Their Obedient Youngest Daughter Stopped Coming Home Chapter 10
“Ellis, someone’s here to see you.”
It was the fall of my senior year.
I was in the apartment proofreading the final manuscript of Echoes.
The publisher was rushing the last round of edits before it went to print.
Every word had to be checked.
Romy called from the front door.
Then I heard footsteps—unsteady ones, and not just one set. Three.
I walked into the living room and found them. Dad. Mom. Blythe.
Mom wore a charcoal-gray coat I’d never seen before.
There was more gray in her hair than there had been during our last video call.
Dad stood ramrod straight, like he was bracing himself for something. He couldn’t meet my eyes.
Blythe stood behind them, holding a canvas tote.
None of them spoke. Finally, Mom did.
“We wanted to see you.”
It wasn’t the tone of someone here to drag me home, or to give orders.
—
It was a tone so unfamiliar it took me a moment to recognize.
She was asking.
I stepped aside. “Come in.”
The four of us squeezed into the tiny living room.
My marked-up manuscript was still spread across the table.
Mom’s eyes landed on it.
“So this is the book you wrote?”
“Yeah.”
She reached out and touched the edge of the pages, her fingers trembled.
“I couldn’t finish it. I got through the third piece, and then I just… couldn’t keep reading.”
I didn’t answer.
Dad never sat down. He lingered by the door, looking like he wasn’t sure he belonged there.
“Ellis. This past year… have you been okay on your own?”
“I was.”
“Were you eating enough?”
“I was.”
“Did you have enough money?”
—
“I did.”
Each question came out quieter than the last, and by the final one, his lips were trembling.
Mom took an envelope from her bag and placed it on the table.
“I went back through the gift log from the graduation party.”
“Margo’s thousand, Ray’s, plus everyone else, including mine. It’s all here.”
The envelope was thick. It wasn’t even sealed. I could see the cash inside.
I didn’t touch it.
“Mom. I didn’t leave because of the money.”
“I know.” Her voice cracked. “But it was yours. I had no right to keep it.”
“You don’t owe me money. What you owe me isn’t this.”
The room fell so quiet I could hear someone downstairs dragging a trash bin across the pavement.
Mom lowered her head. Lower than I’d ever seen.
I could see the gray roots in her hair.
“At the graduation party, when Aunt Patricia asked what school you got into.”
Her words came apart as she spoke.
—
“No one at that table could answer. I was holding my glass, and my mind just went blank.”
“I wasn’t trying to ignore you. I truly couldn’t remember.”
She looked up at me. Her eyes were red.
“You got into Stanton. One of the best schools in the state.”
“Do you know what I was doing the day you got in? I was booking the hotel for Blythe’s graduation party.”
“When your acceptance letter arrived, I was packing Blythe’s things.”
“That letter sat in your drawer for forty days.”
“For forty days, I walked past your room every single day.”
“I never opened the door. I never once checked on you.”
I stood where I was, my hands tucked into my pockets.
In one pocket was a hard candy Romy had slipped me that morning.
“Mom.” I looked at her. “Do you remember my birthday?”
“Your birthday is,” She paused. “September fifteenth?”
“No.”
Silence settled over the room again.
“August twenty-third?”
“Still no.”
The color drained from Mom’s face.
—
She turned to Dad. He opened his mouth, but no answer came.
Then she looked at Blythe.
Standing quietly in the corner, Blythe chimed in, “July ninth.”
I looked at her. “You remembered.”
“You told me in third grade,” Blythe said, her eyes reddening.
“You said Mom could never remember your birthday, so you asked me to. So at least one person would.”
I’d forgotten that conversation. She hadn’t.
Mom finally broke. She covered her face as silent sobs shook her shoulders.
Dad went over and put an arm around her. His own eyes were red.
The only sound in the apartment was Mom trying to hold back her crying.
I watched them.
What I felt wasn’t satisfaction, or vengeance.
It was exhaustion. The kind that settles in after running a marathon.
You finally reach the finish line, only to realize all you want to do is sit down and rest.
“Mom.”
She looked up, tears covering her face.
—
“I don’t hate you. I don’t hate Dad either.”
“You aren’t bad people.”
“You just never learned how to love two children at the same time.”
“You gave all the spotlight to Blythe because she shined so brightly.”
“It wasn’t that I didn’t need it. I was needing it the whole time. But no one ever answered. So I learned to shine on my own.”
Mom couldn’t get a word out.
Dad finally spoke, “Would you come home once in a while?”
“I will.”
All three of them looked up at the same time.
“But I’m not coming back as the easy second daughter.”
“You have to see me as Ellis. Not someone’s sister. Not someone’s daughter. Just Ellis.”
“If you can do that, I’ll come home.”
“If you can’t, then we’ll leave things as they are.”
Blythe stepped forward and pulled something from the cloth bag she had brought.
A family portrait. But not like the old ones.
It was an edited copy of an older photo.
The original had only three people. Someone had awkwardly added a
—
fourth figure.
She pointed at the clumsy silhouette.
“I had someone make this. They used your high school ID photo.”
“It looks terrible. But I wanted you to see you were always supposed to be there.”
The edited figure really did look awful.
The proportions were off, the lighting didn’t match—it looked like it belonged in a completely different world.
But she had wanted me in it. Even if all she could manage was a clumsy outline.
I took the photo, staring at it for a long time.
“It’s pretty bad.”
“I know.”
“Your Photoshop skills need work.”
“I know.”
“Next time don’t bother editing me in. I’ll just stand there myself.”
Blythe blinked and managed a small smile, but it only lasted a moment before she started crying again.
I placed the photo on my desk beside the manuscript pages I had been proofreading.
That evening, the four of us cooked dinner together in my tiny
—
apartment kitchen.
Mom made clam chowder.
She added far too much salt.
When Romy got home, she caught the smell and paused in the doorway.
“Your family’s here?”
“Yeah.”
She glanced at the three people in the living room, then at the food on the table.
In a low voice, she said, “Yours tastes better than your mom’s.”
“I know.”
The table was small.
Just big enough to squeeze four people around it.
No congratulatory signs. No trophies. No one’s name hung across a hotel ballroom.
Just four sets of dishes. Four glasses of water. And one overly salty pan of clam chowder.
Dad took a bite and clicked his tongue. “Could use less salt next time.”
“You cook it, then.” Mom shot him a look.
Blythe picked up a clam and dropped it onto my plate.
—
I looked at her. “As long as it’s not butter shortbread.”
She burst out laughing. “I’ll remember. Blueberry muffins.”
The meal wasn’t perfect.
The food was too salty. The utensils were disposable.
But there were four people at the table. No one missing, no one extra.
Outside, evening settled over the neighborhood.
Someone downstairs was walking their dog, and faint music drifted in from somewhere far away.
I sat in my place, eating my own food.
And for the first time, that was enough.