What a Girl Needs by Kristin Billerbeck

Author:Kristin Billerbeck
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Romance
Publisher: Kristin Billerbeck
Published: 2015-11-07T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

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As I enter my mother’s house, and all its old, familiar smells, it occurs to me that maybe I never wanted the big career that I worked so hard for. Maybe all I wanted was to feel important—and I’ve found out that doesn’t come from being a star attorney. It certainly doesn’t come from having obnoxious hair or being someone’s wife.

“Ashley, your father will be home soon. Can you put your stuff in your old room? Fish and Clara are staying in your brother’s room.”

I nod. My mom has an agenda of course. She’s the hospitality queen and they have friends staying—this takes priority over their long-lost daughter coming back into town—especially without my husband. The roots of my discontent are suddenly starting to show like ugly growth before a touch-up.

I drop my handbag in my old bedroom and plop myself on the family futon. My room, the den now—my dad’s man cave—though he was too lazy to paint, so it’s a pale pink man cave, which takes some of the testosterone out of it. It does have a red and gold San Francisco 49ers’ poster, clashing over the top of it, a wooden case of empty beer bottles, and a deer head plastered above them. Poor deer. It’s disturbing to think of an animal missing its head, and to have it summarily attached to a bubblegum pink wall is the height of indignity. My dad’s flat screen is too big for the room, and so it feels like you’re in the first row of an IMAX theater while you try to watch.

I text Kay that I won’t be there for dinner—that’s enough explanation for now.

My mom appears in the doorway and smiles, “It’s good to see you back where you belong. I’m going to get dinner started—your dad is late, so it must have been a good boat show.” As she disappears, I wonder at her ability to enjoy the simple things in life—making dinner, my dad coming home from the boat show.

Being here makes me miss my own home—which I normally regard with disdain. Kevin’s parents bought it for us as a wedding gift. It’s a dumpy, little rancher with a sagging roofline and more mold than ten-year old cheese in an abandoned mousetrap. But it was free.

All you can really say when someone gifts you with a mortgage-free home is thank you. With a big grin. Even if you’re thinking, I hope this place comes equipped with copious amounts of bleach, because it is disgusting and bears a striking resemblance to a house I saw once on “Hoarders.”

Life, and ugly encounters, has taught me that you can’t say everything you think. Even if you think people might really need to hear the truth. It’s not my place to tell them that truth. Granted, it should be, but it isn’t. As in the case of Kay’s engagement to Matt Callaway.

So, my house… Philadelphia is a real estate paradise with an enormous amount of history and style behind its architecture.

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