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“I got a new job!” Mom chirps through the phone. This is the first thing she says to me each time we speak. When we speak. She leaves for weeks, months, years at a time. Like a stray cat, she comes and goes as she sees fit. Sure to let us know that this is not her home. We are not her home. Though, it’s nice of her to call once in a while, if just to let us know that she’s not dead and that she has a new job.

I am weak to the past. When I was a young girl, my mom would tuck me in, kneel by my bed and pray with me. I still don’t know what to think of God, but I know those nights were the most I felt like I had a Real Mom. I asked my dad, once, what was wrong with her. Why she was all edge, no warmth, not here, like I thought a mom ought to be. Why she was all screams, or sobs, or just not at all. ‘She feels too much,' was all he said. That scared me, the thought that if I felt too much, I would end up just like her. I tried not to cry for a whole year; I failed. I have her eyes, of course they’d cry just like hers. At least she can’t see my face when she calls.

I hope she calls.

They say moms know best and mine taught me all the best things. I learned how to shout to get what I want, though I doubt my voice could be as loud as hers. I learned how to read her moods like a book and blend in with the walls when I could not. I learned not to trust big plans and not to hope for more, at least not from her. I learned how to love with one foot out the door and that I must be hard to love.

Does she have a new job yet?

Would she have come home if I had asked her? Is it too late to ask her? If words could heal wounds, I would pray for her pain to be gone; but she won't tell me what hurts. I still don’t know the right words to say. I pull at my hair and pick at my skin. These ticks are the scars that she left me with. I still feel too much.

It's fine, this is fine, things are fine. I'm sure she has a new job, so I wait for her call.