“That won’t do it,” I said.
She let the hand with the phone drop down, and we stood there not talking, and after a while the screen went dark again.
“Have you eaten?” she asked me after a while.
“Not so much,” I said.
“You want to go out and get something?”
“What do you mean?”
“I didn’t know there was more than one meaning to a thing like that.”
But there was. She could’ve meant walk to a store or a restaurant and we each buy something, but maybe she’d choose a place where everything cost more than I wanted to spend.
“Are you . . . ,” I started out, and then I wasn’t sure if I should ask, “. . . offering to, like . . . buy me something to eat or something like that?”
“I am,” she said.
“Like where?”
“Anywhere you want.”
“You’re telling me you’ll take me to any kind of restaurant I want and I can order whatever sounds good to me and you’ll pay for it, and all I have to do is listen to you talk about whatever you’re still wanting to say about that night?”
“Exactly.”
I thought about pizza places, and restaurants that sell burgers and fries. Maybe we could even go to the kind of place that has food like your mother makes at home. You know, like meat loaf and mashed potatoes, or fried chicken with okra. I couldn’t decide what I wanted, but I definitely wanted something, and I couldn’t really see what I had to lose.
“I guess . . . ,” I said, “. . . why not?”
Chapter Fifteen
Brooke: Maybe
“Ooh,” Molly said. But she drew it out a lot longer than that. It was a syllable that just kept going. “I know what I want.”
“What looks good?”
“This open-face hot turkey sandwich with gravy. And mashed potatoes and gravy on the side. I haven’t had that for so long. I bet you can guess how long it’s been since I had it.”
“Last Thanksgiving?”
“Right. But it wasn’t a sandwich, just turkey with gravy and mashed potatoes. But I had rolls with it, so that’s pretty close, right?”
I opened my mouth to ask her a question I probably had no right to ask. Or maybe that’s redundant. Maybe every question was a question I had no right to ask.
Before I could, the waitress showed up.
She took one look at Molly and then backed up a step. Which I thought was rude.
Molly had used the restroom to wash her hands and face, which is at least decent before you eat. But her hair was filthy, and her clothes were filthy. And she smelled as though she hadn’t had a bath or shower for a while. Which I suppose she hadn’t.
I watched the waitress’s face and wished she would look at me. So I could ask her with my eyes to downplay her reaction. But she was staring at Molly. When she finally caught my eye, she was giving me this “You’re a saint” look.
I didn’t like that, either.
It wasn’t that I didn’t have some of those same feelings about Molly. I’d noticed the odor. I’d felt a little embarrassed bringing her into a restaurant in that condition. But at least I’d had the good grace to keep those reactions a secret. At least, I hoped I had.
“What’ll it be, ladies?” she asked.
While Molly ordered the open-faced turkey sandwich, I changed my mind about my own food. I’d planned to have either a chef salad with no cheese or an egg-white omelet. Then I thought, Why am I obsessing about weight? For whom?
“I’ll have the same,” I said.
And the waitress, fortunately, left.
I sipped at my coffee for a minute, and Molly stared out the window and said nothing.
“Sounds like you’re nostalgic for home,” I said after a time.
“Sometimes.”
“If you miss it, you could always go back.”
“Nope,” she said, still staring out the window. “Not an option.”
“Did your parents abuse you?”
“No.”
“Then you could go back.”
“Not really.”
“I know you think they’re terrible. A lot of kids go through a stage where they think their parents are terrible. But you could try to work it out with them. I mean, my mother is the worst. Has been as long as I’ve known her. I didn’t just decide that because I was going through a stage. She’s a very unpleasant person. So if I can work out my stuff with her . . .”
“She’s not the worst,” Molly said.
She had ordered a glass of milk but she wasn’t drinking it yet. Wasn’t even looking at it. She was still just staring out the window.
“Well, you don’t really know that,” I said. Trying to sound patient. But instead of sounding patient I just ended up sounding like I was trying to be. “You haven’t met her.”
“Did you live with her till you were eighteen?”
“I did, yes. Nineteen, actually.”
“So she never told you to go away and never darken her doorstep again. And she never said you couldn’t ever see your little sisters again as long as you all lived. So she’s not the worst.”
I realized then that I had been told this already. I had known she’d been thrown out of the house, rather than running away. And then I’d forgotten it. That time had been such an emotional whirlwind for me. Nothing got in. Or maybe everything fell right back out again. I felt deeply ashamed for bringing it up.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I guess I see your point. I’ll have to think about that.”
We said nothing more until the food came. It was awkward. I’d been the one who felt I had so much to say to her. And suddenly I wasn’t sure what it was. All those thoughts had flown away, but to where?
I wondered again what she’d done to get herself thrown out of the house. Must’ve been something big. Mothers don’t put their kids out on the street for nothing.
She looked at her food, and then at mine. It seemed to please her that I had chosen the same meal.
“Do you really love my daughter?” I asked.
She had just taken her
