“And do what?”
“Go back to waitressing, that’s good money.”
But I didn’t want to be a waitress anymore. I liked handling social media for Egal, I wanted to be the community manager. It was not so much being part of a corporation, but I liked being able to handle the community aspect of the company. I believed in the products, and I thought I could help make a difference. I knew Dax thought I was selling out, becoming a boring office worker. When I talked about ideas I had for work, he was never really interested, and it was affecting our relationship. Everything was always about him.
“But I love this work. The vegan products Egal is promoting now are so cool.”
Dax rolled his eyes. He’d never had much of an interest in health either and ate a burger almost every day.
“Can’t we go just five minutes without talking about your job?!” he exclaimed. We’d walked back to his apartment, and I was going to spend the night there. We were standing outside his building, and I suddenly just wanted to go back to my own room and my own bed.
“I’m going to go home,” I said.
“What? No, come on,” he pulled my sleeve, trying to get me to come up.
“I’m tired and I’ve got an early morning,” I said.
Dax looked at me and pulled his shoulders up. I could see something close in his face.
I took a cab home, feeling low.
As I walked into our apartment, my mom looked up from the couch where she was watching TV.
“Back already?”
“Not really feeling like being out tonight,” I said.
She patted a spot next to her, inviting me to sit down next to her.
I knew that I could have told Dax the real reason for my worries about work. But then I’d have to talk about Matthew and our past relationship, and I wasn’t ready for that. Dax and I didn’t have that kind of relationship either. We didn’t delve into our emotions or discuss our history, certainly not our former partners. I wasn’t even always sure that he wasn’t seeing anyone else while he was supposed to be with me either. I knew he got very drunk after some of their gigs when the band partied all night and I wasn’t always with him. Dax was an attractive guy, and he had a hard enough time saying no to tequila and weed when he was partying. I did wonder if he’d say no to some of the groupies who were always hanging around backstage.
I snuggled up next to my mom and we watched some mindless reality tv. As per usual, we got drawn into the lives of these characters, arguing about what they were doing and wearing. It was an escape from real life, and I enjoyed thinking about someone else’s problems for a bit.
Chapter 6
Matthew
When I came back from my morning run on Saturday morning, my mother was waiting for me in the kitchen. This was unusual. She wasn’t up early as a rule, and we tended to avoid each other. Or, more accurately, I tended to avoid her. The house was split into different floors, she had the top half, and I had the bottom. The kitchen was a communal space but since she never ate and I usually came home late from work, we hardly ever saw each other.
“I’ve made coffee,” she said. She was dressed in a silk blouse and pressed pants, her hair set perfectly, not a strand out of place.
“Thank you.”
I took some water from the fridge and waited.
She leaned against the counter and folded her arms, waiting for me to finish.
“Is there something I can help you with?” I asked, a bit impatiently.
“What are you up to this weekend?” she asked lightly. “I was wondering if you would join me on Sunday for lunch at my club.”
“Why?”
“Can’t a mother have lunch with her son? I haven’t seen you in ages,” she said in a slightly plaintive tone that I hated. “Also, I wanted to talk to you.”
“About what? Can’t we talk about it now?”
I had to fight back my annoyance. Over the years, my mother’s emotional fragility had become an irritation. For years, after my father’s death, I’d been told how vulnerable and weak she was, how she couldn’t be expected to attend sporting events or go away on holiday with me. While in boarding school, I had to spend almost all the holidays with my insufferable cousins or be locked up in this house with some nanny. When I saw my mother, it would be for an hour of two, when she’d have a vacant, vague air about her that I later came to realize was caused by the tranquilizers she took. I had agreed to move into this house following graduation but only if we could have separate living quarters.