Chương 9
“When you say it like that—”
“How should I say it?”
“I don’t know.”
“That is the first honest thing you’ve said.”
Savannah flinched.
Tessa stood. “I told her to call you.”
“Thank you,” Lila said.
“I also told her you were manipulative for not calling her first.”
“Thank you less.”
Tessa shrugged. “I contain multitudes.”
No one laughed.
Savannah reached for the door again.
Lila said, “Did Diane know?”
Savannah’s hand froze on the handle.
“Did Mom know you knew?” Lila asked.
“She found the article.”
The answer hurt more than it should have.
Diane had known.
She had attended planning meetings, approved menus, chosen linens, and told Eleanor that Lila had declined. She had watched Savannah walk down an aisle on Lila’s land without saying Lila’s name.
“Leave,” Lila said.
Savannah turned. “Lila—”
“Leave.”
“I’m trying to explain.”
“No. You’re trying to survive the explanation.”
Savannah’s eyes filled. “You always get to be right.”
“This is not right. This is information.”
“You enjoy the difference.”
“Get out.”
Tessa placed a hand between Savannah’s shoulder blades and guided her through the door.
Lila remained in the security room after they left.
On the frozen monitor, Savannah’s hands were not yet touching her.
The moment before harm looked almost peaceful.
Diane came to the winery two days later carrying a lemon cake.
Lila saw it through the office window and almost locked the door.
Her mother had baked the same cake after illnesses, breakups, funerals, and one failed attempt by Savannah to cut her own bangs at age nine. The cake did not signify apology. It signified Diane’s desire to enter a room without beginning with words.
Lila let her in.
Diane placed the cake on the desk.
“I know you don’t eat sugar during harvest season,” she said.
“It isn’t harvest season.”
“Almost.”
“That rule was never real.”
“You said it was.”
“I was twenty-six and annoying.”
Diane removed the plastic wrap. “You were disciplined.”
“I was annoying.”
The cake had sunk slightly in the middle.
Lila cut two pieces. They ate without speaking.
Outside, forklifts moved cases across the loading dock. Someone laughed in the hallway, then lowered their voice near the office.
Diane set down her fork.
“Savannah told you I knew.”
“Yes.”
“I found the article accidentally.”
“How?”
“It appeared on Facebook.”
“You haven’t liked one winery post in six years.”
“I read them.”
“Why?”
Diane looked irritated. “Because you are my daughter.”
“You could call.”
“You could answer without interrogating me.”
“We’re back there?”
“We never left.”
Lila pushed the cake away. “Why didn’t you tell Eleanor?”
“Because she would have done exactly what she did.”
“She didn’t know until the wedding.”
“She knew you worked here. If she knew you owned it, she would have made it symbolic.”
“She did that anyway.”
“I was trying to protect Savannah’s day.”
“From the fact that I exist?”
“From the fact that everything becomes about what you have accomplished.”
Lila sat back.
Diane folded the edge of the plastic wrap into a small square.
“Do you think it is easy,” she said, “to be your mother?”
Lila almost answered cruelly. She stopped.
Diane continued. “You were twenty and more capable than I was at forty-three. Your father had emptied the savings account. I couldn’t remember when Savannah’s school started. I slept until noon. You knew which bills were due. You knew how to speak to the bank. You knew how to make Eleanor stop panicking. Every time you helped, I was grateful. Every time you helped, I hated myself.”
“I didn’t ask you to.”
“No. That made it worse.”
“You’re blaming me for being useful.”
“I’m telling you why I avoided you.”
Lila looked at the cake between them.
Diane’s voice thinned. “You did not need me.”
“I did.”
“You never showed it.”
“I showed it for months.”
“When?”
“When Dad left. I called you from community college because the car wouldn’t start. You told me to ask a classmate. I asked you to come to the financial-aid office. You said you couldn’t get out of bed. I told you Savannah had been suspended. You said handle it. So I handled it.”
Diane’s eyes lowered.
“After a while,” Lila said, “not needing you became the only stable thing I had.”
“I was sick.”
“I know.”
“I was depressed.”
“I know.”
“You speak as though I chose it.”
“I speak as though it happened to me too.”
Diane’s fingers stopped folding the plastic.
The room filled with the mechanical rattle of the labeler downstairs.
Lila said, “You knew Savannah had lied to Caleb.”
“I knew she had told him you declined.”
“That is the same thing.”
“I encouraged her to reconsider.”
“When?”
“Several times.”
“Did you tell Caleb the truth?”
“No.”
“Did you tell Eleanor?”
“No.”
“Did you tell me?”
“No.”
“Then what did your encouragement cost you?”
Diane looked away.
Lila waited.
Finally, Diane said, “Nothing.”
The admission was barely audible.
Lila felt some part of her anger loosen, not from forgiveness but from the relief of hearing a fact left undecorated.
Diane wiped her thumb across the desk where a crumb had fallen.
“I reported you,” she said.
“I know.”
“I was frightened.”
“Of what?”
“That Eleanor would move in here. That she would give you control of everything. That Savannah would lose Caleb and blame me. That people would see the video and decide what kind of mother I am.”
“What kind are you?”
Diane’s mouth trembled. “I don’t know anymore.”
“That isn’t an answer I can fix.”
“I’m not asking you to.”
It was the first time Lila believed her.
Diane opened her purse and took out a folded document.
“What is that?” Lila asked.
“A list of Eleanor’s medications, doctors, bills, and household services.”
“You made a file.”
“I know how to organize things.”
“I know.”
May you like
“I have been doing more than you think.”
Lila unfolded the pages. They were detailed. Dates, contact names, account numbers partially redacted, notes about a plumber and a grocery delivery service. Diane had included the date of Eleanor’s last eye exam and the battery size for her hearing aid.
