The Co-op

by Tarah DeWitt

“Quit trying to force it into looking exactly like what you picture. Let it be imperfect, ma fille. Shape it into something new. Just because it’s not what you thought it was doesn’t mean it’s not made of the right stuff.”

I’m tired of being so affected. By him, by my parents, by my own brain.

“When you have a bad day, ma fille, think about it from beginning to end. Walk your way through it. Was it really a bad day, or was it a few bad moments? What part of your day would you like to hold on to before you close your eyes? Find that good bit, and let it be the thing you fall asleep to.”

“Don’t be that guy,” I say before he can. “Don’t say the thing that every person who’s ever moved furniture since 1999 has said. I’m begging you. It was really before our time, man.” He ignores me. “PIVOT.”

I guess when the ones who are supposed to love you the most never made you feel safe or important, I’d assume the worst of people, too.

I wonder if she’s quick to want justice for other people because no one ever did that for her.

The trying was what it was really about. I’d begun to believe that trying was its own love language. Trying to understand a person, trying to make them happy, trying to make yourself happy, too. My relationship with him is what made me believe that.

“The messes and mistakes we make as parents are more about us than about our children.” She looks at me softly. “I think when you remind yourself that their choices were more about them than you, you can get to a place where you’re open to forgiveness. Or at least, not punishing yourself anymore over it. Because sometimes that’s all that forgiveness accomplishes. Setting yourself free of it.”

My home, my girl, my pain in the ass, my world. That fucking force of nature. I want her on my side, that formidable, fierce woman.