Page 62 of Something Borrowed

Chapter 30

Cal stared in horror at his phone. He wasn’t a weirdo. He’d meant to text, not call. And even then, he’d been on the fence.

“Hello?” Vic said again. Shoot—she’d hang up in a minute.

“Hi, Vic?”

“Yes?”

“It’s Cal.”

“Oh, hi—weird!” Her voice had warmed, though, and lost its suspicious note, so whatever she thought was weird, apparently it wasn’t him calling. “Your name didn’t show with the number. It just says private caller. I was sure you were a spam.”

“Uh, yeah, sorry. This is my personal phone. I usually call you on my work cell.”

“It’s funny you rang. I was just thinking of you.”

Cal hated that his stomach did a weird tightening thing. He couldn’t help it, though. She’d been thinking of him.

“I’m going to write Michael an email, like you suggested.”

“That’s great. Fingers crossed he responds.”

“And I’ll do better with Audra, too. I’m going to keep an even closer eye on her.”

Cal had been about to say, “That’s great,” again, but something in Vic’s tone struck him oddly. “Hey, I hope you already know this, but just in case . . . When I said that, I was in no way implying that you needed to do more. Far from it. You do more for your mom than almost anyone I’ve known, and it looks like a pretty thankless job. I only meant, well, she doesn’t seem well. You know?”

“Yeah, I think I do . . . It’s just hard because I kind of feel like a frog in hot water.”

Cal gave a surprised laugh. “What does that mean?”

“Oh, sorry—I don’t even know if it’s true, but I’ve heard that if you put a frog in water and slowly raise the temperature, even though there’s nothing to stop him from jumping out, he won’t . . . he’ll just get so used to the subtly rising temperature that you can boil him to death.”

“Gruesome.”

“You don’t sound like it’s gruesome. You sound like you’re smiling!”

Now he was full on grinning. Cal settled onto his couch, pressed the recliner’s release button, and stretched out. “It’s not funny. It’s horrible. It was just you comparing yourself to a toad or a frog or whatever . . . I don’t see it.”

“Ah, okay, yeah, maybe it was a bad example.” Vic was quiet for a few seconds, as if gathering her thoughts, or perhaps deciding how much she wanted to say. “A lot of how Audra acts . . . isn’t new. I don’t think it fully registered with me that she’s getting worse.”

Idiot. Cal smacked his forehead with his free hand. “I’m sorry—the frog thing, I get it.” He closed his eyes, still cringing—but for Vic now, not at his own obtuseness. “And if she’s always been like this to you . . . man, I hardly know what to say.”

“You don’t need to say anything. But you really think how she is with me is unusual?”

“Hell, yeah, I think it’s unusual. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“I always just tell myself that parents are hard on their children.”

“They can be, that’s true—but this isn’t that. Audra is, well, the only word that really describes it is abusive.”

There was a sharp intake of breath from Vic’s side of the call.

“I’m sorry. Maybe that’s not my place.”

“No, no, it’s okay. I’m just surprised. Sometimes I’ve wondered, and I did when I was a kid, too—but then again, I’ve always been too sensitive and kind of prone to being melodramatic. I figured I was overreacting.”

“No.” Cal shook his head for emphasis even though Vic couldn’t see him. “No, you aren’t—and when you were a kid, you weren’t either. Also, who told you you’re ‘too sensitive’ and ‘melodramatic,’ anyway? Audra?”