Page 7 of Call You Mine
I don’t know how many times I’ve moved it a fraction of an inch down and then back up again—tilting it a tiny bit to the left and then to the right.
I can’t get it just straight.
“Ava?” Georgie says a little louder.
I bring my hand back to the steering wheel, realizing I still haven’t answered her.
We haven’t exchanged many words since I told her to pack a bag and get in the car.
But what else do you say after getting a frantic phone call from your thirteen-year-old sister saying Mom won’t wake up?
The shattering sadness I expected to feel when I finally gotthiscall was nowhere to be found. However, I experienced the most intense anger I’ve ever had in my entire life.
My mompromisedshe would be better for Georgie—better than she was for me, Phoebe, and Jasmine. She promised she would be the mother for Georgie that she never was for me and my two other sisters—the motherIhad to be for all of us.
But instead, she was going to leave this earth, traumatizing Georgie for the rest of her life, leavingherto find her own mother’s dead body.
Luckily, when I got there, I was able to tell my sister that her mom wasn’t dead.
She was just so wasted that she passed out on the couch.
Up until tonight, my mom was sober for thirteen months.
And before that, almost thirteenyears.
“It’s fine, kiddo. You’re just going to stay with me for a bit while Mom figures her shit out.” I manage to keep my voice even, not allowing myself to sound as angry as I feel. “Stuff, I mean.” I quickly add, correcting myself.
Georgie snorts. “I’ve heard swear words before, Ava.”
A small smile tugs at my lips. Hearing that sass in her voice, the way I know she’s rolling her eyes at me even though I can’t see her, has me forgetting for just a second why we’re in the car together.
We sit in silence for a moment, both of us just watching the road before she asks, “How long?”
“A few days,” I answer, not knowing how to give her something more concrete. I don’t know how long it’ll take my mom to be ready tobea mom again.
While Georgie packed up everything she needed, I tidiedup the house, throwing away the empty bottles and half-eaten to-go containers of food on the coffee table. I plugged in my mom’s dead cell phone and covered her with a blanket before leaving a note to let her know I took Georgie and for her to call me when she’s in her right mind.
And I can say—with one hundred percent certainty—I don’t know how long it’ll be before I get that call.
My mom has battled mental health issues my entire life, but her medicine came in a clear bottle—not the orange one, like the kind we got at the doctor when I had a sore throat.
She could down a bottle of vodka before I got on the bus to go to school in the morning and still somehow be able to help me with my homework when I got home that same afternoon.
Even as a child, I knew that wasn't what normal parents did—she was the perfect example of a functioning alcoholic.
Capable and present, yet always, unmistakably, an alcoholic.
The drinking got better when she met Phoebe’s dad, so much so that she didn’t even take a sip of alcohol when she was pregnant—something I went my whole life never seeing her do until then.
Then Phoebe’s dad left a few weeks after she was born—having lasted longer than mine—and the drinking started again.
Until she met Jasmine’s dad, and the cycle repeated.
All of a sudden, I was ten years old, taking care of my two younger sisters and somehow managing it well enough that no one noticed anything was wrong.
Then, five years later, she met Georgie’s dad.
But instead of the cycle repeating, it was like my mother finally found what she was looking for. Georgie’s dad was nothing like the other men she pursued.
