My Life in Black and White (30 page)

“What about her dad?” Theo said.

“Her dad is so pissed”—jab—“that Jarrod got suspended”—cross—“he grounded both of them”—jab—“until the end of the school year.”—cross—“He wouldn’t even listen”—jab—“to their side of the story!”

I hesitated, then threw the hardest punch I could. “How can you not listen to your own kids?”

“Good question,” Theo muttered.

“There should be a license”—hook—“for parenting”—uppercut—“and you can’t be one”—hook—“if you don’t pass”—uppercut—“a test.”

“There should be.”

“I feel so bad for her…. What do I do?”

“I don’t know,” Theo said. “Maybe you should just be glad you don’t have her parents.”

It was this sentiment that sent me straight to the kitchen after Theo dropped me off, fully expecting to find my mother waiting for me.

Only she wasn’t.

Nothing
was waiting for me. No after-school snacks, no pitcher of ice water. No Post-it Note stuck to the counter, explaining that she’d run out for milk.

It was 5:30, and the table wasn’t even set. My mother
always
set the table for dinner. Four places, every time. Regardless of whether my dad would be home to eat with us, regardless of my field hockey games or Ruthie’s band rehearsals.

“Mom?” I called out. “I’m home!”

When there was no answer, I walked through the house looking for her, my mind starting to spin.
She left. She left her rotten, ungrateful daughter to run off and be someone else’s mother. And on the way, she crashed the car….
But when I pushed open the door to my parents’ room, there she was, sitting on the bed, surrounded by photo albums.

“What are you
doing
?” I asked, overcome with relief, but it came out like annoyance.

“Looking at old photographs,” she said in a voice I didn’t recognize. Her nose sounded stuffed. Her eyes, I realized, were rimmed with red. There was a box of tissues on the pillow beside her—a few crumpled ones on the floor.

“Why?”
I said, eyeing the albums, which my mother had spent a lifetime assembling. Documenting every moment of our lives in color-code. Green for Ruthie. Purple for me. Blue for family. Red for holidays. “You know you can do all this on the computer,” I said. “It’s way easier.”

“I like albums,” she said.

She lifted the one on her lap and placed it, still open, on the bed beside her. My eyes darted to the pictures. Me at the age of seven or eight, wearing some fancy white dress and a veil, mugging for the camera.

“What’s that?” I said.

My mother smiled. “Your first communion.”

“I had a first communion?”

“You did.”

I shook my head. “I don’t remember that.”

“You don’t?” She looked surprised.

“No. I remember going to church when I was little, but … Did Ruthie have a first communion?”

My mother smiled. “Ruthie refused to put on the dress. She said white was a sign of—I’ll never forget this—
patriarchal oppression
.”

“Yeah, well, she might be changing her tune,” I muttered, thinking that at the rate Ruthie and Carter Benson were going, they’d be dropping out of high school to get married and raise their love child.

“What’s that?” My mother raised her eyebrows.

“Talk to Ruthie,” I told her. “Anyway, I thought first communion was for Catholics.”

“It is.”

“But Dad’s Jewish and you’re … what? Congregational?”

She nodded. “I attend a Congregational church now, but that’s not how I grew up.” She went on to explain that her mother, my grandmother Julia, had been Catholic, and that her father, my grandfather James, had been Baptist. “I was raised with both faiths and I wanted you and Ruth to grow up the same way … understanding where you came from … and knowing that someday you could make your own decision. Just like I did.”

I knew I should say something deep and meaningful—about faith, or about my mother’s parents, who died before I was born and who I’d only seen in pictures—but I couldn’t think of anything. Except for the Landry McCoy story, I’d never heard my mom say this much about herself in one sitting.

“God,” she murmured, glancing down at the album. “You were so beautiful. So, so beautiful.”

I stared at her, feeling a surge of shock and anger. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I could barely choke out the words. “Thanks a
lot
.”

“What?” My mother looked up, startled.

“You’re up here crying because I’m not that girl anymore. That beautiful girl in the white dress with the perfect face that you lost and you can’t ever have back. Ever. Because she no longer exists!”

“You’re wrong.”

“I
see
the tissues, Mother. I’m not
stupid
.”

“I know you’re not stupid,” she said quietly. “I
have
been crying, but it’s not for the reason you think. I’ve been crying for the girl who used to jump out of bed in the morning and come running in here.” My mother patted the space beside her. “That’s what I want back…. Ruth always needed her space, her independence, even as a little girl. But you—you were my koala baby.” She shrugged, giving me a sad smile. “I guess I just miss being your mom.”

I shook my head, my throat filling with something—relief or sorrow, I didn’t know which. “You’re still my mom.”

“In title, maybe. Not in practice.”

“That’s not true—”

“Alexa.” She gave me a look. “You barely talk to me anymore if you can avoid it, let alone tell me anything about your life. It’s like pulling teeth just to get the most basic information out of you.”

She was right, of course. She was spot on, and there was no point in denying it. “Well…” I said, swallowing hard. “I’m talking now, aren’t I?” I picked up the first communion album and placed it on her bedside table so I could sit on the bed. “I’m sitting, aren’t I?”

She nodded, tearing up a little.

We stayed that way for a long time, both of us quiet, until I finally blurted, “I haven’t really been taking a dance class.”

“You haven’t?”

I shook my head.

My mother sighed. “I guess that explains why those leotards I bought you are still sitting on the end of your bed.” She hesitated. “Do you want to tell me what you
have
been doing?”

“It’s kind of a long story.”

“Well,” my mom said. “I’ve got time.”

On Sunday afternoon, I went to New Haven to volunteer at the community soup kitchen. My mother’s church did this once a month. Every time she asked me to join her before, I’d made up some excuse. Now—as a peace offering—I was coming. I’d discovered over the past two days that it doesn’t take much to make my mother happy. Just getting in a car with her, talking about boys for an hour, can make her day.

