Peer Pressure (27 page)

“It’s not about me, it’s about you,” he replied, walking over to her and touching her face,

“I love you, why won’t you love me back?”

Katy said nothing. Instead, she brought her hand up to his, holding them there for a second before pulling his hand away from her and stepping past him to stand by the window. Rob was trying to figure out what was going on, why was Katy acting so strange all of a sudden? Katy stood at the window staring out into the night, willing herself to stay strong and finish what she had now started — saying goodbye to the person she was completely in love with.

She knew that her priority had to be her daughter, which meant she had to choose Jodie over Rob. Once again, put her daughter before her happiness. She’d done this before -

cancelling dates, standing up potential boyfriends, even denying herself career progression, all in the hope that her daughter would never end up like her.

While she knew what she was doing and believed that it was the right thing to do, inside Katy McPhee’s heart shattered. It shattered with regret. But it also shattered as Katy realized that everything that was happening between she and Rob was all within her control. And now she was throwing it away, as she had so many times before. What made it all the more twisted and crazy, was that she was letting it happen. Encouraging it, even.

It may have been a defense mechanism, a barrier to keep her from getting hurt. She knew, deep down in her heart, that she had used her daughter as a convenient get out of jail free card more than once in her life. And she hated herself for it. It was just that, after all these years, she had come to terms with it. What she couldn’t have realized was how much it would become second nature to her and that now, even with Rob, she was willing to use Jodie’s situation as the perfect plot twist in her own neuroses.

A horrible thought formed in Rob’s mind:

“You were never really serious about this, were you?” he asked, now angry that she had walked away from him, “Christ, I should have known, we’ve been sleeping together for months. You don’t even keep a toothbrush at my place. You’ve given up, haven’t you?”

Katy used this as fuel and suddenly whipped around to face Rob, hurt and ager in her eyes.

“Piss off! Given up? Given up? When did I ever have a chance to
try it
let alone
give it
up?
I’ve been a mother for eighteen years now.”

“That’s the point,” he continued, “You’ve spent all your love on your daughter.”

Katy smiled a condescending smile,

“...well, spoken like a person who’s never looked after a child.”

Rob stood bemused, shaking his head.

Katy could feel tears building up in her eyes. She headed for the kitchen, took a seat at her table and lit a cigarette. Rob followed, slowly, and stood in the kitchen doorway. Katy had her back to him, as he said,

“So tell me you aren’t in love with me.”

Katy sighed.

“What?”

“Go on. If it’s so easy to dismiss then it should be no big deal, right?”

She turned to look Rob in the eyes, adding,

“I don’t love you.”

Rob barely hesitated. He stepped into the kitchen and grabbed his coat off the back of Katy’s chair, saying his last piece as he put it on.

“I hate those other men who’ve left you, Katy. Want to know why? Because I’m the only one who’s willing to stick around, and I’m getting all the blame for it.”

Katy didn’t look at him, but she could hear the quiver in his voice, the hint that it was about to break. She was in the same place, which was why she said nothing. She didn’t turn around until the sound of the front door signified that Rob was gone. And just like that, it was over. Katy took her cigarette and walked slowly back into her empty living room and for the first time in eighteen years cried for everything she had given up.

Rob must have been sitting on Katy’s doorstep for a good half hour trying to recover from the whiplash inducing turn his life had just taken. Unable to come up with a suitable answer he got up and began to walk down the path towards his car, he found himself coming face to face with Jodie. They both froze. Neither knew what to say to one and other. They were both embarrassed; at least they knew they had that in common. But in the end, both of them knew that there was probably no need for anymore words tonight.

Rob merely gave a tired, resigned smile and said:

“Goodbye.”

He walked passed her and got into his car. Jodie could do nothing but watch as he drove away, before turning her attentions back to her front door. Or more importantly, what lay beyond that door.

Walking up the garden path felt like a death march, but she knew there was no avoiding what was had to happen and that delaying any further would be pointless.

As she walked through the front door, she was immediately hit by the warmth of the house. However, almost as quickly, she was hit by an atmosphere of unease.

