Page 15 of The Triple Threat

“She’s nice enough.” It was the best I could come up with.

“But?” Ellie asked, glancing at me.

There were a whole lot of buts. I felt bad saying them though as Pop seemed to like her. I decided to go with partial honesty.

“But she’s not my mom.”

As I stared out of the side window, I heard Ellie take a sharp intake of breath, but I couldn’t look at her. I didn’t want to see the sadness on her face. I had enough of my own to deal with.

“What do you miss most about her?” Ellie asked, her tone tentative.

I considered not answering and accusing her of being too nosey, but the need to talk about Mom was greater than the worry that I might break down in front of Ellie.

“Her smell,” I replied with a smile. “She always wore the same fragrance; Miss Dior and it smelled flowery and feminine. We have lots of video films of her, you know holidays and birthdays, so I still get to hear her voice and see her, but that smell is gone from the house.”

Ellie gave a soft whimper beside me and I turned to see her swipe a hand at her cheek.

“You could buy the fragrance,” she offered with her eyes dead ahead.

“Pop doesn’t know I know, but he started to about a year after she died. I figured he must have finished Mom’s original bottle because I went up to tell him dinner was ready and saw him unwrap it and spray it on his pillow.” I sighed as I remembered how the cry of pain had caught in my throat as I watched Pop from the doorway. “I went back downstairs and pretended I hadn’t seen it.”

“Why?” Ellie asked, her voice gentler than I’d ever heard it before.

“Because it was his private moment. It was him trying to find a way to cope with the death of the love of his life. I didn’t want to invade on that.”

I turned to look at Ellie who had her eyes focused on me, there was a tremble to her bottom lip.

“I went back up there while he did the last check of the night, but it didn’t smell the same.” I swallowed hard and turned back to watch the trees blowing in the breeze. “It didn’t smell like Mom, and no matter how often I sneak into Pop’s room and take that bottle of fragrance out of his drawer and smell it, it still doesn’t remind me of her.”

Ellie blew out a shaky breath but otherwise remained silent as she concentrated on the road ahead. I looked out too, but from the corner of my eye noticed that she kept glancing at me. I thought about telling her not to worry about me, but I didn’t want to bring the subject of Mom up again. I wanted to talk about her, but like every other time I did, it broke my damn heart all over again. Now I’d have to let it heal until the next time I felt the need.

After a few minutes I couldn’t stand the silence any longer and reached over to turn on the radio. Sam Hunt’s ‘Body Like a Back Road’ was playing and Ellie immediately started to sing along. Shit she was bad.

She kept one hand on the wheel while the other swung around in the air, punching in time to the beat while she crowed like a rook about driving with her eyes closed and knowing every curve like the back of her hand. I’d heard about folks being tone deaf but had never experienced it until now. Ellie was making my damn ears bleed.

I turned in my seat to watch her as she bounced around, her voice growing louder and louder and higher and higher, until on the final note I looked over my shoulder to check we weren’t being chased by a pack of dogs.

When the next tune slowed things right down, Ellie pulled her shoulders back and gave a big smile like she was real proud of herself.

“What the actual fuck?” I couldn’t stop the belly laugh bursting to get out.

Ellie’s gaze snapped to mine and if looks could kill, my pop would be burying me tomorrow. “What?” she asked.

“What the hell was that?” I poked a finger into my ear and wiggled it around.

She curled a lip at me and then turned back to watch the road. “I was in the choir.”

“Really?” I asked incredulously. “Was it a choir for the deaf?”

“You think you’re so funny, don’t you? Well, let me tell you, I had a solo in the Thanksgiving festival when Bronte and I were in middle school.”

“Seriously, they let you sing on your own? Was it in an empty room or something?”

I let out another burst of laughter and then winced as I felt my ribs complain.

“Serves you right,” Ellie grumbled. “And no, I sang in front of the whole school. I’m surprised you don’t remember. I was a triumph according to Miss Gruber at the Dayton Valley Press.”

I trawled my memory banks to recall Ellie being called a triumph, but I had nothing. To be honest, I failed to see how anyone could call that noise a triumph. She sounded like a bobcat that I once trapped in the barn. In fact, the angry little critter sounded a whole lot better than Ellie did in full voice.