I told her everything about Theo, but of course, she still brought up Ryan. “Have you tried talking to him, honey?” she asked. “Have you given him a chance to make things right?”

I sighed. “There’s nothing to make
right
, Mom. He’s moved on.
I’ve
moved on.”

“You could turn the other cheek,” she suggested. “Try being friends.”

“I don’t want to be friends with Ryan.”

“Why not?”

I threw up my hands. “Besides the fact that he cheated on me? … Why do you care if we’re friends? … ‘Turn the other cheek,’” I muttered. “What is this, some kind of Bible lesson?”

“No,” my mother said, smiling a little. “It’s not a Bible lesson. I just thought you were sweet together.”

“Yeah, well. We’re not together anymore,” I said. “And I think it’s pretty ironic that you want me to ‘turn the other cheek’ with Ryan, when just the other day, when I told you I made up with Taylor, you acted all miffed.”

“I wasn’t
miffed
,” my mother said.

“You were miffed.”

“No—I suggested that you proceed with caution.”

“What does that even
mean
?”

She sighed. “Oh, honey. Female friendships are complicated…. There’s jealousy … competition….”

“Here we go,” I said, rolling my eyes.

“I just don’t want to see you get hurt again.”

“I’m not going to get hurt,” I said. “Anyway, Taylor’s still grounded. We barely get to see each other…. Can we please just drop the subject?”

“Of course,” my mother said. “We’re here, anyway.”

She pulled into a spot in the parking lot and cut the engine. Then suddenly, as if stung by a bee, she yelped, “Oh!”

“What?”

My mother squinted into the rearview mirror. “Sharon Dano. She’s on the soup kitchen committee.”

“So?”

“So…” Her voice trailed off, and she motioned for me to look.

I peered into the mirror. There, across the parking lot, getting out of their black SUV, were Ryan and his mom.

“Mo-
ther
,” I said, my voice rising.

She held up both palms. “I didn’t know. Honestly … Do you want to go home? I can just run this food in and—”

“No,” I said firmly. “I came here to serve soup. And that is what I am going to do. Serve soup.”

I didn’t have to talk to Ryan. I’d successfully ignored him for the past eight weeks. I’d successfully ignored him for the past half hour, both while greeting his mother and while peeling potatoes in the church kitchen. Why start talking now?

But here he was, standing at the bread station—with his gelled-down hair and his look-at-me, I’m-such-a-good-citizen blazer—and something just compelled me to choose the butter station.

I went to stand next to him. I watched his body stiffen as though he sensed that I was there and wasn’t sure what to do.

“Hello, Ryan,” I said. Cool. Polite.

“Oh … hey, Lexi.” As if he was surprised to see me. As if he hadn’t noticed I was in the same room with him this whole time.

“Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m not going to throw any plates.”

He shot me the old crooked grin—the one that used to make me weak in the knees—but this time I felt nothing.

“You look nice,” he said.

“Thanks.” Out of habit, I reached up to straighten my hood, but then I remembered it wasn’t there. I was wearing a cardigan, for my mom. So I swung my hair in front of my face instead.

“Would you like some bread?” Ryan asked our first customer, a wispy-haired lady with earmuffs, shuffling along with her tray.

“Well,” she said, blinking up at him, “aren’t you handsome.”

“Butter with that?” I asked, holding out two foil-wrapped packets.

“Bread?” Ryan said to a man in a stained, orange hunting jacket.

“Butter?”

It was all very civilized. Two exes, dressed in their Sunday best, putting aside their differences to serve the greater good.

Ryan was blissfully unaware of what was coming.

“Bread?” he said to a man with stubbly cheeks and a big, red nose.

“Butter?” I asked. Then, casual as can be, as though I were inquiring about the weather, I turned to Ryan and said, “How can you live with yourself? How can you defend those assholes?”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

“I’m not going to dignify that with an answer,” he muttered, dropping a slice of bread onto the next plate.

“Why? Loyalty to the Brotherhood?”

“No,” he said low. He sounded mad, but he kept his composure. “Because you don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I know exactly what I’m talking about,” I hissed back. “Everyone on your team is calling her names…. She got tripped in the hall today. You think it’s cool, what they did? You think they’re big studs?”

“Yeah,” Ryan said sarcastically. “That’s what I think.”

“It’s a class D felony, you know. Voyeurism. This could go to court.”

“Well, it’s not really any of your business,” Ryan muttered.

“But see…” I dropped two pats of butter onto the next plate. “That’s where you’re wrong. It
is
my business because Taylor’s my friend.”

“You’re friends again?”

“Yes.”

“Good,” he said.

For a second I was speechless. “
Good
?”

“Why wouldn’t I want you to be friends again?”

“Why wouldn’t you want us to be
friends again
?”

“Is there an echo in here?”

I shot Ryan a look. “If you cared about our friendship, even a little bit, you never would have hooked up with her.”

“Come on, Lex,” he muttered. “I already apologized. We really don’t need to rehash it.”

I felt stung.

We really don’t need to rehash it.
…
We really don’t need to
rehash
it?
That night put me in the hospital! That night changed my
life
! How could he be so offhand about it, like what happened was just some annoying incident that we should put behind us?

“Bread?” Ryan said, smiling at a tired-looking woman in a turquoise tracksuit.

“You have beautiful eyes, sweetheart,” she said.

He shrugged modestly. “Thanks.”

I took a deep breath as I held out two packets of butter. I decided to concede the point, even though it hurt. It wasn’t what mattered now.

“I thought you were different,” I said softly.

“Yeah,” he said. “I thought you were, too.”