Chapter Twenty-Eight
When the universe, fate or whatever, decided to kick your ass, it took aim and kept kicking. There was no avoiding the fact she’d traveled miles to end up where she started. Lucy looked at the silent phone in her hand. The center had called looking for her mother and then ended up speaking to her instead.
Lynne had never sent in the forms for Carl. She had never given them the doctor’s recommendation. They had held a place for as long as they could, but places were at a premium and there were other people out there who needed care. The center had tried, several times, to get ahold of her mother, but Lynne never returned any of their calls.
“We’re sorry, but we have had to give the place to another family,” the center director told her.
Lucy assured the woman she understood. She carefully replaced the phone on its cradle. She was angry, but not entirely surprised. Some part of her had always suspected this is how it would end. If that weren’t enough, all the signs were there. Mads had seen it, Richard had seen it. Hell. Even she’d seen it, but she hadn’t wanted to acknowledge what was staring her in the face. She wanted to rescue Lynne. Who knew what Lynne wanted? Perhaps Lynne was as clueless as the rest of them?
She’d barely seen her mother since that last get-together in the kitchen. Lynne was avoiding her. Either making herself scarce or hiding, in plain sight, behind an endless supply of domestic detritus.
Lucy glared at the phone again and then got wearily to her feet. Frustration curdled in her stomach as she stood there for a moment more.
All of this, all the anguish and the soul searching, all of it felt like it was all for nothing right now. She was feeling sorry for herself, but by her reckoning, that scene with Brooke had earned her the right for a little wallow. So, yes, she was feeling sorry for herself and, no, she was not going to do anything about it for the moment. Later, she might decide to show up and man up, but not right now.
She blew out a large breath and went to find Lynne.
Lynne was in the basement. The place smelled faintly of the beer Carl used to brew years ago and of dust and damp. It was her least favorite place and Lynne spent hours down here, doing the laundry. A coat of paint wouldn’t have killed anyone.
“Mom?”
“In here,” Lynne chirped cheerfully. The walls were covered in vinyl wainscoting that was clinging on from the seventies. It kept company with mold-colored linoleum on the floor. On second thought, a coat of paint wouldn’t have made any difference.
Lynne hauled sheets out of her ancient washer and stuffed them into an even older dryer. The things must still be coal powered.
“I spoke to Mrs. Rogers from the home.”
Lynne stiffened immediately, but did not look up from what she was doing. “Oh?”
“She said she has been trying to get ahold of you.”
“Hounding me is more like it.” Lynne slammed the dryer lid down with a metallic clunk. “The woman has been calling nonstop. Don’t you think she’d have gotten the hint by now?”
“Mom, she needed to talk to you, because she had a place for Dad.”
Lynne’s lips compressed and she bent to load more laundry into the machine.
“Mom?”
Lynne started shoving shirts into the machine. It was not like her mother not to carefully check labels.
“Mom?”
“What?” Lynne straightened suddenly and glared at her. “What do you want me to say to you? You are as bad as that woman on the phone. Always pushing and pushing to get me to do what you want me to do.”
“Mom, I thought this was what you wanted.”
“You thought, Lucy, you thought and you went ahead and dragged me off to see the doctor and started talking about selling the house and making me throw out stuff. You thought, Lucy, and then you charged straight in, without even asking.” Lynne measured detergent into the dispenser.
A surge of anger speared through Lucy and she ground her teeth together to stop from blurting out hurtful, ugly words. “You’re right, Mom.” It cost her a molar to get that past her clenched teeth. “You never asked me to help sell the house or to find somewhere for Dad.”
Lynne gave a vicious twist to the dials.
“But all my life you’ve needed me to stand between you and Dad.”
“That is not true. I have never asked you to do anything of the sort.” Lynne turned to her with wide eyes. Shock glimmered in their depths. But, there, right at the back, the tiniest flash of guilt. It disappeared as quickly as it had come and Lynne crossed her arms over her chest. “You can’t blame this on me. This is what you do. You go rushing into everything impetuously without thinking about what anyone else wants or needs. It’s the way you are. It’s the way you always were and you can come back here talking about change, but I am not sure you even know the meaning of that word.”
Shit, that hurt. “I have changed.” Lucy dug her nails into her palms. “Whether you believe that or not, it’s my truth.” The anger simmered and spat near the surface and she took a deep breath, counted to ten, and then again backward. Serenity danced tantalizingly outside of her grasp as she stood and looked at her mother.
Lynne with her face set in bitter lines of disappointment. The years etched across her skin like a living journal.
“If you don’t want to put Dad in a home, that’s fine. If you want to live in this house for the rest of your life, that’s fine too.” Lucy met Lynne’s glance head-on. “But you chose this, Mom. And, just like me, you’re going to have to live with the consequences of the choices you make.”
“Why are you talking to me like this?” Tears filled her mother’s eyes.
Lucy’s heart gave a sharp twist. She didn’t want to hurt her mother. That was not what any of this was about. “It’s okay, Mom,” she said, finding her voice. “Mrs. Rogers only called to say the place has been filled.”
Lynne fiddled with dryer dials and Lucy made her way back upstairs.