“You work too hard,” he says. “I bet if you were to go out there and have a good time, you’d come home with a bunch of friends.”
“Maybe,” I tell him and look at my phone.
“What’d he say?” my dad asks.
“Oh, you really don’t want to know,” I tell him.
“He’s not being disrespectful, is he?” my dad asks, and I have to smile. He’s always been the protector. “You know, despite what you may see on television, it’s not okay for men to say the nasty, sexual things that they do to women.”
“It’s not that,” I tell him. “He’s never talked to me like that, actually. I was just telling him about Mom and the cancer.”
“What did he say?” my dad asks.
“He just told me to hang in there—that it’s going to be okay.”
I leave out the fact that my text-friend’s mom died of cancer. Dad has enough on his mind as it is.
“Well that’s good,” my dad says. “Now, why don’t you come inside for some more of your mother’s award-winning blueberry pie?”
“Dad, I know you’re the one that makes it,” I tell him.
“What?” he asks, feigning ignorance. “What are you talking about?”
“Every time we have blueberry pie, your hands are stained purple,” I tell him. “Mom’s never have been.”
“She wears gloves, dear,” he says and gets up from the porch swing. It’s a ludicrous response, but it’s too endearing to argue with him about it. He smiles and holds a stained hand out toward me. “Shall we?”
* * *
“I think I’ve become my mother,” I write. “Don’t get me wrong, I love her and everything, but she’s not exactly who I thought I would be at thirty years old, you know?”
I’m sitting on the corner of my old bed in my parents’ house, hoping that he knows male/female propriety well enough to try to convince me that I couldn’t possibly be anything like my mother.
“Tell me,” he writes, “if you could go anywhere in the world with anyone in the world, who would it be?”
Well, it’s hardly the response I was hoping for, but at least he knows male/female propriety well enough to change the subject.
“I don’t know,” I write. “Where did that come from?”
Along with coming to talk to my mom and dad about the house, I came here for another reason.
It’s hardly new. In fact, it’s something that I’ve tried to talk myself into doing for years now, but I can never find the nerve to just do it.
My phone beeps.
The message reads, “In my experience, when someone starts to think that they’re turning into one of their parents, it usually means it’s time for a vacation.”
I cover my mouth as the laugh escapes me.
“Well,” I write back, “you’re right about that. It’s starting to look like you’re right about a lot of things.”
Even as a little girl, I tried so hard to impress my mother, to show her that I wasn’t this frail, stupid thing she’s always thought me to be. Apart from trying to convince my parents to help them with the mortgage, I’m here to confront what is quite possibly the saddest part of my childhood.
My phone beeps.
“That’s something I never tire of hearing,” he writes. “What specifically am I right about this time?”
I write back, “I should start trusting my employees. I’ve had a few lackluster workers in the past, but the staff I have now is pretty amazing.”
I joined every club in high school and before that I went for every team, volunteered for every school play, every bake sale, every fundraiser... One year, I tried out for the cheerleading squad, but the coach said I didn’t smile enough.
He wasn’t wrong.
My phone beeps and the message reads, “So what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to start management training,” I write. “It’s terrifying, but I think it’s time I realize that I’m not the only one who can do it.”
Despite my cheerleading disappointment, over the years, I built quite the collection of first place ribbons, trophies and certificates declaring me champion at this or first place with that.
Every time, I would come through that door and I’d walk right past my dad and show my mom what I’d won.
Every time, she said the same thing, “That’s okay, honey, you’ll do better next time.”
When I was younger, I tried to explain that I had, in fact, done better than anyone else, but she’d just pat me on the head and say, “It’s not nice to take advantage of people’s kindness.”
It took me years before I realized what she meant. She was saying that I only got the awards because the judges felt sorry for me.
After that, I stopped tacking up my certificates and stopped polishing my trophies. Now, they all sit in the bottom of the closet in this room.
My phone beeps.
The message says, “You’ll do great. Have you ever done employee training before?”
I’d been trying to ignore the fact that I’ve never in my life trained a person to any level higher than salesperson or cashier.
“No,” I write, “not to that level. It can’t be that much different than normal job training, though, can it?”
When I got to be a teenager, I’d still try out for everything and I’d still come home with awards and certificates, but by the time I walked through the door and saw my mom sitting in her chair, I’d be overcome with a sense of dread at the response I knew was coming, and I’d just walk in my room, open up the closet door and toss whatever I’d gotten in one of the boxes I’d placed in there.
It’s been so long since I opened that closet door that I don’t even remember how many boxes I put in there.
I’m pretty sure my high school diploma’s in there somewhere.
The phone beeps and I read the message.
“That’s all right,” he writes. “Do you know anyone who has trained other people to higher positions?”
“Not really,” I start, then as the thought comes to me, I groan. “There was a guy who was doing some work for me. He’s done that sort of thing, but I’d feel weird asking him.”
I lie back on the bed.
Eric probably wouldn’t help if I asked him anyway. Besides, they’re totally different kinds of training.
The phone beeps and the message reads, “Are we still avoiding the finer points of our lives, or can you give me a little more to go on? What kind of work do you do?”
There’s really no reason for me not to tell him what I do. I mean, I’m nowhere near ready to actually meet him, so it’s probably best to keep the store name out of it, but maybe it might actually help to give him a little more to go on.
“I own a clothing store,” I write. “The guy’s a contractor.”
I just close my eyes and wait.
My mom’s still got the TV blaring like she used to and my dad’s already in bed, though how he can sleep with that racket, I’ve never known.
A new message comes in, saying, “They’re different kinds of work, but I bet the basic principles are close enough that he could help you. Why don’t you ask him?”
“Maybe I will,” I write, “but have kind of a weird relationship. Things are starting to even out, but he doesn’t work for me anymore.”
I sit up and look back toward the closet and decide that tonight’s the night I open that door again and pack whatever I find in the car.
This is something I’ve done every time I’ve come home and stayed in this room, but I already know that the shot of courage is not going to last.
I lie back down and wait for the beep.
“Do you have his number?” he writes after a few minutes.
“Yeah,” I write, “well, his work number anyway, but he’s never answered it. I don’t even know if it’s a working number to tell you the truth.”
After a minute, another message comes in, “Well, now that he’s not working for you anymore, he might be more willing to answer that phone. Try giving him a call.”
He has a point.
Stupid as it is that Eric didn’t answer his work number—granted, I only ever called it while he was working on the other side of the store—he’s got to be hoping for someone to call, so I find the number and press send.