The Names They Gave Us(84)

“Mom,” I whisper. “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”

“That I went to Daybreak as a girl?” She scratches the back of her neck. “Well, at first it was because I wanted you to go to church camp. Ironic, no?”

“You didn’t want me to go to Daybreak?”

“It was a different part of my life, Bird. Lifesaving, but . . . very hard in some ways. I just wanted my adult life— my family—to be separate from it.”

“So, that’s how you knew Rhea? And Bryan?”

“Yes.” She opens her mouth to say more, but thinks better of it, searching my eyes. I don’t know what she sees there.

I place my palm on the cover of the handmade book. “You never told me about your uncle. The wolf.”

“Telling you this story was my way of sharing that with you.” A tear spills over her eyelid, one quick streak until it drops from her chin. “How do you tell your daughter something like that? I promised myself I’d tell you when you were eighteen. But I’m not sure I would have, if I’m being honest.”

“Mom, I’m so sorry.” Her crying makes me cry too, and I don’t even bother to clear my tears. “I’m so sorry you went through that. I’m sorry he . . . existed.”

“Well, he did die in prison,” she says. “Heart attack. And, God forgive me, I felt no pity. No mercy.”

“Good,” I say darkly. “Saves me the trouble of breaking the sixth commandment.”

She almost smiles at this. “You sound like your father.”

My dad has threatened to kill the man who hurt my mom? “So he knows? Everything?”

“Your dad knows everything there is to know about me.”

“And now I do too?” I ask hopefully. When you’re faced with your mother’s mortality—when her withered hand is in yours—you can’t help longing for more pieces of her story.

“Well,” she says, patting my hand. “Let’s save a few things till you’re older. Now while we’re at it, anything you want to tell me?”

She seems to be referencing something specific, but I have no idea what. “No?”

“You sure about that, Lucy Es?” My heart stops beating for a moment. It’s a reference to my online channel name, LucyEsMakeup.

“You know?” I whisper.

She snorts, without a trace of anger. “Oh, please. I’ve known for ages. Since Mallory’s mother raved about your ‘smoky eye’ tutorial.”

“Mallory’s mom knows about it?”

“Adults use the Internet too, child of mine.”

Well, this is mortifying. Possibly the only thing worse than someone finding out your big secret is realizing that they’ve known all along. “And you’re not mad?”

“I mean, I wish you’d told me, of course. But your dad and I thought it seemed harmless enough. We’re glad you have passions, you know, even if we don’t share them. We’re not monsters.”

That warrants an eye roll from me. “Of course you’re not. I guess I just . . . wanted something that was mine? If that makes sense?”

“It does.” She settles in more, adjusting her back against the pillows. “So is that it? Any other secrets from me? Better tell me now in case this is my deathbed.”

I recoil, horrified. “Mom!”

“Sorry! Sorry. Dark humor. It keeps coming out because . . . well, I’m so angry, Bird.” She reaches for my hand, a wry smile on her face. “It is not well with my soul, Luce. I want it to be. But damn it, I want to see you grow up all the way. There are things I want to tell you, experience with you. I want to help you through college and life out on your own. I want to see who you spend your life with, if you have kids. And I’ll just be so . . . pissed if I get cheated out of that.”

“I’ll be so pissed too.”

She sighs, wiping my tears. “Don’t say that word, Luce—it’s ugly.”

“You just said it!”

“Well, I have cancer.”

We laugh in a way that feels . . . yes, dark. But as necessary as all the rest of it: our clasped hands, our mirror-image faces, our seventeen good, good years together.

I stay longer than I’m supposed to; I stay until my mom nods off. Sundays are slow, even at Daybreak, and my cabin can live without me for a bit longer.

My dad walks me out. In the warm noonday sun, his hair looks almost blond and his face, by contrast, even younger. He’s wearing his most awful, beloved jeans—worn thin and faded to near-white—and a T-shirt from his alma mater.

And all I can think is that I haven’t noticed him enough. My whole life, my mom and I have been attached. Sure, our family of three has always done pizza nights and the movie theater, trips to the beach, dinner table conversations. But my mom and I have spent so much time en route to swim team or piano practice, talking about boys and school and every feeling that I’ve ever had. I don’t think I’ve ever really appreciated what a loving, steady father he is to me.

I have always felt loved. But I have only recently learned just how lucky that is.

And now I feel left out—the two of them here, dealing with the worst of the cancer and treatment.

“It feels wrong, leaving.”