Warren smiled and handed me the keys. “I have a mother too. Take your time and just get the keys back to me sometime later today.”
Thank you, I mouthed as I raised the phone to my mouth again.
I waited until he’d exited the car to say, “Hi, mum, just been busy with school. It’s the last two and a half weeks of the winter trimester.”
She made a disappointed noise in her throat. “Not an excuse to leave your mother’s phone calls unreturned.”
“No,” I sighed when she paused for my response.
“Really, Cressida, I know you are going through some kind of horrible mid-life crisis—”
“Quarter-life crisis,” I corrected her automatically because I’d never been so aware of my age before. “I’m only twenty-six years old, mum.”
“Twenty-six years old and married. You’re hardly a spring chicken anymore.”
Ouch.
“I want you to come to Sunday dinner this weekend. You haven’t been home since Christmas,” she ordered.
I hadn’t been home since Christmas because it had been an absolute unmitigated disaster. I’d given in to my loneliness and my mother’s insistence and attended the family celebration because I was a weakling. Christmas Eve hadn’t been too horrible. It had started off with awkwardness between my parents and me, which was unusual because we used to be so close. My father was a professor of Greek and Roman studies at the University of British Columbia so it was safe to say that I’d inherited my dorkiness from him. We read the paper first thing every morning, first together at the kitchen table when I still lived at home and then over the phone for a morning debriefing when I lived with William. He loved to quiz me on current events, debate with me over moral quandaries in the media. He was my husband’s best friend, which meant that I saw my dad just as much as a married woman as I did when I was growing up.
My mother and I were part of the same book club, we went for power walks every morning before I went to work at EBA, and we talked on the phone at least once a day. Since leaving William in September, all of that had stopped. My parents hadn’t allowed me to move back in with them. They couldn’t fathom why I was leaving such a good man and they were actually angrier than William had been when I’d told him I wanted a divorce.
So, I’d taken what meager money I’d had in my own bank account to get a little apartment too close to East Hastings Street for comfort and, when that money started to run out, I’d turned to Lysander. With the money he’d lent me, I’d bought my little house in Entrance six weeks after leaving William and I’d never turned back.
That Christmas Eve was the first time we’d seen each other in two months and I’d foolishly thought they’d embrace me. Mum would make me her famous hot chocolate that was more chocolate than milk and dad would whip out his latest research for me to read over and give him notes on.
Instead, the awkwardness followed by a house-shaking fight.
I’d never fought with my parents like that before. We all shouted, called each other names and, regrettably, I’d told them that they were awful parents for giving me to William.
The night had ended in tears on all sides.
The next morning, despite assurances that they wouldn’t ambush me, William had been next to our Christmas tree when I descended from my room. When I’d immediately turned to go back upstairs, my mum had demanded that I speak with him or she would never see me again.
I’d spoken to William. He’d graciously forgiven me for my ‘tantrum’ and asked me to come home. In response, I retrieved the divorce papers I’d tried to send him in the mail four times from my briefcase by the door, and handed them to him. In an uncharacteristic bout of anger, he’d tossed them in the flaming hearth then told me I wouldn’t survive without him to guide me or without his fortune. He’d stormed out, my parents began to shout again and I’d hastily retrieved my bags and left.
So, you can imagine that I wasn’t looking forward to a repeat performance.
“I can’t make it this Sunday, mum. As I said, it’s end of term and I’m swamped with work,” I said, studying the texture of Warren’s dashboard like it held the secrets to the universe.
A loud, nails-on-a-chalkboard silence followed.
“William was here yesterday. One of his colleagues asked him out, you know. You probably remember her from his work functions because she is uncommonly pretty. Natalie Watson, her name is.”
Great, we’d moved onto target practice. My mum liked to shoot arrows at random tender spots until they stuck. If she wasn’t my mum and I wasn’t her bullseye, I would have respected her for her ruthlessness and tenacity.