Thanksgiving Fables

I sat in the airport terminal twitching my foot nervously. Mike and I were waiting for my dad to pick us up. Mike could tell I was nervous about this trip and was trying to distract me.

“It’ll be really cool to see where you grew up and your room from when you were a kid.” He said enthusiastically.

“Yeah…but you won’t be able to see my room.” I said.

“What? Why?”

“Because three weeks after I left for college my mom turned it into a second office.”

“Oh.”

“We can see my brother’s room, though. She hasn’t touched that. It still has the Transformer figurines and Super Hero action figures lined up the exact way they were when he moved out.”

I said it matter-of-factly but Mike got the hint and was quiet. When my dad arrived at the airport I introduced him to Mike and everything was very cordial. My dad was never going to be the problem. I knew that going in, but I still breathed a somewhat relieved sigh as we drove away from the airport. Over the 45 minute car ride my dad asked Mike about his work as a fireman and the car he refurbished with Frank. When we got to my parents’ place it was like that sigh of relief had never happened and I was twice as nervous about Mike meeting my mom…or really, just me having to be around my mom at all. Things between us hadn’t been good in a while and tensions were still there.

As Mike grabbed our bags from the back of the car, my dad pulled me aside.

“I like him, Faith. He seems like a good guy. Just so you know, though, your brother isn’t coming to Thanksgiving this year. Your mom is pretty broken up about it.”

I stopped myself from rolling my eyes and giving an irritated sigh. I didn’t want to deal with my mother on a good day, let alone a holiday where she would be acting like a martyr because my brother wasn’t able to come for dinner. My energy levels for dealing with my mom were already quickly falling and I hadn’t even seen her yet.

She was in the kitchen looking at all sorts of ingredients lined up on the counters.

“I just don’t see the point in making Thanksgiving dinner if Justin won’t be here.” She said staring at the dry bread crumbs and eggs sitting out sadly.

“Hi mom.” I said, “This is Mike.”

And like a switch, she turned around in a completely different mood. After all, there was a show to put on for a stranger. My mom fawned over Mike for a few minutes and then showed us to our rooms. Our separate rooms. I was staying in my brother’s old room in the basement and Mike was staying upstairs. Mike brought my suitcase down the stairs for me and took stock of my brother’s room.

“Not as bad as a hotel, right?” He tried to lighten the mood.

“I think it’s silly that she wants us in separate rooms, but it’s fine. We’re only going to be here for three days.” I kept telling myself it was only three days the entire plane ride here, it didn’t help much but it gave the aura of a countdown which I hoped would make the time go faster so I kept doing it.

Much to my surprise, my mom was on her best behavior. Thanksgiving dinner with Mike went really well and my mom actually seemed to approve of him. I knew this behavior wouldn’t last forever though. The morning of the day Mike and I were supposed to leave, my dad took Mike to the store to grab some doughnuts, which left me and my mom alone in the house. I went to the kitchen and poured myself some coffee before sitting down to read the work emails that had built up over the holiday.

“Mike is a lovely boy, Faith.”

“Thanks mom.” I said with surprise.

She was sitting across from me with a cup of coffee, looking at the weather on her phone.

“He’s too good for you. You should be sure no to do anything stupid to lose him. You don’t want him to realize he deserves better.”

She said it very straight-forwardly, as if I should have known this all along. I put my coffee down and looked up from my phone but I said nothing. She continued.

“You don’t want to lose him like you did with that boy who was in that band….Sam?”

“Sean.” It took everything in me to keep my voice even.

“That’s right, Sean. You don’t want to make the same mistake with Mike-”

“I didn’t make a mistake with Sean.” I cut her off. I wanted to be very clear and I also felt that her giving unasked-for opinions on my relationship with someone she’d never even met was crossing a boundary.

“Well, you aren’t together anymore so you must have done something.”

I blinked. I wasn’t surprised but I was struck by just how little respect my mother had for me; for her to assume that I must have done something reckless or hurtful to have ruined my relationship with Sean and not that he might have had anything to do with how we ended showed that clearly. I decided to just be blunt.

