“Chat about how you’re invading my privacy? Sure, let’s grab a cup of tea and talk it through, shall we?” Her daughter turned to face the window and said nothing for the rest of the trip.
Frances sighed. “Yes, let’s have some tea.”
Once they were home and Ava had walked Kate, Theo, and Wyatt down the block to their houses, and Milo had gotten Lally and himself their inevitable bowl of Pirate’s Booty and had sat down with her for their regulation half hour of post-school TV, Frances carried two cups of tea up to Ava’s room.
Ava looked up, apparently surprised to see her mother. “Oh, are we really going to have tea?”
Fortunately, Frances knew she’d just been sitting there waiting to nonchalantly throw out that line, in the hopes of getting first blood. No dice.
“Yeah, I thought it would be a good idea.” Frances held up the tea. “But if you don’t want to, it’s fine.” She looked around the room at the early teenage mix of old horse posters and new rock star posters (similar hair styles), the blend of dolls and books and makeup. She understood why parents who lost their children kept their rooms just as they were: Every single thing in this room meant something. Either it meant something to her or it simply meant something to her because it meant something to Ava.
Ava took the tea and resettled herself on the bed, putting her laptop to one side, keeping one of her earbuds in, just in case she needed to do that “Oh, I’ve just been distracted by a notification, I’m going to let my gaze drift to the screen to underscore how unimportant this conversation is” move. Again, nice try.
“Both earbuds out and close the screen, OK? I want to talk to you, and I want to hear what you have to say.” Frances suddenly wondered if she should wait for Michael to come home, but it was a bit late to change tack now.
Ava rolled her eyes, but complied. Honestly, the eye-rolling thing just had to be developmental. There was no other explanation for its simultaneous appearance in pretty much one hundred percent of tweens and teens, all over the world. Three wisps of underarm hair, the first actual pimple, and eye rolling, all at once. Frances got a brief mental montage of teenage eyes rolling in the spotty faces of multitudinous nationalities, then returned her focus to the kid in front of her.
“I went to talk to Jennifer today, because your dad and I were worried that you didn’t seem to be bringing the same attention to school as you used to. It’s as simple as that.” She smoothed the coverlet, flicking a crumb to the floor.
“As simple as ‘My kid is failing, what are you going to do about it’?” Ava pulled her legs up under her, just in case her mother’s smoothing hand got too close.
“No, you’re not failing. You’re just not succeeding.”
Ava snorted. “Isn’t that the same thing?”
Frances shook her head. “No, and you understand what I’m saying and what I mean, and there’s no point pretending you don’t. Look, lovely.” She put her hand on Ava’s knee, but her daughter twitched it away, frowning. “We love you, and want to help you, that’s all. It’s our job.”
“Well, how about I fire you?”
Frances smiled. “You can’t. It’s a lifetime appointment. We have tenure.”
Ava wasn’t smiling. “I never hired you.”
“We were appointed at birth. Your birth.”
“How come Milo gets a pass?”
“He doesn’t, but our expectations for him are different from our expectations for you. He’s ten. We expect him to lower the toilet seat after peeing, eat his vegetables, and that’s about it.”
“You weren’t that easy on me.” Ava’s eyes were glittering, but Frances couldn’t tell if it was tears or rage.
“Yes, we were. Easier, maybe, because you were the first and therefore we didn’t know how mean we could be. Poor Lally’s going to be sweeping chimneys by the time she’s eight.”
Again, no smile. Usually humor would breach her dam of irritation, her hormonal wall of ice. Frances waited.
“Lally gets away with everything.” This was clutching at straws. Ava doted on Lally, and the feeling was mutual. When Lally had been a baby Ava had been ten, and for a brief period it was only Ava who could stop her from fussing. It had been instant glory, witnessed multiple times by various members of the family, and the connection was still there.
“She’s four. Are you suggesting we send her to college? Should Milo be looking for work in the financial sector?” Frances tried to touch Ava again, but she still held herself too far away. “Darling, we want all of you to be happy, and that means different things at four than it does at fourteen.”
“What is it supposed to mean for me, then?” Frances could hear an actual question in Ava’s voice, rippling across the surface belligerence. She really wondered what happy should mean for her, and Frances remembered that feeling well. She smiled and tried to soften her tone.
“We expect you to work hard at school, get enough to eat, get more sleep than you seem to want, and to have a social life. Not a continuous round of parties and sleepovers because that would mess with the first three, but fun is allowed and indeed encouraged.” Frances looked at the face she knew better than her own, watching for clues as to what Ava was thinking. She would get a tiny indentation at the corner of her mouth when she was trying not to cry. She fisted up her hands when she was getting frustrated. She stopped blinking so much when she was about to throw a total shitter. So far her blink rate appeared normal, but Frances was ready to duck. “And we also want you to tell us what’s
