Page 83 of Rory Rides Her Fake Fiancé
“You work seven days a week.”
“I’ll quit my job,” I impulsively shout. I grab a clean shirt from the laundry pile and throw it on.
Rory doesn’t respond for a moment, and when I finish pulling my socks on, she’s standing in the doorway. “Then you’ll never get your own bar and you’ll leave your best friend in the lurch. I live wherever Grandma is, and you live here. Face it, our fake engagement was doomed from the start.”
Rory
* * *
The next few weeks are a particular kind of hell. I interview pet sitters and hire someone to come take care of Bartholomeow once a day to help Grandma. His coat stays clean, but my heart twinges every time I think about how I’d look up from my work when Morgan was home and would find Barty loafing on his chest, Morgan absentmindedly petting him.
Grandma puts an ungodly amount of money down for a deposit on her new place in Boston and I move back to my place in Westchester.
All that happens between jobs, and I go back to my visiting-every-other-week schedule. It feels lonelier than it did before.
I don’t go to On the Rocks on Sunday nights. I haven’t seen Morgan since I left. We’ve only talked via text to sort out when I could come by and get my stuff.
He didn’t once call me “my queen” and I felt like I was talking to a completely different person—like Morgan had given up on trying to charm me.
I hated it.
Finally, Grandma’s moving day is approaching. I’m spending the weekend with her and the movers will be here tomorrow, Monday. We spent all day Saturday packing up her kitchen and bathroom, and today we’ve tackled the bedroom and living room. It’s been slow going, wrapping each picture frame, folding all the clothes. Grandma took an extra-long nap, and now we’re down to the wire. It’s dark outside, and the movers come at 8 a.m.
Bartholomeow winds around my ankle. “Grandma? Do you remember where we put your laptop bag?” She’s moved four times, and I’m just thankful she doesn’t have a desktop.
“The front hall closet,” she says, with a lot of confidence for a woman who misplaced her cane and had to take her backup one to lunch yesterday.
I get up to retrieve it and Bartholomeow voices his complaints.
“I think he misses Morgan,” Grandma says.
I ignore her. She’s brought up Morgan several times and I get madder each and every time.
“Rory? Don’t you think he misses Morgan?”
“Of course he does,” I mutter. “He’s a cat. And Morgan was a nice warm person who cuddled with him and fed him and pretty much loved on him but also gave Barty his space when he needed it.”
Grandma doesn’t respond. When I glance over, Bartholomeow is on her lap and she’s giving me a funny look.
I ignore her.
We sit in silence while I pack up her cords and mousepad. I really should be cleaning the keyboard before I put it in, but I think we already packed up the compressed air somewhere.
“Rory, I’m sorry.”
My hands freeze.
Grandma continues. “Sometimes I . . .” She searches for the right word, and I look up at her. “Your mother said I was manipulative. I’ll never forget the argument we had where she said that.” Grandma’s hands come to rest on her cane and Barty’s ears twitch. I can almost see him debating whether it’s worth staying where he is if he’s not going to get pets. “I wasn’t a good grandmother.”
I open my mouth to protest and she raises her hand to stop me.
“I wasn’t a good grandmother when your mother was alive.” She sighs. “I thought I knew everything about how to be a mother, and it wasn’t until I took you into my care that I realized I had no goddamn idea on how to raise a child anymore. Maybe it gets harder with every generation. I don’t know. But when I realized you had lied to me—manipulated me—I thought some terrible, awful things about the both of us and I lashed out. For that, I’m sorry.”
I sit on that for a moment. When I was growing up I had asked Grandma why she and Mom hadn’t been close, and she’d been vague. “We didn’t see eye to eye on things,” she’d said. “But even though we disagreed, I should have mended fences more, swallowed my own pride. It’s a lesson for us both.” She reached out and touched my cheek. “It’s a lesson that life is short and even when our tempers get the best of us, we should reach out anyway. Forgive.”
I blink the memory away. I look at Grandma. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry too.”
Grandma reaches out and I grab her hand. And then she gets to her real point. “Do you miss Morgan?”
