Good for You: A Novel (67)

And the love.

A fissure had already formed in the wall around Aly’s pain, but now it split wide open, and she began to wail like a child. She curled into a ball and rocked back and forth, and Cindy knelt and folded her thin body around Aly and rocked with her, stroking her hair and making soothing sounds, just like Aly had always wished she’d done when she was younger. “Shhh,” said Cindy. “I know. I know. You’re going to get through this. You are.”

“I don’t want to,” cried Aly.

“I know that, too,” said Cindy, holding her tight. “Trust me, I do. But I’m here. You’re here. It’s going to be okay.”



“Why were you on the beach?” asked Aly an hour later. Cindy had made her take a shower while she put on tea, and then she’d tucked a blanket around Aly and had been pretending to clean up while circling the couch to keep an eye on her. It would’ve been nice had it not been so unnerving. Had someone secretly sent Cindy to a finishing school for wayward mothers? “I figured after our fight, you wouldn’t come back,” Aly added.

“I don’t know,” said Cindy with a shrug. “I know you like me to call first. I was just missing Luke, and since you didn’t want me at the house, I walked out to the beach. And then I saw you bobbing up and down and . . .”

Even after the tea and the shower, Aly was still shivering, but a new chill came over her. What if Cindy hadn’t come by? Aly really hadn’t been trying to end her life, but she hadn’t been trying to save it, either. “Thank you,” she said softly. “It wasn’t what it looked like.”

“I never said what it looked like,” said Cindy, sitting on the edge of the coffee table across from her. “But you scared me real good. You want to tell me what happened? Was it Wyatt?”

Just hearing his name made Aly’s heart hurt—literally hurt, as though someone had stomped on it. “No. Well, not really. I’m just . . .” Maybe she would tell her mother about Luke’s illness one day. Probably not, though. Cindy would blame herself for smoking around him all those years. Even if that had contributed to his cancer in some way, Aly realized that she didn’t actually want her mother to be in even more pain than she already was.

“I did have a fight with Wyatt,” she confessed. “But mostly I’ve been upset about Luke.” Upset—no, that was how you felt when your fridge broke, or you didn’t get a promotion you were up for. “Devastated,” she clarified. “And I guess kind of hopeless. At least today.”

“I’m glad to hear you say it.”

Aly eyed her mother. “What do you mean?”

Cindy rubbed her eyes before looking at Aly. She’d washed her face, and without her makeup she looked younger, or at least less weathered. “Just, you’d been acting like everything was normal every time I called you. I know you’re strong, Allegra, but no one’s that strong. Not about the important stuff. And Luke was your most important person in this world.”

“That’s the thing, Mom,” she said quietly. “I don’t think I am strong.” In fact, she knew she wasn’t. If she were, she never would have lost her temper with Meagan and Ashleigh or wandered out into the lake and scared her mother half to death.

And she definitely wouldn’t have told Wyatt to leave. He wouldn’t come back now—not when she’d tried to control him. She hung her head as she realized just how badly she’d bungled their relationship.

“You’re one of the strongest people I’ve ever met,” said Cindy with a new fierceness. “I know you didn’t like how it went when you were at home with your dad and me. But you came out of it with a spine like a steel rod.”

Aly pulled her head back in horror. “I seriously hope you’re not implying that the way that Dad treated us was good for us.”

“I’m not,” said Cindy, whose gaze had shifted to her feet. “I am sorry I didn’t step in sooner. And I should’ve said that the other day, so I’m sorry about that, too.”

“Sooner?” Aly was grateful to her mother, but she wasn’t about to let this go. “You didn’t step in. That’s the whole problem. Not only did you not step in, you acted like we deserved it!” How many times had Cindy said, “Wait until your dad gets home,” knowing full well that the minute she so much as insinuated that Aly or Luke had misbehaved, Dan would unleash his fury on them? Aly stared at her mother in disbelief. “Mom, do you know what happens when someone tries to touch my face or hair?”

Cindy didn’t say anything, but she looked up at Aly.

“I flinch,” said Aly bluntly, recalling Wyatt’s reaction. “And when someone slams a cupboard or shuts the door too loud, I squeeze my eyes closed. Every time, Mom. I can’t hear children crying without feeling sad—or worse, terrified for them—and then I get even more upset because I know there’s nothing I can do if they’re really being hurt. I can spend an entire day worrying about some random kid I saw at the grocery store. That’s not strong, Mom. That’s damaged.”

“I’m sorry, Allegra,” said Cindy woefully.

“Yeah,” said Aly, shaking her head. “Me, too.”

“I know I didn’t do right by you. And I know that I turned to the bottle to try to forget about that. But I’m trying to now, the best I can.”