Page 37 of Begin Again

“You still aren’t saying yes and that is reason enough. But you are around on the weekends. I get it,” Abby said. “If I were in your shoes I wouldn’t want my sister to move in either. It’s fine. Your kitchen looks stunning, by the way.”

“Thank you,” she said. “It’s nicer than I thought it’d be.”

“And half the price.”

She sighed. “I hate that.”

“Don’t,” Abby said as she continued to do her hair. “I know you think you owe Dad, but he doesn’t feel that way. You did a lot for me as a kid. You helped him more than he can ever repay you.”

“You’re my sister.”

“I am,” Abby said. “But I was more of a handful than you were. He works a lot and you were there for me. Driving me places rather than hanging with your friends. Or taking me with you half the time when you’d rather be with your friends.”

She shrugged. “Dad was working late a lot when the weather was nice. If I wasn’t at practice or working then I had to get you.”

She’d played a lot of sports and her father was always in her corner supporting her in them. He’d never told her she couldn’t have a life or do those things, but she knew she had to still be there for Abby. Going to community college close by helped some too.

In the colder months it wasn’t as big of a deal as her father didn’t work a lot. The warmer months though, that made it harder to have a life, but she’d found a way to balance it.

“You raised me well,” Abby said.

“I wasn’t around much when you were a teen,” she said. “I’m sorry about that.”

“Don’t be,” Abby said. “You deserved to move away.”

“Yeah, and look at how well that turned out.”

“As you said, you might be a better person for it in the end.”

Her sister could be wise at times, but it was the tone of voice that led her to believe there was more going on.

“Something is on your mind, Abby. What is it?”

There was about a thirty-second moment of silence. “Have you talked to Mom lately?”

She turned her head to look at her sister. “No. Have you?”

“She reached out to me a few weeks ago.”

“She did?” she said. “What did she want?”

“I don’t know, really. Just to talk,” Abby said. “She has my cell phone number.”

“She has mine too but doesn’t reach out to me much,” she said.

“Because you’re a nurse and you are like Dad and lecture her to get better and take her meds.”

“She should,” Liz said. “But you can’t help someone that doesn’t want to be helped.”

“That’s the point,” Abby said. “And that is why you got away from Tanner. You wanted to be helped. You know it.”

“Yeah,” she said. “I did. I just had to plan it out more. If Donna hadn’t shown up that night, it wouldn’t have been as fast. You could say she covered for me and then gave me the start I needed.”

“You hated taking that money,” Abby said. “Admit it.”

“I did. I still do.”

“You would have gotten money in the divorce,” Abby said. “You know that. You left everything there but your clothing. You took your car and that was it.”

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