The Lies I Tell(9)
Instead, I made a detour through Brentwood, the streets as familiar to me as an old friend. The Brentwood Country Mart where my mom used to buy me ice cream and, if I was lucky, a book from the bookstore there. The corner where I fell off my bike and skinned my knee. The large stump of a tree that came down in a storm when I was seven, cutting off traffic on San Vicente for an entire day.
I turned left onto Canyon Drive and navigated as if on autopilot. The houses there were on large lots, set far back from the street, some behind tall gates you could barely see through. I wound my way slowly, as if pulled by some magnetic force, back to the place where it all started.
I parked just south of the house, a spot that gave me the best vantage point from which to study it. To follow the familiar contours of the dark wood and white stucco. The round tower that housed the circular staircase that led to a tiny third-floor study. The large windows of the living room, where my mother said her grandfather would spend his days, smoking a pipe and worrying about his son—her father—who spent more time in rehab than out of it.
“The front door is made of oak, milled from a forest in Virginia,” I recited into the silent car. “A tree that probably greeted the colonists of Jamestown before arriving here to keep us safe.” The start of my mother’s monologue, the one she’d use to help me sleep at night. Like a bedtime story, she’d walk us through the home we both yearned to return to. Always, I’d picture it behind my eyes. The plastered walls that still held the tray marks of the artisans who smoothed them. The wide, wooden beams that spanned the width of the ceiling in the great room. The fourth stair that always creaked if you stepped on it near the banister. The closet with the trapdoor that led to the attic, and the wall that measured not only my mother’s height, but a few months of my own heights as well.
My mother, Rosie, had been born right before her parents had graduated high school. Her mother had disappeared early on, and her father had descended into drugs and alcohol use, leaving Rosie in the care of her grandparents—my great-grandparents—whom we both called Nana and Pop, the only stable influences she ever had.
It was Nana and Pop who went to her school open houses. Who taught her how to ride a bike. Who waited up for her when she went on dates in high school, raising her as if she were their own.
My mother fell in love only twice in her life. The first time was with a college hockey player who’d gone to Europe and never returned. That relationship had given her me and the set of rules that dictated my entire childhood:
Convenience and comfort aren’t worth settling for. We can earn what we need; we don’t need a man to hand it to us.
If money is tight, we work harder.
Two women working together are a force to be reckoned with.
She managed to make ends meet by working multiple jobs, renting studio apartments when we could afford the security deposit, and staying with Nana and Pop when we couldn’t. I marked the periods of time we spent with them as some of the happiest I’d ever known. Nana taught me how to bake chocolate chip cookies from scratch. She showed me how to start a vegetable garden. Pop taught me how to play cribbage and poker.
The second—and last—time my mother fell in love was a few years after Nana and Pop were gone. His name was Ron Ashton.
Across the street, automatic gates swung open, and a woman exited on foot. A maid, carrying a plastic bag of rags and cleaning supplies. She eyed me suspiciously, and I could see her wondering whether she should go back and tell her employers about the woman sitting in front of the neighbor’s house, staring at it. I gave her a smile and lifted my cell phone to my ear, as if I’d pulled over to take a call, then turned my attention back to the house. The one that should have stayed in our family. The one that Ron Ashton stole from us.
***
Cory’s message arrived the following morning shortly after eight. I want to meet you. How about today at four? Rocketman Coffee on Main Street?
The dryers tumbled behind me, my fingers hesitating over the keyboard. Like a song I was just beginning to learn, I let my instincts guide me. And they were telling me to take a breath. To not give him a response within seconds. Sometimes, doing nothing was the most powerful move.
I waited until almost noon. Today at four works for me! I’m looking forward to it. A flash of excitement passed through me, knowing that I’d have the advantage firmly in my pocket from the moment I entered the coffee shop.
When my shift was over, I took a shower and put on a pair of jeans that hugged my curves in all the right places. I slipped on a form-fitting tank top that lowered into a V-neck and layered a soft wrap sweater on top of it. Amelia was a surfer and a student who had fallen on hard times. I wanted to make sure I could slide into the spot she left when she didn’t show up.
***
I parked a few blocks away from Rocketman Coffee and waited in my car, giving Cory time to get there and get settled. Pulling my phone from my purse, I flipped it open and dialed Cal.
He answered on the second ring. “Hey there.”
“Can you do me a favor?”
“Always,” he said.
“In about a half hour, can you call my cell? I don’t need you to say anything or to stay on the line. I just need the phone to ring.”
He laughed. “Got a date you’re thinking of ditching?”
I watched a woman maneuver a fancy stroller down the front steps of her apartment, her toddler strapped in safely. “Something like that,” I told him. “Can you do it?”