Page 10 of Anywhere with You
Another text came through:Florence and the Machine.
I texted back,I’m impressed. Now, get back to work. What are your students doing while you’re texting?
Oh, they’re texting, too. Nobody smiles as much at their own crotch as a teenager hiding a phone in class. I hope.
I laughed so hard that strangers at the supermarket stared at me.
I went home again long enough to pick up Badger, who was always hesitant about a ride in the car, but willing to go if it meant hedidn’t get left behind. I didn’t tell him about the trip, only that he was going to see hisotherfavorite people.
Before we got to the end of the block, he’d jumped all over me and the dash, then got his head stuck between the middle console and the passenger seat. He yipped pathetically until I stopped the car to free him. Then I turned the car around and went back home to get his carrier.
Mom met me at the front door with several packages of homemade monster cookies, putting them into my hands and going to take Badger out of the carrier. Dad came out and scratched Badger’s head, then unloaded the bags of toys and food, the leash, the name and phone number for Badger’s vet, and twenty other things I was sure he absolutely needed.
Badger wiggled in my mother’s grip like his lifelong dream had just come true.
“Traitor,” I said. He looked at me with his uneven face and yipped.
“I know you’ve been through a lot, Honey, but I can’t see that running away is a good choice,” Dad said, herding us toward the house with his arms full.
“And with…her?” Mom said. “Aren’t you worried that you’re just going to be in an echo chamber of anger the whole time? You need a healing environment. Why don’t you just tell her you’ve changed your mind and come relax here with us for a few days?”
“I’ll be fine. Cara and I aren’t wallowing anymore. It’s been almost two months. We’ve both been through the five stages of grief, or whatever. Is it only five? It seems like it should be more. And one of them should definitely be vacuuming. That would be handy.”
“Just a few days,” Mom wheedled. “A week at most. I’ll cook whatever you want.”
“That’s very much not going to happen,” I said, “but I appreciate your concern. Actually, that’s a lie. I don’t. But I do love you both, and I’ll take lots of pictures.”
They looked at me and sighed simultaneously, which made all three of us laugh.
Mom made me come in and have a cup of coffee before I left. It had never in my life bothered me to scoop sugar out of a Tupperware container, but today it occurred to me that Mom would adore a little sugar bowl and pitcher like Cara’s. And she had a birthday coming up.
“Where are you planning on sleeping?” Dad asked.
“Underpasses, park benches, the usual.”
Dad stared at me, waiting for a serious answer.
“Well, we realized that we’re not backpacking college students. We’re adults, so we’re going to stay in semi-nice hotels. But we’re also broke adults, so we’re sharing a room. We actually found a little cabin to rent once we get there, so we’ll wake up to the redwoods.”
“Oh,” Mom said a little wistfully.
“Want to come along?” I asked, grinning. I knew she’d say no, but I also knew that Mom had always loved traveling. In between college and my birth, she and Dad had been to three continents and over a dozen countries.
After that, money got tight. In part it was the expense of a difficult pregnancy and delivery, plus a year of unemployment after Dad was laid off when I was eight, plus my grandfather’s long illness, plus house repairs when the pipes—designed for Houston weather and not real winters—burst during a freak ice storm that lasted days and left most of the city without power, plus saving to help me pay for college, and to top it off, an economic system designed to make sure that we all struggle as much as we can until we’re dead.
“I wish I could go,” Mom said. “But it’s planting season, and there’s just too much to do here. God knows what the garden would look like if I left for a week. Everything would be dead.”
Dad took her hand. “We’ve never seen the redwoods. What about in the fall? We won’t drive. It takes too long. We’ll fly.”
She smiled at him. “It’s a date.”
They kissed.
“Ugh, you guys are the worst,” I said and stood to leave.
“Honey,” Dad said, his voice cajoling me not to run off.
“I’m kidding. You’re adorable. I do need to go, though.”
