And Our Parents

Part 16 ( Does Your Mother Know?)

All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.

Becky returns to the opening quote from Anna Karenina often throughout her life. When she first read the book in college, she found it an apt assessment of her own family life: while some of her peers hated their families with similar intensity, no one else had family drama like hers.

Over the past two days, since her declaration of mutual "feelings" with Freen, she dwells on that quote once more, though she now desires to revise Mr. Tolstoy's words ever so slightly to fit her present situation:

All happy relationships are alike; each unhappy relationship is unhappy in its own way.

Is it fair to call whatever it is between her and Freen a relationship? In the most general sense, obviously – any connection between two people of any nature is a "relationship", but in the colloquial sense, which implies romance, maturity, some level of formal commitment, does it apply? Or would "fling", "affair", or "romp", still be more apt labels? After all, "relationship" also implies some sort of future. Some common agreement to invest in the bond and try to extend it indefinitely. That certainly isn't the case here. The future is a dark, messy, haze, at least up until the wedding day. June third stands like a beacon, shining and clear. End of the road. No trespassing.

Oddly enough, Becky misses the days when all she did was ruminate on whether or not Freen might possibly feel the same way she did. When she was utterly consumed by a craving for her more-than-just-sexual attraction to be reciprocated. For that was in a way preferable to the new dilemma in front of her: what on Earth do you call a relationship with a predetermined deadline? How do you allow feelings to grow when you know they must be chopped down and thrown in the trash in seven weeks' time? "Unhappy in their own way" is an understatement: Becky has somehow stumbled into the most uniquely doomed romance of all time.

But, even after settling on the umbrella term "relationship", is it fair to call it "unhappy"?

For as much as she shouldn't be – as much as it's unwise and downright dangerous – Becky is happy. Happier than she has any right to be. The happiest she's been in years, maybe, when she's with Freen. But she can't show it.

Becky's a black belt in repressing feelings, but usually she's stuffing down anger, guilt, or shame – it's totally foreign to her to be hiding away happiness.

Thus, another revision:

All happy relationships are fucked in their own way.

At least, that's true of the happy relationships in Becky's life. Sorry, Tolstoy.

Perhaps it isn't healthy for each ounce of happiness this relationship brings to be accompanied by a pound of self-loathing, but on the other hand, Freen's already exerting a positive influence by forcing Becky to quit another unhealthy habit.

That very night after dinner with the family, when they met up an hour later at Freen's apartment, she immediately stole Becky's purse, found the half-empty packet of cigarettes, and threw them in the garbage.

"Hey!" Becky protested. "You can't expect me to go cold-turkey. There's a process to this."

Freen responded by throwing her arms around Becky's waist and pulling her close. "Remember how good I am at kissing?" She leaned in close, her nose brushing up against Becky's. "You will never experience that again if you pick up another cigarette."

She made a pretty compelling case.

Nonetheless, Becky starts to go through withdrawal keenly over the next few days – from nicotine, and from Freen's kisses. The symptoms aren't as bad as when she quit smoking the first time, after college, but still: headaches. Irritability. Distraction.