Ruin Me

43. Teach me

The week passed uneventfully, routine had resumed and I spent most days the same way. The Silent Boys drove me to school where I hung out with Mina and her friends then I came home and spent the evening with either the boys or Ben. It was nice to have a set routine that I could rely on because life with my mom had always been so unstable but some small part of me missed that wild life. I missed the thrill of constantly moving that always seemed to open the door to endless possibilities. At least that's what mom convinced me it did.

***

"What's the scowl for?" Mom probed as she lay along the door frame between the bathroom and bedroom in our hotel room.

"I don't want to move," I glowered at her half packed suitcase lying at the foot of the bed. She hadn't said we were moving, she didn't need to. We'd been in the same place for over two months now and I could feel her need to move on.

Mom's need to constantly be moving was like an itch. She could hold back from scratching it for so long but always relented to the need again. She had to itch the itch.

"Don't you like moving?" Mom sighed dramatically as she twirled a strand of her silky hair around her finger.

"I like it here," I whined, "I like our neighbours and the other people here. I like our room and I have friends here now. I don't want to go."

"You'll make friends at the next place," mom dismissed, that only made my anger grow. Why wouldn't she take me seriously?

"I said I don't want to go," I insisted steadily raising my voice to a growl.

"Cara," mom fixed me with her most withering look that could make grown men quake.

"It's not fair," I threw my hands up but I knew I sounded like a whiny child.

"Life's not fair," mom told me bluntly as she retreated back into the bathroom. I heard the tap running before the rustling of a towel.

"When are we going?" I asked already resigned to failure. Mom would win the argument every time, just like she won everything. I knew I shouldn't have bothered to fight her in the first place.

"On Friday," mom returned to the room still patting her face dry with a towel as she sat in front of the vanity. She regarded me in the mirror and our eyes fixed on each other in the reflections on the glass.

"I really don't want to," I whispered sadly in my last futile attempt to make her listen.

"But moving on is like opening another door," moms lips parted in her winning smile, "you're welcoming in the endless possibilities of a new place. Don't you find that exciting?" I knew she was manipulating me like she always did but I wanted to believe her. I wanted to believe her fantasies as much as she did because she found so much comfort in them and I wanted that too.

"I guess," I shrugged not wanting to let her get the upper hand.

"You'll see," mom nodded knowingly, "when we move on you'll remember what an opportunity it is. One day you'll understand Cara, I know it."

"What if I don't?" I murmured. What if I wasn't like her? I wasn't beautiful or talented or adored or feared. What if I never understood her? Where would that leave us then?