“Zach, couldn’t you have waited until…” I trail off, seeing that it isn’t Zach at the door at all. Instead, a woman stands there. Dark hair and vaguely familiar.
“Trillian?” she asks, taking me in from head to toe.
“Yes,” I reply. “I’m sorry, do I know you?”
The woman tightens her lips. “Of course, you know me. I’m your mother.”
My eyes widen and my jaw drops. I examine her facial features. It’s her. What’s she doing here now? After all these years?
“What are you doing here?” I ask.
She scowls. “Is that any way to talk to your mother?”
My jaw tightens. “After you abandoned me when I was a child? I think I can talk to you any way I like.”
Is it really her?
Dad kept one picture of her on the wall. One. It was of them at their wedding. I don’t know why he kept it. If it were me, I would have burned the damn thing. I took it down when dad died and put one up of him and me instead.
She’s aged, obviously. Her face is lined with wrinkles, but her eyes are the same. And her hair.
Fuck, it’s her.
“Are you going to invite me in?” she asks stiffly, lifting her chin up at me.
It isn’t the reunion I had always envisioned. In my dream, my mother runs to me and wraps me in her arms. She gives a good reason as to why she left and tells me how much she missed me. How beautiful I am to her. How she wants to make up for missed time.
I don’t get any of that.
I feel… numb.
Blank.
“Trillian,” I hear Xander call out from behind me, breaking me out of my stupor. I turn around to look at him as he walks to me in nothing but a pair of boxer shorts sitting low on those delicious hips of his.
“Who is it?” he asks, running his fingers through his messy brown hair. I want nothing more than to slam the door in my mother’s face, forget it ever happened, and get back into bed with my sexy boyfriend.
So that’s what I do.
I slam the door shut, lock it, and walk back to the bedroom, taking Xander’s hand along the way.
“Who was it?” he asks again, staring at the door.
“No one,” I mumble. “Just my mother.”
Xander stops in his tracks. “What the fuck?”
I turn to face him and sigh as she starts pounding on the door. “It’s my mother and I can’t deal. She’s a bitch. She wants something, I just know it. Why else would she be here?”
Xander scrubs his hand down his face and looks between the door and me. “We should at least find out what she has to say, right?”
I shrug. “I guess.”
“Okay,” he says, placing a hand on my arm. “Let her in. I’ll throw some clothes on and meet you in the lounge room. You’re not alone in this. I’m here, okay, Trill. And I won’t let anything happen.”
I believe him.
“Okay,” I whisper.
He kisses my lips. “I’ll just be a minute.”
I nod, attempting a smile, and head back to the front door.
Time to face my past.
*****
Xander is fuming mad.
And I mean fuming.
“You mean to tell me, after abandoning your husband and child, you’re coming back here after all these years to claim that this house is yours and you want it back?” he says, disbelief filling his tone.
My mother sips the cup of coffee I made her. I should have laced it with something. “Your father and I never actually divorced. So, all of this should belong to me.”
I’m speechless.
My mother is a cold-hearted bitch.
“Dad left this house to me in his will,” I say. “It’s mine. You left and you have no say anymore. Now, why don’t you please leave, and go try to ruin someone else’s life.”
Her eyes darken. “If you want to go to court, then fine.”
Xander laughs without humour. “I think if you had to come back here for this house, you don’t have the money for a court case. I know a lawyer in Perth and I’m sure she would love to help us out in this situation. So, I guess we will see you in court. Now, get the fuck out of Trillian’s house.”
My mother stands up. “If I had known my own daughter would treat me this way, I never would have returned.”
“You returned for the house, not me. Let’s not pretend you’re a good mother,” I add.
I can’t believe her audacity. Does the woman have no shame or pride? Xander walks her out while I sit and stare at the wall. I can’t believe this. I’m so damn disappointed right now that it’s not even funny. I hear the door close, and then I’m safe, wrapped in Xander’s arms.
Only then do I allow the tears to fall.
*****
Later that day, Zach paces up and down my kitchen. “I will handle this.”
I put my orange juice down. “What are you going to do, threaten her?”
He grins evilly. “She doesn’t know just how well-connected you are, does she? I’ll just inform her. No one messes with one of our own and gets away with it. Wait until dad hears about this. Fuck, he’s going to lose it.”
Xander walks into the kitchen, back from the gym. “Hey, Zach.”
He slaps him on the shoulder in an affectionate yet manly way.
“Hey, bro. Heard you met your future mother-in-law.”
I can feel my face flush. Does he have to bring up something like marriage?