By the time I got to book club that night I’d had three cups of coffee too many and a bad day at work. The last thing I wanted to do was talk about some fictional woman’s problems. But I forged ahead anyway, helping Chris’s daughter Nicole arrange the chairs in a circle, setting out the wine and snacks as Emily and I always did.

“So, what do we think?” The bright smile on my face belied my churning insides as I consulted the book club questions provided by the publisher. “When Molly chooses to leave her old life behind to renovate the farmhouse in the Midwest, what does that symbolize? Does anyone have any thoughts on that?”

On my right, April shrugged. “I’m not a symbolism kind of person. Can’t a farmhouse just be a farmhouse?”

Chris snorted and popped another cube of cheese in her mouth. “I don’t know, I could go either way with that. I think I can see where the author was going with the symbolism. Scraping off the old paint as a way of showing how Molly sheds the skin of her old life.”

“Right.” My mom leaned forward, clearly interested in this line of discussion. “She talks about the house being vulnerable before the new coat of paint goes up. Maybe that’s how Molly feels herself, being between relationships? Raw, like a layer of herself has been scraped away? And once she gets into that new relationship, with the guy who helps her put the new coat of paint on the house, she feels strong again.”

“But why?” April made a tsk sound. “Why does it have to be a guy, or a relationship, that makes you feel strong? I don’t like that message: that a woman can only be strong if she’s with someone. Why can’t Molly have painted the house on her own?”

“I agree,” I said. “What kind of message is that, that you’re nothing without a guy? That’s crap. There’s nothing wrong with being single. In fact, it can be liberating. You’re not dependent on anyone else to make you happy, you can just . . . live your life. Right?” I turned to April, who looked a little amused by my vehemence but was also nodding in agreement.

“Well said.” She held up her hand and I high-fived her.

“There’s also that theme of starting over,” Nicole said. “Speaking of liberating. Molly goes to this whole new part of the country where nobody knows her, and she’s able to start over, reinvent herself just like she’s reinventing that farmhouse. I mean, when I started college, that’s one reason I went out of state, you know? I wanted to go to a school where I wasn’t going to classes with the same people I knew in high school. I wanted to see if I was the same person when I wasn’t around the same people.”

That was a really astute thought, and any other time I would have actively engaged her on it, delved deeper into that idea, which was the kind of thing you were supposed to do at a book club. But I was high on exhaustion and caffeine and sadness. So I latched on to the exact wrong thought. “Must be nice.” Oh, no. My voice was bitter and there was nothing I could do about it. “Must be nice to just . . . leave town. Start over. Be able to pursue your dreams and chase the life you want, instead of getting stuck, while everyone else goes on and lives out their dreams. . . .” I stopped talking because I realized, to my mortification, that I was crying. Everyone in the circle looked at me with varying degrees of confusion, pity, and what-the-hell-is-wrong-with-her.

“Okay.” April plucked the paper with the discussion questions out of my hand. “On to the next question. Weather. What did the freak snowstorm in September represent?” She looked around the circle as I fled to the back room to get myself together. “Other than climate change and we’re all doomed, right?”

* * *

  • • •

Mom was silent during the drive home from book club. It wasn’t until I turned into the driveway that she spoke up. “Do you want to talk about it, honey?”

“Talk about what?” By then I had my regular smile back on my face, but for once my false cheer wasn’t fooling her. I probably wasn’t fooling anyone anymore.

“Is it that boy?” She unclipped her seatbelt, and I had to smile at the thought of Daniel as “that boy.” Did Mom not realize I was pushing thirty, and he was past it? Maybe in her eyes I would always be seventeen. “Is he . . . Was he . . .” Her voice trailed off. Mom didn’t have the language to ask if he’d been nothing more than a summer fling.

“He was just here for Faire, Mom.” My car chirped as I engaged the lock, and I followed her into the house. I was too tired to deal with the steps leading up to my apartment.

