“What is going on here?” my voice cracked out, low and dangerous.
Both of them froze.
My mother gasped, nearly dropping her glass of iced tea. In a split second, the venomous scowl on her face vanished, replaced by a look of utter terror, which instantly melted into a fake, radiant smile.
“Oh! Tommy! My sweet boy!” she cried out, her voice instantly shifting back to that warm, maternal drawl I had known my whole life. She rushed toward me, arms open wide. “Why didn’t you tell us you were coming home? Look at you, you’ve gotten so dark from the sun! Come, sit down, let mama get you something to drink!”
I didn’t move. I didn’t hug her back. I stood stiff as a board, my eyes locked onto Sarah.
Sarah hadn’t stood up. She was still on her knees, looking up at me with wide, terrified eyes. But she wasn’t terrified of my mother anymore—she looked terrified of me. She looked like a prisoner who had accepted her fate and was ashamed to be seen in her chains.
“Sarah,” I whispered, my voice trembling. “Get up.”
She scrambled to her feet, wiping her wet hands nervously on her shorts. “Tommy… you’re home. I… I didn’t know. I would have made something you liked. I’m sorry, I’ll go fix it right now—”
“Stop,” I said, stepping past my mother and grabbing Sarah’s hands.
The moment my fingers touched her skin, she flinched. She actually flinched away from me. That tore a hole right through my heart. I looked down at her hands. The skin around her knuckles was bleeding from being dried out.
