AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“She forced you, in other words,” she said, derision dripping from her words.
“I’m sorry,” he said immediately. Automatically. The urge to submit to an angry female beaten into him since birth.
But Sandy shook her head. “No. I know it’s not your fault. Your mother is a genuinely terrible person, you know that?”
He did, but hearing someone else acknowledge it, understand him that way, somehow lifted a huge weight off his shoulders he didn’t realize he’d been carrying.
He knew he didn’t like his mother, but when the entire world thought she was doing the right thing, no matter how he felt about it, some part of him had been unable to stop thinking that maybe they were right, and he did indeed deserve it.
But with that irritated toss of her head, Sandy shattered that insecurity so easily. And he thought maybe he loved her just a little bit for that alone.
Chapter 9
Sandy
Elffa really was irritating. Sandy bit her cheek, trying to avoid unkind thoughts, but being unable to stop herself from thinking that maybe they would all be better off if she took a long walk off a short pier. But that was her grandmother’s voice, not her own, and she tried not to let her grandmother’s sassy tendencies control her too much.
“Is your mother not like that?” Rane asked, staring at her so earnestly, his dark eyes shining in the lights of the stadium.
She focused back on him, forcing her thoughts from her anger and onto his question. “I don’t really know what my mother was like.”
“No?”
“No. I guess, I can say that she did the best she could for me. Which is to say that she knew she wouldn’t be able to do anything for me, so she dropped me on my grandmother’s porch and ran right after I was born.”
Rane stared at her, aghast, and she laughed.
“Relax. I’m over it. She was right. That was the best thing she could have done for me. I would rather have been raised lovingly by my grandmother than neglected by my mother. On one hand, you could say that she was a terrible mom, but I prefer to think the opposite. Her single act of motherhood was knowing she wouldn’t make a good mother and so she gave me to someone who would. I don’t know her, so I can’t say I hate or love her. I’m grateful she didn’t put me in a dumpster or something instead, but aside from that, I don’t really feel anything towards her.”
“Your grandmother raised you then? Was she good to you?”
“Oh, grandma was amazing!” Sandy declared, tossing her head back, her eyes wanting to cry and her lips wanting to smile.
It was interesting, the pain that ripped through her at the thought of the woman that had meant so much to her. She missed her with all the ache of a throbbing tooth, but at the same time, her memories of her were so good, she couldn’t help but be comforted by them.
“She did her best for me. She raised me all by herself. Grandpa died when I was really little, so I don’t have many memories of him, but grandma loved me enough for an entire family.”
Rane cocked his head, his crest starting to fall. “You sound sad. Did she…?”
“Yeah, she died,” Sandy said, smiling at him reassuringly. “Just before I got scanned, actually. She was really sick. Liver cancer, you know? By the time we caught it, it had already spread, and there was nothing we could do. I stayed with her until the end. Took care of her. Spent as much time as I could with her. And when she passed, I found out about the True Match appointment. She left me a letter. She said she felt bad for making me take care of her in her last few years, but that she wanted me to go out and have adventures. So, here I am.”
She chuckled softly, looking around. She didn’t know if this was exactly what her grandmother had in mind, but it certainly felt adventurous to her. Maybe she wasn’t out there skydiving or climbing mountains, but exploring an alien planet was exciting enough for her.
Crazy mother-in-law-to-be notwithstanding.
“What was her name?” Rane asked, pulling her attention back onto him. He was staring at her with such interest, though she knew her story wasn’t that fascinating.
“Lexi,” she smiled. “We shared the same name.”
“Your name is Sandy though.”
She laughed. “Same name; different nicknames. We’re both Alexandra Tollman. I guess that makes me a junior, but no one ever called me that. She told me if I have kids, I can’t name them after us. But I’m definitely going to, just because I know it would annoy her.”
Rane cocked his head, confusion on his face. “Why? I thought you said you loved her. Why would you then go against her wishes like that?”
Sandy shook her head. “Because that’s just how our relationship was. We teased and pranked each other all the time. She knew I was going to pass our name on. She put that in the letter because she knew I was going to do it, and she wanted to tease me. And I’m going to do it, just because I know that she would have been all like, ‘I told you no!’ But we don’t really mean it.”
Rane just looked more confused.
