“I’m sorry I wasn’t the daughter you wanted me to be.”
She shook her head. “What I wanted was an illusion, and I worry I’m still trying to find it. My parents weren’t perfect. Far from it. Neither is your father. Lord knows I’m not. I’m struggling with getting old and feeling like life has passed me by, and I worry that you rejecting the life I led means you don’t value it.”
She reached out and held her mother’s hand. “I do value it, Mom. You can be a lot, but I’m guilty, too. I didn’t fight for the relationship I wanted with you. I didn’t even tell you I wanted a relationship. I want to be able to call you, but you have to stop pushing. You have to support me even when you think I’m wrong.”
Her mother’s fingers entwined with her own, like they had when she’d been a child. “I will always tell you my opinion, but I will try to stop saying I told you so. And I will absolutely stop talking about how much better your life would be with a man. I think you understand that now. The relationship with Zep was real, wasn’t it?”
“Yes.”
What had Zep said? Sometimes he asked his mother’s opinion not because he needed it, but so she would know he valued it. Life didn’t have to be a contest between her and her mother. It didn’t have to be some checklist where she finally measured up to what her father expected.
“It was real for me. I don’t know about him, though.”
A brow rose over her mother’s eyes. “What do you mean?”
“I told him I love him and he didn’t say it back,” Roxie confessed. “He told me he was happy for me and I should take the job and acted like it was over even though I hadn’t made any kind of decision. It wasn’t like him. I expected him to sit down with me and talk it out, but he wouldn’t. I don’t know what to do. My instinct is to walk away, but I think he’s important.”
The hand in hers tightened. “There’s something you need to know. Your father talked to him while you were with Joel. He basically laid it out to Zep that he would hurt your career if he stayed with you. He told Zep he knows about his record. Please don’t be mad. Your father thought he was doing the right thing, but I can see now that he wasn’t. We were being selfish because we want you home. I didn’t think you were in love with him. I would have fought your father if I’d known how you felt. What I did know was he was in love with you.”
The world went a little watery. “How can you know?”
“Because of the way he looks at you. He looks at you like you’re the brightest star in the sky. And he broke it off with you because he didn’t want to hold you back. The fact that you’re here at the airport with us shows that.”
He was doing what Zep did. He was sacrificing. “So what do I do? Go and have the interview and talk to him when I get back?”
“Do you honestly want the job if it means you have to leave this place? You’ve changed, sweetie. I didn’t want to admit it, but you glow here. You have a light in your eyes I’ve never seen before,” Pamela said, tears flowing freely. “Darling, I don’t completely understand what you see in him, but after seeing you with him here . . . I do know you’re in love and if you’re very sure about this—about him—then don’t even get on the plane. It will only waste time. Zep was trying to do what he thought was best for you. He was sacrificing his own happiness.”
“He was making decisions for me.”
Her mother’s shoulders straightened. “Then let him know he can’t do that. Tell him if he’s going to be your partner, he’s got to respect your part of the relationship. Be strong enough to tell him he made a mistake and he should correct it. I’ve been married to the man I love for almost forty years. He is a flawed man, and more than once I’ve given him the opportunity to correct a mistake. You can’t love someone and let your pride be the only thing that matters. Give him another shot.”
She wanted to. “What if you’re wrong and he doesn’t want me?”
“Would that change your mind about coming home?”
“No.” When she looked deep down, she knew. Perhaps it had been the act of standing here in the airport getting ready to leave that made it simple. “I live here now, Mom. There are at least ten women I know of in New York who will be amazing at the job they’ve offered me. But I’m the only one here. They need me, and there is something beautiful about that. I won’t get the recognition I would in New York, but I’ll make a difference here in ways I can’t there. I’m going to stop pretending like this is a stopover. Papillon was always the destination.”