Until Tomorrow: A Flirting With Trouble Novel by Annie Kelly

Author:Annie Kelly [Kelly, Annie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2016-03-17T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

It’s been a while since I’ve been to my mom’s house. For a long time, since Lennon was living here I avoided it to avoid the temptation to use. Now it’s more about avoiding Lennon in general.

My mom is an ER nurse—she’s been working twelve-hour shifts for most of our lives, even growing up. We never saw much of her once we were old enough to become latchkey kids. Afternoons were filled with homework and evenings with frozen meals, at least for me. Lennon, on the other hand, ditched school at sixteen and never went back at all.

Still, I can’t blame Mom for that. I know she did the best she could. Being a single mother who worked in Baltimore sort of opened her up for a family riddled with problems.

Now, though, standing outside her row home at nine a.m., I’m reminded of the girl I used to be when I lived here. There’s nothing like coming back to my mother’s house to make me feel sixteen again. Frankly, I feel like a teenager most of the time anyway, but visiting mom for a weekend breakfast definitely clinches it.

I decided to come early today, mainly because I’m sure that Lennon is either not home at all or completely passed the fuck out. The only chance I ever get to chat with my mother openly is when my brother is nowhere to be found.

I pull open the storm door and squint through the main door window.

“Hey Mom? You home?”

I knock and ring the bell for good measure, but I see her turn the corner from the kitchen, wiping her hands on a dish towel. When she recognizes it’s me standing there, her face lights up.

“Carson, baby!”

She swings the door open and pulls me into the kind of hug that only Mom can give me—all-encompassing and incredibly warm. Tears involuntarily spring to my eyes and I blink them away.

“Hey Mom. How are you?”

“I’m great, honey, just great. Come on in—I was about to make banana bread.”

I follow my mother inside, taking in the scenery like I’m watching a movie. The same sofa and chairs, the same crocheted doily on the end table that my grandmother made before she died. In some ways, nothing ever changes around here. In other ways, I feel like I’ve never been more different.

“How’s everything going with school, Cars? You still gonna finish by the end of the year?”

I shrug and sit down on the peeling vinyl seat of one of the kitchen chairs.

“I don’t know. All I have left is my student teaching and then, technically, my master’s degree is done. I just need to set stuff up for the fall.”

“Hmm.” Mom pulls a metal bowl out of a cabinet and starts dumping ingredients inside of it. I watch as she spoons flour directly from the bag without even measuring. Some recipes, like this one, she just knows by heart. By feel.

“Well, honey, don’t wait too long,” she says, wiping her hands on her jeans. “I don’t want you to miss out on another chance to finish your graduate degree and begin your life.

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