You Are Here Read Online Free Page B

could take her and Jack out of here. I wished that we could get back in our car and keep driving. Drive someplace far from here. I didn’t care where. Maybe somewhere where we didn’t know anybody and could start all over.
    “Well, you’re certainly free to go to Seattle and work with Cheryl but we have a similar facility here in Phoenix. Do you have family in Seattle?”
    “No,” Mom said.
    Ann leaned back.
    “I don’t think my car would make it to Seattle,” Mom said. “It needs new brakes. And the kids.” She paused, looking at Jack and me with watery eyes. “Well, the kids have missed a week of school already because I failed to... Well, because I failed. Because of me.” The day we moved into the shelter, Mom had called the school secretaries for my high school and Jack’s middle school and explained that we had to take an unscheduled vacation and would return next week.
    Ann’s forehead lowered. “You did not fail, Elaine. The unexpected happens sometimes, you know?”
    Mom swallowed a sob. “I know a little something about the unexpected.”
    Ann squeezed Mom’s hand again, this time with both of hers like a sandwich. “I understand it’s been tough for you these last two years. Cheryl mentioned your husband. And your mother.” She paused. “I am so very sorry, Elaine. You’ve endured so much loss.” Ann’s gaze turned to Jack and me but I had to lower my eyes. Another second and I’d be crying, too, and I barely knew this woman. I didn’t like to talk about Dad with strangers.
    “I’m not a grief counselor, but if you don’t mind my saying, I believe you’re still grieving.” Ann’s gaze settled on Mom. “Especially you, Elaine.” She paused. “It’s easy to be forgetful when you’re grieving, even forget those things that you believe most people wouldn’t. Like paying a mortgage.”
    Mom cracked a smile but it wasn’t a smile at all. I knew her fake smile and she hated pity. “I just can’t believe I lost my children’s home. I saw all the notices from the state and the mortgage company. And then the late notices from the assessor’s office. It all became...” She paused for a breath. “It became too much, especially after it wouldn’t sell. We’d used up all of our savings. And then it became too easy to simply ignore everything, especially when I couldn’t pay all of the other bills, either. What did it matter paying a mortgage if I couldn’t afford all of the other bills that go along with it? It’s foolish thinking and makes no sense, I know.” Mom looked from me to Jack. Tears began to spill onto her cheeks. Her voice caught. “I’m so sorry, kids.”
    “It’s not your fault, Mom,” I said quickly, my own voice cracking like hers.
    “Yeah,” Jack added.
    Mom’s teeth gritted. “It is very much my fault. I am your mother. I am supposed to take care of you, and now because of me we are...” She paused to inhale, her nostrils flaring. She blew out the word. “Homeless.”
    The word sucked the oxygen from the room. It was as if the ceiling and the walls drew closer around us, shrinking the room. How I hated that word.
    Mom’s head dropped into her hands as Ann pushed forward a ready box of tissues. Jack took one and blew his nose. I was still fighting back my own tears, watching Mom’s shoulders shake with frustration and shame, something I’d never seen before.
    I swallowed back my tears, watching Mom sob openly before my eyes. Softly, I laid a hand on her back and felt heat radiating to my fingertips. Mom’s body shook beneath my hand. One of us had to keep it together in this room, in this place with strangers and photos of people we didn’t know. One of us had to stay strong and now it was my turn.
    “Well, the good news is that you have employment,” Ann said when there was a pause in Mom’s sobbing. Though not for long.
    Mom choked. “I’m a Realtor. Not sure if that qualifies for employment. I haven’t sold a house in almost eight