Chapter 41

She hisses my name. She drops it. Like a mistake. I can't find the courage to tell her to come out. I can't find the courage to say anything to her for a few minutes. We look at each other but don't get close. It's like we're radioactive. I know that if I got closer, we'd both explode. I feel Travis' hand on my waist. I smell his perfume and he's next to me. I want to tell her about the book. About marriage. To show her my diploma and the fact that I moved on without her. Her abandonment has never been more real, more painful, than now that she's back. She talks. She talks as if she hasn't been gone even a day. She tells me about her new book and places it in my hand. She tells me about France. About wine. About her grandfather who hasn't died even now although he's been sick and in serious condition for a long time. I don't even know what his illness is. She grabs my hands and even though I look at Travis, I let her pull me closer. I feel drunk. Confused. Like plasticine.

"Why don't you love me?" I find myself whispering as we move away from the group.

"What?"

"I needed you all these years and you were the motherfucker. Why don't you love me? Aren't I a... Aren't I a part of you? Isn't that what you always told me? Why don't you love me anymore?"

"Why did you kill him? It's difficult, isn't it? To answer?"

He doesn't tell me he loves me.

"No. It's easy. It was revenge. Because I..."

"Leave those lies with me Kassie! He hisses at me. Damn it, he knows why you did it, but that boy wouldn't even lay a finger on you. Not to mention Travis already told me about the hunt. You did it to make yourself feel like part of the family. You did it because you're a psychopath and you've always been that way."

What?

"Parent?"

"Don't worry, I won't tell anyone. I know the truth, that's all. And I'm starting to see where this marriage of yours with this Wade boy comes from. I have to admit that I don't expect you to be that kind of woman. But then, why not be?"

I don't understand what he's saying to me. What he's suggesting. What he's implying. What exactly did Travis tell him and what ideas does he actually have?

"Mom?" I repeat slowly, confused.

"Do you do not get Kasie for money for money for money. Poor tist, to give birth to a girl and to summarize my career in tired novels and full of clichés and children who do not want to learn."

"I don't understand what you're saying," I insist.

"I was supposed to be the owner of this place. Chiron loved me and was ready to leave her. He was my professor in college. He told me what the price was, though. To be part of this family you have to make room for yourself and I didn't have it in me. You, on the other hand… And I'm proud of you, he caresses my face. Angry maybe, because you beat me to it here too. But proud."

This is not my mother. This is not the Lucille I knew.

"And what do you want?" I ask her.

I actually know the question from her. When you create a character Kassie, she would whisper to me in bed before going to bed, you have to give her a purpose. You don't ask what she looks like or what her name is. You ask where she comes from and where she goes. Where she goes. When you meet a new character, you ask her what she wants. People are guided by their desires. It's the same with characters. So what does she want. If you know what she wants, she continues complicitly, you know her weaknesses because you'll know what she's willing to sacrifice to get that something. And you know her strengths. And her relationships with the other characters. You know everything. I'm waiting for her to remember the conversation too, but I think she was just as fragrant with alcohol then as she is now. Drunk. Mom is a little drunk and for the first time I'm considering the idea that maybe Mom has more than just a passion for wine. Maybe she has a problem.

"Money. I need money. I need… damn it! Dad leaves everything to you. To you! And he hasn't even met you. I need money."

He repeats the last sentence as if he doesn't hear my soul breaking over and over again. As if he doesn't see me shrinking and feeling like my skin is too big. How I have to cling to the edge of a ceramic pot with a silver, dwarf spruce. They're everywhere in the hotel. His thorns scratch my hand because I suddenly cling to his pot. It's like he's scolding me. Like he's rejecting me. He doesn't want me, he doesn't want me. Even he doesn't want me.

"Okay, I give in. Okay. How much do you need?"

I don't know why I'm giving money to someone I don't actually have.

"A house. An apartment in the city or something. And a monthly amount to support myself on top of my salary. I want to live a good life. I deserve a good life."

"Okay. Whatever you want. Pick an apartment and tell me how much it costs and I'll… I'll fix it, I promise. I'll take care of this too, but I swear to you, mother. It's the last thing I'm doing for you."

I don't know where I find the strength to get out of there and go outside. I know I'm angry, that I feel like crying and that I hear Mina saying that the journalists have left so we can have a good time. He wants to offer me a Shot but I refuse. I walk straight to Travis. I'm angry and deep down I know it's not him, but I also know that I don't have the courage to refuse my mother, that I can't understand what happened to my Lucille when she became this woman. I remember another name though, vaguely mentioned. Travis. I'm sure I can take my anger out on him. Part of me wants to do it there, still in public. Another part of me knows it's not a good idea so I signal for him to follow me. He's smiling but stops. He follows me into the gazebo and my first instinct is to take off my slippers. We're alone. When he catches up to me I get up from the floor, I stop massaging my ankles.

"Are you crying?" He asks me.

Am I crying? I slap him. Right across the face and caught off guard I realize I'm crying when I start to see him in the fog.

"What the hell did you tell her? How do you tell her about hunting, how?"

"What?"

He's confused. So confused that he only reacts on the third slap when he deflects my blow slightly. I feel like he doesn't feel me.

"Who? Stop," he demands when I want him to take revenge, to make him suffer too, to hurt him too. "Lucille? He knew. Not from me. Stop! He raises his voice when I try again. Damn it Kassie I'll give you two days to leave if you don't calm down, he warns me. I didn't say anything to him, he grabs my hands. He knew. And I know he knew because apparently she and Chiron, Mina's grandfather, had a brief relationship. Look at me. Stop crying and tell me what he said to you that brought you to this point."

"It's your fault, I accuse him. She sees me as a monster and it's your fault."

"Damn it! I put the gun in your hand, didn't I? I brought it under your nose? Tell me what he asked you for, he lifts my chin. Kassie? Now. What did you talk about?"

"Mom hates me! I immediately soften. Mom hates me and it's all..."

"My fault?" He still holds my chin between his fingers and he's not gentle, but on the contrary, angry and with an iron grip.

"Mine"