Page 3 of Starting Back
She was just a kid but worried about her own mother more than any teenager should. She’d most likely heard all the drawn-out fights and was old enough to notice every bit of stifling tension in the room between her father and me after. Forcing it for so long did much more damage than just walking away when it was time.
I’d never wanted this for my daughters, and putting them through it made me feel like the world’s biggest failure.
As a mother, as a wife, and as a person.
I rooted around in my bag for the granola bar I’d picked up at the airport and took a chomp on my way down the hallway leading to the pool. I hadn’t eaten anything since before I’d boarded the plane, and if I was going to day drink my problems away, passing out on the lounge chair near the pool with no travel companion to nudge me conscious wasn’t the smartest course of action.
Regret stuck to me like a constant fungus no matter where I was, but if I’d made it all the way here, I’d find a way to give it a shot.
TWO
KRISTINA
“Are you in Disney World?” Emma asked me. I held the phone to my ear as I lounged against the pillow of my pool chair, running my finger up and down the drips of condensation on my frosty strawberry daiquiri glass next to me.
“No, baby. I’d never go there without you and Chloe. I’m just sitting by the pool.”
“Oh,” she said. “Are you bored? You have no one to play with.”
I pictured her adorable nose scrunching up like it always did when she asked a question. At six years old, she was young enough that her lack of filter was still cute, even though her big sister would often groan in embarrassment and roll her eyes when Emma would ask a simple but maybe not-so-appropriate question.
Emma was a little pipsqueak, all big blue eyes and long dark hair that she never let me cut more than an inch off at a time. Although Chloe and I shared my mother’s odd green eyes, Emma was a mini, big-mouthed version of her grandmother.
She was our unexpected joy, my precious miracle that had appeared when I had long ago accepted that Chloe would be an only child.
Colin and I had retreated to a getaway in the Poconos in a last-ditch effort to rekindlesomethingbefore we gave up, and to our surprise, we did manage to reconnect enough on that trip to discover a surprise pregnancy upon our return.
I had hopes that her arrival meant things would work out after all—until they didn’t. Still, she ended up being the best gift to all of us, even to her sister, although Chloe would never admit it.
Emma was too young to remember the fights and frustration that came back in full force after her birth, the memories that I feared haunted Chloe. My baby girl was young enough to be oblivious through most of it, but my eldest child had seen and heard too much over the years to have the pure heart that her sister had. We all cherished Emma’s innocence, and I wanted to clutch on to it for as long as I could.
“Aunt Peyton, Unca Jake, and Mike are having a sleepover here. She has a belly now.”
I laughed, surprised she knew enough to whisper the last part.
“Well, she’s growing a baby in there. When I had you and Chloe, I had a big belly both times.”
My mother, brother, sister-in-law, and nephew were all staying at our house with the girls while I was away. While I knew they’d be happy and cared for with my family, I’d hoped Colin would have taken the girls instead while I was gone. He’d said his work hours were too unpredictable and he couldn’t take off, but Colin couldn’t handle more than a weekend alone with his daughters. Although I’d known that, I hoped this time he would try.
But I was done asking Colin to try anything he didn’t want to do. No good ever came from it, and when I remembered all the times I pleaded with him to do the simplest of things, the memories turned my stomach and settled into my gut.
“Unca Jake brought donuts,” she said after a big gasp. “I love you, Mommy. Here’s Unca Jake.”
The thud of a phone dropping filled my ear, followed by my brother’s husky chuckle.
“How’s it going, Kris?”
“Here I was thinking my kids would miss me, and my baby forgot all about me once she saw donuts,” I said, feigning a heavy sigh.
“They do miss you. We’re just keeping them distracted until you get back. Relax and try to have some fun.”
“Hard to do when you’re alone.” I reached for my drink and took a long sip, the sweet strawberry taste warming and cooling my throat on the way down.
“Look, you made it all the way down there, so you owe it to yourself to make the most of it. Maybe meet some new people. Embrace being single.”
“Wow.Did my big brother just tell me to have a vacation hookup? I think that’s what the kids call it these days, right?”
“You’re an adult. It’s not like when I had to threaten my friends when I caught them gawking at you while you were still in high school. And how the hell would I know what the kids call it?”
