Dating Without Novocaine by Lisa Cach Page B

worry.

Twelve
Embroidered Linen
    â€œH ow do I get rid of that little picture?”
    â€œIt’s the PIP button, Dad. It means ‘picture in picture,’” I said as Dad fiddled with the remote control, trying to remove the box in the lower right-hand corner of the television screen.
    The sound went mute, then came back on at wall-shaking volume.
    â€œHere, I’ll do it!” I said, grabbing the remote and returning all to rights.
    â€œI don’t know why they have to make it so complicated. What are all these buttons for, anyway? ‘Learning.’ What’s a ‘learning’ button do?”
    â€œYou point the remote at your skull, press it, and suddenly it all makes sense.”
    â€œHa, ha, very funny.”
    I got up and went to go help Mom in the kitchen. There was a pork roast in the oven, seasoned with rosemary, and the smell was making my mouth water. Apples were waiting to be peeled and diced for applesauce, so I took a knife and set to work as Mom started cutting shortening into flour for biscuits.
    Home was a two-storied 1930 farmhouse, in a neighborhood of houses of much newer vintage. There was nothing left of the original farm, the land having been developed long before my parents bought the house. Mom had liked the old look of it, and Dad had spent every year since making repairs to the structure, and swearing that, “Next time we’re buying a new house.” The threat used to scare me, thinking we’d have to move, but eventually I got used to it and realized he had no intention of relocating.
    The yards, both front and back, were filled with bird feeders and baths, and Mom’s carefully tended beds of roses. There was a workshop out back that Dad had built, for his “projects,” but mostly it seemed a place for him to store his junk, out of Mom’s sight.
    When Mom wasn’t gardening or feeding Dad, she was volunteering at the library twice a week. She loved popular novels, and while Dad would sit and watch his games on the television, the volume loud enough to vibrate bones, she would be in her own world inside her head. I think all those years of teaching third-graders trained her to tune out at will.
    All in all, I thought I was pretty lucky in the parents I’d gotten. They weren’t sophisticated, they weren’t wealthy, but they were kind and loving, and were still together, despite the occasional snippy argument that I was, thankfully, no longer around to hear.
    â€œHave you been meeting any nice boys?” Mom asked.
    â€œThere’s no one at the moment.” I had told her about the unexpected end to my relationship with Wade.
    â€œI just can’t stop thinking about that biologist. That poor confused boy.”
    I frowned at her. “Poor confused boy? What about me? I’m the one you should feel sorry for.”
    She waved off my words. “You’re strong, you always come through. But that poor boy. How miserable he must be. Are you going to stay in touch, stay his friend?”
    â€œNo! Jeez, Mom, why would I?”
    â€œHe sounds like he needs a friend.”
    â€œHe shouldn’t have lied to me. He should have let me know up front what was going on.”
    â€œPoor boy.”
    â€œI didn’t do anything wrong!” She was making me feel guilty, when I was the victim. Wasn’t I? “I don’t want him as a friend. We really have very little in common.”
    â€œThen why did you date him? You should be friends with the men you date. The passion doesn’t last, you know. You need a friendship for when it goes away.”
    â€œDo you feel like you and Dad have a friendship?”
    She scooped biscuit batter and dropped it in rough mounds on a cookie sheet. “We have comfort, and familiarity.”
    â€œMom?” Comfort and familiarity? That was all?
    She smiled, rather sadly, I thought. “Choose someone you can talk to.”
    â€œYou and Dad love