‘You’re home, then.’
I glanced round at Mum as I hung my coat in the hall. I couldn’t answer. To acknowledge her statement would be like admitting that this was home; that it was where I belonged.
I frowned as I turned away. Where did I belong? Had I ever belonged anywhere?
I glanced at the door. I always returned here. It was like a magnet, always pulling me back.
This time was different, though. I had a purpose.
I needed clarity.
Susan’s claims made no sense. Mum wouldn’t have told her I’d kissed Tim. Mum knew the truth. And Mum never lied.
And yet Susan had been so convinced.
I nibbled my lip. I needed to hear Mum’s explanation. There had to be one. A perfectly logical reason, one that I just couldn’t see for myself.
‘Come on, I’ll make you a cup of tea. You look like you could use it.’
I nodded and followed Mum to the kitchen. It was funny how tea was always the first thing that people thought of; as though it was a magic cure for all ailments.
‘I wondered where you’d gone when I woke up this morning. You didn’t tell me you were going out.’
I twisted my hands together in my lap as I sat at the kitchen table. It was the same seat I had sat in since I was a child. It was my seat. My place.
‘I was worried,’ Mum added.
The kettle popped and whirred in the background, filling the empty space between us.
‘I’m sorry.’
She nodded. My apology pacified her. I could feel it. Her mood lifted as the frown dissipated from her brow.
Except, was I sorry? I tilted my head to the right. I hadn’t wanted to make her worry. I never wanted to do that. But an apology implied I had done something wrong. Had I?
I rubbed my eyes. The truth was becoming harder and harder to distinguish these days. Until recently everything had always seemed so simple. Lately I was questioning everything, even things that I had simply accepted before.
I frowned.
Had I really accepted them? Or had I just chosen not to think about them?
I rolled my eyes. I was doing it again. More questions. More doubts.
Mum clanged cups behind me. ‘So where did you go?’
This was my chance. I could tell her where I’d been; tell her what Susan had said. I could ask Mum why she had betrayed me.
I hesitated.
Did I really want to know?
Was my curiosity about something that had happened so long ago really worth risking my relationship with Mum? If Susan was right about Mum’s involvement, then it meant Mum had lied to Susan. She’d destroyed my only friendship. And she’d done it intentionally.
Or perhaps Mum hadn’t betrayed me. Maybe Mum really thought I had already confessed.
We don’t have secrets, Jess. Not between us.
What if she didn’t have secrets from me? What if I simply couldn’t remember the truth?
Was I ready to face that? It wasn’t just Mum’s theory now; Susan had made the same accusations that my memory was faulty. What if they were right? What if…?
I gripped my hands together and my nails dug into my skin.
What good would knowing the truth do now? It couldn’t change the past. It couldn’t give me a second chance at the life I had lost; the opportunities I had let slip away. All it would do was risk my present.
Taking risks was foolish. It was dangerous. I belonged on the side lines, where I had always been.
‘Just for a drive.’
The vagueness of my statement surprised me. It wasn’t a lie. But then it wasn’t the whole story either.
It was a half-truth. Not wrong. But not entirely right.
‘I guess you just needed to clear your head a bit.’
I nodded, but my stomach twisted inside. Somehow Mum’s acceptance of my explanation made my deception worse. She was always suspicious, and yet for once she didn’t question my answer.
‘This whole situation has been most unsettling.’ Mum set cups of tea on the table and sat opposite me.
‘Situation,’ I repeated her word as I stared at her. That’s all Adam was to her. A situation.
‘You know what I mean.’ Mum shrugged.
Her shrug was another dismissal.
‘The whole thing is a bit distasteful.’ She picked up her tea, took a sip and winced from the heat.
‘It’s more than distasteful. It’s…’ I floundered for the right word to sum up the magnitude of how I felt. But every word I thought of somehow fell short.
‘Yes, well, true,’ Mum conceded, saving me the trouble of finishing my search.
‘I just don’t understand how it came to this.’ I heard the whine in my tone and braced myself for Mum’s disapproval.
She blinked. ‘Don’t you?’
The surprise in her voice grated on me. It was as though she thought I should have seen it coming; that I should have expected it.
Mum shrugged. ‘Well, you never manage to keep them, do you?’
I stared at her. ‘Adam died.’ I could not believe even she could be that callous.
‘He still left, didn’t he?’ She nodded, as though answering her own question. ‘Just like the others.’
