Page 164 of Anything Necessary for Her
For the rest of the night, I ate, drank, laughed non-stop, and took so many pictures I worried about my phone storage.
My favorite part, though, was seeing Low intermingle with my brothers in a way I’d never witnessed. Before us, he was always just in the background, my brother’s sidekick, but thistime, he was actually in the mix. He talked, he laughed, and he looked as if he were with family.
Afterward, we went home and made love.
“Wow, good job!” I clapped once my junior ballet class finished going through the choreography.
Today had been my day to teach, and I hadn’t realized how much I loved doing it. Somehow, in between dancing in shows, I would figure out a way to run my own shit, especially now that I had my own studio to do it in.
Since class was over, the little girls rushed to their cubbies to grab their bags, drink some water, or munch on a small snack their parents had sent them with until their rides came.
As I tidied up, bobbing my head to the music Robin had playing, I noticed a figure appear in the doorway. My heart stalled at the sight of Whitney, already wearing her signature disgusted expression.
“Whitney, hi.” I hurried her way, hoping to apologize to her in person before Waverley spotted her mother and came over. “I wanted to apologize?—”
“Mommy!” Waverley came barging through excitedly. “Prolific is doing a junior ballet show forThe Nutcracker, and I wanna audition!” She rambled off happily, making me grin.
“No. As a matter of fact, I don’t think you’re going to keep coming to this little class.” Whitney spoke to her daughter but was looking me in the eyes.
“Mommy, no! I?—”
“Go get your shit and let’s go!” She barked at Waverley, making all the children who’d been talking look over. Robin, too, whipped her head around before I told her through my eyes that I had a handle on it.
“Can we talk outside?” I asked Whitney.
“For?”
“You’ll know once we get outside. Please.”
Whitney scoffed and stormed through the exit before spinning around to face me with her mouth balled up and arms folded.
Her raggedy pleather purse hung from her forearm, and she smelled a little like beer. She wasn’t drunk, though, and it reminded me of how my Papa Block always said some people drank so much that it was in their pores, so you’d smell it even when they were sober.
I was thankful Whitney appeared to be lucid, or else I wouldn’t have been able to let her take Waverley with her.
“We have nothing to talk about, little miss spoiled.”
I took a deep breath, willing myself to ignore her smart comment so I could actually speak with her. I loved Low, and though I wanted to go upside his mama’s head again, I couldn’t because of that love I had for him.
“I get that you’re currently fighting demons, Whitney, but your behavior is going to leave you lonely and with no one to turn to,” I said. “You’re going to keep at it, and your kids will get to a point where they won’t want to deal with you at all. Is that what you want?”
She looked at me, glaring, but after a few short seconds, her face fell. She blinked rapidly as she peered down at the gravelly parking lot briefly.
“You don’t get it. It’s hard staying sober. It seems easy because you don’t have any addictions, but I can promise you that it’s not.” Her eyes finally met mine. “And because I can’tstay sober, I can’t make anything of myself or do what I should be doing for them. And . . .” She sighed, looking off and squinting at the bright sun while she seemed to weigh whether or not she wanted to divulge her true thoughts.
“You get jealous when other people do things for them.” I finished for her, and she whipped her head around to size me up as if I were some prophet. When she nodded, I continued. “Kids will always have only one mother, Whitney. Low loves me but as his woman, not his mama. The things I do for him are because I’m his girl, and it could never replace you. Wave likes me as a big sister, and Wyatt just has a crush on me.” I smiled softly and noticed the corners of her mouth rise slightly. “People do shit for me all the time, but they can never replace my mother and the love she gives. It’s something that’s irreplaceable. But just the way a mother can love you like no one else, she can hurt you like no one else too. The things you say to Low bother him, and after hearing it for years and years, he started to believe it.”
“No he doesn’t.” She shook her head, worry in her eyes.
“Yes, he did and still does a little bit. I couldn’t imagine my mother speaking to me the way you do him, but I know if she did, it would hurt me more than anything. What you say to him holds weight because of who you are to him.
“Now I apologize for hitting you because that was wrong, and my parents didn’t raise me that way, but you have to understand that I won’t sit by and allow you to mistreat him nor Waverley. Not even Wyatt. I think you need to go back to rehab. Don’t rush it thinking they’ll have replaced you by the time you get out, because it’s not possible. Go in there, get better, then come out and be a good mother. I know you can do it because you wouldn’t be standing here teary eyed if you didn’t want it.”
She nodded, wiping at her eyes with the back of her hand.
“I think I can do that.”
“You can. Some therapy for the four of you as well, or at least for you and Willow.” I eyed her, and when she nodded, I exhaled out of satisfaction. “I will make sure your kids are good while you’re gone. I have a big family, and they will too. Maybe when you get out, you can meet them, too, but I have to warn you, my mother is worse than me, and you may have an issue if she sees you mistreating your kids.” I smirked, and Whitney laughed, though I think she kind of knew I wasn’t exactly joking. “Can we hug?”
