17. Vera

"I'm going to kiss you," Robbie warns me as he pulls the sedan up in front of my parents' apartment building. Tell me now if you don't want any PDA."

"Why would you think I don't?" I ask, trying not to laugh as his neck flushes red.

"Photographs?" He shrugs. "I know we agreed to take this as it comes, but we haven't really talked about after tomorrow. I wasn't sure if you wanted this to go public for real."

Right. After tomorrow. When I leave. My shoulders tense just thinking about the plane, but my stomach trips at the thought of leaving Robbie.

He puts the car in park and I watch as he jogs around the front of the vehicle to get to my door. Ever the gentleman. He did the same thing any time he drove me around back in high school. He pulls the door open with a mock bow, but he's smirking even as I slide my hand into his and let him lift me out of the passenger seat.

He yanks me to my feet but doesn't step back, and we're chest to chest in the middle of the senior living community parking lot. His eyes drop to my mouth and it would be easier to stop the earth from spinning than to stop my body from swaying into his and pressing our lips together. One of his hands is still clutching the car door, and he lets go to cup the curve of my waist. His fingers brush the strip of skin between my jean shorts and my baby tee. I huff a breathy sound into his mouth and there he is, hot and insistent, pressing against my button fly.

"Fuck Vera." The words are a growl into my mouth and my lips curve. "I survived you for thirty-three years, just to have you take me out in a damn parking lot."

I snort, trying to hold in my laughter, and we break apart as he pulls a hand down his face.

"Don't be dramatic." I lean in to kiss his cheek, the coarse hair of his beard rubbing against my chin. "That's my job."

"Is it?"

I pause. Is it? I meant more that I was always the one prone to histrionics while Robbie remained the one person tethering me to reality. But it could be. Right? Wasn't I just thinking about how I was done with the fashion world? How it was close to done with me? I hate the travel. I have more money than I could need.

Coming home has never been something I've considered, but I could do it. I could go back to dance, to high school drama productions. I could retire and spend a few years helping little girls like me reach their goals. I have the connections and the know-how. It's something I'd never considered. Maybe I should.

"That was meant to be self-deprecating," Robbie says, ducking to catch my eyes. "You have to admit, it's pretty dramatic to pine for a woman for sixteen years, especially when you're the one who broke her heart."

I force a chuckle. "You're right. Drama King alert."

He lifts my chin and presses a chaste kiss to my mouth.

"Have fun with your parents Vera, I'll see you later."

"Can I come watch the scrimmage?" Like old times? Sitting in the stands cheering on my Robbie? "Sorry. Didn't think that through. I don't want to distract the kids."

"No," he shakes his head, "I'd love for you to come, but we're going to get started right away. I know you planned breakfast with your mom and dad."

I did plan breakfast with them. I've spent very little time with my parents. Partly because they're busier than I thought they'd be, partly because I've been focusing every spare minute I have on time with this man. I've felt very guilty about putting Robbie first, especially when I came home to see my dad, but I can't seem to stop myself. We're cramming sixteen years into one week. Whatever happens next, it's still going to happen with distance. I don't want to miss a second available to us.

"Maybe we can all come."

"I'd like that."

I feel his eyes on me as I make my way up the concrete walk and let myself into the building. When I turn for one last glance, he's still there, leaning his shoulders against his dad's too-small car, arms crossed over his broad chest, and smiling the soft grin he used to reserve for only me. My heart turns over in my chest.

"Mom?" I push the front door open with the key Dad gave me and step into my parents' apartment. My pulse is still thrumming like the wings on the hummingbirds that visit the neon red feeder Mom puts on the balcony.

"There you are baby," my mom peeks out of the kitchen, her checkered apron already tied around her waist. "Did Robbie drop you off?"

I nod and wrap my arms around my mom's neck. I can feel the delicate arch of her shoulders and the bumps of each vertebra under her skin. When I pull back, I can see the fine lines around her eyes and mouth, the gray hairs along her temple. My mother isn't old, but for the first time I can see that she isn't in her forties anymore. I hug her again, this time tighter, glad I came home on a whim.

"Everything okay, honey?" My mom's eyes search mine. "You seem sad."

I shake my head, "I'm good, Mom. Promise. I'm just glad I get to spend time with you."

My mother's laugh has always been beautiful. Dad used to say that it was the first thing he noticed about her. His fraternity—yes, I know—was hosting a party, and he heard her laughing from somewhere in the house. He searched everywhere before he found her in the kitchen, laughing at a story being told by his best friend.

The next day he took Mom out on a date and his best friend had to stop by the on-campus health center with a broken nose.

