“Why aren’t you taking this seriously?”
“I’ve spent my whole life taking dance seriously, mother.” I lined my boots next to hers and straightened, which was hard to do considering my spirits were sinking. “I…It’s a hard life, not at all what you think. I need this intermission.” Maybe permanently.
“As long as it’s just a breather. You still have so much time ahead of you.” Mom put her arm around my shoulders. “Don’t get tangled in something without a future in Christmas Mountain the way I did.” There was a familiar note in her voice.
My spirits sank further. I’d heard this lecture hundreds of times.
Mom had wanted to be an Olympic skeleton racer, hurtling down winding, icy tracks on her back on a bare-framed sled. Don’t ask me how she fell in love with the sport. It terrified me. But the year she was supposed to qualify, she met Dad and got pregnant with me. Choices were made. Dreams were lost. And everyone in this household knew that Mom had placed all of her escape-this-small-town dreams on me.
“Hey, Mom,” I said before she fully committed to the dream speech. “What did you accomplish for your store today?”
My mother made a small noise, kind of like a mouse squeak, and froze, arm literally stiffening on my shoulders.
My mother was a force. But it felt like her energy was lagging. Impulsively, I led her to the couch, sat her down, and held her hand in mine. We may have been caught in a time-warping power struggle over my career, but she was my mother and I loved her. “What’s going on with the store?”
“Nothing.” But Mom wouldn’t look me in the eye.
“How funny that you say nothing’s going on, Mom.” I gave her hand a gentle squeeze. “Because that’s quite literally what’s happening. Nothing.”
“I…” Her gaze bounced off mine.
I tried again, taking a more indirect route. “Has anyone ever told you about Marlene Covington’s pre-Olympic skeleton career?” In other words, her career before I’d come along. “That woman moved heaven and earth to achieve her dream.”
“Until heaven brought me down-to-earth, and I had you,” Mom said in a tone that was too-quiet and un-Mom-like. She sounded defeated, which made me worry. “I’m not that woman anymore.”
I scoffed. My mother could be a holy terror if she wanted to be. And she often wanted to be. It was one of the reasons she led many of the committees she volunteered on around town. “Are you feeling okay?” I pressed my palm to her forehead.
She swatted my hand away. “Stop. You’ve had your fun.”
“Only if you’re ready to be honest with me.” I made a show of looking her up-and-down. “You have everything you need to launch. What’s holding you back?”
“I have everything I need…” Mom said slowly, volume descending to a whisper. “…except courage.”
“Pfft. Try again.”
In the soft glow of Christmas tree lights, Mom seemed to shrink back as if afraid.
It was true!
I didn’t know what to say.
“Don’t tell your father or your brother,” she whispered furtively.
“Why not?” Did she think they didn’t know something was up?
Oh, they knew all right.
Maybe not that she was afraid, but that something was holding her back.
“I just feel so inadequate and…”
“Unhappy?” I guessed because I knew how unhappiness could derail the most determined. Me included. My career was not what I’d dreamed it would be. I longed to be the happy Allie Jameson I’d been when I’d lived here.
Mom nodded. “I feel like I’m alone in this endeavor. Trapped. I can’t move forward. And I keep buying items from my suppliers as if I’m open and doing a tremendous business.” She blinked, staring at the wall, looking defeated.
This was bad. This was worse than me scraping to get by as an injured dancer in New York City bad.
And it wasn’t something I could solve in one night.