Should Have Known

ONE

Saskia had always known the day would come when her daughter Coco moved out again, but damnit, not like THIS.

After her husband died of cancer, Saskia had been so desperately lonely, she’d agreed to let Coco and her grandson move back in with her. Which wouldn’t have been too bad, all things considered, but Saskia lived with two dogs in a motorhome in the outskirts of Leipzig.

Of course, Coco had known this beforehand. But she’d been so desperately in need of a roof over her head and free food (at least for a short time) that she’d even have moved in if there hadn’t been a bed available.

And it started out well, both of them agreed. The problems started later.

Saskia was from the older generation. The one that grew up with black-and-white TVs and real music and craft classes at school. The one that had to grow up and get a Job that paid, because that’s what one did. And then get a Car and get Married and buy a House. Because that’s what one did. She was from the generation that only had two genders.

Coco was from the next generation. The one that was spoilt with choices, grew up with music getting worse and worse, electronic devices being switched out for newer ones on a daily basis and TVs where you could see everyone’s oily pores in minute detail. Where even makeup no longer made a difference. She was from the generation where a job should be FUN and one should only do what one REALLY wanted to do in life (as if anyone ever knew that). The generation where there were millions of choices for gender.

In short, they were complete opposites.

And yet, they were exactly the same. They had the same straight blonde hair cut into a bob. They had the same super long legs that still didn’t manage to make them tall. And they clung to their stubbornness as though it was a lifeline.

But when Coco called, Saskia had no way of saying no. Coco had no place to live, no job, no boyfriend. Just a three-year-old son called Flynn. How could a mother say no to that?

“My friends all live in one-room apartments with no space for either of us,” Coco had said on the phone, and Saskia could taste the crestfallen emoji from her voice.

“I suppose I do have two beds in here that I don’t use,” she’d admitted, the old ache for her daughter to return suddenly back in her chest. She’d tried everything to make the miserable silence in the motorhome more bearable since Luc had died. But apart from the occasional barking and shuffling of the dogs, she’d only managed to fill it with the radio, an endless loop of news, music and weather reports.

So Coco and Flynn came to live with her.

Back when things had gone from bad to worse with Luc’s cancer, Saskia refused to move out of the motorhome. The motorhome that was way too big for one short person, with too many beds for her to choose from. But she’d given up the house in favour of it. Luc had needed the money for the cancer treatment, and she’d have done anything for him. Except the stupid treatment had been a waste of money. He’d died anyway.

She slept on the back bunk, leaving a man-shaped hole on her right. She could have taken the entire bed, really, but the hole was in her heart, anyway. It felt like taking away even more from him. Even if she really would just be filling the space. Love didn’t work like that. Once you started poking holes, they never went away again. It was like cheese.

Coco was glad two beds were empty. Maybe empty was an exaggeration, she thought when she arrived at the motorhome and every inch was filled with her mother’s stuff. But she thought of Flynn and how she had nowhere else to go, and forced herself to take a deep breath as she slipped off her shoes and climbed into the vehicle.

Jayne greeted her with an enthusiastic bark and both dogs thumped their tails on the front seats where Saskia had sent them for the time being. Coco couldn’t stand dogs, but she smiled at them, anyway. She’d rather have been anywhere than tied to a loud, smelly, and hairy motorhome, but she was glad her mother hadn’t refused her.

“How come you lost your job?” Saskia asked from the back of the motorhome, bouncing Flynn on her knee. He’d already run in ahead of Coco, barely knowing his grandmother but already a fan.

Coco bit her lip as she dropped multiple bags on the space at her feet, then emptied a cotton bag filled with her son’s clothes on the table. “I didn’t lose it,” she said eventually.

She didn’t even have to look at Saskia to know her eyebrows shot up. “But you said on the phone…”

“I said I didn’t have a job. Not that I lost it.” Not that the distinction made any difference. But if the only control she had in her life was speaking her mind, she wouldn’t let anyone take the words away from her.

“But you had one. You worked for that firm. You know, the one out in Halle.”

“Yeah.” The look Saskia gave Coco didn’t allow her to stop there. Coco sighed. “I did have that job. And now I don’t have it.”