I remember practicing Mom's laugh in the mirror, trying to get the cadence just right. I never quite did. Instead, I snort like my dad.

Mom laughs now, that same musical sound, and I smile.

"Vera Aster, are you trying to butter me up?"

Maybe not intentionally, but now that she mentions it…

"Is it working enough to convince you to make waffles?" Besides the best laugh, Mom makes the best waffles in three states.

She smiles, patting the back of my hand. "Sure baby. Can you get out the waffle iron?"

Mom turns to the sink to wash her hands and I open a cabinet full of mixing bowls. We'll need one of those too, so I pull it out and set it on the counter. I remember helping hold this blue and white Pyrex and folding in the eggs and milk with the ancient wooden spoon.

I open two other cabinets, and peek behind an old, red toaster, but I still can't find the Belgian waffle iron.

Dad walks into the kitchen, stopping long enough to press a kiss to my temple.

"Hey bub, I have to drop something off at the post office, but I'll be right back for breakfast."

He looks older, too. Lines along his forehead and gray hair thinning where he's combed it over the top of his head.

"I love you, Dad." I close my eyes as I hug him back, feeling just like I did at ten, when a hug from my dad could cure anything and everything. He pats my back and shifts me out of his way to get to the door. "Hey Dad?" I ask as he puts his hand on the doorknob. "Any idea where Mom keeps the waffle iron?"

He frowns.

"Waffle iron? I think we gave that to the Jessup's when we moved." He shrugs. "We're not really hosting big breakfasts anymore." Unsaid is that I also don't visit…ever… so there's no need to make my old favorites.

"Yeah. Of course." I nod. Mom must've forgotten where it went.

"Need me to swing by the and see if we can borrow one from the Oakes?"

I shake my head. "We're good. Pancakes work for you?"

"Pretty sure there are chocolate chips in the cupboard and blueberries in the fridge."

It's not like my mother to forget something like the whereabouts of a trusty kitchen appliance, so I check a few more cabinets just to be safe, but Dad's right.

"How about pancakes?" I ask my mom, and her brows tip together as she frowns.

"No, to waffles then?"

I'm not sure what to say to that. It feels weird to correct her. I may be a grown adult, but this is my mother.

"I think I'd prefer pancakes."

We stare at each other, silent for a moment, and then she shakes her head, as if her thoughts are all jumbled. Then she smiles.

"Pancakes sound perfect."

She hands me the flour and baking powder, and I open the fridge for milk and eggs. I slide them onto the Formica counter and scrape my hair back into a tiny ponytail. Mom is standing in front of one drawer, staring down at the measuring cups like she's never seen them before.

An itch starts at the base of my spine. The feeling from that first day coming back full force. It feels like a horror movie, but not one about ghosts and vampires. The kind with psychological twists and turns. The kind that feels ominous and heavy, like a discordant pause in an otherwise familiar tune. I want to plug my ears and close my eyes, hiding under the covers until the moment has passed.

Instead, I reach around my mother and pick out the cups and the collection of measuring spoons.

Mom blinks at me.

"I can make them," I tell her.

That seems to snap her out of whatever fog she's in, and Mom gets the heavy non-stick pan and sets the front burner to medium heat.

The batter comes together quickly, even if I don't normally make pancakes for myself. I'm more of a savory girl in the mornings, but there's something nostalgic about stirring in the wet ingredients while Mom turns up the Chordettes on her speaker.

I get the blueberries out of the fridge, waiting for the pan to heat. I always move too quickly and the first batch is always undercooked.

"I'm so glad you're here, Vera," Mom says, squeezing my upper arm as she passes behind me to put away the milk. "I feel like we never get a chance to see you anymore."

Shame floods me because she's right. I moved away at eighteen and never looked back. It wasn't my parents' fault. I wasn't running from them, but that doesn't change the fact that I put distance between us besides miles.

"I was thinking the same thing," I say, and it's true.

The whole reason I'm here is to spend some time with Mom and Dad, so that I don't get a surprise phone call from the executor of their will informing me I've run out of time. And okay, Tandy's relationship with her parents is nothing like mine—she purposefully put space between herself and her hometown in Texas after her brother died—but I still sometimes catch the sad look on her face, especially when she thinks no one is watching. I can't help but wonder if she regrets not being able to fix things, or maybe she regrets that she'll never see him want to change.

"How's Robbie?"

I catch my secret little smile in my reflection in the microwave.

"He's good."

Mom's smile matches mine. "You've been spending a lot of time with him lately."

I nod. "I'd say I'm sorry but—"

"You're not?"

