This Is Where We Talk Things Out

by Caitlin Marceau

And while Sylvie had a bad habit of extending poison ivy disguised as olive branches, Miller had a worse habit of accepting them.

Same

“Just put your stuff in the back seat. I already have things in the trunk.”

Sus

“I am ‘Mom’ to you still,” Sylvie pushes, “even if you don’t like it. It’s just a fact.” “You’re my mother, Sylvie, but you haven’t been my mom for years.”

Preach

“I don’t have any, but I appreciate it!” Sylvie says with a smile. “I’m going to go make sure the heat’s on in all the rooms, so I’ll meet you inside.”

Huh

This is what it was like growing up with her: every event, every memory, rewritten and retold to you enough times that you couldn’t help but wonder if the version you remembered was wrong. It always started with the tears she could summon on command, and ended with Miller apologising for something she never did and agreeing that Sylvie was right.

Can relate

And, quite honestly, I think it says a lot about someone if they can’t love another person unconditionally unless that person’s their offspring. It’s narcissistic.”

Has

“But I’m tired of you acting like we’re friends. Like we’re close. Like I had a picture-perfect childhood where everything was happy and easy and good. I didn’t. It wasn't.”

“I’m just saying that while Dad and you loved me, Dad’s the only one who ever made me feel like he meant it. I think you think you were a great mom, but you were selfish and you were mean and you made everything about you. Why the fuck do you think I cut you out? For fun?”

It seems Miller had been wrong about the locks. Her door has one. It's just on the other side.

Creepy

she just stopped blindly agreeing with her mother; she hasn’t been ignoring her mother, she's just trying to live her own life; she didn’t cut her mother out, she just set boundaries.

“It should have been you,” she finally says, voice cracking. “I wish it had been you.”

Say it louder