take it, um, hard.
We’re just too different, I’d say. I’m leaving for college and you’re staying at the mall.
“Your mother and I want to take you out to lunch this afternoon,” Frank said as he pulled into the mall parking lot.
The Volvo was rolling along at less than five miles per hour. But my stomach plummeted as if we were speeding over a cliff Thelma & Louise–style. Even though I’d never gotten to see it with or without Troy, I still knew how the story ended.
“Lunch?”
My parents never, ever went out for lunch. They always started their work days in late morning and scheduled appointments through lunchtime because it was often the only time of day working moms and dads could get away from their own jobs to take their kids for checkups. It was that high level of patient care and parental accommodation that had made Worthy Orthodontics and Pediatric Dentistry an industry leader for twenty years.
Mom gestured toward the neon red-and-yellow wagon wheel sign.
“Does Ponderosa Steak & Ale serve lunch?”
This invitation had gone beyond bizarre and had crossed over into offensive.
“Are you seriously considering taking your vegetarian daughter to eat at a steakhouse?”
Never mind that their vegetarian daughter had considered employment at a steakhouse. But for all they knew, I was still working for America’s Best Cookie and dating Troy, and now didn’t seem like the time to correct either one of those assumptions.
“Somewhere veggie friendly, then,” Kathy suggested. “Is there still a Panda Express in the food court?”
“Not the food court!”
Kathy sighed deeply. Frank pulled the Volvo up to the pedestrian drop-off and put it in park. Both parents looked at each other, then turned around in their seats to look at me.
“We didn’t want to tell you here,” said Frank.
“We didn’t want to tell you like this,” said Kathy.
At that moment, I realized just how infrequently I saw eye to eye with my parents. Like, literally. Back-seat driving was all I’d ever done, so the from-behind perspective was far more familiar to me than the face-first view. Over the years, I’d made myself useful from this vantage point by warning Frank about the deepening sunburn on the nape of his neck or tracking the stealthy gray hairs that had escaped the pluck of Kathy’s tweezers.
“We’ve decided to take a break from each other,” said Frank.
“Two decades of living and working together have taken their toll,” said Kathy.
The morning sun shined unforgiving light on the lines crisscrossing their middle-aged faces. When had Dad’s eyes gotten so droopy? What were those fleshy pouches sagging below Mom’s jawline?
“We thought it over very carefully,” said Kathy.
“And we’ve decided that our dental practice is easier to save than our marriage,” said Frank.
They were both so calm. So calm that their calmness totally freaked me out.
“What does that even mean?”
They looked at each other again. Kathy solemnly nodded. Then Frank mirrored the gesture. How could this be happening? They talked about splitting up, yet they were still so totally in sync.
“It means Worthy Orthodontics and Pediatric Dentistry will stay open for business as usual,” said Frank.
“But your father is moving out,” said Kathy.
And then one of them—I honestly can’t remember who—began explaining how Frank had already found another apartment, a condo actually, in Toms River, and how I would be welcome anytime …
I tugged on the handle, but my parents had locked me inside.
“Let me out!”
“Cassandra…”
“Let me out!”
I pulled again, then pushed the door open.
“Cassandra!”
“Cassandra!”
“Cassandra!”
“Cassandra!”
I escaped the wreckage, staggered across the parking lot, and stumbled into Macy’s, where I promptly knelt on the floor and puked my guts into the base of a plastic palm tree.
14
CINNABON APPETIT
I arrived at work ten minutes late. Gia was in mid-pitch to a customer in a midnight-blue cocktail dress.
“Now, Vicki, Bellarosa Boutique is a proud member of the International Formalwear Association,” she boasted. “We stand by our No Repeat Dress Guarantee…”
This girl Vicki was getting a major head start on homecoming. Even in my dazed state, I knew three-quarter-sleeved stretch velvet with a multitiered ruffle skirt was not a summer style. I didn’t know who this girl was, but I envied her for setting her sights on such a trivial, easily achieved goal.
“Cassie!”
I expected Gia to chew me out for my tardiness. Late again? Really, Cassie? You’re worse than No-Good Crystal! Instead, she rushed over and pressed me to her bosom. That was when I should’ve figured out that I was even worse off than I thought.
“It’s gonna be okay, hon,” Gia said, stroking my hair.
“How—?”
My