Page 71 of The Summer House
The phone pulsedagainst Callie’s ear as it rang. Sprawled across her air mattress, she looked up at the fresh paint on the ceiling and the recessed lighting that had been installed where Olivia’s pencil marks had been. She could barely keep her eyes open after the day she’d had, but she had one more thing that she wanted to do. She couldn’t make things right with Luke, but she could start to make them right with someone else.
Callie had seen tonight how right Gladys was when she’d said, “The truth will set you free.” She’d learned by letting Luke into her world and her thoughts how being honest with someone made life richer and not so scary when she’d always thought it was the other way around. So, if she were being honest with herself, she’d have admitted that she missed her mother. She missed those days before everything had become so complicated, and she was going to try mend things.
“Hello?” her mother answered.
“Hi. It’s Callie.”
“Oh, hi, Callie. How’s the cottage? Is everything okay?”
Callie had felt a twinge of guilt for having been in the same city as her mother and not tried to see her, but things had gone so fast, and she hadn’t been ready then. Now she was. Her mother hadn’t been very supportive after she and Kyle had split up, and they hadn’t ever really talked about it, which had hurt Callie. But now, she could step back and see that being supportive might be easier for her mother if Callie would forgive her.
“The cottage had some damage,” she said. “But we’re getting it all fixed. Thank you for asking.”
“That’s great. I’m glad you called to update me.”
Callie sat up. “That’s not why I called.”
“Oh?”
“No, Mom. I called because I just wanted to see what you were up to.” She balled the sheet into her fist and then smoothed it out, her fingertips light with anticipation. She’d never taken a step like this before.
There was a kind of silence, during which Callie felt that her mother was assessing her, trying to decide her motives, but the truth was, she only had one motive: Luke had lost a lot of time with Frederick—time he’d never get back. Callie didn’t want the same thing to happen with her mother.
“I know we haven’t been really close…”
“No,” her mother said, her voice shaky. “I’ll tell you. I’m alone a lot. I used to think that being alone would help me get better, figure out what I needed. I craved the silence, trying to make everything calm down in my head, but now that I have it, it just feels empty. I think about you… Wonder what you’re doing.”
“You don’t have to be alone,” Callie said. “Come stay with us sometime. We have plenty of room.”
When she didn’t respond, Callie said, “The sea air will clear your head better than anything else. I speak from experience.” She heard the small breath before her mother’s smile.
“Maybe I will.”
“You have my number. Just text or call whenever you want to come.”
