She said I was trying to punish her and Dad.
I said I wasn’t thinking about them at all when I made the decision, which was true, but clearly hit harder than anything else I could have said.
Eventually, she asked, “So, what happens now? Are you going to send us a list of approved visit dates?”
And I have to give her credit for that one because it was the first time my mother had ever acknowledged what Sutton’s list actually meant.
She knew it was cruel.
She’d always known.
She just hadn’t wanted to deal with it.
I told her, “No, Mom. The door is open. It’s always been open. That’s the difference.”
That was about 4 months ago.
Here’s where things stand now.
The lake house is finished.
Waverly and I go up most weekends from May through September.
We bought a canoe.
I fish off the dock in the mornings the way I used to with Grandpa Hank.
The frogs still sing at night, and the screen door still caks, and the whole place smells like cedar and lake water and something I can only describe as home.
My parents came up for a weekend in August.
It was awkward at first.
My dad sat on the porch and didn’t say much, which is standard gene behavior, but at one point he looked out at the lake and said, “Hank would have liked what you did here.”
That’s the closest thing to emotional expression Jean has ever produced, and I took it for what it was.
My mom brought her cranberry sauce.
It still tasted like sweetened battery acid.
I ate two servings and told her it was delicious because some lies are acts of love.
Sutton came up once without Jolene.
He and I took the canoe out and didn’t talk much.
We just paddled around the cove the way we used to when we were kids.
When we got back to the dock, he said, “I missed this.”
I said, “Me, too.”
And I meant it.
We’re not fixed.
We’re not back to normal.
I don’t know if we ever will be, but we’re talking carefully, honestly, like two people who are building something new instead of trying to patch something broken.
As for Jolene, she and Sutton are still together, but I hear things are strained.
I’m not going to pretend that doesn’t give me a tiny bit of satisfaction, but I’m also not rooting for their failure.
People make choices.
Choices have consequences.
That’s not revenge.
That’s just physics.
Waverly is pregnant.
Found out two weeks ago, she told me by handing me a tiny fishing rod and saying, “You’re going to need another one of these.”
I stood in our kitchen with a 4-in toy fishing rod in my hand and cried like I was auditioning for a daytime drama.
We’re already talking about spending summers at the lake, teaching our kid to fish off the dock, catching fireflies on the porch, doing all the things that made me who I am in the place that made me who I am.
Grandpa Hank told me once that the lake house would always be there for me.
He was right.
It just took me a little longer to find my way back, but I’m here now.
The porch still leans to the left.
The dock still caks.
And the door is open.
It’s always open.
That’s the difference.
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Disclaimer: This story is a work of fiction created for entertainment purposes. Any resemblance to real persons, events, or places is coincidental.