quilts. Her chattering teeth told a different story. Murphy’s neck was stark white and her nose and cheeks flushed red. How long had she been out on the coast? Had it been since Claire had abandoned her?
“I’m so sorry.” Claire barely got out the whisper, and she couldn’t look at Murphy as she said it. She definitely couldn’t look at Mom, who was sitting by the couch, one hand resting at Murphy’s side.
“For what?” asked Murphy. “Earlier? You were just being Claire.”
Claire didn’t think Murphy meant for the words to hurt her, but they did—more than any insult ever could.
Just being Claire. Just insisting on perfection, blowing up, running away from her sisters, her life, herself, for something better in the future.
Yes. That was her.
Eileen had finished stoking the fire and joined them by the couch. She stood at a distance from Mom, hands on hips, jaw firm.
“Elephant in the room,” she said. “Mom, what the hell are you doing here?”
Eileen was trying to sound unaffected, sure of herself. Claire knew, though: Eileen was at as much of a loss as Claire was. This was too surreal.
“I’m … sure you didn’t expect me.”
As Mom spoke, Claire studied her mother. She seemed small sitting there, cross-legged on the carpet, with her fine blond hair shrouding her face and her shoulders carved into a slump. Claire had never thought of her mother as a commanding presence, but she hadn’t thought of her as small, either. Small, or scared, or uncertain, or—at one time—young.
Kerry’s words were in Claire’s ears: Leslie, she stuck to that boy through thick and thin.
Leslie.
Mom.
Who had once been seventeen and overwhelmed.
Claire knew a startling truth about Mark Enright. She’d been working it out on her run back to Laramie Court. Now, though, staring the truth in the face, Claire was breathless with inaction, incapable of reconciling any of it with this woman.
“Mom,” said Claire, “why aren’t you in the Bahamas?”
Mom stared at her folded legs, tucking her stringy hair behind both ears. “When we got to Florida,” she said, “I changed my mind. Actually, when we got to the dock. Melodie wasn’t happy, but I made her go on without me.”
“I don’t understand,” Eileen said tonelessly. “Did you forget sunscreen?”
Mom sucked in her lower lip. It was chapped, Claire noticed, and unpainted. In fact, Mom wasn’t wearing a dab of makeup.
“I think,” she said slowly, as though testing the weight of each word, “it took getting there, being in a different place—or maybe it was the heat. It felt like … I don’t know, waking up from a hard sleep. I saw things clearly: I shouldn’t have convinced myself the trip was something I needed. I was wrong to pretend you girls were okay with it. And …” Mom looked up, locking her eyes on Claire and, in the process, nearly knocking the breath out of her. “I was wrong to drive off when you told me how you felt. I’d been telling myself for so long that I deserved that trip. That Murphy was in high school, and old enough that this one Christmas wouldn’t matter. And that the same held especially true for you girls.” She nodded to Claire, and then to Eileen.
“Well,” mumbled Murphy, “we told you it was okay.”
“I didn’t give you a choice.” Mom’s voice had grown firm. “I asked you, but I didn’t listen. I … don’t think I’ve been listening for a while. I guess you’d call it an epiphany, whatever happened in Florida. And then I knew I couldn’t live with myself if I got on that ship. It wouldn’t be vacation, it’d be torture. So, I came home.”
“But,” said Claire, “that had to cost so much money.”
“Southwest.” Mom smiled wanly. “No change fees. Only had to wait on standby for three different flights.”
“And then we weren’t home.” Claire snapped the next piece of the puzzle into place. Her legs felt strained—a delayed reaction to the running before. She sank to the ground, sitting only a foot off from Mom.
“I tried calling,” Mom began.
“I broke my phone,” Claire replied.
“I went searching your rooms for some kind of clue. I thought—my God, I thought someone had taken you.” Mom dropped her head in her hands. On its face the move seemed melodramatic, but Claire could see: This was true emotion. Her mom had been scared. Her mom had cared.
“You found Knutsen’s letter?” Eileen was still standing, arms crossed, face devoid of feeling.
Mom raised her head, revealing two splotchy pink patches around her