“I’m at the security tent. They tried paging her, but she probably didn’t hear it. It’s pretty loud.”
“Okay. Stay there. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
Through the bustling crowd, Zadie spotted her sister sitting on a bench outside the security tent, absentmindedly swinging a bag of kettle corn between her legs. “Finn!” Finn looked up as she approached. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I guess.”
“Still no sign of Mom?”
“No. She’s probably looking for me, too.” There was an anxiousness in Finn’s voice that broke Zadie’s heart.How could Mom do this?Forgetting to give your teenager a ride home was one thing; leaving your twelve-year-old alone at a busy festival was another.
“Yeah, you’re probably right,” she answered, trying her best to disguise her anger. “Come on. I’ll walk you home. Then I’ll come back and see if I can find her.”
“Why don’t we just look for her now?”
“Because…”I don’t want you to see Mom that way.“I think I left the door unlocked. I want to lock it before Mom gets home.”
How hard could it be to find someone with blue hair? As it turned out, very hard. Zadie searched every booth, every tent, every bathroom line, but Nora was nowhere to be found. There were fleeting moments when she would worry that something had happened to her. But then she would remember the anxious look on Finn’s face and the anger would come rushing back. After she had spent an hour wandering the festival grounds, the anger was all that was left.
The one place she had yet to check was the event stage, where a corn-fed rock band was in the midst of a harmonica solo. A sea of mostly middle-aged spectators was grooving along on a grassy slope, sipping from their beers as they danced. This wasn’t exactly Nora’s scene, but Zadie scanned the crowd for her anyway.
Finally she spotted her standing off to the side of the stage next to a tall man with a tattoo sleeve. Something he said must have been funny, because she was touching his arm and laughing. The sight of her mother yucking it up with some stranger while she’d been combing the whole park for her made Zadie’s blood boil.
She charged toward her. “Mom!”
The man with the tattoos was the first to notice Zadie, followed by Nora, who gave her a curious look. “Hey, hon. What are you doing here?”
“I’ve been looking for you,” Zadie shot back.
The man with the tattoos quietly slipped back into the crowd. Nora glanced after him briefly, then returned her attention to her daughter. “Is something wrong?”
“Yeah. You’re over here flirting instead of taking care of your kid.”
“I’m confused…” Nora narrowed her eyes. “What, exactly, are you accusing me of here?”
“Where’s Finn right now?”
“Finn?” she answered like it was a trick question. “I… I don’t know.”
“You don’t remember leaving Finn alone?”
“What? No!”
“If you don’t remember ditching your daughter, whatdoyou remember?”
Nora looked around. Several other festivalgoers were staring at them now. “Can we wait to do this at home?”
“No,” Zadie said, defiant. “I’ve been waiting for months for you to tell me what the fuck is going on. We’re going to talk about this now.”
Her mother anxiously ran her fingers through her mermaid hair. Zadie suddenly found herself resenting the fact that Nora’s hair matched hers. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“Okay. I’ll talk, then.” Zadie squared her jaw. “I don’t want you around Finn anymore. She’s not safe with you.”
“Zadie—”
“You’re a bad mom.”
The hardness in Zadie’s voice cut right through Nora. She could see it in her mother’s eyes.