Roses are Red...Violet is Dead by Monica-Marie Vincent

Author:Monica-Marie Vincent
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Booktrope Editions
Published: 2015-03-14T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty Two

WE BOTH SANG TO THE MUSIC as we pulled into my driveway. Mom’s car was there so this was going to be interesting. I cringed as I got out of the car and heard the country music flowing out of the house. Hopefully she had all of her clothes on. We both peered around to see if anyone or anything was out of place, but the neighborhood was generally quiet—if you could ignore Mom’s music. We glanced at each other and hurried to the front door. Knowing Mom, it was probably not locked. She might have complained that Dad never locked the door but sometimes she was as bad, so I turned the knob and we hurried in like someone was chasing us.

Mom was actually clothed and puttering around the living room, cleaning it up. She didn’t seem surprised to see either of us and smiled as we closed the door behind us. “Hi, girls!”

“Umm… Hi, Mom. How’s it going?” I asked cautiously, hoping there wasn’t any slur to her answer. Her greeting had sounded OK, but that was only two words. Not enough to really go by. At the very least she wasn’t in that deranged June Cleaver get up from the fingerprint fiasco.

“It’s a good day! I woke up, not really in pain and I realized that I’d left a mess in the living room, so I came to clean up,” she sang as she danced around the living room with a feather duster. None of her words slurred and her balance was really good.

“Great! Well, Shel’s here to help me clean up that mess that the cops left.” I jerked my thumb toward the stairs.

“I was going to go up there next, but I wasn’t sure if I was ready,” Mom said slowly. If I hadn’t been watching her closely, I would have missed the relief that flashed across her face for the tiniest of seconds.

“That’s OK. We’ll do it!” Shel answered brightly. “We don’t mind. Honest.”

I nodded in agreement. It was hard to tell what Mom was feeling. What was on the surface wasn’t always what was truly going on. Back in the day she’d told me that it was the way she was brought up. Her parents and grandparents never showed their true feelings. “Messy feelings” were hidden. “Stoic” was how she used to describe it. I hoped that the relief I thought I saw was how she really felt. When it came to Dad’s things, I never knew how she’d react. One day she wanted to destroy it all and act like it was never there and another she’d find something and bawl for hours, holding it.

“Thanks, girls. Eventually I’m going to go in there and clean that stuff out. We don’t need constant reminders of Steve hanging around the house. I don’t ever want to forget him, I loved and still love him. I can’t keep on hanging onto all his things when he’s not going to be around to use or enjoy them ever again.

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