Loving Groom’s Cake—
gooey flourless chocolate cake with fresh raspberries, modest and simple and perfect
My mother is in a strangely good mood when I get home from the bakery. She has brunch prepared and she’s talking animatedly with Spence at the breakfast table in the kitchen about the horse-drawn sleigh rides Mr. Hamza orchestrates on Christmas Eve.
“We used to go every year,” I say, taking a seat with them. “It was my favorite holiday activity.”
“Can we go?” Spence asks, shoveling frittata into his mouth. “Can we do it again this year?”
I defer to my mom, aware of what it means to her. And even though she hesitates, she nods. “If you both want to.”
“We really do!” Spence says, all enthusiasm.
A small laugh escapes my mother’s lips. “Your grandfather would always dress up in a suit,” she says, remembering. “And I’d wear a red velvet dress. He said that when we were old enough and our hair was white, children would think we were Mr. and Mrs. Claus. It was a silly little thing, but we enjoyed it.”
I smile along with her. I always loved that ritual.
“Why did you dress up?” Spence asks, and I look at my mother.
“Your grandfather proposed to me on Christmas Eve,” she replies, her smile both happy and sad, and my heart clenches right along with her. “We were very young, mind you. And we’d only known each other a few months. I was just out of college when I met your grandfather, and on a weeklong skiing trip with my girlfriends. We were staying at a friend’s bungalow up in Vermont. And in the little mountain town we were situated in, there was the cutest Italian bakery you ever saw. I went there every day; their cannoli were that good. But if I’m telling the truth, I was more interested in the cute boy who was serving them.”
“Grandpa worked there?” Spence asks, and it makes me smile that he’s so interested.
“He did,” my mom says, sipping her tea. “It was actually his father’s bakery. In fact, your grandfather comes from a long line of bakers.”
“So, it’s in our genes,” he says, in his I’m making adult conversation voice.
“That’s right,” my mother replies, briefly looking at me.
“What happened next? Did Grandpa ask you out?”
She raises an amused eyebrow. “He did, and you know what he said?”
Spence shakes his head.
“After I’d come in the third day in a row, he brought us our pastries and coffees and then turned to my two girlfriends. He said, ‘Ladies, I’d be grateful if I could have a moment with Eleanor.’” She shakes her head. “And you can only imagine my surprise because I had no idea he knew my name. Not that my friends hadn’t said it many times during our visits, but I didn’t know he was paying attention. I was flattered.”
Spence leans forward. I, too, find myself gravitating toward her story, one I haven’t heard since I was around his age.
“Now of course my friends looked at me for approval, and I nodded. And even though I was never one to be shy, I remember being so nervous when they got up and he sat down. To make matters worse, he didn’t speak for the first minute.” She presses her lips together like she’s stifling a chuckle. “So, I lifted my chin and said, ‘Did you come over here just to stare at me?’ Well, that did it. He put his elbows on the table and smiled. And I swear on everything, that man could smile.”
My chest lifts a little, my breath catching.
“He said, ‘Eleanor, I’m not a talker. Never was. So, I don’t know how to do this other than just to tell you straight. I’d really like to take you out.’” She leans toward us, conspiratorially. “Now since I was raised in Boston, a city girl, it certainly wasn’t the first time a boy showed interest. I wanted more than that. ‘Give me one good reason I should say yes,’ I replied. But if I expected this country boy to falter, he did no such thing. He looked me right in the eye and said, ‘I’ve lived here all my life, and even though it’s a small place, I’ve seen thousands of tourists come and go, more pretty girls than you could ever imagine. But I’m telling you now that I’ve never seen one as beautiful as you. And while I understand that what you look like is only a fraction of who you are, I’d really like the opportunity to know the rest of you.’”
I find myself grinning, and Spence has actually stopped eating to listen.
“I laughed then, more surprised than anything. You see, it’s not that I was unattractive, I was pretty enough I suppose, but I was never the prettiest girl in the room. In fact, the girl whose bungalow I was staying at, the one who was no more than ten feet from where I sat that very moment? She was the type boys would lose their wits over, just crumble into a blubbering mess of flattery and roses right at her feet. And so, I said yes. Now that I think of it, I didn’t even know his name when I agreed.”
“And then he proposed?” Spence asks, sipping his orange juice.
