CHAPTER 0024- MAMA

My phone rang a little after two the next afternoon.

Chloe was at work. Elias was in his office with the door half-open, the low sound of a conference call leaking into the hall. I was on the couch pretending to care about a show when my mom’s name lit up the screen.

I almost let it go to voicemail.

Instead I answered.

“Hi,” she said. Her voice sounded smaller than usual. Careful. “Do you have a minute?”

I stood up and walked into the guest room, shutting the door behind me. “Yeah.”

Silence stretched for a second. I could hear her breathing.

“I’ve been trying to figure out how to say this,” she started. “And I keep landing on the same thing, so I’m just going to say it. I’m sorry, Riley. For what happened at the house. For all of it.”

I sat on the edge of the bed and stared at the wall. “Okay.”

“That’s not— I don’t expect ‘okay’ to cover it.” She let out a short, shaky breath. “I crossed a line I had no business crossing. He told me you two had… something. Not the details, but enough. And I still let it happen. That’s on me.”

My throat felt tight. “Why are you calling now?”

“Because I can’t stop seeing the look on your face when you walked into that kitchen. And because you’re my daughter. And because I hate that I hurt you like that.”

I didn’t answer right away. The anger was still there, but it had thinned out into something more complicated. Tired. Raw.

“I watched you,” I said finally. “I stood in the hallway and watched him fuck you on the same counter he’d had me on. Do you get how fucked up that is?”

“Yes.” Her voice cracked on the word. “I do. And I don’t have a good explanation. It was selfish and stupid and I hate that I did it. I just— I’m sorry. I’m really fucking sorry, Riley.”

I pressed the heel of my hand against one eye. “Did he call you after?”

“No. I called him the next morning. He told me not to contact him again. Said it was a mistake and it wouldn’t be repeated. He was… clear.”

Something in my chest loosened a fraction at that. Not forgiveness for him. Just confirmation that he hadn’t kept a door open.

“I don’t know what you want me to say,” I told her.

“You don’t have to say anything. I just needed you to hear that I know I was wrong. And that I love you. And that if you need space, I’ll give it. But I’m not going to pretend it didn’t happen or act like it was nothing.”

I was quiet for a long time. Outside the guest room window a lawnmower started up somewhere down the street. Ordinary sound. Ordinary day. Like the world hadn’t tilted.

“I hate that it happened,” I said.

“I know.”

“I hate that I still care what he does. And I hate that part of me understands how easy it is to make a bad decision when he’s looking at you a certain way.”

She didn’t try to jump on that. Just waited.

“I’m not ready to act like everything’s fine,” I continued. “But I don’t want to hate you either. I’m tired of carrying it.”

“Does that mean…?”

“It means I forgive you.” The words felt strange coming out. Heavy, but lighter than holding them in. “Not because it was okay. It wasn’t. But because you’re my mom. And because I don’t want this to be the thing that sits between us forever.”

She made a soft, broken sound on the other end of the line. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet. I’m still allowed to be weird about it for a while.”

“You can be weird as long as you need.” She paused. “Are you still there? At the house?”

“Yeah.”

“With him?”

“Yeah.”

Another silence. Then, carefully: “Are you okay?”

I looked around the guest room — the bed I’d barely been sleeping in, the open closet with my clothes mixed in with nothing, the door that still didn’t get locked most nights.

“I don’t know,” I said honestly. “But I’m not leaving yet.”

“Okay.” She sounded like she wanted to say more and was choosing not to. “I’m here. Whenever. Even if it’s just to sit on the phone and not talk.”

“I know.”

We stayed on the line a little longer without saying much. Eventually she told me she loved me again. I said it back. When we hung up I sat there holding the phone, staring at the dark screen.

The anger toward her had burned down into something manageable. Not gone. Just quieter.

I left the guest room and walked down the hall. Elias’s office door was still half-open. The conference call had ended. He was at his desk, glasses on, looking at something on the laptop. He glanced up when I stopped in the doorway.

“You good?” he asked.

“My mom called.”

He went still. “And?”

“She apologized. I forgave her.”

Something unreadable moved across his face. He took the glasses off and set them down. “How do you feel?”

“Like I can breathe a little better. And like I’m still pissed at you.”

The corner of his mouth almost moved. “That’s fair.”

I leaned against the doorframe. “She said you told her not to contact you again.”

“I did.”

“Good.”

He watched me for a second. Then he pushed his chair back slightly, an open invitation without words.

I didn’t go to him right away. I just stood there, letting the new quiet settle around the old mess.

“I’m still not over it,” I said.

“I know.”

“But I’m here.”

“I know that too.”

I crossed the room and sat on the edge of his desk. He rested a hand on my knee, thumb moving once across the skin. Not pushing for more. Just present.

Outside, the lawnmower kept going. Inside, the house felt a fraction less heavy than it had that morning.

It wasn’t fixed.

But it was something.