Page 49 of Don't Bet On It
“No.” She let loose a hollow laugh. I thought she was done talking, but I waited anyway. She seemed to be making up her mind about something. “She used to leave me alone. It started when I was six. She would take a long weekend with her current boyfriend.”
I froze with my beer halfway to my lips. “She left you alone when you were six?” I couldn’t fathom that.
“She did. She left me with some microwave meals—I learned how to use the microwave when I was four, I think—and disappeared on a Friday afternoon. She didn’t come back until late Sunday night.”
My heart shriveled at the look on her face. “I’m sorry.” It came out softer than I was anticipating. “That is terrible.”
“Oh, it gets worse.” She took a long pull on her beer. “Her trips started extending. She left me for two weeks when I was eight. There was only enough food for two days. The neighbors fed me … and then they called Social Services.”
“That must have been difficult,” I acknowledged. “You were likely frightened at the time. That was the best thing for you.”
“It might have been if I’d stayed in foster care, but I didn’t.” Her smile was rueful. “My mother comes across really well in front of a judge. She kept making up stories where she was the victim.
“My father abandoned her when I was a baby, or she was struggling to put food on the table and doing the best she could, or a neighbor had promised to watch me and flaked out on her,” she continued. “Every judge fell for it, and I was always sent back.”
“How many times did Social Services step in?” I asked.
She shrugged. “Quite a few. More than ten. They stopped coming around when I was fifteen. Her trips lasted two weeks or sometimes even a month by then. I could take care of myself at that point and was always glad for her to be gone.”
“I am so sorry. That is terrible.”
“Yes, well…” She let loose a heavy sigh but didn’t say anything else.
“What about other family?” I asked. It was impossible to fix the past for her, but I found I was frustrated that she’d had to go through it at all.
“I had a grandmother. She was better than my mother but not by much. She died when I was young, though. I never knew my father. I don’t even know who he is.”
“And the therapy was provided by Social Services?”
“Yup. I hated it. I learned how to get past the therapists by shutting down and saying nothing.” A small smile appeared on her face. “Well, until I met Robin.”
I latched onto that name. This memory was somehow better for her, and that was the memory I wanted to dwell on. “And who is Robin?”
“Robin DeMarco. She was my last therapist, and she still tries to shrink me once a month. She sets up a lunch, won’t let me wiggle out of it, and spends an entire hour tricking me into talking about my issues.”
I grinned. “You still go to the lunches. You’re an adult. You could say no if you didn’t like them.”
“She’s given me a few coping techniques throughout the years,” Tallulah acknowledged “They’ve helped. I still have anger issues. They build up until I snap, and then I immediately regret overreacting.”
“Like what happened with Olivia.”
“Yeah. If Kyla had gone at me—or even you—I would’ve been okay. Olivia is the one person who has always been there for me, though. I can’t do nothing when she’s being attacked.”
“It seems to me that Olivia is just as protective of you.”
“She tries,” Tallulah said. “She can’t understand where I’m coming from because she had a stable home life. Her parents understood, though. They always invited me to spend the night when my mother was out of town.”
“Did you?”
“Sometimes. By the time I was a teenager, I’d learned to enjoy my freedom. My mother taught me the only person I could rely on was myself, and I still live by that motto.”
Her statement, which she saw as fact, made me unbelievably sad. “I’m sorry.” It was all I could think to say.
“What are you sorry for?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s just… I don’t have the best relationship with my parents. My mother is better than my father, although that’s not saying much because she always defers to him. No matter how much I dislike my father at times, hearing stories like yours makes me realize that I should probably suck it up.”
Rather than agree, she shook her head. “Just because one person has it worse than another person doesn’t mean that anybody’s pain should be ignored. I understand the limitations of my mother. That doesn’t mean your issues with your parents aren’t legitimate.”
