Page 78 of The Someday Daughter
“Honey, you’re part of everything.” My mother leans toward me, sliding a little closer on the bench. “And when you were born, at a completely different stage of my life, people assumed that of course the book was written in anticipation of you, and—”
“And you let them believe it,” I say. “You lied.”
She doesn’t defend herself. She doesn’t seem to know what to say at all.
I swallow, trying to clear the tightness in my throat. “If you didn’t keep her, why did you keep me?”
In the space before my mother responds the words bubble up in me, a pleading whisper:Because I loved you, because I wanted you.I want to hear them with searing, immediate shame.
“Because everything was different this time,” she says finally. “Because it was a decision your father and I needed to make together.”
But what I hear is:Because he made me keep you.
I make to stand, and she says, “Honey, wait. Please.Please.”
When I look back at her she’s blurry, and I wipe my tears roughly away. She doesn’t deserve them. I want so badly to be alone.
“Audrey, you’re so smart.” I sigh harshly, and she holds up a hand. “No, I mean it. You’ve always been so much smarter than me.”
When I lower myself back onto the bench, she keeps going.
“You came out of the womb like that. Analytical. Precise and curious.” She draws a rickety breath. “But it was easy to be your mom when you were small: scraped knee, Band-Aid. Midafternoon tantrum, nap. You needed me so tangibly.” I look away from her, watch a party line of ants track across the walking path. “Sometimes I don’t know how to be a mother to you, because I know you don’t need me anymore. You’re brilliant. I sent you to school so you could get what you needed.” She swallows, looks down at her hands and then back up at me. “We expect our children to need the same things we do, but they don’t. And I wanted you to have everything I didn’t know how to give you.”
I look at her. “What do you need that I don’t need?”
She smiles, lets out a short exhale. “Permission. Other people’s approval. I’ve always needed those things. I spent years hearing other people’s voices in my head before I heard my own.” She spreads her hands in the space between us. “That’s part of the reason I wrote the book. I had horrible guilt over a choice that Iknewwas the right one for me. I didn’t offer myself any kindness, or trust my own intuition. And you’ve never struggled with that. You’ve always honored what you want. It’s one of my favorite things about you.” She starts to tear up, and I have to look away. “You’re incredible, Audrey. And so brave—not like me. I knew I had a daughter out there, somewhere, but I could only acknowledge it in this veiled way.” She lets out a strangled exhale and I look back up at her. “I built a career on a book I wrote for her and I couldn’t admit it—even though I wrote the whole book to tell myself that what I’d done was okay. I wasn’t brave.”
It feels simultaneously satisfying and devastating to hear her admit it.
“And when people came along and assumed the book was about you, I wasn’t brave enough to correct them, either. Because you were right in front of me, and you were my whole life, and—” She breaks off, swallows. “I loved you so much. Love you so much. And it hurts me to hear that you feel I’ve shaped you into something you’re not.” She braces a hand on the bench between us, almost reaching for me but not. “Because that was the opposite of what I wanted. I chose the Summit School so you could have a normal life, out of the spotlight, and discover yourself away from any association with me.” She clears her throat. “But it sounds like I was misguided on that front, too.”
I look up at her, and for a moment we’re quiet. I wonder if we’ve ever understood where the other’s coming from on the first try. If we’ve ever tried at all.
“I liked school,” I say finally. “I just wanted to have a mom, too.”
She nods, and a tear rolls down her cheek. She brushes it away with the tips of her fingers. “I’m sorry. I know we haven’t—” She hesitates, swallows. “I know I haven’t been as present for you as I should be. We could have done this tour in a whirlwind two weeks, but I drew it out because I wanted to spend the summer with you.” She draws a breath. “When I lost my parents, I’d been away at school for two years, wrapped up in my life, and suddenly they were just gone. I wanted to fix this before I lost you like that.”
Something whispers, angry, from deep inside me.But did you ever want me at all?
“Audrey,” she says, when I still haven’t spoken. “I’m so sorry I kept this from you. I’m so sorry about all of it. I didn’t handle it well.”
“But how did you handle itsobadly?” I’ve been holding my bag on my lap this whole time, and my thighs are going numb. “You’re a therapist.”
She breathes something that almost sounds like a laugh. “Being a therapist means I know better. It doesn’t mean I alwaysdobetter. That’s why therapy isn’t a one-and-done thing: you don’t go to a session and learn the lessons and leave a cured person. It’s ongoing work. It’s lifelong.” She looks at me. “You have to keep choosing the right thing—and it’s usually the hard thing. I don’t always make the right choice.”
My eyes glaze with tears, and I blink them away. “Was it the right choice? Keeping me?”
“Oh, honey.” She reaches for me finally, and I let it happen. My bag is a hard obstacle between us, and when she hooks her chin over my shoulder it presses into my stomach. “Of course. Ofcourse. When I wrote the book I was imagining this daughter I knew I’d never raise. It was intangible—it was hypothetical.” She pulls away, ducks her chin to make me look at her. “Having a child in real life isn’t the same. It’s so much more complicated and so much better.”
I draw a shaky breath, pull back to look at her. “But there’s two of us,” I say. “In real life.”
Her eyes scan mine, brilliant blue and blurry with tears. “Yeah,” she says quietly. “And I think it’s time we go talk to her.”
50
The lobby of the hotel looks like an ER waiting room. Mags, Mick, Cleo, Sadie, Silas—all of them gathered in the carefully clustered armchairs like family hoping for news. Which is what I thought they were, in a way. My family of some kind.
“Audrey.” Silas is on his feet the moment my mother and I walk through the doors. Puddles isn’t with him, which is how I know he’s beside himself. He’s wearing theGG’sbaseball cap and a thin T-shirt and sneakers. His eyes are bloodshot. The lobby is freezing, and when he gets close enough to reach for me, I can see the goose bumps on his forearms.
