“Thanks, Mom. You don’t think it’s…?” I trailed off, unsure how to say what I really meant. Mom didn’t tolerate self-deprecation, even if I tried to be funny about it.You don’t think I look ridiculous? Out of my element? Like someone slapped lipstick on a pig?
“You’re perfect, hon. I’m sure everyone at the dance will be begging you to be their valentine.”
“I don’t know about that,” I said with a nervous laugh.
“Well, I do.”
Mom had no idea where I was actually headed, and that wasn’t going to change. Not if I could help it.
She didn’t even know I’d reached out to my dad in the first place, and I had no plans to let her know that, either.
Instead, my story was that I was going to a Valentine’s Day dance held by a sorority some of my college friends had rushed.
I’d had to drop out at the end of the fall semester due to lack of funds—even with the partial scholarships I’d managed to land, I didn’t have enough to pay for more textbooks, traveling to and from campus, much less the costs for on- or near-campus housing now that Mom was drowning in medical debt—but Mom still wanted me to be as involved with “kids my age” as I could be.
She worried that I spent too much time taking care of her.
That I was wasting my youth being her caretaker.
It was no use trying to convince her that I’d rather be helping her, trying to repay her even a little for how she’d sacrificed everything to raise me, than off partying with college kids.
Mom was watching me with something like concern in her eyes. Focusing a lot on the dress, the bejeweled neckline that I suspected was made with real crystals.
She was noticing how far out of my price range my dress was, wondering where I got it. I was sure she was half scared I’d had a sudden and abrupt character change and started shoplifting.
“I, uh…borrowed the dress,” I told her to save her the trouble of asking. “Natalie from my Spanish class. She’s, well, she comes from money.”
Again, a lie. Though she didn’t push, Mom didn’t seem to buy it based on the subtle raise of her blonde brows, and that wasn’t surprising. I wasn’t a practiced liar.
Had I ever lied to my mom as much as I was doing tonight in my entire twenty-one years of life?
Definitely not, and the newness only amplified the discomfort.
I had no other choice, though. I couldn’t exactly tell my mom,Yeah, your rich, estranged ex-husband sent me this dress mysteriously in the mail with a note that I should wear it tonight and that I shouldn’t “tell Lois” where I got it. He’s also sending someone to chauffeur me to an event you’d never, ever let me attend in a million years.
As if me remembering that last detail had manifested it, the low hum of an engine pulling onto the street in front of our house broke through the silence.
I darted to the window, peering through the blinds to see an honest-to-god limousine parked in front of our humble home. I couldn’t help but laugh.
“That’s my ride, I think,” I told Mom breathlessly.
“It’s about that time,” she agreed. She wheeled her chair alongside me all the way to the front door. In response to her “come here” gesture, I ducked my head down so she could kiss me on the cheek.
“Have the best time, my best girl,” Mom said, love shining in her brown eyes—a lighter amber shade than my own. “And be safe.”
I couldn’t guarantee either of those things. I nodded to avoid another lie, tacking on an earnest, “If you need anything, any help at all, you can still call me.”
Mom frowned at me. Lois Taylor was the strongest, most independent woman I knew, and as a result she was not a big fan of being handled this way by her own kid.
Ever since she got sick, she’d tried to brush off my help, even as it became clear she needed me. “I just want you to be young,” she’d always tell me, even when she lost the ability to walk on her own and I had to take on more of a caretaker role. I didn’t complain, not out of some attempt to be a perfect selfless daughter, but because I genuinely liked being able to help her.
I’d always been responsible, sensible past the point of my actual age, and instead of taking this as a truth of my character, my mom was always trying to encourage me to let loose.
“I won’t need you,” Mom said with a determination that set her jaw firmly. “I just need you to care for yourself tonight. Have fun. Find a little romance, maybe.”
I nodded, squeezing her hand once more before I left, and the next thing I knew, I was in the sleek and luxurious back seat of a limo, almost too warm despite the late winter chill beyond the windows.
We sped through an area of town that looked seedy in the fading evening light.