Tiny Tim полностью

For a moment I was irritated at how she seemed to know what I was talking about, even though I never told anyone about it. But then I remembered how our first night together ended. The night I was so drugged up with painkillers that I thought she was Tess, and that ended with me crying like a little boy while constantly apologizing for not realizing that she had cancer. Back then, Claire had simply held me and let me cry myself out. Now she looked like she wanted to do the same, though I wasn’t anywhere near crying again. I was angry with myself.

“But I did know. I noticed her behavior. I saw her extreme mood swings. And I knew something was wrong. But I ... I thought she was bothered by our age difference or something. I SHOULD’ve realized that it was more than simple crap like that!” I protested, but Claire wasn’t in the least bit impressed.

“You were sixteen!” she reminded me vehemently. “You had no way of realizing that something was seriously wrong! You had no way of understanding what was going on without her telling you! You never experienced anything remotely like it! If anyone is to blame for this, it’s Tess for leaving you in the dark. And it’s us, for pushing you out of our lives and leaving you with nobody but your colleagues to ask for advice.”

Now her voice was full of regret as she got up from her knees and sat on the chair’s armrest instead. And then I got my first mom-hug in roughly a decade, when she wrapped her arms around my neck and pulled my head into her chest, before she continued talking.

“Don’t blame yourself for this. If you didn’t realize, it was because Tess didn’t want you to realize. Probably to protect you.”

That startled me. As we sat there, my head leaned into my mothers breasts while she played with my hair, my mind wandered back to the months between Tess’ move and her death. I remembered how often she had encouraged me to find someone else during all those phone conversations we had. How she encouraged me to go out with the guys from work, after I had confessed how they took me to a strip club. How she made me promise to “keep going and hang on”.

Until that very moment, I had always thought that was Tess’ way of telling me that something was going to happen, and I failed her by not understanding it. But now, after hearing Claire’s explanation for it, I might have been wrong about that. For the first time, I allowed myself to view those events from a new perspective. Maybe Claire was right. Maybe that really was Tess’ way to tell me that I had to move on. Or, maybe, that was just wishful thinking.

My arms wrapped around Cliare’s waist and pulled her into my lap, though there was nothing sexual about it. She let it happen, but continued to hold my head to her chest and comfort me, as I held her tight and thought about what she had said. After a good fifteen minutes, my mind had calmed down enough to reach a conclusion. Wishful thinking or not, I knew I couldn’t go on like this. If I wanted to make my relationship with Mia work, I had to let go of my doubts about Tess.

“When Mia left, I looked at the pictures. I thought having my girlfriend over while that wall is plastered with pictures of my Ex would be ... you know...” I started to explain without pulling my head away from Claire, but my voice trailed off.

“Oh.” Claire remarked. She thought about what I had said for a moment, before she jumped up and rushed into the bedroom she shared with Ava. When she returned, she carried some kind of black box that had a power cord dangling from it.

“What’s that?”

“First of all, you shouldn’t feel bad about having pictures of Tess in your apartment.” Claire proclaimed sternly. “The woman is an important part of your life. ‘Is’, not ‘was’. Without her, you wouldn’t be who you are today. That is something Mia should appreciate. It’s also not like you build Tess a shrine here, Honey. But if you feel like you want to make room for new pictures, I think this would be a good compromise.”

She finally handed me that black object she was holding, and I found out that it was a digital picture frame. I studied it for a moment, then regarded Claire with newfound admiration.

“I could leave the ones that also show me, and put the ones that only show Tess on this.” I said, holding the frame and starting to smile.

“Exactly! You’d still have her photos, you wouldn’t get rid of them, but you could put up photos of you and Mia right next to the ones of you and Tess. That would show Mia that she’s on the same level.” Claire said happily again, and beamed at me.

I couldn’t help it. I got off the armchair, pulled her close, and wrapped her into a bearhug.

“Thank you, Mom.” I whispered next to her ear while my hands pulled her into me.