“You got a bunch of food,” she said, looking down at the bag and I suddenly realized that my mother wanted us to share the holiday.
Like a regular family.
My stomach churned with horror and pity.
“I’m going to Zoe’s,” I said.
“Ah, right. Girlfriend.” She smiled and I didn’t deny the title, even though she clearly expected me to. “That’s nice.”
“Mom…” Unbelievably, I felt bad. I didn’t understand how she did it, but I stood here feeling bad that the mother who’d deserted me years ago had no one to spend the holiday with.
“Don’t worry, Carter. I understand. I’m not even sure why I came.”
“I’d invite you, but she’s not even expecting me.”
“Well, I’m not quite the mother you bring to meet the girlfriend.”
I laughed, but she didn’t.
“Mom, are you okay? I mean, your lip? Do you need…help?”
“No. The last thing I need is help. I’m an O’Neill, remember? We take care of ourselves. I was just looking for company.”
“Maybe…” I couldn’t believe it as the words came out of my mouth, but they did, even though I knew my sister would kill me. “Another time?”
Her smile was brief, but it was the most sincere thing I’d ever seen on my mother’s face. I suddenly remembered that before she’d left me with Margot and never looked back, this was the woman who had taken me to the pool. Put me to bed at night. Kissed my knees when I fell down.
The tenderness had been so easy to forget. I’d had to forget it, just to pull my family forward out of the abyss she’d dropped us into.
She retreated back into the shadows and I opened my door, but then stopped. I had to tell her that this tie that bound us, this secret that had become a wall that separated me from every single thing I’d ever cared about, was about to be ripped away.
“I’m going to tell her,” I said and I saw her turn, knowing immediately what I was talking about.
“The alibi?” she asked, and I could hear the disbelief in her voice.
I nodded.
“You sure that’s smart? You have a lot at stake now.”
I knew that, but I also knew that if I didn’t tell Zoe, I’d lose her. Maybe not now, but at some point I’d freeze her out again, because this secret was ice in my veins. “What if she’s spying?”
“She isn’t. I know she isn’t.” End of discussion.
“You know, trusting people, sometimes—”
“You’re a little late for motherly advice.”
“Okay,” she said, holding up her hands and I could see that two of her fingers were clearly broken. “Do what you have to do.”
“Mom, what happened to your hand? This is crazy!”
“It’s fine, Carter. Go to your girlfriend’s. Have a nice time.”
“Here,” I said, reaching into the bag of food. “Take a sugar pie,” I said. “I think Katie made it.”
For a second something crumbled in her. All the support beams holding her up buckled and I saw an unfathomable pain.
“No thanks,” she breathed.
And then she was gone.
ZOE
“Mom, please, I am begging you to take the turkey out now!” I cried, leaning against the counters in my own kitchen—a kitchen in which I was currently a stranger. But that’s the way it was with Mom, she just took the space over. Made it hers.
“Sure,” Penny said, emptying the potatoes I had just mashed into a chipped china bowl that had come back from Houston with me. “I could take it out now and poison everyone.”
“It won’t actually poison us,” Ben said, usually so calm but getting a little anxious about his organic, free-range, very expensive bird. Ben didn’t know about Penny’s take-no-prisoners Thanksgiving process. “I brined it first and it takes much less time to cook.”
“You don’t say?” Penny said, sprinkling cheese and green onions over the potatoes in a way that said she didn’t care if he’d carried this bird to term and delivered it fully cooked—it wasn’t coming out of the oven until Penny was ready.
“Wow,” Ben breathed to Phillip, who only shrugged.
“Luckily her stuffing and cranberry sauce is amazing, so we won’t starve,” Phillip whispered.
The front door buzzed and I pressed the intercom.
“Zoe?” Carter’s disembodied voice floated through the speaker. Carter. Carter was on the other side of that door.
And my mother was on this side.
“You didn’t tell me we were expecting someone else,” Penny said, arching one eyebrow.
“We aren’t,” I said, taking a quick look over at Ben and Phillip. Ben shook his head no, but Phillip, who could almost always read my mind, was silently clapping.
This can’t be happening.
I pushed the button to let him in.
A few moments later there was a light tapping on the door and I walked on numb feet to answer it. Having my mother and Carter in my apartment at the same time would be a Thanksgiving Day massacre.
I opened the door a crack and wedged myself into the opening. Carter glittered in late-afternoon sunlight, all shiny and golden, the most handsome man who’d ever stood on my doorstep, and my body sighed with fond memories.