Page 86 of The Backtrack
“Of course!” Jessie extended a hand to Pearl.
Grandma Pearl stood from the chair then. “I’m going to get another cup of coffee with my potential new roommate.”
Sam watched her grandma and Jessie walk toward the house. Before she talked things out with Bonnie, she had to talk things out with Pearl. “Wait,” she said before standing from her chair and following the women toward the house. “Grandma?”
Pearl turned around and motioned for Jessie to continue inside. “Sam, you can’t run from your mama anymore.”
“No, I want to talk to you. Just us.” Sam caught her breath and continued, “You somehow forgave Bonnie, but I still need to process a lot of things, too.”
Pearl gently stroked her thumb along Sam’s jawline. “If packing up this house has taught me one thing, it’s that it’s healthy to let things go. It’s time, Sam.”
Sam swatted Pearl’s hand away and let out a frustrated breath. “You know something? Maybe Ishouldn’tbe mad at Bonnie anymore. Maybe I should be mad atyou.”
Pearl’s shoulders slumped. “I realize now that I should have told you sooner. But when would have been a good time for that? You never came home. And it wasn’t news I wanted to drop over a quick holiday where all you wanted to do was talk about anythingbutTybee.”
“You could have told me,” Sam insisted. “You had years to find the right time.”
“Well, I didn’t.” Pearl adjusted her hat and looked off. “Anyway, I’m going to be paying my dues truly alone now, aren’t I?”
Sam stopped short. Sure, she had flown Grandma Pearl out to Paris a few times over the years, but Sam never really thought that maybe Pearl was hurt by her fleeing Tybee, too. Pearl had a whole community here—Jessie, the Rochas, Alligator Alice, Byron...she understood Sam had her own life to live, too, right?
“Grandma...” Sam started to say. “I was never running from you. You are the most important person to me. And you getting injured scared me so much. I don’t want to leave here again knowing you might be isolated in some retirement home. What happens if Jessie can’t visit every day, or you can’t access the beach so easily anymore, or get your rotisserie chickens, or—”
“Sammy girl, I’m going to figure it out.” Pearl straightened and her expression turned serious. “I always do.”
“With Jessie.” Sam scratched her eyebrow while she searched for the words to make Pearl see her side of things. “Please say you’ll seriously consider her offer.”
Pearl turned toward the house and let out a little muffled sound that might have been her getting choked up.
But just through the window, Jessie had a bottle of sriracha and seemed to be squirting some into a coffee cup. Then she poured hot coffee into the mug.
“Hot sauce in coffee,” Sam said. “You don’t want to miss out on that every morning.”
And then Pearl laughed and turned back to Sam and wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes.
“Change doesn’t have to be huge for it to be significant, Grandma,” Sam offered. “I know that now.”
Pearl let out an exhausted sigh as she glanced at Jessie in the kitchen. “I meant what I said about keeping my beach signs, though.”
Sam wrapped Pearl in a hug. “Thank you. I love you.”
“I love you, too.” Pearl hugged her back. Then she grabbed Sam’s chin, maybe too forcefully, and said, “You are not perfect, Sam, no matter how much you want everyone to think that. So have a little compassion. Talk things out with your mama.”
Sam rubbed the spot her grandma had pinched and turned to see Bonnie watching her.One more to go, Sam thought to herself as she made her way back to Bonnie and the beach chairs.
Bonnie clasped her hands in her lap and leaned forward. “I’m not the world’s best actress, but if you want me to pretend we worked things out when Pearl gets back, I can do that.” Bonnie brought a hand to her chest as if swearing a solemn oath. “I really don’t want to force you to have any conversations you don’t want to have.”
Sam wasnotperfect, that much had become abundantly clear through her trip here. She’d gotten a lot of closure from getting answers out of Bonnie on the beach—answers that were probably hard for Bonnie to give. So maybe Sam could at least try to do the same thing for her mom, even if she maybe didn’t deserve it.
“Who knows when we’ll be in the same room again after you leave,” Sam said. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to sound rude, but who knows. We might as well say what we need to say. But you go first.”
Bonnie pressed her palms into her capri pants and looked at Sam. “I want to say that I am sorry for how I left, even if you don’t believe that. I regret my choice every single day, and I wish I could go back and change things. But I can’t. None of us can. All we can do is learn from our mistakes. And I promise I will do that. I will be here for you, if you ever need me for anything. And I won’t leave you to figure out things with Pearl by yourself. She’s my mom, and I plan to help sort out what she needs, okay?”
“Okay,” Sam said. She wasn’t totally sure how her mom planned to help, or if she actually would, but what else could she say? She could grill her mom about the details of how and why, but what would that do, other than remind Bonnie that Sam didn’t trust her? “It probably goes without saying, but you leaving me behind was not okay. What you did will never be okay. I am going to try to move forward with you, but if I can’t, then you have to respect my decision not to talk to you.”
Bonnie licked her lips and considered that. “You’re not wrong. I’m asking you to forgive me for something unforgivable.”
Sam glared out toward the water. She didn’t owe her mom anything, but she had promised to try to move forward. “Grandma has missed having you here. As much as you’re trying to mend things with me, you need to mend them with her as well. So if you expect me to give you a chance, you have to try with her, too.”
