“Hey, Mom.”
“Hi, Mrs. Sinclair, how’s it going?” Derek said.
Avoiding eye contact, in a strangely chipper voice, she said, “Hello there. Oh- can’t complain, I suppose.”
She couldn’t fathom what about Ella’s boyfriend made her so jumpy and tongue-tied, it brought back the awkwardness of her high school years, when she was outside of something, trying to look in.
As she passed them, straining under the weight of shopping bags, she inexplicably burst out, “Don’t you both have homework to do?”
Ella’s face froze. “Jesus Mom, we are seniors you know!”
“Oh right, lots of time to goof off, I suppose.” Her tone was not what she intended.
Ella’s eyes widened, as she said sarcastically, “If you count Derek’s two different baseball teams, weekend job coaching at the Mini Cage, volunteering at Big Brother, and being an A student, it doesn’t leave too much time to ‘goof off.’ ”
Derek shifted straighter, crossing his arms on his chest, and averted his eyes.
“Oh,” she murmured red-faced. Clammed up by the well-deserved retort, and desperate to escape the blunder, she shuffled towards the front door. She shouldn’t have opened her mouth- it always came out wrong, she wished she had driven past the house and gone in after they had left.
Looking back on her gaffe from earlier in the day, and shrinking from sharing it with James, she understood why Ella wouldn’t want to discuss the Prom House planning with her. She and James watched an episode of Downton Abbey without talking about the show or anything else, after which she turned in.
Subsequent conversations also fared dismally. As the number of days remaining before the big event became uncomfortably fewer, James, with concern for his little girl’s special day, reached out to his sister-in-law Bobbie for support. Anneliese felt chagrin at the request for help outside their family, which exposed her failing, yet not enough to inspire motivation.
Weeks passed with shopping and appointments, though Anneliese couldn’t be sure what Ella and Bobbie were doing. One night, with only a handful of days to go before Prom, James didn’t switch off his night table lamp to go to sleep and instead turned towards her in bed. She hesitated to pick up her novel and looked over at him inquisitively. She didn’t dare speak, as there were volumes unspoken these days. Her lack of motivation to be there for Ella lay like a grenade between them. In a few short weeks, Ella would be leaving them for the summer research position.
James said, “Ella said the Childers decided to host the pre-Prom with pictures and wine/cheese. You RSVP’d for that right?”
Anneliese said, “I thought you were going to?”
James said, “I never got the invite, it went to you.”
“Oh. Sorry. I’ll do it tomorrow.”
There was silence, the light remained on. Anneliese was wholly spent with the continual feeling of letting everyone down and not knowing how to right it.
James leaned up on one elbow to face her. His handsome face was lined but kind. “Anneliese, aren’t you happy for Ella?”