Mom nods. “We dated for two months, almost no time at all, really. But we were crazy about each other. And when he took me on a sleigh ride in Boston on Christmas Eve, he didn’t even have a ring. He said later that he hadn’t meant to propose that night, but that when he saw me in my red dress, he knew he didn’t want to wait, that whatever life we had left he wanted to spend it together. We were married for thirty-three years.”
Her words hit me hard, like a sweep to the legs I never saw coming. And I find myself blinking away moisture in the corners of my eyes.
My phone buzzes then. Three times in a row. I pull it out of my pocket, hoping to distract myself from the sudden emotion.
For a split second, I panic, like somehow everyone already knows about the confusing feelings I’ve been having for Wilder. But an instant later, I realize what he’s saying.
I can’t tell over text what his tone is, but I know if our positions were reversed, I’d be a little miffed. I’m just not used to including him in my life that way, not that that’s an excuse.
“Mom?” Spence says, and I realize he must have said my name more than once. Both he and my mother are staring at me.
“Sorry. I was just answering a message.”
“From Dad?” Spence says. “What did he say?”
Shit. He must have seen my phone. “He just wants to ask me about something. I’ll be back in a sec.” I get up and walk out of the kitchen before either of them can object. I grab my coat from the closet and step onto the stoop, pressing send on Jake’s name. He answers on the first ring.
“Well, hey there,” he says, and it sounds like I’m on speakerphone in his truck.
“Hey,” I reply, slipping my arms into my coat sleeves. “So, about the bakery . . . What did you hear exactly?”
“That your father left it to you and Wilder? And that you’re moving back here?” he says, and even over the phone I can hear he has mixed feelings about it.
“That’s partly true,” I say, walking down the driveway.
“Which part?” he asks, but before I can answer, he adds, “Are you home? You sound like you’re outside.”
I nod like he could see the gesture. “I’m standing in my driveway.”
“Oh, got it. So, this truth . . .”
I walk along the edge of the plowed snow. “Well, my dad did leave the bakery to me and Wilder. And his will does specify that we have to work there for a year full-time, but I’m not sure I’m moving back.”
“Huh,” is all he says, and goes quiet for a few seconds. “Why?”
I shrug. “Because I like our life in California, and I’m not certain I want to upend it.” But the truth is even if I were willing to, even if I could get past the tangle of emotions I feel about my father’s bakery, living in the one place I know I’ll never be enough is not something I can do.
Only instead of answering, his truck pulls into Mom’s driveway. I can’t help it; I panic a little. I went outside to bring this conversation away from the house, not draw him closer.
I find Jake on the football field after school, throwing a ball with a few of his buddies. And in a way it seems fitting—I’ve become a high school cliché in every way.
He sees me coming, but he doesn’t pause his game. Even when I stop right next to him, he doesn’t acknowledge me.
“Jake,” I say, “I need to talk to you.”
He tosses the ball, barely glancing at me. “I wouldn’t stand there if I were you. Benny has shit aim. He might bean you.”
“I’m serious. I need to talk to you,” I say, not impressed with his attempt to ignore me, and also not blaming him for it.
“So am I,” he says. “I’m surprised they even let Benny on the team.”
To which Benny yells, “Dude, my dick can throw better than you.”
“Jake, it’s important,” I try again.
He shrugs me off, turning once again to his friends and catching the ball. Panic starts to set in. It took me four full days to leave my house, my bedroom really. And pulling up to this school, looking for Jake’s truck, waiting for Wilder’s car to leave before I’d get out, took everything I had. My resolve is wearing thin, my upset materializing before I can stop it.
I wipe my eyes, turning around and trying to hide my face as I walk away. And worse still, I can feel his friends watching me.
But before I reach the edge of the field, Jake jogs to catch up with me.
I stop, looking up at him and sniffling, wishing I’d just stayed in my bedroom where I could be messy without any observers.
“So, what’s this important thing you need to tell me?” he says, a little concern seeping past the hard edge he had a minute ago.
I fidget with my coat, working up to it. “Can we go somewhere?”
He shakes his head. “I’m giving Benny a ride home. But it wouldn’t matter anyway because I’m busy today.”
I exhale, folding my arms around myself. In my head, I pictured marching up to him and telling him I was pregnant flat out, but in real life, it feels nearly impossible.
He looks from me to his friends and back again. “Maddi?”
And while I understand why he’s not enthused to spend time with me, I also wish there was a little bit of residual kindness to buffer this moment.
“I’m pregnant,” I say quietly.
