"Six and a half years ago."
"If you're married, why aren't you wearing a ring?" Tilly glanced at her naked finger. "And more to the point, where's your husband?"
Alexis felt her entire body tense up. "It's not something I'm ready to discuss."
Try as she might, Tilly couldn't bear the betrayal. It was bad enough that Alexis had shut them out over the years, but to marry someone and not even have the decency to inform her own parents? What else was she hiding?
Tilly shifted the box of flour away from the edge of the counter and retreated from the room without another word. Alexis stood with the whisk still in her hand, uncertain whether to follow. Although she wasn't ready to discuss Mark, she no longer wanted to bury all of her emotions. She needed to start some type of dialogue with her mother, however uncomfortable.
Alexis found her mother in her parents' bedroom. Tilly sat alone on the bed holding a piece of embroidery. Alexis was struck by the appearance of the room. It hadn't changed a bit in seventeen years. Same floral bedding, same beige blinds with matching floral curtains, same magnolia white paint. The room was neat and tidy with a place for everything and everything in its place. She seemed to have inherited something from her mother, even if it was a simple de-cluttering gene.
Alexis knocked on the half-open door. "Mom, can I talk to you?"
"I sure wish you would," her mother replied. "Your silence has been deafening."
"I'm sorry that I've hurt you. Truly."
Tilly placed her embroidery to one side and removed her reading glasses before turning her attention to her daughter. "Tell me, Alexis. Did we abuse you?"
Alexis could already see where this was going. "No."
"Did we neglect you?"
"Not legally."
Tilly stiffened. "I don't really know what that means."
Alexis sat down beside her on the bed. She wanted to explain herself in a way that wasn't hurtful to her mother, but she didn't know how.
"It means you gave me food, shelter, and all the necessities I needed."
"That sounds like a good start," said Tilly. "It's more than a lot of kids get. Don't you see those commercials with the poor, starving children? They look like they're on death's door."
Alexis steadied her breathing, not wanting to lose patience with her mother. This conversation was too important and too long in coming.
"So do you think you played your parental parts and I'm some ungrateful spawn who spurned you and left you in the dust?" Alexis asked.
"I wouldn't put it quite like that." Tilly folded her arms across her chest. "I'd like to know what we didn't give you that you feel so strongly you should've had." "Encouragement. Acknowledgment. A real sense of family."