“Not yet.” Her face lights up a bit, and I know it makes her happy that she’s the first of them to know, which just seems petty to me, but that’s what it’s come to.
“Well. You should call him tonight with your good news. Maybe it’ll inspire him somehow to know that you’ve accomplished what you set out to do.”
She speaks the words lightly, but they’re laced together with sarcasm. It doesn’t seem to matter to her that he’s now teaching writing at a school in New York, which most people would consider a successful endeavor. But not her. At any mention of it, she’s more than happy to discuss her opinion that he’s hiding behind helping other people with their writing because he can’t do it himself anymore. I change the subject. “Can I go out with Kat for a little while tonight, to celebrate?”
She shakes her head—a reflex she can’t help when Kat is involved. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. You still have a speech to write. Besides, isn’t that what we’re doing right now? Celebrating?” She gestures at the spread of sushi in front of us.
“Yeah . . . but she wants to take me out for coffee or dessert or something. Just for a little while?” I watch her perfectly made-up face for a sign of compromise, but get only the inflexibility I expect.
“It’s a school night, Parker. And you already had coffee.”
“What?”
“Debbie Monroe said you and Kat were at Kismet today, and that she wasn’t exactly being polite.” She stabs a piece of salmon with her chopsticks. “You know, that girl really needs to be more aware of how she acts in public.”
I literally have to bite my tongue to keep from answering back the way I really want to. Kat has been “that girl” to my mother for as long as we’ve been friends, and the way she says it never fails to remind me just what she thinks of her.
“Mom, Debbie Monroe thinks everyone under the age of twenty is either on drugs or involved in some other ‘illicit teenage activities.’ She actually said that. In line at the grocery store, and she wasn’t joking.” I stir up the cloud of miso that’s settled in the bottom of my bowl. “She doesn’t know what she’s talking about. Kat wasn’t doing anything wrong; she was just excited for me.”
My mother doesn’t say anything. Just pinches another slice of salmon roll between her chopsticks and adjusts her glasses, and there’s my answer.
“Fine,” I say into my soup. It’s useless to argue. Even more useless to think that she could bend, just a little, or trust me for once. I’ve never given her reason not to—but then again, I’ve never had the opportunity either.
My mother lets out a heavy sigh. “Parker, soon. Soon enough you’ll be making your own choices. Humor me in the meantime, okay?”
I look at her, hair pulled back sleek and tight, smile to match, and decide to see if I can finish my celebratory dinner without saying anything else. It’s surprisingly easy. While she goes on about the rigors (and cost) of Stanford, all of which I’m well aware of, thank you, I think about what Kat said and try to decide what worthwhile, unexpected thing I could do. I would love, more than anything, to have the guts to stand up right here and tell my mom to just lay off it all—the expectations, the pressure, the constant judging—all of it. A tiny part of me would love to just tell her to forget it. To say never mind, I don’t want any of it. But that’s not what Kat meant.
She meant I should do something unexpected that would leave me with something I could keep and remember. An experience instead of a goal. And I get what she means. She’s right about me not having very many of those to show for four years of high school. But it seems to me that the experiences that stay with you, the things you’ll always remember, aren’t the ones you can force, or go looking for. I’ve always thought of those things as the ones that somehow find you.
5.
“Love and a Question”
—1913
By the time we get home my mom has outlined how she thinks my entire speech should go, including all the keywords I should include to ensure that I’m the foundation’s obvious choice. I’m actually thankful because as soon as we walk through the door, it gives me the perfect excuse to head upstairs and “get started right away.”
“That’s my girl,” she says, smiling at my unfailing dedication. “Strike while the iron is hot and the inspiration is fresh.”
I stop at the top of the stairs and do my best to smile back. Then I walk into my room and close the door behind me. I need a moment. A moment to breathe, because the combination of expectation and good intentions feels especially suffocating tonight. In the quiet of my room, I drop my bag to the floor, flop onto the bed, and exhale. Finally.
Like a reflex my eyes travel up to the ceiling above me, where in ninth grade, in a small act of rebellion, I pinned a poster I’d made for English. My final project for Romeo and Juliet. My mom had just had the house painted after my dad moved out, and she decreed there would be no more pin holes in my walls. But she didn’t say anything about the ceiling, so I put it up—a collage of images: the sun and moon and stars, a rose, a balcony, a kiss in silhouette, and a tiny glass vial, all under the glittery caption, IT WAS WRITTEN IN THE STARS. It wasn’t a masterpiece by any means, and I didn’t even get the top score, but it meant something to me. I was in love with the idea of it all—the stars, and fate, and these two people who loved each other enough to want to die without the other. My parents didn’t love each other enough to even make eye contact anymore.