Jodie didn’t see her mother at first; it was only when she saw the smoke from her mother’s cigarette that she knew she was in the room.

“You’re smoking?!”

Katy sat up and turned to look at her daughter.

“Since when?”

Katy took another drag, before taking it from her mouth and stubbing it out on a nearby plate and replying:

“Try living my life and you’ll understand.”

Jodie then noticed the letter in her mother’s hand. She swallowed, hard.

“I can explain that.”

“Well, you’d better start talking because I clearly don’t know what the hell has been going on inside your head lately.” said Katy.

Jodie slowly walked around the couch and sat in the armchair opposite her mother, keeping her hands up as if she was trying to both repel an attack and re-assure a loved one.

“It’s not what you think.”

Katy gave her a look that said,
‘Yeah, right!’
Jodie realized that her mother was way ahead of her, so back tracked a little.

“Alright, it
is
what you think.”

“What were you thinking? Have you any idea how bad this looks to a University?”

“I don’t even know if I want to go anymore,” whispered Jodie, with a shake of the head.

“Don’t you dare say that,” Katy’s voice trembled, “Don’t even think that.”

“Why?” Jodie didn’t mean to sound ignorant, but she knew that if an argument was coming then she would have to at least make an effort here, “I mean, what’s so important about going anyway? Unless you want to get rid of me. Is that what this is?”

“Don’t turn this around.
I’m
the one who’s mad here.”

“Well maybe I’m mad too.”

Katy couldn’t help but laugh.

“Oh please, don’t try the rebelling teenager routine on me now. You’re about three years too late for it. We all know how smart you are,” Katy then motioned to her letter, “All evidence to the contrary of course. Monday I’m calling your school and we’re going to try and sort this mess out. And you are going to get your head down, young lady. Now, about tonight.”

“Let’s not,” added Jodie, with a groan, “I’m really tired.”

“You’re tired? Now why would that be? Would it be the drinking or the running away?

Or maybe it’s something else?”

“What do you mean?”

This was when Katy pulled out her secret weapon, Jodie’s ‘sabotage list’

“This?” she said, waving it in front of her daughter’s face, “Your little sabotage itinerary?”

Jodie knew almost immediately what it was and knew the game was up, but she knew there was nothing she could say.

“I was happy, Jodie. And maybe that means nothing to you, but let me let you in on a secret of life that you haven’t been privileged to experience yet; more often than not, things don’t go as planned. Do you want to know why? Because there is no fucking plan in the first place. All you can do is keep going and just hope that somewhere along the line you’ll find a little bit of happiness.”

Jodie didn’t really know how to respond to this. She had never really seen her mother like this before and had certainly never been spoken to like this by her before.

“Mum,” she replied, trying to appeal to her motherly instincts with no success.

“And when I do actually find a tiny bit of that for myself, you can’t just be happy for me and accept it — you actually try and ruin it. I feel like I don’t even know who you are right now.”

Jodie felt tears coming on, so decided to go for broke,

“Why him? Of all the men, why did it have to be my teacher?”

“Don’t!” Katy shouted out, leaning forward and talking very precisely to Jodie, never breaking eye contact with her daughter, “I’ve always been fair to you, always indulged you, maybe too much sometimes, and I thought you turned out alright. But after tonight, what am I supposed to think? We’ve never kept secrets from each other. If you had just come to me and told me what was going on, then we could have sorted this months ago, but no you had to go behind my back,” Katy now started to read from the list, “changing phone numbers, cancelling dinner reservations, faking a seizure? My god Jodie, do you have any respect for me at all?”

“I was confused. I thought I was in love with him. I mean, I
was
in love with him, but...now I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? You go to all this effort for I don’t know!”

And then there was silence, they just stood and watched each other. In the end, Jodie broke the silence.

“Is he coming back?”

“I doubt it.”

Jodie sat back down.

“I’m sorry.”

“I don’t care,” was Katy’s reply.

“You don’t care if he comes back?”

“No,” Katy snapped back, “I don’t care if you’re sorry. Jesus, Jodie for such a smart girl you can be pretty bloody stupid sometimes. What did you think was going to happen?”

