Soaring (Magdalene #2)(40)

Then, to my surprise, it binged again to tell me I had a voicemail.

New.

He hadn’t yet left a voicemail.

Shit.

That was when I did something else I shouldn’t do.

I activated my phone, went to voicemail and listened to it.

“Amelia, call me,” Dad bit out icily.

“Shit,” I whispered, dropping the phone but moving my finger over the screen, going to my text messages.

Not that I was going to text my father. I knew he was already losing his mind, frosting over, hatching plans to eviscerate me. He did not text. If I tried to text, he’d likely pay millions of dollars to some scientific genius to build snow bombs, have them directed at my house and bury me under an avalanche of chill.

No, I went to Robin’s text string and opened it.

I’d texted her last and I’d done it two weeks ago.

But my text reply had been two days after she’d sent hers.

She was giving up on me.

I told myself this was what I wanted. I needed relationships that were healthy. If nothing else, my recent visit with my kids told me I could not veer from that path.

But I missed my friend.

I rested my hand with the phone against my thigh and dropped my forehead to the steering wheel.

Josie and Alyssa were sweet. Josie and Alyssa both made it clear they liked me. Josie and Alyssa also had made it clear that they were there to listen should I need to share.

But I couldn’t share, not that, not the ugliness that I’d perpetrated against my family. I wanted them to keep liking me, not think I was the whackjob my son called me.

No, right then I needed someone who knew me. Who got me. Who understood where I’d been and where I was going.

Robin understood the first part.

The last, I wasn’t sure she had that in her.

But right then, I was no longer sure I shouldn’t give her the chance to try.

And right then what I was worried about was that the longer I didn’t offer her that opportunity, the less likelihood I’d learn she had it in her to give it to me.

More, I had it in me to give what I could back.

“One day at a time,” I whispered to the steering wheel. “One challenge at a time. One thing at a time. Keep moving, Amy.”

I blinked at the steering wheel and abruptly sat straight.

I’d never called myself Amy because no one had ever called me Amy.

Until now.

“Oh God, now I’m torturing myself with absurdities,” I snapped at the windshield.

What lay beyond came into focus and I remembered I was challenging myself to go see a movie. To keep building a life. To learn to be comfortable with me.

Sitting in my car, doubting myself while talking to myself meant I was failing.

Resolutely, I turned the ringer off on my phone, threw it into my purse, grabbed my bag and got out of my car.

I was in my seat in the theater when I realized none of that was hard.

In fact, it was not only easy, it was great.

Sure, asking for one ticket was a little tough.

But then I got to buy whatever concessions I wanted, knowing I didn’t have to share. So I got myself a vat of popcorn, a box of Milk Duds and a Diet Coke so big it could quench the thirst of an army.

And when I hit the theater, I found that I didn’t have to take anyone’s preferences but my own into account when selecting a seat.

I didn’t have to sit in the middle of the row in the middle of the theater because Auden liked close but Olympia liked far. I also didn’t have to sit way at the back, where Robin demanded we sit because she enjoyed people watching more than movie watching.

I got to sit where I wanted to sit, behind the handicapped railings, knowing no one would sit in front of me and I could rest my feet on the railing without bothering anyone.

Okay, so it was off to the side.

But it was awesome.

I sipped. I munched. I bested nearly all the trivia that flashed on the screen and freely judged (mentally) the ridiculous ads, enjoying myself immensely, looking forward to losing myself in a movie, finding something I actually liked to do spending time with just me.

Then it happened.

The lights were already lowered, the trailers coming on, and I saw movement at the opposite entrance to where I was sitting.

I glanced that way, expecting only to glance, but I didn’t just glance.

This was because the latecomers were a couple.

And one half of that couple was Mickey.

My stomach got tight, my muscles contracted, and I stared as he walked in, his arm flung around the shoulders of a very tall, very buxom, very pretty redhead who looked not one thing like me.

The lights were dim, I couldn’t study her to get a lock on her age, but many things were clear.

She was way taller than me.

She had way better hair than me.

She was way better dressed than I’d ever be.

She was way, way prettier than me.

And, smiling up at a smiling-at-her Mickey, the biggest hit of all…

She was out on a date with Mickey.

I jerked my eyes to the screen, feeling like throwing up and hoping, hoping, hoping that he would not see me all alone at a cinema to watch a movie.

Not long after, the theater went dark and I waited. I actually counted the seconds.

When I figured the time was right, I carefully, quietly set my snacks on the floor (even though the sound system could drown out an exploding bomb). I grabbed my purse then bent double (even though the theater wasn’t close to full and I wasn’t obstructing anyone’s view, I still made myself as miniscule as I could) and I dashed to the stairs and around, running down the side hall and out of the theater.