Page 8 of A Lifetime in 30 Days
“I wanted to make sure he had his own bank accounts, insurance protection—you know, all of that,” Gail continued. “And he told me the two of you had separated all your money and the accounts and that he’d gotten his own auto and life insurance policies. Had a deal with one of those companies, I think.”
“Well, there you go,” Vanna said. “He had his own policy. You should find that and take it to the funeral home with you.”
Gail shook her head. “That policy lapsed a few months back. I saw the notice when it came to the house and said something to him about it. But he told me not to worry because you kept one of the life insurance policies you had on him when you were actually trying to act like his wife.”
Vanna was certain what the woman meant to say was when Vanna had been taking care of her grown child instead of his mother continuing to do it. That headache she’d felt coming on a few minutes ago was now an insistent throbbing at her temples. She reached up, pressed two fingers to the spot, and rubbed. “I’m not gonna argue with you, Gail. It never did me any good anyway.”
“And it’s the respectful thing to do,” Gail said. “I would think you’d been taught that, but then again, your mother was always more worried about finding her next drink than teaching her daughter manners.”
“You can go now,” Vanna said, and dropped her hand back to her lap. “If you don’t have any insurance to cover the funeral expenses, I’ll take care of it. Alone. I’ll send you the information, and you can share it with your family.”
Gail’s eyes narrowed. “I want to be there to give my opinion on what’s planned.”
“Then you should’ve paid the premiums on his insurance policy,” Vanna shot back. “But since you didn’t, and it seems that this responsibility falls in my lap just like every other thing concerning your son has for the past twenty years, I’ll handle it by myself. Now, you can leave. I’ll call you when the arrangements are made.”
Why couldn’t this have fallen on someone else’s shoulders?Why was it, and every damn thing else, Vanna’s job to handle? A better question, one that she’d paid $175—or actually, a thirty-five-dollar co-pay—to the therapist she’d seen for two years prior to her thirtieth birthday, was, Why did she feel compelled to do all the things? To take care ofallthe issues? To make it—whateveritwas in any given scenario—all better?
The resoundingly clear answer to that final question had been because she’d always wanted someone to do that for her. And yes, Granny had stepped in where her mother had slacked off. She’d taken care of Vanna and given her everything she possibly could to make her life appear as normal as possible, but there would always be the one thing that wasn’t normal. The one thing that Vanna had been unable to—despite all the therapy and advice on how to do it—reconcile with. Disappointment. Disillusionment. Rejection.
Okay, that was three things, but they were all valid bullet points beneath the topic of emotional validation she’d seen her therapist scribble on a notepad long ago. The three things she felt most when she thought about her mother.
Diane, the alcoholic who’d had a baby by a man she’d met in a grocery store. A man who’d emphatically told her he would not claim or take care of any child she gave birth to and proceeded to threaten her life if she ever told his wife or anyone else about what they’d done together. She’d never been cut out to be a mother. Not when her one and only priority was getting as drunk as she possibly could, on as many days of the year as she could manage without being incarcerated or dropping dead. She’d never cared about or for Vanna and had no problem admitting that. So why did Vanna, after all these years, still crave her love?
Vanna was smart enough to know that it was a sentiment she would never receive from Diane, and surprisingly, she didn’t hate her mother for that fact. Diane was who she was. Still, there was no ignoring the part of her that felt robbed every single day because of it. The part that always wanted to prove she could be there for others. That she was capable of loving and supporting the people in her life who expected and needed those things from her.
Like Caleb.
The first day she’d met him, she’d known she would give him her heart. He was so attractive, dressed in black jeans and a hoodie, black Tims, and that gold-and-white bandanna tied around his head. She’d met him at a step show that was held on campus. For two hours she’d watched six fraternities present their best step teams, and she’d been enamored. There was something about these intelligent Black men who not only looked good but were also getting their education and leading the way in several community-based programs. They were all enigmatic and driven, and she’d itched to learn more about them and what they did. Her roommate at the time had pledged to be in a sorority, but Vanna had dismissed the conversation wherein she was asked to do the same. Groups weren’t her thing—too many people, too many opinions, too many judgments over who she was and what she’d come from. Still, that night, she’d felt a connection. Later, when the winners werecrowned—Caleb’s squad, of course—she realized that what, or rather who, she’d been so drawn to was him.
“Come sit over here and keep me company.”
That’s what he’d said to her, and she’d felt like her insides had immediately turned to slush. He had a great voice—not too deep, but just smooth enough, like LL Cool J in thatI Need Lovevideo. She’d had no choice but to fall, especially when Caleb’s pursuit of her was nothing less than a man on a mission. A week after meeting, they were inseparable. Whenever they weren’t in class, she wasn’t working her part-time job at the bookstore, and he wasn’t doing whatever frat stuff he needed to do, they were together. She spent more time in his room at the frat house than she did her own dorm. He wasn’t her first boyfriend, or sex partner, but he was her first love. Her only love for so long that she didn’t know how or if she’d ever have those feelings again.
And he’d broken her heart.
For the second time in her life, the person she’d needed to love and pour into her the most, hadn’t. And that reality almost crushed her.
Not that anyone on the outside looking in would’ve noticed. No, Vanna was a pro at dressing and playing the part. So, while her closest friends knew that putting Caleb out had been a hard-fought decision and that he’d hurt her, they’d never had to come to her house to pick her up from a pity party. She didn’t do those, nor did she look back once she walked away—not publicly, anyway.
“I don’t want to lose you, Van,” he’d said the Saturday morning she’d sat at their kitchen table and told him he had to go.
“You’ve already lost me, Caleb.” She kept her hands around the mug still full of the heavily creamed and sugared coffee she preferred. “Truth be told, I’ve had one foot out of the door of this marriage for the last six years, since you spent a week in Vegas partying and gambling with Steve for his bachelor party.”
“That’s my boy, Van. And he was getting married; what was I supposed to do?”
“You were supposed to stay home with your wife, who’d just had emergency gall bladder surgery,” she replied. “You were supposed to use your paycheck to pay your car payment and our car insurance. You were supposed to be a husband, not one of Steve’s boys.”
“That’s not fair,” he countered. “You had Granny, and your girls were here. You act like I left you alone.”
“No,” she told him, and looked up from her mug. “I’m acting like you left me, which you did. And now, after even more years of stunts like that, of your disregard and disrespect of me and this marriage, I’m finally saying I’ve had enough.”
He pushed back from the table and stood. “So you’re the only one who gets a say in this? I don’t have any thoughts or opinions to put on the table? How is that right?”
“How was any of this ever right?” she asked. “How has the way you’ve treated me and our marriage for all these years ever been right?”
“Don’t act like I’ve never made you happy. Don’t sit there and play the victim, ’cause we both know you love doing that. Or the martyr—yeah, that’s the one.” Now he scowled. “Poor Vanna, she’s gotta be the smart one and the responsible one because her mother was a drunk. Let’s give Vanna all her flowers because she didn’t fall apart just because she was abandoned and abused. All praise to Vanna for keeping a good credit score, for buying a house before she was thirty years old, for getting a promotion at work, for just breathing. Damn, Vanna! How you gon’ just bail on us like this?”
He ranted for forty-five minutes after that, but Vanna had tuned him out after the remark about her drunk mother. He was trash. He was wrapped in a well-dressed, well-groomed, and fine-as-hell package—one she’d mostly paid for—but she was ready to throw that package away. To get on with her life without the heartache lying in bed beside her every night.
