Claws & Crochet

Part 79

ZOEY

At the mention of Warner's club, I can't keep still anymore. What I said to him, what I did to us, is still too fresh. So, I stand. And I pace.

My ankle throbs with each step, but I deserve the pain.

"Did you tell him . . ."

"No. That's not something your brothers need to know about."

"It is if they keep trying to fight them!" The old floorboards creek under my agitated feet. "So? What new insights did you hand out?" Turns out, I'm still smarting from her keeping me in the dark.

"I didn't." She watches me move, and I feel like an injured field mouse avoiding the attention of a hawk. "I asked him to tell me what he'd learned. He told me about Warner."

When she says his name, I try not to flinch. I fail.

"He talked about a biker that follows his baby sister around like a puppy. A man who looked ready to commit murder when he found out you'd been hurt. A man who makes you throw glitter and moon over him like he's a block of cheese." A reluctant smile forms on my mouth at her description, but she's not done. "A guy who seems to expect you to stay in Pine Falls for longer than just the month or so it takes to sell this place."

This time I'm able to stifle my flinch, but just barely.

"Well, you don't need to worry about that. I just told him I can't stay."

"Why not?"

I almost trip, her words a slippery banana peel in my path.

"What do you mean, why not? You want me to move to Pine Falls?"

"I'd never claim to want that. But children move away from their families all the time. Across the country. Across the world. It's not like you'd be the first."

The idea sounds so reasonable when she says it.

Still, I shake my head.

"Maybe that works for some people. But you know how I get. How different I am than you all."

She scrunches her nose. "You all? What does that mean?"

"Come on, Mom. I'm the introverted black sheep in the family. You all seek each other out, while I'm one step from a hermit."

"So what?"

"So! You know how I am. I get lost. Cut myself off from the world."

"Zoey." The amused exasperation in her tone frustrates me. She doesn't get it.

"You all drop everything to come save me. And I hate it. Mainly because I keep needing it."

"Sweetheart. No. We're not saving you. We're loving you."

"I . . ." Words don't come easy as I try to explain something about myself I don't even fully grasp.

"We know how strong you are." My mom reaches out to clasp my hand. "And we also know that your mind lies to you sometimes. That it tells you that you don't deserve happiness. We're here to remind you that you do, and that you're loved." Mom tilts her head toward the front porch, and I hear the strains of Maren Morris's The Bones. The same song I had on repeat the week leading up to my leaving for Pine Falls. "To be honest, I think they needed to see you more than you needed them."

"They . . . hell, Mom." My fingers curl into claws around their invisible collective neck. I'd never really strangle them. Only in my imagination. "They piss me off so much."

She chuckles but tries to stifle the reaction when I glare at her.

"It's disheartening. Having to choose to live with their constant smothering just so I don't drown."

Humor leaves her then, and she squeezes my palm. "You won't drown, sweetheart. I promise you."

"You don't know, Mom." I feel like there's only one person who does. And she's gone.

But maybe I can make my mother understand.

I pull free and hobble away, toward the back bedroom. The boombox sits beside the bed. I grab it, and the precious wooden box full of decades old tapes, returning to the kitchen.

"I found these. Do you recognize them?" After gently placing the box in front of my mom, I set the stereo up on the counter, plugging it in.

"These . . . they're not . . ." When I turn, she has a tape in her hand, staring at it like she's cradling a ghost.

I limp over, choosing another from the collection at random and popping it into the player. After a moment, we hear a voice.

"Good morning, Colorado! It's your girl, Silly Selena back with the best beats in town—"

Seeing the shimmer in my mom's eyes, I stop the tape.

"They're all you. Every one. Grandma Minnie listened to you. She loved you, but you never spoke." I sigh, collapsing into a chair across from my mom. "Living here, I can see myself drifting away. Just like she did."

My Mom is quiet for some time, her fingers tracing over all the tapes.

"I understand, Zoey. Where you're coming from . . . I understand. But, it's not the same thing."

I huff, but she waves to keep me quiet.

"You know some of my childhood. That my father died in a motorcycle accident. That your grandmother kept me secluded. That I left when I was eighteen and never looked back." She sucks in a bracing breath, and I find myself reaching for my tea. "But that's just a rough outline. You deserve the whole story."