Jodie now felt as if she was a five year old being scalded for breaking a window, and replied in accordance with such a manner,

“I don’t know.”

“Was it because he was with me, is that what it was? Was it jealousy, or were you just being spiteful?”

“I didn’t mean to...”

“...to what?” Katy interrupted, “Ruin everything? Well, I’m afraid that ship has sailed.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean it’s over, finished, done.”

“You broke up with him?” asked Jodie, genuinely surprised.

“Yes Jodie, congratulations — your plan was an overwhelming success.”

Katy watched her daughter, waiting to see what her reaction. Then Jodie stood back up and addressed her mother as though the roles had been reversed.

“You’re an idiot.”

Katy was taken aback.

“Excuse me?”

“You let him go?” Jodie asked, although she almost didn’t expect an answer.

“What choice did I have?”

“You really are an idiot.”

Katy’s eyes narrowed, as if she was an animal approaching its prey.

“Watch your tone, Jodie, I’m warning you.”

“Why? I mean, is it for my benefit? Is that why you never looked for a man?”

“Don’t!” Katy whispered.

“Is that why Dad left?”

That did it; Katy stood up and pointed towards the ceiling.

“We are not doing this, go to bed.”

Jodie, however, stood her ground.

“I’m not a child anymore.”

“You’re right. You’re not, you should know better,” Jodie noticed there were tears in her mother’s eyes, “Your Dad left because he didn’t give a shit about us. That’s the only reason. He left and I gave up whatever plans I had for my life to make sure you could have anything you want. So don’t you dare stand there and judge me.”

“Best for me,” shouted Jodie, now tearing up herself, “there it is again.”

“I gave my life up, you ungrateful little bitch. Maybe I wasn’t ready, did you ever think about that? And maybe I didn’t make all the right decisions, but I did my best.”

Exhausted from the evening’s events, Katy slumped back down into the couch. She fixed her eyes on her daughter.

“And then, someone like Rob comes along, someone who doesn’t care about the

baggage, doesn’t care about me having a kid and look what happens.”

Jodie sat back down, but it wasn’t a sign of resignation.

“You mess it up.”

Katy shook her head and gave a small, exasperated laugh, adding:

“No,
you
did.”

Jodie didn’t expect to hear her mother to actually say it. Only now, did she realize what had happened. Not only had her mother given up on Rob. She’d given up on her too. And inside, something started to hurt.

Katy wiped her eyes and slowly got to her feet.

“I’ve given up everything for you, Jodie. Why would I stop now?”

She slowly started to make her way towards the door, Jodie watching her go.

“Monday morning, you and I are going to see the guidance counselor. See if we can’t get you out of this fucking awful mess. In the meantime, I’m going to bed.”

It was as she reached the doorway that Jodie stood up and called out,

“Mum?”

Katy stopped in the doorway, but didn’t turn she couldn’t face her daughter.

“I’m sorry about what I said,” Jodie continued. Katy sighed and asked,

“Which part?”

Jodie wasn’t sure, really.

“The thing about dad.”

Katy nodded, but still didn’t turn around to face her.

“Oh, that.”

“It was an easy stone to throw, that’s all it was.”

Katy stood still for a moment and then let out a large sigh.

“Well, maybe I’m sorry too, okay? I’m the one that let him go.”

Jodie suddenly felt her heart skip a beat, as she tried to figure out what her mother was saying to her.

“You mean, Dad?”

Katy shook her head, but still couldn’t look her daughter in the eyes.

“Rob. Maybe you’re right, Jodie. Maybe I didn’t do this for you. Which means, God help me, that I’m way more messed up than I originally thought.”

Katy wiped her eyes again and walked out of the room. Jodie stayed rooted in her spot, merely listening as she followed her mother’s footsteps up the stairs and into her bedroom. When she heard the dull thud of her mother closing her door, Jodie walked over to the couch and sat down. She didn’t know what to do. As she felt the first blushes of a hangover coming, she curled up on the couch, pulling the throw that draped over its back, over her body and slowly, uncomfortably fell asleep.