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“Food does sound nice.” Especially since she’d just taken her medication. “Let’s walk down the block. I know a cute place.”
They walked to the Front Porch Café, which was a dog-themed breakfast joint. It featured all kinds of delicious breakfast foods with paintings of dogs everywhere.
It was a good meal. She told Daniel some of John’s best moments from their childhood, and he shared some about his sister too.
When they got back, the condo was quiet, but her mom’s purse was where it had been that morning. Amelia frowned. Usually, they went out and about. Now that she thought about it, her mom hadn’t been dressed when she saw her on the balcony.
Amelia peeked into the master bedroom and saw her mom asleep, even though it was almost noon.
It worried her whenever her mom would get like this. When she was a kid, she didn’t understand why her mom would be doing a million things at a time one week and nothing the next.
Then she figured out it was bipolar disorder, what used to be called manic depression.
Amelia hated thinking about what her mom went through mentally, and for the longest time, she thought she didn’t need to worry about it. She’d never had manic episodes like her mom did. She never went weeks without wanting to sleep. Sure, she had moments where she did all the cleaning and organizing in the world, but she would stop halfway through. That made her normal, right?
Only it didn’t. Amelia hadn’t inherited the bipolar disorder from her mom, but she had something different. In Amelia’s case, it was ADHD.
When she’d heard about it, she thought it was a childhood disorder that didn’t really affect adults.
But she couldn’t help but notice how messy and chaotic her life had become. She couldn’t focus on anything she wanted to. She had sensory issues. And her ADHD was what ruined her last relationship.
This was what she didn’t want Daniel to see. This is what would make him change his opinion of her forever.
“Did your mom go back to sleep?” he asked as he walked into the condo. “Is everything okay?”
“Um, yeah,” Amelia lied. In reality, her mom would more than likely be down for a bit and then come out of it since she was on medication. But it was always noticeable. She glanced outside to see her dad on the balcony. “I think I’m gonna go catch up with my dad for a minute. Is that okay?”
“Sure,” Daniel said. “I’ll be in our room.”
She nodded and stepped outside. She sat next to her dad who was reading a book and looking calm. He was always like this—he never seemed worried, and Amelia felt like her whole life was a ball of stress.
“Hey, is Mom okay?” Amelia asked.
“I think so. She reduced her medication a few weeks back, so this is to be expected.”
“Why did she reduce her meds?”
“They started making her dizzy all the time,” he replied. “And she’s been feeling better, just a little up and down.”
“Oh.” She bit her nail. If she’d known, she wouldn’t have bothered to ask Daniel to come with them.
“Why do you look worried?”
“Daniel doesn’t know about all of . . . this.”
“I thought you two were dating.” He raised an eyebrow.
Amelia doubted she would have told him even if they were really dating.
“We are,” she said, the lie tasting like acid in her mouth. “But he still doesn’t know.”
“Amelia, mental health is important. He should know.”
“I told you guys this was new.”
“I know it’s new, but I figured he would at least be aware of what was going on.”
“I can’t exactly tell him that my mom has bipolar disorder on the first date.”
