Pusher

thirty-nine.

I could practically feel the egg shells crunching underneath my toes as I paced into the kitchen, my mother glancing up at me as I floated through the doorway. More and more I felt as if I'm haunting this house. She spared me a small smile, looking up from the frying pan for only a moment.

It's a picture perfect replica of all the Sunday mornings of my childhood. Bacon sizzling over the stove top, our table overflowing with homely clutter, the top hits from my mother's adolescence playing through the antiquated radio. The only difference was us.

Age lines traced my mother's forehead. Exhaustion hung beneath my eyes. Time and silence drove a rift in the middle of our kitchen, cutting this home right down the middle.

Maybe I was being melodramatic. It had been over a week since we had our fight, the one here in this very room. We didn't talk about it, and yet things returned to normal. Or, as normal as they could. I mean, all the sign of forgiveness were there — kind, soft words; nights spent together watching TV on the couch; little hearts adorning the notes she left for me when she was working a late shift — and yet every night I was left wondering when the little gestures of love would run dry.

I sunk into a dining chair and she probed me with the usual survey: how did you sleep? Have any plans for the day? Not even with Ellie? The phone interrupted my quiet, vague answers. It was buried amongst the junk strewn across our table and my mother had to lean over me to grab it, pressing a kiss to my forehead as she did.

She took it out into the hallway, masking her morning haze with an overly cheery voice. I helped myself to some eggs, peering through the doorway to get a look at her as I did. She looked as she always did: brown frizzy hair thrown up into a ponytail, little flyaways floating around her face; an invisible weight curving her shoulders forward; the softest blue eyes you've ever seen.

Not for the first time, I wished I was born with her eyes. I had my father's — brown, dull. There was nothing particularly wrong with the color, but the fact that they belonged to him was enough to make me want to claw them out of my skull.

I sunk back into my chair, unable to make out her muffled voice. I shoveled bite after bite into my mouth, hoping to distract myself from my thoughts.

She had seen Maverick's sweater. It was buried amongst my bedding, and she had taken it out to wash it. I found it one afternoon right after school, neatly folded and laid out for me on my desk chair. I wasn't quite sure what that meant, if that was her way of telling me something.

She never mentioned it, and neither did I.

When my mother returned, tears were running along the soft curve of her cheeks, dripping down to the underside of her chin. Those big blue eyes had crinkled, coated over with glassy sorrow. She clutched the phone tightly to her chest. Within the moment it took for my eyes to flit over her, all the blood had drained from my face and my fork clattered to the table.

"Who was it?" I asked, my voice hollow, but a part of me already knew. Who else could bring my mother to tears in less than a minute?

The memory of my father's voice echoed in my mind, rattling off the walls of my skull until I could hardly see anything but his muddy brown eyes and the cruel curl of his lips. THAT'S MY DAUGHTER I WON'T LET YOU TAKE MY DAUGHTER I SWEAR TO GOD MARYANN I WILL FIND YOU I WON'T LET YOU TAKE MY DAUGHTER

My legs were itching to bolt, five years of straight-shot fear pooling right into my feet. Upstairs I kept a suitcase, buried at the bottom of my closet and stuffed with enough provisions to last me a week. Clothes, toiletries, chargers, a sock stuffed with emergency cash, a first aid kit, a single photo of me and my mother. Anything we might need if he ever came back.