The pink stain the cold air left on his cheeks nearly disappears. “Wait, what?”
“I’m pregnant,” I say again, and this time the word backs up on me, sending a wave of tingles through my sinuses.
“Fuck, really? I mean, are you sure?” he says, and it’s like a punch to the gut. I didn’t expect him to be excited about it or even happy. But his panic only makes me feel worse, like somehow, I did this to him, instead of it being a mutual decision.
“I’m sure,” I say.
He pushes back his hair with both hands and walks a few feet away in a loop before turning back to me. “And you think it’s mine?”
For some reason, I never saw this one coming, which I suppose again makes me not only a cliché but a giant chump. And now I’m mad. “Are you seriously asking me that?”
“Come on, Maddi, you know you and Wilder never got over one another. I saw you two at the booth together last weekend.”
I want to strangle him, just grab him by the neck and thrash him about like an alligator. “I said I was pregnant, not a lying cheater. I don’t know why I expected something better from you. Something less bro-y, but I guess that’s just who you are.”
His expression hardens. “Did you think I was gonna be happy about this? Jump for joy and go out and buy a stroller because my ex-girlfriend who dumped me suddenly shows up and tells me she’s pregnant?”
The ball bounces off Benny’s chest a half second after Jake stops speaking like he didn’t even try to catch it. Great. Now his friends know, and the whole school is sure to follow. Can this moment get any more perfect?
“Really, Jake?”
“It’s not my fault you came to tell me on the goddamn football field,” he fires back, which only makes me angrier. I turn around. Screw this. I did what I had to do and now I’m leaving.
He grabs my arm as I walk away, but I slip out of his grip.
“Don’t touch me,” I say, so worked up I might actually explode.
And he doesn’t. He just lets me walk away.
Jake gets out of his truck and closes the door. “Actually, what I meant was why did your dad leave the bakery to Wilder?”
My worry transforms into frustration. That’s his pressing question? Not a plea that if we do stay, he’ll be able to see more of his son?
“I don’t know,” I say flatly.
“That annoys you?”
“A little, yeah,” I say.
“My question? Or that you have to work with Wilder?” he continues, and I give him a hard look.
“Why are you even asking about Wilder?”
“Why would I not?”
“Because Wilder isn’t the point.”
He shakes his head. “I really don’t get you, Maddi.”
“What do you mean?”
He hesitates like he knows it’s a bad idea to continue. “Look, do whatever you want, but all I’m gonna say is that every time you get involved with him, you get hurt.”
I stand there for a second, getting my annoyance in check and resisting the urge to disagree. He’s not exactly wrong. And there’s no way in hell I’m going to utter the words This time is different, because I’m not an idiot, and also because that would be admitting something was going on between us . . . which it’s not. Mostly.
Instead, I go with: “Is that all you came by to say? Because if so, your concern is noted.”
Only he’s Jake, so he laughs. “Wow, Maddi, I didn’t realize you’d be in this deep already. I have to hand it to Wilder, he’s smooth.”
I press my lips together, biting back my reaction. “I, too, have some questions, Jake, while you’re here. Mainly, why don’t you care as much about asking if Spence is staying as you do about if I’m somehow getting friendly with Wilder?”
His smile falls. “That was shitty.”
I want to say, Which part? The fact that I pointed it out or the truth of it? But I don’t because I’m not trying to fight with him and have him avoid Spence in the process. “Look, I know you’ve been trying. You’ve been spending a lot of time with Spence and he’s really loving it.”
“As am I,” he interjects.
“And that makes me really happy,” I continue, which is true. “But I think it’d be better if we didn’t try to relive our teen years. They were painful enough the first time around.” Now, if I could just take this advice myself that would be great.
He nods, looking out into the snowy front yard and back at me. “Sorry, Maddi. I don’t know why it made me so crazy when I heard. You’re right. It’s none of my business.”
I sigh. Apologetic Jake is like a golden retriever giving you sad eyes; it’s basically impossible to stay mad.
“It’s fine,” I say. “You should have seen my reaction when Mom read the will.”
A hint of his smile returns. “I can only imagine.”
“If Spence wasn’t there, I might have lit the house on fire, starting with Wilder.”
“I don’t doubt that for a second,” he says with a laugh and pauses. “And Maddi, you’re right, my first question should have been about Spence. He really is a cool little guy.”
“The coolest,” I agree.
