It Sounded Better in My Head - Nina Kenwood Page 0,57
to my parents and what they’re going through. I was going to be the mature, open-hearted, caring daughter they need right now.
That vow lasted for one hour. I have since replaced it entirely with anger at Mum, which is much easier and less taxing on me.
‘It’s not a date. It’s dinner with three other people,’ Mum says.
‘Two of whom are Aunt Jenna and Uncle Ian.’
‘Right. Very boring.’
‘No, I mean, it’s a couple, plus you, and who else? Who’s the fourth person?’
‘A friend of Uncle Ian’s. I told you that.’
‘You’re dating. They are setting you up on a date.’
Mum turns to me and gives me a long look. I stare back at her, triumphant.
‘No, it’s not a date. And even if it was, Natalie, so what?’
‘So what? So what? You told me you were breaking up two weeks ago, on Christmas Day, which, quite frankly, I’m not over yet, and Dad just moved out today, and you are already dating? I mean, that’s ridiculous. And hurtful. And emotionally scarring. I’m not ready for any of this.’
‘We haven’t handled this whole thing very well. I know that. I’m sorry. But all that’s happening right now is that I’m going out for dinner. I’m socialising with my sister and her husband. That’s it.’
‘And another man.’
‘Yes. A friend of theirs.’
‘What’s the rush?’ I throw myself on her bed, lying across the clothes she’s already tried on and discarded. All of Mum’s clothes smell faintly of the rose and sandalwood body cream she always wears. No matter how I’m feeling about Mum at a particular moment, this smell makes me feel safe.
‘There’s no rush,’ Mum says, but I can’t trust anything she says anymore.
Mum is forty-eight. That’s too old to get pregnant, surely, even with IVF, even with donor eggs? But maybe not. Forty-six is the new thirty-six, I think I read in a headline somewhere. I try to picture Mum pregnant, I try to picture myself with a sibling. A stepfather and a baby and my mother having an entire do-over, and Dad and me standing outside their lounge-room window, peering in while eating ice-cream and gently weeping.
‘Do you want to get married again?’
‘I’m not divorced yet, so getting married again is the last thing I’m thinking about.’
‘I doubt it’s the last thing. After all, you are going on a date right now.’
‘It’s not a date.’
‘It’s date adjacent, at the very least.’
Mum holds different earrings up against her ears, turning to me.
‘Which one?’ she says.
‘The left.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes. The other ones are too much with the shoes.’
‘You’re right.’
‘See, that question about the earrings? That’s a question you would only ask if you were going on a date.’
‘Natalie.’ Mum sounds tired.
‘What?’
She turns around. ‘It’s one dinner. Please let me have this.’
‘You have it. I can’t stop you, can I?’
‘If you really don’t want me to go, I won’t.’
‘Oh, please.’ Arguing with Mum is almost comfortingly predictable. I knew she would say this, because when we fight, we throw guilt back and forth like a ball.
‘I’m serious.’
‘You’d love that, wouldn’t you? I tell you not to go, and then you get to sit home and feel sorry for yourself, and I have to feel bad.’
‘I wouldn’t love it. I’m looking forward to this dinner. But I’ll give it up if you want me to.’
This is Mum at her passive-aggressive best, and she knows it.
‘The last thing I feel like doing is spending the night with you, to be honest,’ I say.
‘Good then. I’ll go with your blessing.’
‘You do not have my blessing.’
She ignores me, staring into her mirror and tweezing her eyebrows. I seethe silently, and let the silence between us draw out, knowing she’ll speak first.
She stops plucking and turns around. ‘Look, this isn’t a date, okay? I am not going to bring a man back to this house. It’s dinner with my sister and her husband and his friend. It’s not a date. Please don’t make me feel bad about this.’
My greatest power over my mother is making her feel bad about things. Being considered an inadequate parent is one of her fears. I once saw her google history and it included a late-night search for ‘signs you’re a bad mother’ and I went out and bought her a World’s Greatest Mother mug that week. I gave it to her as a joke present but that was three years ago and she still uses it all the time and seems to care about it, which makes me feel a little bit worried for her,