“Hmm.” Her voice was noncommittal as she filled up the electric kettle. “He was over here an awful lot the past couple weeks for someone who was just here for Faire. Not that I’m judging,” she hastened to add. “Quite the opposite. It’s about time you had someone over. I was about to give you a vibrator for your birthday.”

“Mom!” A shocked, slightly scandalized laugh spilled out of me. Maybe I wasn’t seventeen in her eyes after all. I got down two mugs and handed them to her. “I’ll have you know I’m all stocked up in that department,” I said as primly as I could. “Batteries make a great stocking stuffer, though.”

Her eyes sparkled with laughter. “I’ll keep that in mind.” She added tea bags to the mugs before pouring in the hot water. “Here.” She pushed one mug toward me. “Chamomile. It’ll help you relax.”

“I’m relaxed,” I said, a little too petulantly. Okay, maybe she had a point. I took the mug and stared into it.

“You’re sure you’re all right, then?” Mom asked while our tea steeped. “This really was a, uh, short-term thing?”

I nodded, but then the words burst out before I could stop them. “He wanted me to go with him, Mom.” I wanted to clap a hand to my mouth, take the words back. What was the use of saying them now? That decision had already been made.

“Oh.” She sat down at the kitchen table, her own mug of tea in front of her. “You mean out on the road with him? Doing what he does?” Her eyes narrowed. “What does he do, anyway?”

“His cousins are a musical act. He manages them. And yes.” I sighed into my own tea. “He asked me to go out on the road with him.”

She nodded sagely. “And you don’t want to.”

“No, I don’t . . .” But that was a lie. “I mean, I can’t.” I sighed and took a cautious sip: the tea was still really hot. “It was for the best that we broke up. Really. His life is out there, you know?” I ran the tip of my finger around the lip of the mug. “And mine is here. He wouldn’t want to settle down here in Willow Creek.” Neither did I. Not really. But here we were, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to say that to my mother.

“Well, neither do you.”

“What?” My eyes flew to hers. Had I said that out loud? Had she read my mind?

“You heard me.” She blew across her mug to cool the tea. “Listen. I know why you stayed, the first time. And believe me, I appreciate that you did. Your father means well, but it would have been hell without you, that first year or so when things were so bad.” She eyed me over her mug as she took a sip. “But you have to know, honey, how much I hated it. You gave up a great opportunity—a career, a life—to stay home in this small town and watch me go to doctor’s appointments.”

I waved it off. “It’s fine, Mom.”

“No, it isn’t.” She set her mug down with a thud, and I sat back in my chair. I’d never seen her look so determined. So angry. So . . . full of regret. “We asked you to stay, but it wasn’t supposed to be forever.” She sighed as she looked me over, and I fidgeted a little in my chair. “You were such a happy child.”

“I’m still happy, Mom.” The response was a reflex, an automatic reassurance to my mother that everything was fine.

“No, you’re not. I’m your mother, Stacey. I know you better than anyone. I know when your smile is real, and when it’s just for show. But that boy—”

“Daniel,” I supplied.

“Daniel.” She nodded. “He put your real smile back on your face these past few weeks. And now that he’s gone . . .” She shook her head. “I’ve watched you fade, the last couple years. I figured you needed a kick out of the nest, but I didn’t know how to do it. Especially since I was the reason you stayed in this nest in the first place.” She reached across the table for my hand. “But don’t let me stand in your way again, honey. If you have something—someone—worth leaving home for, don’t miss that second chance.”

Her squeeze on my hand was strong. Once again I flashed back to her, so weak in that hospital bed, and for the first time it really sank in how long ago that was. Mom wasn’t weak. Not now, and probably hadn’t been for a long time. I’d stayed in Willow Creek to help take care of her, to be there for her, but she didn’t need me anymore. She hadn’t needed me for a while.

Somewhere along the way Mom’s health had stopped being a reason and had become an excuse. I thought back to that night, Daniel and I wrapped up in my sheets, when he asked me to come with him. I should have said yes. Why hadn’t I?