The Royals Next Door

Oh my god.

I’m frozen in place, frozen in time, knowing that Harrison is about to kiss me and . . .

He pulls back. Clears his throat. “I better get going.”

Then he walks around me, leaving me feeling cold.

He sits on the end of the bed and slips his boots on and I want to say something, anything, but I can’t. My skin feels alive where he touched me, my heart aching for that kiss that never came. I’m confused and tired, and damn it, I’m yearning.

“I’ll see you later,” he says to me once his boots are on, not bothering to lace them up. Then he’s walking to the front door, and then he’s gone.

I stand there for a few moments and then slowly lower myself on the bed.

I don’t think I’m going to fall back asleep anytime soon.

* * *

Despite what Harrison said about seeing me later, I didn’t see him at all yesterday, nor today. It’s back to quiet in the house, which gives me time to start working on my lesson plans for the first week of school this fall (just because teachers get summers off doesn’t mean they don’t have work to do).

It also gives me a lot of time to think about what happened on Friday night. It made me realize that I can’t let the fear of what other people think of me rule my life. I’ve never been that social, mainly because it’s been ingrained in me to stay home and look after my mother, but I wonder how much of that is really needed and how much of that is misplaced guilt.

I decide to spring the question on my mom on Sunday night, when we’re sitting around on the deck, waiting for the sun to set, a sweet breeze coming off the water beyond the trees. She’s wrapped up in a crossword puzzle. I’m trying to read a book, but I’ve basically been repeating the same sentence over and over again.

Finally I put the book down.

“Mom?” I ask.

“Mmm,” she says absently as her pencil hovers above the squares.

“You know how I went out the other night.”

“Mmhmmm.”

“Were you okay with that?”

She puts down her pencil and peers at me. “What do you mean?”

“Did it bother you that I went out?”

“No. Of course not.” She tilts her head, considering. “Okay. I have to say I was a little concerned that you went with Mr. Cole.”

“Why?”

“Because I know your type.”

“I’m not dating him.”

“It doesn’t matter,” she says, shaking her head at me. “I see the way you look at him. I’ve seen that look many times before, Piper.”

I cross my arms, feeling defensive. How am I looking at him? I can’t control what my face does. “I’m not . . . We’re not . . . We’re just friends.”

“You want to be more than friends.”

“Well, so what?” I say in a huff, throwing my arms out. “So what if I want to be more than friends? It hurts only me. I know we can’t be together for a million reasons, so obviously whatever feelings I have will remain buried, locked inside me forever.”

“No need to be so dramatic,” she says, as if she’s not usually the queen of self-created drama. “I’m just pointing something out to you. You say your therapist does the same thing. You haven’t gone to her in a while, so maybe someone has to step up.”

She’s right. I talk a big game about therapy, but I haven’t been in at least six months. I guess I kind of felt like I was done, but I’m starting to think that therapy doesn’t have an expiration date. You’re never cured. There is no cure. There’s just a way to cope. Only you know when you’re ready to move on, but you also have to know when you should go back.

Maybe I should go back. Maybe everything I’m dealing with hasn’t resolved itself.

I gnaw on my lip for a moment, pulling the plaid blanket I have wrapped around me tighter. “Maybe you’d like to go with me?” I ask quietly, bracing for the impact.

“To therapy?” my mother questions. Her eyes are wide and unblinking. She’s pushed back against this so many times before that I know it’s pretty much futile to even ask, but I figure I might as well try.

“Yeah. I think it would be good for both of us to go together, don’t you?”

Now she’s blinking rapidly. Tears are forming at the corners of her eyes.

Shit.

“Why . . . I thought I was doing well,” she says. “I’ve been doing well, haven’t I? I’ve been good.”

I reach out and put my hand on top of hers. “You’ve been so great.”

“Then why would you say that? Why would you say that to me?”

I’ve made a mistake. I wanted to talk to my mother about how perhaps I’m not as needed at home as I think I am, that maybe I ought to stop using her as a crutch, as an excuse to withdraw from society. But now I’ve mentioned therapy and she’s upset and on the defensive, just as she always is.