Briyana
The unfamiliar SUVin the driveway was what had me most nervous when I finally pulled up to my dad’s house, my car just barely put in park before I turned it off and hopped out so that I could get inside to see what was going on. But when I rushed in through the front door asking, “Dad? Dad, where are…” my question came to an abrupt halt once I saw him and the alleged emergency sitting in the living room.
“Mom?”
“Hello to you too, stranger,” she responded with a grin, standing up from where she’d been perched on the couch to ask, “Been back in town all this time and didn’t think to tell your own mother?”
“Had you reached out to me over the last month and a half, you would’ve known,” I replied in a sarcastic, airy tone that unsurprisingly made her snap, “Don’t get smart with me, Briyana,” and made my father decide, “I’m gonna leave you two to talk.”
Once he slipped out of the room, my mother gestured for me to take his spot on the couch as she returned to where she’d previously been sitting. And I did so, begrudgingly, completely unsure of what to expect when she finally spoke again.
“I ran into your father, and he told me what happened. I’m sorry things didn’t work out for you in Oregon.”
“Yeah, me too.”
“I would’ve helped you out, you know. If you would’ve just called and asked.”
Her sentiment was the same as my father’s after he’d found out what was going on. But unlike him, she didn’t have any recent receipts that gave me a reason to believe she was even telling the truth, my expression neutral when I responded, “Honestly didn’t think you’d care.”
“Briyana, you’re my daughter. Of course I care.”
“And how would I know that?”
Like my question was completely out-of-pocket, she scolded, “Briyana…”
“What?” I asked, my face growing hot as I reminded her, “After I decided to stay here with Dad instead of coming to live with you during the divorce, you didn’t care to help me move into college, didn’t care to come to any of my track meets, didn’t care to show up to either of my college graduations. But I was just supposed to assume you’d care to be there for me with this?”
Instead of answering my question, she remained quiet as I continued to rant, “And I get it. I’m an adult now, so it’s not like you even have to be. But let’s not sit up here and act like I had no reason to believe my problem wouldn’t have mattered to you the same way everything else didn’t.”
When I finally finished my spiel, I noticed my mother had tears in her eyes. And with one blink, they began to roll down her cheeks, my shoulders dropping as I empathetically sighed, “Mom, why are you crying?”
“I didn’t think you needed me anymore,” she confessed, her voice filled with raw emotion as she turned my way and explained, “When I left you here with your father, you seemed to be doing so well without any of my love and guidance, any of my input. Then you did even better once you went off to college, and itjust… it really seemed like you were better off without me, Briyana.”
Hearing her point of view after all this time honestly only left me more confused since the truth was, “Mom, the only reason I got to where I was at the time was because of you. But when the divorce happened and I didn’t wanna move,because what teenager wants to enroll in a new school during their senior year, it was like you treated my decision as some... get out of parenting free card.”
“Because I was hurt, Briyana,” she defended with a swipe at her freshly fallen tears. “It felt like I’d lost everything all at once. My home, my husband, myself,you. And I guess I was so immersed in my own pain that I didn’t really consider how I could be hurting you too; especially since you didn’t seem hurt.”
The adult side of me who was desperate to understand her side of things was with her until that last part, the daughter in me jumping out when I frowned and challenged, “Because it was so easy for you to tell how I felt from all the Merry Christmas group texts that I literally never responded to?”
Confusedly, she replied, “I just assumed you never got those.”
“Oh, I got them,” I assured her. “Along with all the glittery, animated responses from your friends and that copy and pasted prayer from your one cousin who expected everyone to forward it onto five other people if we really loved Jesus.”
I wasn’t trying to be funny, but we both couldn’t help chuckling at the accuracy until my mother randomly commented, “You ran a 12.69.”
“What?”
“Junior year. NCAA Outdoor Championships. It was cold and rainy that day, but somehow you still ran your best time of the season to win the 100-meter hurdles,” she shared, grinning proudly as she continued, “And during the indoor season your sophomore year when you finished under eight seconds for the first time in the 60-meter hurdles? I’m pretty sure I cried that day I was so happy for you, Bri.”
Hearing her speak so fluently about specific moments from my track career was honestly shocking since, “I had no idea you’d even been paying attention.”
“The only meets I missed were the ones they didn’t live stream,” she responded. “But I always kept an eye on my baby, even if it was from a distance since I didn’t think you really cared if I was there or not.”
The way she’d repeatedly mentioned how little she thought I’d cared about her presence had me pulling out my phone so that I could show her just how much I actually did, scrolling through my old videos to find one in particular as I told her, “This is what I used to watch before all of my races.” Then I handed the phone her way and pressed play while explaining, “Of all the different voices cheering in the crowd that day, I can distinctly hear yours counting out my hurdle pattern. And listening to this every meet was the only way I could keep it in my head over the years since you weren’t there to do it in person.”
Once the starter pistol was shot, you could clearly hear my mother counting out,“One, two, three, ah. One, two, three, ah. One, two, three, ah…”from the moment I cleared the first hurdle until I’d crossed the finish line to win the state title during my junior year in high school. And even though she looked proud as hell watching the video like she hadn’t been there to see it in person, I suppose my reason for still having it was what brought the sadness back to her face as she turned my way to say, “I’m so sorry, Briyana.”
When she threw her arms around my neck to pull me in closer for a hug, I instantly tensed up, almost as if my body had gone into shock from experiencing her embrace for the first time in far too long. But the longer she held on, the more I began to relax, my head resting against her chest as I quietly shared, “I didn’t stay with Dad to slight you. In fact, I’m pretty sure I took my feelings about the whole divorce thing out on him like…every day. But I just really wanted to finish my high school career here with my team, and my friends…”