Lily

“ H ello, Darling. How’s everything going?”

I internally cringe at how sugary sweet and fake her voice sounds. My mother is anything but sweet .

“Hey, Mom. Everything is fine.” I really didn’t even want to answer, but she’s called three times in a row and would have kept calling if I didn’t.

“Fine? That’s all I get from my baby girl? We haven’t talked in forever!”

Yes, I know. Thankfully .

My relationship with my mother is complicated, to say the least. We’ve never gotten along great because she’s too focused on herself, and I wasn’t the daughter she wanted. I always had my nose in a book and wasn’t worried about doing all the girly things that girls my age did.

And my mother hated it. She wanted a sweet little girl to dress up and show off to all her stuck-up, pretentious friends, but what she got was me.

Sometimes, I wish I had a sibling my mother could focus on instead, but my father didn’t want any more children after I came along. That left me by my lonesome to bear the brunt of my mother’s displeasure.

I was never good enough. I was never pretty enough. I never acted the way she wanted me to. My precognitive dreams only served to further place a wedge between the two of us. She already thought I was an odd child, and dreaming of my death only reinforced that .

Our relationship only worsened over the years. My father seemingly grew so tired of fighting her while trying to protect me that he gave up completely. He retreated into his work, leaving me to deal with her on my own. I can’t say I blame him. Gwendolyn McKenna is a force you don’t want to go up against.

It also makes complete sense why my grandmother didn’t want to rock the boat when I was little about my reoccurring nightmare. My mother would have forbidden her from seeing me, just like Grandma May feared.

My father, Henry McKenna, isn’t a bad man or a bad father. He just married the wrong person. I’m more like him in a lot of ways. He’s quiet and reserved, whereas my mother is loud and lavish. I got my brains and thirst for knowledge from him. He’s a well-known oncologist back home in Rochester. He’s part of the reason I want to become a doctor.

I admire his wisdom, caring nature, kindness, and willingness to do whatever it takes to help someone. Unfortunately, my mother preyed on those attributes.

Clients come from all over the northeast to see him because he’s the best. His practice has been able to help countless patients fight against one of the scariest diagnoses a person can receive. No one wants to hear those dreaded three words: “You have cancer.”

My father’s clinic has given hope to thousands of clients who otherwise would have had none. He has saved many lives and continues to do so, day in and day out.

With that kind of reputation comes a lot of pressure, stress, and, of course, wealth, which is all my mother cares about. That’s all she’s ever cared about. Wealth and status. It’s why she married a doctor. She doesn’t seem to care that the amount of stress and fatigue he feels from carrying the outcome of so many people’s lives on his shoulders grows as he ages.

The problem is he cares too much, and she cares too little. I’ll never understand how the two of them ended up together, let alone married for as long as they have been, but I vowed to myself a long time ago that I would never be like her.

I don’t like to use the word hate because I feel like it’s overused and inaccurate. Most of the time, people use it when they really mean they’re discontented, displeasured, or even unhappy .

To hate someone means to loathe them, abhor them. You despise them so much that they repulse you. So, I don’t say this next statement lightly.

I think I may hate my mother.

“Everything is going fine, Mother. School is good. Work is good.”

She makes a disgusted scoff from the back of her throat. “Honestly, Lily, I can’t believe you’re working in a coffee shop like some commoner off the street.”

Her obvious revulsion, words, and facial expressions combine to give the illusion that we come from decades of wealth, old money descended from generations before us.

I laugh under my breath at how ridiculous she sounds. She grew up in a trailer park! If you asked her if that was true, though, she would deny it like her life depended on it. My father, however, let it slip accidentally one day when I was little. To this day, she still doesn’t know that I know.

Grandma May and my late Grandpa Clyde are considered middle class and so were their parents. Dad is an only child like me, and he’s the first in his family to graduate college, let alone become a doctor.

“I like my job, and it pays for my apartment.”

“You know your father and I would have paid for a much nicer apartment closer to campus.” She scoffs again.

That’s exactly why I didn’t want their help. Well, her help. When I decided to move out of the dorms, my mother offered to find the most expensive and extravagant apartment she could. That was the last thing I wanted. I didn’t want to live in a place she could use to control me, and for her, that’s all it would ever be. Control.

Instead, I wanted to do it on my own. Unfortunately, I quickly realized that I may have bitten off more than I could chew with rent, working full time, and going to school full time. Grandma May offered to help so I could reduce my hours at work and focus more on school. I wanted to be able to do it all without anyone’s help, but if I could ask anyone for help, it would be Grandma May.

I took her up on her offer, and we both agreed to keep it between us. I will forever be grateful to that woman for being there for me without conditions. That was something I could never expect from my mother. With her, there are always conditions.

“My apartment is just fine.”

“Fine, fine, fine. Everything seems to be just fine, then.” I imagine the eye roll she must have given me to go along with her patronizing tone. “Anyway, I was calling to make sure you’re coming home for the long weekend next week.”

What? How does she even know about the break? She never pays attention to that stuff, and she usually doesn’t care if I come home or not. Something is up.

“Umm, no. I already have plans.”

“Plans? What kind of plans? You haven’t been home in over a year, Lily. Don’t you think it’s about time?”

What in the world is happening right now? I’m shocked and unprepared to fend her off as my brain quickly tries and fails to come up with a reason why I can’t come home.

“I have… I have a thing I have to be here for.”

I literally facepalm.

Thing? A thing? That’s the best I could come up with? That won’t be good enough for my mother. She’s like a predator. Surely, she can hear the panic in my voice. This isn’t good.

“What kind of thing? What could be more important than coming home to see your mother and father, who miss you terribly?”

“Tutoring! I’m tutoring a hockey player, and he needs the extra study sessions, Mom. I can’t come home.”

I really didn’t think this through. It’s like waving a red flag in a bull’s face and hoping it will ignore it. Never going to happen.

“A hockey player?” she coos, and I can hear her practically salivating over the phone.

Fantastic. In my panic to avoid telling her about going to visit Grandma May, I inadvertently gave my mother the holy grail of all gold-digging grails.

“He’s a nobody, really—terrible player. Like the worst on the team.” My stomach roils, but if I don’t get her attention off Luka Russo and quick, I’m screwed .

“Oh, honey. I’m sure that’s not true. To play for Hart, he’d have to be a talented player.”

I close my eyes, praying for a way to divert her attention. Maybe if I agree to come home for a day, she’ll forget all about said hockey player. I mentally calculate how I could make it work. If I leave for Grandma May’s right after class on Thursday, I could have Friday, all day Saturday, and the morning on Sunday to spend with her. I could head to my parents Sunday afternoon, have dinner there, and head back to school Monday.

Yeah, that could work.

“Let me see what I can do. I may be able to come up Sunday for dinner after I finish everything I need to do here.”

“Oh, darling! That would be just perfect. I have some friends I would love for you to meet, and a Sunday dinner would be just wonderful.” Her fake, overly sweet tone is back. I knew there was a reason she wanted me to come home.

There always is.

A “friend” is probably the son of one of her overly pretentious friends that she wants to set me up with. She does this every once in a while. Usually, I manage to dodge the setups with claims of having too much schoolwork or needing to work, but I really screwed the pooch with this one.

However, anything is better than her finding out that I’m tutoring Luka Russo. If she knew he’s the one I’m tutoring—the star hockey player of Hart University—I would never hear the end of it. She would push for us to start dating and, soon after, plan for us to marry. When she sets her mind to something, she’s relentless until she gets it.

No. I will protect that secret at all costs.

My mother can never know about Luka.