I grinned at her and handed her a granola bar.
She sighed gratefully. “Thank you.”
“How are you feeling?”
She took a bite of the bar and lay back against her headrest. “I’m fine. Just annoyed by all of this.” She motioned to herself in a hospital bed. “All the fuss it’s caused. It’s going to take so long to get me back on track.”
“They told me the guy who hit you is going into surgery, but he should be okay too. They don’t have insurance.”
She rubbed her eyes. “I heard that too. I’m glad he’s okay.”
I cleared my throat. “Have you talked to your ex-husband lately?” I tried to sound nonchalant, but my words were clipped. I didn’t want to have this conversation, but we needed to.
Her eyes lifted to meet mine. “Yes, I did. He was here this morning.”
“Where’s he staying?”
“Somewhere in Salmon, I think.”
“The Pink Flamingo Motel’s not fancy enough for him?”
Her lips lifted in a smile. “Probably not.”
A wave of disgust at the very idea of him back in our lives filled my stomach.
“I heard he came to see you last night,” she ventured.
“Yeah.”
She waited a moment before she spoke. “There are lots of emotions that come up whenever he’s around, aren't there?”
“I heard you gave him the okay to pay for your rehab.” I broached the subject lightly, trying to keep the negative out of my voice. The fact was, it was her choice, and I knew it. But it bothered me.
“Yeah, I did.”
When I said nothing else, she sighed and picked at the thin blanket across her lap. “For a long time, I was so angry at him for leaving like that. And not just leaving…it was like he didn’t even think about us. He just…moved on. When he first left, he was planning to come back. At least that’s what he told me.” She huffed out a laugh. “It wasn’t long after I found out he’d moved on and sent me the divorce papers.” Another big sigh. “Anyway, he went from girl to girl pretty quickly. But the wife he has now…I think she’s done him some good. That was the most settled and grown-up I'd ever seen him.”
“Still a jackass, though.”
She laughed again, grabbing my hand and holding it. “Yeah. He’s still that. He also reminded me of something I don’t think I ever told you. And maybe it’s not fair that I didn’t.”
“What?”
She drew a breath. “He did try sending some money here and there over the years. But I could never bring myself to cash the checks. I never told you that, did I?”
I shook my head slowly, my body tense at her words. I hadn’t known he’d even tried. My mom and I worked our tails off to make ends meet. But even knowing this information, I would have told her not to cash them.
“At first, it was a pride thing. I didn’t want him to feel like he was still a parent. Still a part of us. Like he could go away and destroy everything but send a check and somehow make it all better. Make him look better. I couldn’t stomach the idea.”
“So I get my vengeful thoughts from you, huh?”
She laughed as a quiet sadness etched across her face.
“But thinking about it all now, I realized that it just kept me bitter. Not cashing those checks. It’s kept a hardness in my heart that wouldn’t ever go away. And it was just hurting me. It’s hard to forgive when you’re steeped in resentment. And now I wonder how your life might have been different if I’d cashed the checks and let you have a childhood free from some of the worries we shared over the years. I?—“
I leaned forward, my hand on her arm, stopping her mid-sentence. I didn’t need to hear any more. “Mom, you did everything right. He messed up, not you. I had a great childhood. It was good for me to learn how to work. I wouldn’t have wanted anything different.”
A tear rolled down her cheek, and I was done with all the talking. My emotions had been through the wringer lately, and I wanted nothing more than to flip on the hospital TV and makefun of some idiotic daytime soap opera with my mom right now. Like we’d done yesterday. But she wasn’t done.