Tears brimmed in my eyes and I blinked them back frantically as the past resurfaced in my mind.
‘Look, Jess. I’m sorry. We had fun, but…’
‘But what?’
Matthew stared at the ground as he kicked a stone with his mud-encrusted trainer. ‘I couldn’t turn it down.’
‘Turn what down? I don’t understand.’ I shifted the textbooks that weighed heavily in my arms.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘You said that already.’
Matthew shrugged. ‘It’s all I can say.’
‘What does that even mean?’
‘It’s true, though. Jess. I am sorry.’ He slung his rucksack over his shoulder. ‘I gotta go. If I’m seen talking to you…’ Matthew looked up and down the road nervously.
I glanced at the other students who surrounded us, seemingly unaware of our presence. ‘Seen by who, Matt?’
He pulled a car key from his pocket. He clung to it as though it was a lifeline. I stared at the key, my eyes widened in surprise. ‘Your mum finally let you borrow her car?’
The colour drained from his face. ‘No, er, it’s, er, mine.’
‘Yours?’ I blinked. ‘You have your own car?’
Matthew rammed the key back in his pocket as though he wanted to hide it from me. But why? It didn’t make sense. None of it did.
‘You gotta stay away from me, Jess. You deserve better. You really do.’
I watched as he walked towards a shiny new red Golf. ‘I don’t want better. I just want you.’
‘It’s not the same. Adam didn’t have a choice.’
Mum arched an eyebrow. ‘Didn’t he?’
I shuffled. ‘He didn’t intend to leave. It was an accident.’
Mum leaned towards me. ‘Then why was he drink driving?’
My heart raced.
‘I…’ Words slipped away. I didn’t have an explanation. Not one I could share. Not with her. Not with anyone.
‘Did he have a problem with alcohol?’
‘No!’ My response was instinctive. Her question sliced through me like an accusation, not just about him, but about me too, about us. Adam didn’t drink, not really. He didn’t need that escape, he was happy, we were happy. Or at least we had been.
‘Maybe he didn’t before, but perhaps more recently?’ Mum persevered. I should have known she wouldn’t let the subject drop. She never did. ‘Had something happened? Were you two having any problems?’
I froze. My breath caught in my chest. Did she know? Could she sense it from me? Could she tell from my manner, my tone, that I wasn’t as heartbroken as I should be?
‘Of course not.’ The lie slipped from my lips so easily. Too easily.
Guilt chafed against me. I shouldn’t lie to her, not to my mum. She deserved better. I licked my dry lips, summoning the courage to come clean.
It felt wrong to lie to her. I wanted to take it back. I wanted to tell the truth. But to do so would be to admit that I had lied in the first place.
The lie was out there now. The sin had been committed. My confession wouldn’t make it right, it would just highlight my deception. Everything I said from that point on would be questioned more thoroughly. I had the capacity to lie. The ability to deceive Mum, and she had believed me. My confession wouldn’t lead to my redemption, but to my destruction.
I never used to lie. Not to her. I told her everything. She was involved in everything. Too much so perhaps. It didn’t mean she trusted me. She had always been suspicious and doubtful, even though she had no cause to be.
Now I was hiding something from her. But then if I was truly honest with myself, I’d been lying to her for months. I’d kept things from her; pretended everything was fine; that I was fine. It was wrong of me. I was deceptive and bad. But maybe I wasn’t entirely to blame. Maybe I shouldn’t have had to lie because she shouldn’t be that involved. She shouldn’t demand to know every detail of my life. She shouldn’t have a say in all my decisions. She could give advice, of course. But with Mum it was more than that. It was always meant to be her way.
‘Really?’
I stared at her. There was something about her tone, the incredulousness of it and the way her gaze locked upon me, studying me intently, as though searching for a crack in my armour. Indignation bubbled inside me. It was almost as though she wanted us to have had problems. She wanted to be proved right. She wanted Adam to have been bad for me, for our relationship to have been flawed.
My confession withered from my lips. My desire to be honest was outweighed by my stubborn pride that refused to admit she’d been right.
I gritted my teeth. Anger surged through me. Not just at her, but at Adam too. He’d put me in this position. He’d let me down. He’d made Mum’s predictions come true. He’d made her right about him.
I sat up straighter. Adam had failed me, but that didn’t mean I was ever going to let Mum have the satisfaction of saying ‘I told you so’.