Kylie Cantrall's Arc

Chapter 18 of 78

Kylie reached the bottom step with Arianna behind her. The front door opened before she could touch the handle. Her mother stood in the entry with a small suitcase and a coat folded over her arm. She looked at Arianna first, then at Kylie, then at the puppy tucked under Arianna's elbow. "Sit down," her mother said. "All three of you." They went to the living room. Kylie took the couch. Arianna sat beside her, close but not touching. Her mother stayed standing. "I read the letter," her mother said. "I flew here early because a letter is not a person. I need to know this isn't you running from Malachi and Malia into the first soft place you found." Kylie opened her mouth to recite the six points. She stopped. The list was for the label. Her mother wanted something else. "I don't have proof," Kylie said. "I don't have a contract or a timeline. I have a year of her letters upstairs. I have the necklace I kept in the safe. I gave it to her this morning." Her mother's eyes moved to Arianna's collar. The gold heart sat there against her shirt. Her mother's mouth tightened, but not in anger. She had recognized it. "That isn't proof either," her mother said. "You give things away when you're hurt." Kylie's chest went hot. She almost argued. Then she stood and walked to the shelf by the stairs. She brought back the small wooden bridge from her grandmother, the one with the blank scroll carved in the middle. She set it on the coffee table between them. "Grandma gave me this," Kylie said. "She said find the words first, then cross. I didn't cross with Malachi. I wrote songs about him after he was already gone. With her, I wrote first. A year of it. She wrote back." Her mother picked up the bridge. She turned it over in her hands. Arianna spoke for the first time. "I'm not going anywhere. I told her that upstairs. I'll tell you too." "Anyone can say that," her mother said. "I know," Arianna said. "So ask me in a year." Her mother set the bridge down. She looked at the necklace again. She looked at Kylie's hands, which were steady. "I'm staying through the weekend," her mother said. "I'll be in the guest room. I want to hear her play something before I sleep. Something you wrote together." Kylie's throat closed. "It isn't finished." "Good," her mother said. "Then I get to hear the part that's real." She walked to the kitchen with her suitcase. Kylie sat back down. Arianna's hand found hers on the cushion. "She didn't say yes," Kylie whispered. "She didn't say no," Arianna said. Kylie looked at the piano. One song, unfinished, waiting. The label would call in the morning. Tonight she only had to play.