. “I think I got caught up in it all, too. I used to be idealistic, Emory. You may not believe it, but I was. I thought I could make a difference in the world—but in the circles we ran in, it just became about statusand wealth. I don’t know the exact moment I changed. But I did.”
I shake my head. “It’s not too late to go back.”
“Go back to what?” she asks me, and this feels so strange—my mother speaking to me as if she is the child. “I don’t know who I am, don’t understand who I was.” She rubs her eyes again. “You probably think what I’m most upset about is the party.”
I smile ruefully. “I sort of did think that…”
“I am upset that the party isn’t happening. It made me realize it’s all over. Everything’s ruined. We are not who we once were.”
I say gently, “Were you happy in a life that was built on a house of cards?”
“To be very honest with you, Emory,” she says, “I was. I was quite content to ignore my better instincts, to pretend everything was fine. Even though I knew, the way you probably knew, that it wasn’t. I just assumed nothing would ever change. I didn’t have to question what was going on in your father’s business life. It wasn’t my domain. My domain was what I saw as ourlifelife—our social life. And to me, yes, it felt good. It felt like everything I ever wanted. Or, at least, everything I was ever supposed to want.” She sighs, looks down at the desk, then back up at me. “I’m sorry,” she says simply. “We’ve let you down.I’velet you down. I understand that now. We’re lucky to have a daughter like you. God knows how you managed to be so good when we were often so shallow, so selfish. But you did—and I know we made you feel like you didn’t fit into our lives. I can see that now.”