“And well, I know you haven’t made up your mind . . . but I, for one, would like it if you two decided to move back.”
I’m about to answer but I don’t get the chance.
“What do you mean move back?” Spence says from behind me, the front door clicking shut like an exclamation mark.
Whatever relief I just felt is obliterated in a flash. I whip around as Spence skips down the steps to join us.
“Mom?” he says, looking up at me. Jake has the good sense to let me answer.
Shit. This is not how I wanted Spence to find out. It was supposed to come from me in a controlled way, and while I realize the fault is solely mine, I also thought I was doing the right thing, making it less complicated by waiting. But now . . .
I scratch my eyebrow, all my worries about making the right decision barreling in. “So, you remember how I told you that Grandma wanted to talk to me about Grandpa’s will?”
He nods. “Yeah, you did that like a week and a half ago.”
“Right, well it had to do with the bakery, which is why I’ve started going there in the mornings.”
His eyebrows push together. “Okay . . .” he says like he’s thinking about it.
“The thing is,” I start, “your grandfather decided he wanted me and Wilder to have it.”
“Wait, Grandpa left you the bakery?” Spence asks and there’s a warning in his tone.
“Half of it, yes.”
“Grandpa left you the bakery and you didn’t tell me?” he says like I betrayed him.
“It’s complicated.”
“Saying, Hey Spence, you know that dream I’ve always had about owning a bakery, well now I do, is complicated?”
Jake laughs before he catches himself and tries to cover it with a cough. “Sorry, but wow is he your kid.”
Spence, however, isn’t looking at his dad and he certainly isn’t laughing; he’s staring at me.
“What’s complicated is that in order to keep the bakery I have to work there for a year,” I say, and his face shifts from hurt to shock.
“Wait, what?!”
I close my eyes for a split second, acutely feeling the hole I’ve dug. “Your grandpa specified in his will that in order to claim the inheritance, I have to live in Haverberry for a year.”
I can feel his panic, even before I see it in his expression. “You mean we. We have to live in Haverberry for a year.”
“Yes, you’re right.”
“Why wouldn’t you tell me this? How could you keep this a secret? What about my friends; what about my school?” He’s so upset that his little chin starts to shake. “Were you just going to make this decision without me?”
“No, I was going to talk to you about it,” I say, realizing how lame those words sound in retrospect.
His face scrunches and he sniffs, wiping his nose with the back of his hand. “I don’t believe you.”
“Spence—” I start, well aware we’re headed for a total meltdown. I reach out to comfort him.
But he moves out of my grasp. “Don’t,” he says, voice wavering, stepping back even farther. “You’re lying. You promised you’d never lie!” He makes for the door, jogging up the steps and slipping inside. He doesn’t scream at me or call me names and he doesn’t slam the door, which in a way makes it worse. He’s the most reasonable nine-year-old in the world and his disappointment strikes harder than anything else.
“I feel bad. I didn’t know he didn’t know,” Jake says, but I shake my head.
“Thanks, but this mess is mine,” I say, heading for the door.
I say a fast goodbye to Jake, and he gets in his truck. Only when I go back inside, Spence isn’t upstairs face-planted on the bed or burrowed under a pillow, he’s on the couch with my mother, crying into her shoulder, and the visual gives me a start. It’s not that I expect her to be standoffish, but I can’t help but notice that she’s warmer with him than she ever was with me, stroking his head and shushing him.
“Spence?” I say, softening my voice as I walk into the living room. “Want to come upstairs and talk to me about what just happened? I’d really like to explain.”
He shakes his head and my heart sinks. There have only been a couple of times that he’s refused to speak to me, and I know from past experiences that pushing him to do so only makes things worse.
But then he says the thing I never thought I’d hear in a million years. “I want to talk to Grandma.”
I stand there for a long moment, not sure how to react.
“I’ve got him,” my mom confirms.
And the realization that I’m the one out of place in the room, leaves me feeling upside down. “Okay,” I say, trying to keep the upset out of my voice. “I’m here whenever you’re ready.”
I turn around, making my way into the kitchen, where I pace for the next twenty minutes, punctuated by shoving a cookie in my mouth and staring out the window uncomfortably. My thoughts flit to Liv and the will I’ve yet to obtain, wondering if maybe there’s a solution there that’ll make this easier. And by the time Mom and Spence show up in the doorway, her arm around his shoulder and Spence wiping his face on his sleeve, I’m dead set on that course of action.
