My heart beats steadily, shoulders are relaxed away from my ears, hands lightly holding the tablet. It occurs to me that I’m not angry. I think about Mom and I see my hands reaching out, empty, as the door closes behind her, and I’m holding my breath because I do understand what I feel now that I’m told she’s back in my life. “I’m scared she’ll leave again, Tate.”

We’re in the tunnel; lights clip past the truck like the rolling of an old-time film. I watch the snow melt into pathways on the window that break apart, form glassy balls that spiral down in twisted droplets.

“She w . . . w-won’t,” he says with such conviction it lifts the heaviness around my heart.

“How do you know that?”

“Because she left when she couldn’t . . . get better and be your mom.” He smiles at me before turning back to navigate the narrow tunnel in front of us. “She fought her w . . . w-ay to sobriety, Claire, and I think she deserves a second chance to be your mom. Don’t you?”

On the tablet screen, his last words finish typing themselves out on the notebook-paper graphic.

deserves a second chance to be your mom

A calm rushes over me, slides down to where it settles inside my chest, and I lean into the seat, enjoying the moment. I press the screen and it brings up a keyboard. My name appears in a bubble on the screen, and I type, give Mom a chance. Then I look up from the tablet and outside the window to the water, flat and still, protected by a sheer gray mist that moves languidly above it.

We’re coming into Whittier now, parking in the gravel lot on the side of BTI, when Tate shuts off the car and turns to me, forehead creased.

“There’s something I n . . . n-eed to tell you, Claire. I’ve been meaning to tell you for some . . . time now but—”

“Is that Mom?” She’s across the parking lot, arm in arm with another woman, both swaying, listing to one side, then the other. I know the walk. My nostrils flare and I’m out of the truck, hurrying across the lot toward the pair.

“Claire! Wait!”

I ignore him. “Mom!”

They both turn to face me, the woman beside her hardly able to keep her eyes focused, but Mom is clear-eyed and looks tired. “Claire?”

The school playground is behind the parking lot, and I can hear the delighted screams of kids playing outside, but they get drowned out by a buzzing that builds in my head. The smell of alcohol kicks up with the wind, surrounds me in memories and feelings that curdle in my stomach. “You’re drinking?”

The woman, hardly dressed for a winter day, no matter how nice the weather today, leans heavily against Mom.