I shake my head. "Not even a little. We don't have a ton of time." Less than forty-eight hours, to be exact. Even if we keep things going after I'm back in L.A. and he's back in Quarry Creek, it won't be the same. I feel like I need to soak up every spare second with him while I can.

"I know, sweetheart." She brushes my hair out of my eyes. "I just want to make sure you're going to be okay when he leaves."

I might be fine, I might fall to pieces. I'm not entirely sure. I do know that I'm willing to take the risk.

"We're going to take it day by day," I say around the lump in my throat. "I'm not sure what I'm doing next, but I know he's worth the risk."

"Hockey's an intense sport, honey. It could take up a lot of his time. I don't want you to get your hopes up and then crushed. You know I love Robbie, but you're my baby. You will always come first."

That was the whole reason he broke things off the first time, the assumption that we'd both need to focus on our dreams and not our relationship. And who knows if he was right or not? All we know now is that we both got everything we wanted. Except each other.

"He's been playing hockey for a long time, Mom. Just like I've been modeling. We've both given everything to our professions. When do we get to take something back for ourselves?"

"Vera." There's an edge to Mom's voice and I rear back like I've been stuck or electrocuted. "I know you want to strut the runway, and I know you love Robbie, but have you even thought about college? About your future?"

"Wha—"

"I believe you can do anything you want to, honey, but you need a back-up plan. Following Robbie—Maria says he's most likely going to go at least to the juniors—isn't fair to you. I don't want to see you put yourself second to a boy. Even if it's one as wonderful as Robbie. If he's the one…"

"He'll wait." I finish for her.

Because we've had this conversation before, except I was sixteen. I was a teenager smitten with her swoon-worthy boyfriend and I didn't speak to my mother for almost a month following the big blowout. I only spoke to her through Dad for weeks.

My mother isn't concerned with right now. She isn't expressing her worry about what I'll do when I head back to Los Angeles and Robbie goes back to Quarry Creek. She's stuck somewhere over a decade and a half in the past. Something is wrong here. It's been wrong.

And I missed it for an entire week.

"Mom?"

"I'm just worried about you, honey. Someday, if you have your own babies, you'll understand how scary it is to see your daughter put herself second to a boy, no matter how wonderful he is."

"Mom."

She turns to look at me with wide eyes.

"How old do you think I am?"

She shakes her head, clucking her tongue.

"I know you think you're grown, honey, but sixteen isn't old enough to make these kinds of decisions. I don't want to see you throw away your future because of first love."

"Mom!" I don't mean to raise my voice, but my heart is thundering through my chest. My head spins. I need my Dad to come home right now. I need to call Robbie, call an ambulance. Could this be a stroke? Isn't there only a brief window of time to get help? She finally turns to look at me. "I'm thirty-two, Mom. I graduated years ago. Robbie plays for the Arctic. I was on the cover of Vogue."

"Vera Aster." Mom frowns. "You don't need to exaggerate to get your way. That's a great dream, but you need to finish school first and if Robbie's the one, he'll still be there for you when you've gotten everything you want."

She's not listening. I grab my phone from my back pocket. I‘ll excuse myself to the bathroom and call Dad. We'll take her to the ER. Maybe she slipped in the shower this morning and banged her head.

"Don't forget to spray the pan, honey." Mom holds up an aerosol canister and aims it at the pan I completely forgot is still on the stove. It doesn't look like the cooking spray I'm used to, but maybe it's a new brand? Except I lean closer and it's not cooking spray at all. It's furniture polish.

"Mom, stop!" I yell the words as she presses down on the top of the canister, droplets splashing into the nonstick pan, which immediately starts smoking. The alarm blares, the sound drumming into my ears and pulsing behind my eyeballs. I turn the burner off and shove the pan into the oven, slamming the door.

"What happened?" Mom asks, standing in the Smokey mess she made, blinking at me like a switch just flipped on in her brain.

"Something's wrong with you, Mom. You think I'm a kid again. You just put something toxic in the frying pan. You set off the smoke alarm. I'm going to call Dad and we'll—"

"No." My mother's voice is firm, brooking no argument, but I'm not the child she thinks I am. This is no longer up for debate. Maybe it's a goddamn tumor. Whatever is going on here, it's not normal and there's a pain in my chest, my breathing turning to panting. "I don't like the sass Vera," she says as I reach for her.

I must move too quickly, surprising her or something, because Mom rears back to get away from me. I watch in horror as she steps on the small rug in front of the sink and it slides out from under her foot. Her fall feels like it happens in slow motion, and my mother slams her head on the counter as she crumples to the floor.