“Mother, Sean and I broke up because he cheated on me with his tour manager and got her pregnant.”

She stared at me over her coffee cup and put it down gingerly, then she looked at me.

“Well what did you do to send him into the arms of another woman?” She went back to checking the weather.

I sat there stunned. My face felt hot and as I opened my mouth to unleash the anger I felt, Mike and my dad walked through the door carrying doughnuts. I closed my mouth, got up, and went downstairs to start packing my things. We weren’t supposed to leave until the late afternoon but I insisted we leave for the airport within the hour. I didn’t want to be in the same house with that woman for a second longer than absolutely necessary. When we got to the airport, Mike wanted to know what was going on.

“My mother and I had a fight.” I said stiffly, “That’s all I want to say.”

“Oh, Faith, come on. It couldn’t have been that bad.”

I looked at Mike with so much anger that he immediately shut up and didn’t bring it up again until we got back to his apartment. We were both exhausted but for some reason Mike decided he needed to know what happened with my mother. I stretched out on his couch and kicked my shoes off, closed my eyes, and rubbed the back of my neck.

“Faith, what happened?”

He stood at the back of the couch and looked at me while my head was leaned back. My eyes flew open.

“Mike, my mom has no respect for me at all. That is what happened, she simply reminded me of that fact and why I HATE spending time with her.”

“Your mom seemed perfectly nice, to me.”

I stood up angrily. I absolutely could NOT deal with hearing Mike defend her. I just couldn’t. It highlighted so many issues I’ve had with our relationship. It was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

“Do you EVER take my side?” I screamed.

Mike was taken aback at the stream of rage coming out of me.

“You met my mother for all of 72 hours and know nothing about her but when I tell you the smallest bit about my relationship with her, you deny it! Do you even realize how much you write off the things I say to you or the feelings I share with you!? Do you!?”

Mike took a deep breath and stepped back.

“Okay, you’re obviously really angry…but I’m not the person you’re really mad at right now. And you’re tired and jet-lagged. I’m going to go to bed, you can sleep it off with me in there,” he pointed to his bedroom, “or do whatever, but I’m going in there and you can cool down for a bit or something.”

He walked into his bedroom. I flung myself on the couch absolutely pissed off. I could feel how high my blood pressure was, but Mike was right. I wasn’t mad at him…at least not about this particular thing. I was mad at my mom. Why didn’t I stand up for myself? Why did I just let her say that tome? 

I took some deep breaths and then checked my phone. I had a text from my dad.

“You guys left pretty early today. I hope you got in okay. Your mom means well.”

And then I started crying. I felt like no one really understood the way my mom treated me. First I have my boyfriend tell me she’s a wonderful woman and then I have my dad making excuses for the way she is? And then, of course, there’s my brother who deals with none of her behavior. How was I supposed to handle any of this? It makes me feel like it’s all in my head. Like I’m just imagining how unsupportive and just plain mean to me she is. And that feels so stupid to type out because I’m almost 30 years old and complaining about my mom being mean to me.

UGH!

I shut my eyes for a bit and when I woke up it was the middle of the night. I padded down the hallway and crept into bed next to Mike. He wrapped his arms around me in his sleep and I just let everything go. I couldn’t hold all of that in, it wasn’t worth the energy.

A few days later, Mike brought up Christmas.

I’m beginning to loathe the holidays.

There was no way I was going to be spending Christmas with my mother, so Maggie was the option I was left with.

“Maggie wants you to come to Christmas with the family.” Mike said.

“She specifically invited me?” I asked suspiciously.

“Well…no. She said I could bring one other person but she knows I’m going to bring you.”

I looked at him flatly.

“Fine.” I gave up. I just did not have the energy for this again.

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“I expected a bigger fight.”

“Mike, your family is important to you. I get that. So if you want me to go to Christmas dinner with your family, I will do that for you.”

“I love you.” He said.

I smiled and left for work.