And then I look at Mom.
She avoids my stare, probably because she knows I’m imagining they are lasers and whatever I look at will be forced to spontaneously combust.
“Is that a problem, Kiko?” Uncle Max’s voice is like steel. He’s talking to me like I’m the brat who isn’t getting my way. When I look around, Taro and Shoji are looking at me the same way.
Why? they’re thinking. Why do you always have to make everything worse?
But it’s not me. Why doesn’t anyone else ever see it? I’m not asking for the world—I just want to be heard, by the one person who is supposed to listen.
“Mom,” I start.
She slams her hands on the table, and my entire body jumps back in alarm. Maybe I did manage to make her spontaneously combust after all.
Tears fill her eyes, and it takes only a second before her whole mouth is contorted and she’s ugly-crying like she’s just had her heart broken.
I don’t blink.
Mom presses her face into her hands, and Uncle Max rubs her back like she’s an exhausted, overworked mother dealing with a bratty, deadbeat teenager.
“I do so much for these kids. They don’t appreciate anything,” she sobs into her palms.
“Don’t get upset, Angie,” Uncle Max says. He flashes his eyes toward me. “Your mom works so hard, and she never asks for anything in return. You guys need to start being nicer to her.”
But this has nothing to do with Mom, and she knows it. She’s making this about her so she doesn’t have to listen to me.
She can’t be the villain if she’s the victim.
I look at my brothers. I wish they’d help me.
Taro shakes his head. Shoji is looking around for his escape. Why? they’re thinking. Why can’t you blend in like us? Stay in the background. Don’t question anything. Just be invisible. Just be quiet.
But I don’t want to be invisible to Mom. I want to be able to tell her how I feel.
I want her to care.
But she doesn’t. Because she blames me for Dad. Because she wishes I was different.
Because I’m not good enough for her.
It’s not fair.
I don’t finish eating. I rush to my room before I start crying in front of everyone at the table.
? ? ?
Why would she do this? She knows he’s a total creep. She knows what he did to me. How could she let him back into this house knowing what he’s really like?
It’s been more than an hour since dinner, and I still can’t calm down.
Mom doesn’t knock—she opens the door and walks in, and by the look on her face, she was hoping to catch me crying or feeling sorry for myself. I think she not-so-secretly finds it hilarious when other people are upset.
“Do you want to talk?” she asks, half smirking.
“This isn’t funny.” I stare at her, not crying or feeling sorry for myself. I’m just mad.
“I know that,” Mom says. She closes the door and walks over to my bed, sitting down beside me like we’re former friends who don’t know how to act around each other. “I don’t think it’s funny. I smile when things are awkward.”
I shake my head and don’t respond. Everything I want to say to her is drenched with rage. She would use it against me for the rest of my life if I let it slip out.
“Look, I don’t know what happened between you and Max, but if we’re all going to be living together you need to—” she starts.
“You do know,” I interrupt angrily. “You know exactly what happened.”
“No,” she corrects. “I know your side of the story.”
My shoulders shake violently. “Are you saying you don’t believe me?”
She lets out a sigh. “I’m not saying that. I’m not saying anything, really. I just think you were very young when this ‘event’ happened”—she scratches the air with her fingers—“and maybe it’s not fair to put so much blame on Max.”
“Who else gets the blame? Me?” I ask with a knot in my throat.
“Kiko, would you please stop making this so difficult. I mean, it’s not like he did anything that horrible to you.”
WHAT I WANT TO SAY:
“It’s disgusting that you’d actually make excuses about what your brother did to your own daughter. It’s disgusting that you’re questioning whether I’m even telling the truth. It’s disgusting. You’re disgusting.”
WHAT I ACTUALLY SAY:
“Get out of my room, Mom. Get out!”
I throw myself up from the bed and hot tears pour from my eyes. I tear open my bedroom door and ball my hands up so tight that my fingernails cut into my skin.
She hesitates at first, and for a second I think she’s going to yell at me for shouting at her, but eventually she shakes her head dismissively and leaves.
I slam the door behind her, and the bedroom walls vibrate. I listen to her footsteps move toward the stairs, and when she speaks I know she must have run into my brothers.
“She is so sensitive,” she says loudly. “You can’t say anything to her without her flipping out.”
? ? ?
I paint a woman who steals hearts, but none of them fit the hole inside her empty, black chest.
CHAPTER TWELVE
It’s been two days since I found out Uncle Max is moving in. Mom and I have been avoiding each other, which usually lasts a few days. When we don’t talk, it feels like we’re no longer a part of each other’s life. It feels like we’re complete strangers. It feels more like the truth.
But today she’s downstairs screaming at someone on the phone. Someone didn’t let her use their stapler after she bought everyone doughnuts last week—seriously, I’m not making that up—and her shrieking voice is making my chest tight.
It reminds me that I’m stuck with her—she’s unavoidable, even when I’m ignoring her, because Mom is an actual black hole. She swallows up everything around her so that everything light suddenly becomes dark.
For someone who talks about positivity so much, Mom is the most negative person I know.
I feel like my shoulders weigh more than the rest of my body, and if I don’t get out of the house and into the open air I’m going to suffocate.
I text Emery to see if she wants to meet up for coffee, and she texts back pretty quickly that she’ll be there in fifteen minutes. She doesn’t have to say it, but I know she hates being at home as much as I do.
When I see her in the parking lot, she’s still in the middle of tying up her frizzy hair with a scarf. “Too lazy to straighten it today,” she says. She’s wearing a purple dress with knee-high boots and an oversize crescent necklace. Most of her tattoos run up and down her forearms, with the exception of the turtle on her shoulder blade.
I asked her once what her tattoos meant, and she told me art doesn’t have to mean anything—it can just be pretty.
We have different ideas about art, but I think it’s cool. There’s something inspiring about how casual Emery can be about things I take so seriously that I could die over them.
“I like your hair frizzy,” I point out.
Emery pretend punches my shoulder. “Aw, thanks!”