Page 1 of Mom Com

CHAPTER1

Going Home Sucks Lemon Meringue Pie—

with extra tart lemons and heaps of fluffy meringue to mask the sting

The only thing worse than being humiliated on national television in a baking show is having your disapproving mother call you up directly after it airs, forgo any words of comfort, and instead tell you there’s an unsettled matter in your father’s will that requires you to return home immediately. And that while you’re coming you might as well stay for Christmas—not “it would be so great to have you” or “perfect timing for the season of lights and cookies,” but a flat “Since you’re currently unemployed, you might as well stay until the holidays have concluded.”

I desperately wanted to refuse, wishing I could just spend the holiday in my LA apartment with my nine-year-old, piled in a sea of blankets on the couch, eating sweets and watching movies in our matching striped pajamas. Not to mention that my mother and I haven’t spent more than a handful of hours together in the past ten years and even those were fraught with tension. But I also can’t bring myself to let her spend the holiday alone the first year after my father passed. I’d like to see for myself that she’s all right, and have her see me in turn—the deeply subtle and repressed version of support where I mumble, “You good? I’m good,” even though neither of us probably ever will be. So here I am, headed for my childhood home with my son, pride obliterated and replaced with a couple of reindeer antlers strapped to the windows of my twelve-year-old Prius.

I shift in my seat, my butt numb from the long drive. We managed the frugal cross-country trek from Los Angeles in four days, staying with a friend in New Mexico, a friend of a friend in Missouri, and then using a buddy’s travel points to get a motel room in Pennsylvania, which is not an option on the way back. My only hope is that this issue with Dad’s will includes some long-lost family treasure.

“Seventeen minutes!” Spencer says from the back seat, reading the remaining travel time off my phone mounted on my dashboard. At this point, I don’t need the directions, but I leave it up for him. A handful of seconds later he announces: “Sixteen minutes!”

I take a breath. “Spence, love of my heart, son of my everything, if you count down every minute we have left, Mom’s head might explode. And in such a small space, brains are sure to get everywhere. You don’t want brains on you, do you?” It’s all I’ve got after nine hours on the road.

He grins at me in the rearview mirror. “Nobody likes sarcasm.”

I chuckle. He’s repeating something his teacher once said, but it gets me every time. “But my jokes are so good.”

“They’re not bad,” he says, considering it for a moment. “But they’re not great.”

Leave it to a fourth grader to give you the cold hard truth. He recently read a book where the main character drank a potion that made him unable to lie. He told me that even though the boy’s life was harder, he was happier because he no longer felt he needed to be what everyone wanted him to be, and was free to be his real self. Then he announced he was going to do the same. And he’s been surprisingly committed.

“Haverberry Cove!” he exclaims as we drive past a handsome wooden sign with black script.

I glance in my rearview mirror at Spence, who’s pressed up against his window, one hand on the glass and his eyes illuminated by the white lights forming a canopy over Main Street.

“You haven’t seen anything yet,” I say, punching up my voice in an effort to convince myself more than him that being here won’t be so bad. “They have a holiday market filled with every kind of hot chocolate and pecan pie. Horse-drawn sleighs, the whole nine.”

He grins brightly, never taking his eyes from the window.

Haverberry Cove is Massachusetts’ standard for elegance. It’s three-quarters New England charm and one-quarter brine-scented driftwood, which is to say it’s basically perfect—except for the fact that I can’t stand being in it. Rambling historical houses with ocean views surround a postcard-worthy square where the aesthetic is handmade, hand-carved, and locally sourced. The kind of small where everyone knows a little more than a little about everyone else, which is insufferable when you’re the town scandal (me), but not so bad when a waitress brings you coffee without having to ask or the grocer saves you the last ripe cantaloupe because he knows it’s your favorite.

“I’m gonna see Dad tomorrow?” he asks for the seventy-hundredth time.

“That’s right,” I confirm. Jake—my fertilizer, as my friends have nicknamed him—doesn’t really deserve the title of “Dad” since he barely calls once a month and needs reminders to buy birthday presents.

“Do you think he’ll take me to the holiday market?”

“I’m sure he will,” I say with the utmost confidence, because if he doesn’t, I’ll happily key his truck.

The red light changes to green and I drive toward the square and my father’s bakery. I use my last reserve of energy to redirect my thoughts away from all things Dad and baking, which works for shit. In half a second flat I’m picturing my utterly embarrassing performance onUltimate Bake Off, where I not only revealed my financial woes but indulged in a sentimental rant that included my father’s passing, something I promised myself I wouldn’t mention on TV. Not only because my mother thinks reality competitions are vile perversions of the depraved, but because I do my very best not to spiral about my father—him, his bakery, or the fight we had the last time I saw him alive.

I train my eyes forward, death-gripping my wheel, and decidedly not looking at There’s Nothing Batter Bakery. I don’t want to know if the holiday window displays haven’t been put up or if the door needs repainting—things we loved doing together every year of my childhood. It isn’t mine, I remind myself. He didn’t leave it to me; he left it to Mom, a woman who has less interest in bakeries than she does in reality television. And it wouldn’t matter if he did, because I don’t want it—a painful reminder of everything that went wrong.

“Mom!” Spence says, practically launching himself out of his seat, his pointer finger thudding against the window. “LOOK!”

I glance at the nine reindeer suspended over the green and the large menorah sculpture that resembles whimsical tree branches. There’s a certain National Lampoon zealousness about holidays here. “Told you,” I say.

“But are you seeing Grandpa’s bakery?” he continues, giving me a start; I didn’t realize he remembered what the bakery looked like, considering he’s only been there once and was just five at the time. “Is thatchocolate?”

Before I can reign in the compulsion, my eyes flit to There’s Nothing Batter. But it’s not the shabby, run-down heartbreak I envisioned. Twinkle lights and holly frame the window around an exquisitely detailed winter village scene replete with working lights in cottages and powdered sugar snow. And like Spence said, it’s entirely handcrafted from chocolate—an insanely difficult task—and must have cost Mom a fortune. Unless maybe she hired a new manager who’s a magical chocolate artist?

While I feel the sting of guilt I was expecting, there’s also something else—a sense of not being needed. Now unable to look away, I lean toward the passenger seat window and slow down, trying to get a peek inside at the person behind the counter. But the guy has his back to me and I only catch a glimpse of his brown hair.Come on, turn around so I can assess you and then not-so-secretly hate you for replacing me.As if the dude heard me, he does turn, but just as a group of Friday night shoppers stops in front of the bakery to readjust their scarves and hats, obstructing my view.

“Move,” I breathe, trying to shoo them with my hand, only my snooping is cut short by the distressed tone in my son’s voice.

“MOM!” Spence yells and I whip my head toward the road, just as a fancy car cuts me off.