Begin Again

chapter thirteen

IT'S A WHILE later when I finally venture back inside. I have cried all the tears I have left, hoping to every higher power that my face isn't puffy and that my eyes aren't red, giving away what I'd been doing on the porch steps.

Everyone is talking in the kitchen, and I feel relieved to hear my mother's melodic laughter. I don't want her to think Luke's outburst is her fault because it isn't.

It's mine.

I shouldn't have accepted Miles' offer to spend this day with his family when I should've been at home with mine. Luke is right. It was our first Thanksgiving without Dad, and I didn't even think about how he felt. We should've been at home, eating Chinese takeout like we'd done last year and the year before that.

"Hey, do you want some dessert?" I'm snapped from my reverie to see Miles standing before me. I blink, not realizing that I've been stagnant by the kitchen's entry, staring into space. Miles' green eyes slide over my face, frowning slightly at what is probably clumped mascara and smudged eyeliner. He doesn't even have to ask to know that I've just finished crying, not when his analytical gaze manages to deduce that from a glance at my face.

Shaking my head, I try to put on a convincing smile. "I'm alright, thanks."

"Are you?"

His calculating expression turns softer, and bouts of concern swirl in his eyes. I open my mouth to respond when my mother's face pops into view. She's smiling, her entire face alights with enthusiasm, contrasting with her sullen expression a few minutes ago.

"Where's Luke?"

"I think he went to bed." My mother's smile dims a little, an unreadable expression on her face. "I just know he said that he wanted to be alone."

She nods thoughtfully, turning to look at Miles. "Do you mind if I steal my daughter for a moment?"

He shakes his head, never breaking his focus from my face, and even when I turn around, walking with my mother up the rickety stairs, I can still feel his gaze on my back, burning a hole.

I stay silent as I follow her into the spare bedroom that houses all my belongings for the weekend. Though, after the debacle of what had happened at dinner, I'm beginning to regret promising Candace that I would love to stay here. I don't want to burden the Lively family more than we've already done. I am ruining Thanksgiving for them with our family dramas.

My mother begins slowly pacing the room length while I get comfortable on the bed, tucking my legs underneath myself as I watch her wearily. She's biting on her lower lip, her eyebrows furrowed in concentration.

"Just spit it out, Mom," I blurt. She jumps in surprise as if forgetting that I've been in the room in the first place. "You look like you're about to blow a fuse from how hard you're thinking."

"I don't know where to start," she admits, sinking onto the mattress next to me. Her hair is puffed up in that signature afro she's been wearing all my life, with a few of the black pieces beginning to gray. She looks drained. I didn't even notice the bags underneath her eyes when she came to my apartment earlier, but now I do. They stand out against her brown complexion, darkening the areas around her eyes and aging her well beyond her forty years of life.

"You've grown up so much, Eves," she says softly, her fingers reaching out and coiling around one of my curls, the tendril bouncing off my face. "I remember when you were four and begging me to check under your bed for the boogeyman." I laugh at that, leaning into my mother's palm. "And now you're twenty-one, getting ready to graduate college. Where has my baby gone?"

She looks teary-eyed, her bottom lip quivering as she sucks in a quick breath. "Your dad would be so proud to see the woman you've become." I bite my lip to keep my tears at bay. "What I would do to have him here with us."