Crashed (Mason Brothers 2)

“Grandma didn’t want you to have her money,” I told Mom. “She wanted me to have it.”

“Don’t be silly, Tessa. Of course my mother wanted me to have some of that money.”

“Then why didn’t she leave it to you in the will?”

“We were having a bit of an argument, that’s all. We weren’t getting along.”

“Mom, you weren’t getting along with Grandma for twenty-seven years.”

“She had a closed mind,” Mom said. “She didn’t understand your father and me.”

I thought about my grandmother in that house, watching her pregnant nineteen-year-old daughter drive away with her boyfriend forever, telling her to fuck off as she went. “Maybe she didn’t understand, but probably because she was worried about you. She didn’t want you to make a mistake.”

“So you’re taking sides, then?”

Again, the words tried to come out: No, of course not, I’ll do what you want, sorry. But I could feel a current of something stubborn and resistant in my blood. Maybe it was anger; maybe it was the spirit of my grandma, telling me what her wishes were. “So you left your mom, you cut her out of your life, you kept her granddaughter away from her, and now you think she owes you her money?” I said. “I think maybe she’d disagree.”

Mom was starting to get angry now. “I can’t believe you’re saying this. You don’t understand anything.”

“How many times did she call you, Mom?” I said. “How many times did she beg to have a relationship with you again over the last twenty-seven years? And a relationship with me?”

Mom was silent, which answered my question.

“A dozen?” I asked her. “A hundred? You were her only child, and I was her only grandchild, and you made the decision to cut us off. You did that. You didn’t even go to the funeral when your dad died. Grandma lived the rest of her life a lonely old lady, and she died alone. And now you think you should get her money.”

“I don’t know what’s happened to you,” Mom said. “I didn’t raise you to be disrespectful.”

“You didn’t raise me at all.” The crew at the other end of the studio could probably hear me; they were glancing at me uneasily. I didn’t care. The words came out hot and unstoppable, like lava. “You left me to fend for myself while creeps leered at me as soon as I turned thirteen. You never came to a single school event or parent-teacher meeting. I was barely even supervised most of the time—I just ran around free. Anything could have happened to me. And when I was suicidal at seventeen, I went to the hospital and asked for help alone. You weren’t even in the country.”

“So that’s it,” Mom said. “You’re going to blame me for all of your problems.”

Something shot through my blood like fire, and I realized it was anger. Pure rage. When I’d left the hospital after three weeks of treatment, no longer a danger to myself, Mom had argued against me getting therapy or medication. She’d said they “weren’t natural,” and that I just needed to “work through” my problems. As if I’d imagined it all. As if none of those feelings were real.

So I’d left home. I’d headed for L.A. to try for an acting and modeling career. And I had gotten therapy, when I could afford it—which was rarely. I’d built my life, built myself, all alone, out of nothing. No wonder the person I’d built was a fucking mess.

“I’m taking Grandma’s money,” I told Mom. “I’m going to go t

o nursing school. I’m going to build a life for myself. I think that’s what she wanted.”

“Oh, Tessa.” Mom sounded exasperated. “For God’s sake, you can’t be a nurse.”

“Why not?”

“It just isn’t you.”

They were motioning for me to come back to the set, wind up the shoot. The break was over. “You mean I’m not smart enough,” I said. “You don’t think I can do it.”

“It isn’t fair,” Mom said. “You’re going to waste that money.”

I felt like she’d slapped me. Even after all of the years, with how well I knew my mother, it still hurt, how selfish she was. How blind she was to the pain she caused everyone. “Then I guess I’ll waste the money,” I said. “Bye, Mom.”

I hung up. I turned off my phone.

Then I dropped my robe and said, “Let’s go.”

Twenty-Four

Andrew