Page 49 of Harvest of Sighs (Thornchapel 3)
I’m not fooled by all the words she said after; that casual you’re not seeing anyone is a hook, baited and cast into the water, and biting it is the kind of mistake I know better than to make.
Unfortunately, letting it float by without a semblance of an answer is also a mistake.
“I’ll tell Sheila, of course, and make sure Daniel has your number—”
The idea of dinner with Daniel is suddenly so suffocating, so unwelcome, that I actually take a step back, as if I can put more space between myself and my mother, when she’s already in Accra.
“I can’t,” I say. Blurt. And the silence on the other end tells me that I’ve bitten the hook just as she knew I would. Irritation flares, then ebbs. I wish she would just ask the questions she wants to ask. I wish she could bring herself to.
I wish I could just tell her without having to be goaded into it.
“Why can’t you?” she asks, even though she’s already guessed, I’m sure of it.
I shut my eyes. “I’m seeing someone.”
“It must be someone special,” she says slowly. “You haven’t dated since you finished school.”
“It is someone special,” I say, and if I were less tetchy, I’d be surprised at how easily those words come out. Someone special. Just like that.
“She is someone special,” I add, because if I’m going to do this, then I’m going to do this.
“Ah,” my mother says faintly.
I came out as queer to her years ago, and ever since, it’s been like I dug a pit between us. A shallow one, maybe, one that can be easily bridged with planks and flat stones, one that can be navigated—but it must be bridged, it must be circled. It must be talked over or around or ignored.
My mother is modern in many ways, but the rest of her family is not. Her church is not. Daniel’s mother is not. Not when it comes to this.
She doesn’t say anything for a long time, and I wonder if I should just end the call now. Let her stew about her foiled matchmaking, and then try again next week.
Finally, she says, “I want you to be happy. You know I do.”
I do, I do know that. In fact, I know two things for certain: my mother loves me, and I love my mother. Now, if only that were enough to make it easy between us.
“I just worry,” Ma says cautiously, “that you’re missing a . . . chance.”
“A chance,” I say.
“You’re young now, and doing well in your career, and I know it seems like you have all the time in the world to think of things other than t
he workshop, but time moves faster than you think. Don’t you want to get married? Have children? Know that you’ll have a child to take care of you when you’re old?”
I shouldn’t be surprised by this. Why am I surprised?
Before I can answer, Ma goes on. “There’s nothing wrong with wanting . . . what you want,” she says, and I have to close my eyes again. “But if you like boys and girls both, maybe you could . . . choose? To marry someone nice and have children with him? Here at home?”
Here at home.
Where openly loving another woman would be frowned upon and prayed over—at best. And at worst . . . ?
I don’t know my own feelings. I think I might cry, but the hot thrum in my chest is anger, not sadness. “I’m sorry. I have to go,” I say. “I have to go now.”
“Wait! Wait!” Her voice is desperate, and in that desperation, I hear it all. Her loneliness and her need, and also her shame. “I shouldn’t have—I’m sorry. I don’t want to make you upset.”
I give a dry, mean laugh. “Too late.”
“I just want—Becky, I want you home. I want you living here. I want to see you every day, like a mother should.”
“My life is here,” I state. “My work. Everything I’ve done for the Workshop and everything I still want to do. I can’t move back home now.”
