Page 65 of Right Side of Paradise

Karma

The cafe at the back of Alexander’s Gourmet Grocery was quiet and smelled like a little slice of heaven.

Picking this place had been strategic. Mr. Tiny was at the front of the store, and there for moral support. And if my mother wanted to resort to calling me names, I could just get up and walk away.

I wasn’t in the mood for theatrics and prayed the woman in front of me wasn’t either.

Yvette Donovan cleared her throat, her focus trained on me.

“I owe you an explanation.” Her voice was tight, cautious.

“No, you owe me an apology.” I leaned back and crossed my arms. “But an explanation would be appreciated too.”

My mom eyed me warily as I picked at the shaved coconut on my strawberry toast.

With her purse in her lap and her hands folded on top of it, she looked like she was in somebody’s frigid waiting room instead of having breakfast with her daughter.

“I shouldn’t have said those things to you.”

Progress .

“I should have kept them to myself and prayed you grew out of it.”

Aw, hell.

“My relationship isn’t a phase I need to grow out of.”

“Of course, you think that now but just wait until you’re ready to start a family. You’ll have to explain to your child’s school why there are three dads on all the registration forms. A-and?—”

“I appreciate your concern for your hypothetical grandchildren and their future teachers, but Onyx Cove is a small island, I’m sure the teachers will know and not give a fuck by the time my child makes it to their class.”

My stomach soured along with the taste on my tongue.

“You’re the only one who seems to care, and I would ask you why that is, but I realized in the last two months, your opinion of me doesn’t stop anything.”

That seemed to sober her. Her lashes fluttered almost comically as her mouth opened and closed.

Pushing my plate away from me, I angled my head, waiting for whatever she had to say next.

I was still waiting for the apology and was lowkey kinda scared that had been her apology.

“You’re probably never gonna believe this,” she hedged, staring at her untouched coffee. “But when I lived in King’s Town right after college, I was seeing a guy I thought was the one.”

A nostalgic air took over her tone and I listened without interrupting.

“He knew I wanted to settle down here and promised me the world.” She shook her head, wringing her hands. “I should have known it was too good to be true, but I was young and so desperate for love I said it didn’t matter. I thought I was the exception to young love not having longevity.”

I watched her face morph into a mask of regret.

“We ended up taking a break when he started a new job across the state. He told me to come to Onyx Cove, and he’d come get me when he could give me the life I deserved.”

She glanced around like she was checking for eavesdroppers.

“Well, wouldn’t you know it, he showed up. A year and a half later. But he wasn’t alone.”

My ears perked up.

“What do you mean?”

“He was with another man.” She stopped wringing her hands and cast a faraway glance at the pastry display case. “And he had a proposition for me. He wanted all three of us to get to know each other and think about starting a life together.”

“Oh.”

“Exactly.” Her lips formed a line before she made eye contact with me. “I was distraught. Here comes the man I love, the one I wanted to start a life with, asking me to be in a relationship with two men at once.”

In all my thirty years, she’d never told me about any man before Brock. She was so tight-lipped about her past, I’d been left to believe he was her first love.

“Mom—” I tried to cut in.

“I only wanted him, and he ruined that. It was supposed to be him. As my husband and the father of my children. But I couldn’t do it.

I couldn’t let myself be their plaything while the town whispered behind my back.

All three of us went on one date before I broke it off.

For good. Told them to go enjoy their life, but I wouldn’t be in it. ”

The devil didn’t need any advocates, so I bit back what I wanted to ask and settled on the safe bet. “I’m sure that was hard for you.”

“It was.” She sniveled as if she was reliving it and I stuffed my mouth with a bite of my toast to hide a smile.

She shook her head again. “But I mean, it was the 90s. People were up to all kinds of things.”

Whatever that meant.

“Now here you go, telling me the same thing. God, this has to be my karma.”

“ God ,” I echoed her theatrical tone, but only for a beat.

“You’re so dramatic.” I didn’t bother masking my irritation when I glared at her.

“Your karma isn’t that you raised me to be a grown woman who can think for herself and pick partners who love her and show it.

No, your karma is that you tried to shame me for making a choice you don’t agree with, and I don’t give a fuck. ”

There were no pearls around her neck to clutch, but she gasped loud enough for the attendant behind the counter to shoot us a startled look.

With a shake of my head, I quieted her concern and stared at my mother flatly. “I’m still waiting for an apology, by the way. Because so far all you’ve done is center yourself in this conversation.”

“Harlow, I’m sorry.”

For two months, I told myself I needed those words. Needed her to mean it. And while it did feel nice finally getting it, it didn’t create the shift I hoped for.

“I’m not minimizing what you experienced or how it made you feel, but it doesn’t justify being nasty to me. And it doesn’t mean you get to turn up your nose when someone lives life differently than you. Which is wild that I have to say that because that’s what you raised me to believe.”

Her gaze shifted to the tassel on her purse.

“I guess that only applied to people outside our family, huh?” I couldn’t even fake a humorless laugh. “And just so I’m clear, you’re more upset that I have three partners than the fact that one of them is Rico.”

She didn’t speak but her eyes flitting away from mine was plenty of confirmation.

A dry laugh worked its way out of me as I signaled to the attendant for a to-go box. I wasn’t wasting my food just because she’d killed my appetite.

I didn’t know what to do with my mother, and that hit me like a Mack truck to the face.

I knew she loved me. That much was apparent in the way she looked at me.

But I didn’t miss the lingering disappointment either.

She tied my worth as a good woman to her own traditional values, and she was so entrenched in them she couldn’t even recognize that nobody was judging me but her.

The possibility of continuing my life like I had for the past two months didn’t sit right with me. I could survive without my mother’s steady presence, but I didn’t want to. And I still didn’t understand how she was the one person giving us the most blowback.

Brock was all bark. He was a teddy bear under all his high handedness and being back in Onyx Cove had softened him more.

He loved Rico too much to not be on good terms with him.

And I truly believed that even if things didn’t work out with him and my mom, he’d stick around just to spend more time with his son.

If my mother’s behavior was anything to go by, it was the quieter ones you had to worry about. She was all soft edges and sweet smiles until I shattered her illusion of what my life would look like.

Traveling the world alone for years at a time? She ate that up. Yvette loved having an adventurous daughter and begged me to send her pictures to show off to her friends.

But me loving three men at the same time? Three men she knew loved me? That was apparently her limit.

And the desire to make her understand had slowly faded with each passing day. I was too busy getting loved correctly and feeding my creativity to obsess over whether she would come around.

The cafe attendant placed the paper to-go box near my plate and walked away.

“I hope things are going well with you and Brock.” I transferred my food.

“If this reunion is what you want, I hope it goes exactly how you want and you two get forever this time. And I pray you never run into somebody who tries to make you question your decisions like you aren’t capable of choosing what’s right for you. ”

She sputtered when I stood up. “Where are you going?”

I hiked my bag on my shoulder and closed the lid on my container. Then I winked and let a devious smile curl my lips. “Home to be passed around like a collection plate.”

But first, I was going to the farmer’s market.