How to Bake a Perfect Life - Barbara O'Neal [117]
I WAS THINKING YOU SHOULD COME SEE ME. THEY’LL LET ME OUT FOR AN HOUR IF I WANT TO SEE MY CHILD, AND THEN I HAVE TO COME BACK IN, BUT I COULD DO THAT EVERY DAY IF YOU COULD GET HERE COME RIDE THE BUSS DOWN AND STAY WITH THE PETROSKYS. THEN WE COULD SEE EACH OTHER AN HOUR EVERYDAY. I SURE MISS YOU BABY AND WANT TO SEE YOU SO, SO, SO BAD. I THINK THE BUSS DOESNT COST THAT MUCH MAYBE RAMONA WOULD PAY. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THAT IDEA? WRITE BACK AND TELL ME.
LOVE MOM
For a long time, Katie sits right there without moving, feeling a weird hollowness in her chest, like all her air has been sucked out. When she takes a breath, it doesn’t go away.
She doesn’t want to go to El Paso to see her mother. She’ll just keep sending money and hope that keeps her from insisting. Katie had been thinking of telling her mom about getting her first period and all that, so her mom would be included (she was feeling guilty over dinner that Ramona and Lily were acting like mothers, though she was happy that they did).
Instead, now she writes,
Hi, Mom. Merlin is good. I’m good. I sent some money yesterday, so you should get it pretty soon. I’ve got a big flower show on Monday, so I might not be back to talk for a while, but I love you lots. Katie
Ramona
Trying to make lemonade from lemons, I pay Katie to help me scour the bakery on Friday and Saturday. It is a good use of downtime, and it keeps Katie occupied. The money will no doubt all go to her mother, but that is her choice. Obviously she’s using some of her bakery earnings for things she wants—I noticed her fingernails were painted pale blue one day, and she had on a cute pair of sandals another. When I commented, she said, “Goodwill! Only two dollars, can you believe it? They’re a tiny bit too big, but my feet are still growing, right?”
On Sunday, Lily asks if Katie would like to ride up to the airport with her, but she refuses and hides out in her room all afternoon. Leaving her to her sulk, I tackle another task on my to-do list: having a conversation with my sister.
I’ve been thinking about this since our conversation on Thursday, when she point-blank refused to help me. We’ve been on the outs long enough, and I’m not going to leave it alone anymore.
But how to catch her so that she can’t run away is another trick entirely. I consider and discard a couple of possibilities: showing up at her town house some morning (but that would mean talking to her before she has coffee—never a good idea); going to the trailhead from which she walks every day at three p.m. (but she is much fitter than me and would just outwalk me).
I settle on catching her at the steakhouse in mid-afternoon, when she’ll be performing any number of catch-up tasks for the week. My father is driving my mother to Denver, so he’ll be offsite.
Perfect.
As if I am attiring myself for battle, I choose my outfit carefully—a simple sundress that makes me look a little less curvy, hair pulled back in a half French braid that flows loose partway down my back, sandals. Silver bracelets, like war gear.
I drive over there to arrive at exactly two fifteen, one of the deadest times in any restaurant.
The Erin Steakhouse was established in 1964. A long, mid-century-style building with angles and plate-glass windows on a bluff, it offers spectacular views of the city from one side and the Front Range from the other and has been one of the premier restaurants in the city for more than forty-five years. People book tables with a view in order to propose. Graduating seniors are feted; Air Force Academy cadets and their parents celebrate here. And the number of prom dresses that have paraded through the establishment over the years has to count in the tens of thousands. It is the star of the Gallagher Group, my father’s flagship.