“Spence?” I say, opening my arms, and he leaves my mother’s side, his head hanging, walking straight into my embrace. I bend down, holding him tight.
While Spence is mature, he’s also just a little boy, one who is deeply sensitive. And I’m his world. It’s been just the two of us his entire life.
I look up at my mother from where I hold Spence. “Mom, could you get the addendum for me? I want to be able to explain it to him.”
“Of course,” she says with a nod, and relief floods me. I asked her and we’re not having a blowup; at least there’s that.
A handful of seconds after my mother leaves, he pulls away from me, his face puffy. “I’d really like to talk to you now.”
“Great, because I really want to hear whatever you have to say,” I reply, motioning for him to sit with me at the small breakfast table.
He slides into the seat next to mine, taking a few seconds to collect his thoughts. “The thing is,” he says, “I really don’t want to leave my friends in California.”
I nod, my head dipping a little with the motion. “Totally understandable.” While the adult world isn’t fair, its blowback on the kid world is even less so. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you—”
“That really hurt my feelings,” he says with emphasis.
“I know, Spence. I feel terrible. I should have been up-front with you, even if I didn’t have a clear solution.”
“Grandma said that the bakery is really important to you because it was Grandpa’s and that you’d regret it if you lost it,” he says, and my hackles go up. Now she’s guilting my kid?
“Yes, the bakery is important to me, but that’s not something you need to figure out. That one is on me,” I assure him.
“And then there’s Dad,” he says with a pinch of hope that gives me pause. “I guess it’d be kinda great to live near him.”
I hesitate. It’s not that Jake hasn’t been showing up these past couple of weeks, but the chances of that lasting are slim to nil. I hadn’t put much thought into it, probably because I never seriously considered staying, but now that I hear Spence say it, it might be the number one reason to leave. While we lived in California, Jake’s absence could be written off as geography, but that excuse disappears when he’s a five-minute drive away.
“What I’m saying is,” Spence continues, “the more I think about it, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to live here.” For a moment, I think I misheard him, but he continues, “Being near family actually sounds really nice.”
The air suddenly shifts and the room spins, my own opinion so deeply opposed to his that they don’t even share the same atmosphere. I stare at him for a long moment, trying to slow my galloping pulse. “I know moving isn’t your first choice—” I start, but he cuts me off.
“Actually, I think it is. I think we should do it.”
I freeze. I expected a lot of things from this conversation, but this absolutely wasn’t one of them. Shouldn’t I be relieved right now that I don’t have a crying kid who vows to never leave his friends? But relief is not what I’m experiencing—cold terror might be more like it. It squarely puts me in the “no” camp all by myself, with my mother, Spence, and everyone else standing on the other side of the line.
“Yes, well, it might not be as clear-cut as here or California,” I hear myself say, trying to regain my balance and searching for anything that will steady me. “There might be another option. I’m looking for one.”
His head tilts like he heard something that interests him. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, maybe we can go back and forth or maybe I can figure out a way to operate the bakery part of the time from California?” I hear the desperation in my voice, feel the resistance in my very being. Jake will disappoint Spence. I’ll be forced to live with my mother until I can get on my feet. The bakery. The guilt. The memories. My dad. This goddamn town. Wilder, a dangerous amount of Wilder.
“But how?” he asks.
“You remember Liv?”
“The woman whose car you hit?”
I nod. “I’m going to have her look at the will and see if there are any loopholes in the wording.” I don’t know why I’m telling him this; I know I shouldn’t get his hopes up before I know, but I can’t seem to stop myself. I’m like a large dog that sat down mid-walk, stubbornly refusing to budge, clinging to the sidewalk, and pronouncing it my new home.
But before Spence replies, his eyes move from me to something behind me, and my stomach fills with dread over what I just said because I know what I’ll find there, or rather who.
Only I’m not prepared for how upset she looks. Outrage and hurt mix on Mom’s face in such an obvious way that my unsettled feeling turns to tumult. And it’s made worse by the fact that she’s carrying the will.
“Mom—” I start, regret coursing through me, but she cuts me off.
“Don’t,” she says, and her tone shuts me right up. She puts the addendum on the counter with a thwack.
I stand. “Mom, I didn’t mean—”
The look on her face makes me want to hide under the tablecloth. “Didn’t mean for what? For me to overhear the truth?”
I close my mouth because she’s spot-on, even if my delivery would have been softer.
