Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 131459 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 526(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 131459 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 526(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
It wasn’t like we’d waited on Nora to arrive.
It was brunch. You dove in when you showed up. And if food got low, we made more.
We were all eating.
“Darling, you know I’m always late. You can’t make an entrance if you’re on time,” Nora replied, saying the last two words like they tasted bad.
“Sit down,” Cadence demanded.
Again, that was not Cadence.
I exchanged glances with Tom.
“May I have coffee, Herr General?” Nora requested.
“Huh,” Cadence said, then left her own seat and ran into the kitchen to make Nora’s coffee.
It was then, Nora exchanged a glance with me as she took her seat.
When my daughter brought in Nora’s coffee, I opened my mouth to ask if she was all right, but I closed it when I watched her bounce on her feet, side to side, rather than retaking her seat.
Okay.
What on earth?
Again, I opened my mouth to say something, but then Cadence looked me right in the eye and announced, “Okay, Mom. I want to make a movie with you.”
I shut my mouth.
“I’ve got it all blocked out in my head,” she went on nervously. “It’s called Mothers and Daughters. Like, we go all over the world, and we film the stories of mothers and daughters, like us. Either the dad died, or he left or whatever, but they have to get on. They have to make a family. I want it to be powerful, like we are. I want it to be hopeful, like we are.”
Oh God.
I was going to lose it.
She looked to Judge. “I want…I want…I wanna ask you if I can talk to your aunt. Chloe was telling me stories yesterday and she’d be perfect. Because, when she divorced your uncle, she started her own cattle ranch with her daughter. They…I mean, I googled them, and they’re a force to be reckoned with.”
“Reid and Greer?” Judge asked.
Cadence nodded. “I know it’s awkward. Your uncle left them high and dry. But I just, they made it, like doing”—she lifted her hands in air quotation marks—“‘man’s work,’ and, like, they’re super respected and most everyone working their ranch is a woman.”
My daughter returned her attention to me.
“Like that. Stuff like that. I don’t know, two or three in-depth stories, and four or five smaller ones. Not just in the US. Not just women doing stereotypical men’s jobs. Just mothers and daughters who made it. I want to show how beautiful we are. Not like”—she anxiously glanced through Tom, Matt, Judge, Faun and Teddy to look back to me—“women don’t need men. This isn’t anti-men. This is just really, super, double, extra, pro-mothers and daughters.”
She sucked in a huge breath.
Then said in a rush, “And I wanna talk about Dad. I wanna talk about us. Knowing, even if he wasn’t here, we were stronger because at one time, he was. He helped make us. It’s not about erasing men. I…” She swallowed. “I wanna talk about Dad.”
“Honey,” I said softly, my voice husky.
She talked over me.
“I’m gonna use my graduation money and the money you set aside for me for college and I’m…yeah, I’m going to use all of that. I don’t know how to budget, but I’ll figure it out. I know it might sound crazy or stupid, but I believe in this idea. I see it in my head. I have it all blocked out. But I want you with me. Like, we’ll be co-producers. You’ll be involved. Openly. On camera. So will I. We’re mother and daughter. But it’ll be only me who directs. Still, you’ll teach me.”
Cadence went quiet.
No one said anything.
All I heard ringing in my ears was, Still, you’ll teach me.
So Cadence said, “And that’s it. That’s what I want to do now that I’ve graduated.”
With that, she plopped down in her chair, spent.
“So it’s not going to be Adventures with My Mother?” I noted.
“It’s gonna be kinda that too,” Cadence said. “I want us to be funny and awesome, like we are. Like we’re the springboard. We lost him and it was like…like…it wasn’t nice how we lost him. But”—she threw a hand out to indicate the table—“here we are.”
“Here we are,” I whispered.
She looked upset when she asked, “Do you think it’s stupid?”
“I think I wish I’d thought of it.”
Her face brightened.
“When do you want to start?” I asked.
Tears shimmered in her eyes.
“I need to show you my ideas,” she said. “But I thought, when we’re in London with Tom during Wimbledon, we’ll find a mom and daughter and start there.”
“I’ll have a look and you can share your plan. And that’s where we’ll start.”
Cadence stared at me and then said fiercely, “I love you, Mom.”
“Same right back at you, kid.”
“You will all notice,” Nora cut in, and everyone looked at her to see she had both hands, fingers ramrod straight, pointing at her temples, or, rather, the tears brimming her eyes, “the works of art I have achieved with this eyeliner, as per usual. However, I would appreciate a warning in future if something is going to occur that will threaten this gargantuan achievement. Say…tears.”