"We're just watching out for stardust."
Extrait 1 de "Advice for the Young at Heart"
"So you tried the Tartan golf course?"
"Yes."
"And the small pizza place on the side of the street."
"Yeah. Tony said he didn't need extra staff."
"And you once got a swimming degreee. Have you tried the local pool?"
"Mom they have me a degree because i once stopped an old woman from jumping off the highest plank. I didn't even touch the water."
Susan laughed, pouring some more Froot loops into a bowl, which she then handed over to her youngest child. "No picking with your dirty fingers. There's a spoon on the table, Tom."
She then turned towards her desperate seventeen year old daughter, and her niece, both propped on stools and looking bored out of their minds.
"Well there's always the local library," her mother suggested, hugging her arms. "Okay it might not be the most fun but-"
"Mom i don't even read."
"Sure you do. You read for school don't you?"
"That's not the same. I have no curiousity for litterature."
"You got an A on your essay once."
"I read the resumé on internet...mom!"
"What Caroline, What? I'm trying to help you girls here, aren't i? What do you want to do Gabby?"
Shrugging of elbows, sighing.
"Baby sitting?"
Caroline laughed inwardly. Well that would be something.
"Sure, you girls could put up adverts around town."
Caroline picked at some nail varnish on her thumb which hadn't completely dried.
"I don't want to do it."
Gabrielle turned to fix her cousin. She was probably doing that scary eyebrow thing.
"What do you mean?"
"Well for one thing, we would suck at it. I can't even get tom to have his bath when he's my brother, how am i going to manage a tribe of kids from some random family-"
"Caroline, you've always been great with children. Remember that one time at Sarah Patkinson's wedding when-"
"Mom. Please."
Gabrielle smiled sweetly up at her aunt.
"Maybe Caroline just feels kinda tired. Maybe we should go clear our heads for a while. Go walking around town, get some ice cream from the Big Scoop?"
Susana handed her niece a ten dollar bill.
"You girls just be back before dinner."
Susana hesitated as she watcher her daughter heave herself from her stool and grimly walk towards the door.
"Caroline, can i see you for one minute please?"
Caroline closed the kitchen door behind her and glared up at her mother.
"How much longer? I'm serious now. I cannot take it."
"She's family", Susana said diplomaticly, crossing her arms over her flowery apron in a very Gotta-love-it-all way. Susana knew this made her look wiser, and definetly more at ease with a situation she wasn't comfortable with at all.
"Is that what you're going to tell me for the rest of my life? Mom, i don't think you get my point here. I take her places, she litteraly destroys our family image wherever we go ! Like at Starbucks, did i tell you that, actually pushed some damn muffin-"
"Caroline-"
"...poor guy missed his job interview ! Or like with Ajay, or Katy, no sympathy, doesn't give a damn i tell you!"
"Caroline!"
"We gotta find another solution. I can't."
"Doctor Horgan called."
Caroline was suddenly very silent. Her golden eye lashes stopped dancing crazily as they'd been doing several moments ago.
"You mean Katy's dad?"
"Do we know another Doctor Horgan?", her mother teased, leaning back on grey granite counter.
"I just...it didn't make sense.
"Apparently he had no idea you and Katy'd fallen apart. He was really mad about something, some beach party Katy threw without his permission, lots of drugs and naked men involved...i thought it sounded a little ironic as that's pretty much all Katy throws, right?"
Caroline fixed her blue socks. She had no idea how hard it was, to talk about her like this, living her summer, what should of been their summer of fun, sun-
"And he suggested you join Katy. For a couple of weeks, in Colarado. He's somehow sure you have a positive influence on her. Now-"
Caroline looked up, bewildered.
"Mom, that's crazy. Nothing's changed. Katy still hates me. I know that, you know that, just because David never see's his daughter-"
"Who knows, maybe they talked it through, maybe Katy's embarassed to ask you to come stay, maybe this way-"
"No."
Susana rolled her eyes.
"You've created yourself some little turtle shell here, haven't you?"
At that precise moment, there were many things that Caroline needed to blurt out to her mother. One of them definetly being : Mom, look here. Look how hard it is to open the door again, when you thought you knew something, someone, thought it was true, and that now, you're really not sure what you're going for.