But she’s not done. “Didn’t mean for me to know that you’re telling our closest friends behind my back that you can’t wait to leave? That you’ve gone so far as to implore their help in getting away from me? Or maybe the fact that you hit Liv’s car? Let me ask you, did you make reparations for that? Did you fix her Aston Martin?”
All the color drains from my face. Whatever I imagined her reaction to be, this cuts much deeper because it’s true.
Spence stands up, looking back and forth between us. “I think I’m gonna let you two talk,” he says, and even though I have no desire for him to overhear this, the thought of him leaving jolts me with panic. As long as he’s here, we’re forced to temper our conversation. But he slips past my mom, shooting me a look over his shoulder like you better fix this, leaving me to my self-made peril.
My anxiety rockets into space. I don’t speak to my mom right away. I know that anything I say is only going to make this worse—that I wouldn’t even know how to tell her the thousand reasons I’m terrified to move here because I barely understand them myself.
I catch the muffled sound of Spence closing the bedroom door upstairs, and I know she hears it, too, by the way she glances toward the doorway.
“You know, previously when you said you didn’t want to stay, I gave you the benefit of the doubt. She’s in shock, I thought. But now?” She starts slowly like it’s taking a monumental feat of control to explain the obvious to me.
“Mom,” I say, “please don’t do this.”
“Do what, Madeline? Have an adult conversation about the topic at hand? Because you’ve been here for what? Ten days now? And all you seem to be doing is avoiding it. I’ve tried to give you your space, but really, this cannot go on. Despite the fact that your father’s dying wish was for you to have his bakery, you cannot give up one year of your very important life in California to make him happy?”
Her words split me right down the middle, and my self-control momentarily slips. “This isn’t about Dad. And I’m sorry you don’t like it, but this is about making the best decision for me and my son, and in order to make it properly, I need time.”
“Really?” she says like she’s not convinced. “And would that best decision you cite also include financial stability? Because despite the fact that you try to cover it, I can clearly see you’re struggling. This bakery would mean a lifetime of security.”
No one in the world knows how to push my buttons the way my mother does.
“First of all,” I say, my nerves raw, “I’ve never asked you for anything. Not once since I moved out. I’ve taken care of myself for the past ten years and I can continue to do so.”
She nods like I’m so predictable. “Ah yes, we’re back to this. What terrible parents we were. How could we be so cruel to you? How could we offer to have you and the baby live with us only to have you throw our generosity in our faces?”
I’m trembling now, sick with the deluge of emotion that’s simmering below the surface. “Generosity?” I say, shaking my head. “Is that how you remember it? Because as I recall you treated me like you wished I’d disappear so that you didn’t have to deal with me. Did you really think I wanted to stay in a house where I’d be reminded every day that I was a disappointment? Do you remember what you said the day you got a call from one of the women in your ladies’ club asking if the rumor was true? You said into the phone, and I quote, ‘We’re devastated. I can barely look at her.’”
“Did you expect me to be happy? To be overjoyed that my only child was throwing away her future?”
I don’t know why I thought she might feel bad hearing those words repeated back to her. I should know better by now.
But instead of countering, I pull out my phone and snap a picture of the will, dropping it back on the counter, and sending the picture in a wordless text to Liv.
“Don’t worry, Mom, with any luck I’ll be gone in a few days, and you won’t have to deal with me.”
“Deal with you?” she says like I’ve completely missed the point. “It’s obvious to me now that there’s no getting through to you, Madeline. You think I’m trying to control you, that your father was? One day you’re going to wake up and realize that your own worst enemy is you, only by then it’ll be too late.”
My eyes widen. I’m about to refute her statement, the way she’s painting me as rigid and unyielding, but for one horrible second, I’m not sure she’s wrong. And the doubt twists inside of me, confusing what I know to be true and turning my response to ash on my tongue.
She shakes her head like it’s all too much. “I’d thought your father’s bakery would be a welcome gift, a way to honor his legacy that would bring you joy. But I can see that it’s nothing but a burden for you, anchoring you to a place and to people you can’t stand being around.”
Her words are like arrows punching holes in my armor, inflicting damage to the softest parts of me. “Mom,” I say again, this time quieter, the awful sting of guilt overriding everything else.
She takes a breath, leveling me in her gaze. “No, I think you were right all along, you should go back to California.”
Death blow.
I open my mouth, but she’s already turning and leaving the room, the air noticeably chilling in the wake of her departure.