Page 105 of Exposing Colorado

She takes another drag from her cigarette, eyes a shade darker than mine on the horizon. I know she thinks I’m the one at fault. She’d rather rot alone in that house than take responsibility for anything.

“I guess I’m just a horrible mother.”

“You're just too much like your father.”

“I pray you never have to raise a child like you.”

Still… I miss her.

And I hate myself for that, too.

Picking the camera back up, I capture another picture. “Smile, Mom.”

And this time, unlike countless times before where I visited from afar…

I open the door and get out of the car.

Dead grass crunches under my shoes, loud enough to set my teeth on edge. I half expect her to look over, to toss out an insult or curse, but she doesn’t. She just smokes and ignores my presence. It reminds me so much of my youth that I want to throw a fit like the child I never got to be.

Look at me, Momma. For once in your goddamn life, see me.

I climb the porch steps slowly, one hand clutching my camera. Rickety wood groans beneath my weight, the top step nearly cracking.

She speaks without looking up. “You finally decided to come out, then, instead of sitting over there like a creep?” Her cutting voice sounds the same, absent of anything warm.

“I’m here, aren’t I?”

That earns me a brow arched in amusement. Or disdain. I was never good at telling the difference. “Well, well. I see you're still a cunt.”

And there it is.

My lips twist as I lean against the railing. “And I see you're single again. What was the reason this time? Dinner too cold? Couldn't get his dick up?”

“Don't you talk to me like that, I'm your fucking mother,” she spits, wine sloshing onto the deck.

I shake my head at her hypocrisy and swallow back all the words that want to claw their way free. “I don't want to fight.”

“Then why are you here?”

That makes me hesitate, because the truth is too complicated to voice out loud. Too exposing.

I just needed my mom.

Instead, I say, “I want to talk.”

For a second, something flickers across her expression, something dangerously close to affection. But it’s gone before I can catch it, just like everything else in my life.

She taps her cigarette against the edge of an ashtray. “Hope you brought your own booze.”

Snorting, I drop into the seat beside her and set my camera on the ground. “As much as I wish I were drunk right now, this is a sober conversation.”

My mother scrutinizes me with narrowed eyes as she takes a healthy swig of her drink. “If you've knocked yourself up, I'm not taking care of it. Figure that shit out on your own just like I did.”

Anger boils my blood despite all of my attempts at remaining calm. “By figure it out, do you mean marry a pervert who constantly cheats on you and molests your underage daughter?”

Her lips curl back over her teeth. “I put a roof over your head, didn't I? Fed you? Clothed you? You had everything you needed.”

“That’s what you're required to do to stay out of prison,” I shoot back, rolling my eyes. “Congratulations, you did the bare minimum. Mother of the fucking year over here.”