“But I don’t understand. That was a good firm. A solid job.”

“I quit it, mum.” Coco glared at her. “I quit that job.” This wasn’t going the way she’d planned. Damnit, her life wasn’t an absolute mess. Fine, she’d quit the job and maybe she shouldn’t have done that. But how was she supposed to know she’d come home to have a massive row and break up with her boyfriend and get kicked out of her own home? Which he’d made perfectly clear was strictly his, given that his name was on the contract, and he was the one paying for it.

“But why on earth would you do that?” Saskia had stopped bouncing Flynn and stared at Coco. Flynn yelled for her to keep going, so she did, without taking her eyes off her daughter.

Because she hated that job. Because she couldn’t spend another minute looking at numbers on a computer screen. Because she wanted to be an artist.

But Coco didn’t say any of those things. Maybe she shouldn’t have been so adamant explaining she’d not been kicked out of her job. Maybe pretending that would have been easier. Anything was easier than explaining to her own mother how her thoughts were spiralling towards a darkness so absolute it would swallow her whole. And painting was the only thing that brought her back to reality.

“Coco? Why did you quit?”

“I wanted to focus on Flynn. He needs a mother to be there for him,” she said, incapable of putting her real feelings into words.

“He needs a mother to provide for him! How on earth are you going to manage now that you’ve quit? And if his father won’t even pay?”

“I’ll find another job,” Coco said through gritted teeth, looking out the window.

“Of course. They’re all just lining up waiting for a single mother who’s just quit her job because she felt like it,” her mother muttered in the back.

“Grandma, can we play hide-and-seek?”

“It’s a bit cramped in her, love. But we can go to the playground around the corner. I used to take your mother there sometimes when she was small.”

Yes, it definitely started well. Just like any other mother-daughter reunion.

After Saskia and Flynn went outside, Coco sunk onto one of the benches, a tear rolling down her cheek. How could she ever have trusted that guy? She’d thought Adrian might propose soon. Let her take care of their kid while he took care of the finances. But maybe she should have seen this coming. He’d never really wanted a kid.

For a while, it had been fine. They’d had all their ducks in a row; his career was taking off. But maybe he wasn’t being promoted as fast as he’d expected. Coco had become a nuisance with a baby, both of whom he had to take care of when what he really wanted was to get drunk with his mates and stumble home late at night. Eventually, of course, he’d done just that. Flynn at least had been going to creche at that point. Coco had found her footing again at the job she’d taken a break from after giving birth. But then, how dare she, she’d uttered a dream of her own. Adrian had always ridiculed her painting, but that didn’t matter because he didn’t understand art like her, anyway. He hadn’t taken her seriously. Not until she waited up for him to stumble in at one in the morning and brightly tell him she’d quit her job that day. He’d gone ballistic. Told her it was over. He never wanted to see her or Flynn again.

That had been last night. She’d waited until Adrian passed out on the couch before going to bed. Then pretended to be asleep when he stumbled through the kitchen in the morning, trying to locate the coffee machine while barely awake and late yet again. After he’d left, she’d called her mother, packed the bags in haste, afraid he’d return, and taken Flynn straight to the motorhome.

Now Coco stood up, angrily wiping her cheeks, and grabbed a bag full of shoes. No more thinking about Adrian. She needed to do something.

A lone tear slid down her cheek when she shoved her heels into one of the cupboards. Well, maybe it wasn’t a tear this time, but she did feel a tug in her heart. Those were her HEELS. She loved them more than anything. And now she had no use because there were dogs and a kid and mud outside the motorhome.

But for Saskia, at least, that was perfect. Less perfect was the mother-daughter relationship they now had to fix. Of course, she’d had no way of saying no that morning. Or maybe she’d just tried ignoring that voice in her head that was screaming how little she got along with her daughter, and how the hell she’d manage living in such close quarters when they couldn’t even get along without contact.

Or maybe she hadn’t ignored that voice in her head. Maybe Luc had just convinced her everything would be JUST FINE. Maybe that was the problem. It would have all gone JUST FINE, if he hadn’t up and died on her. Bastard. Not that it helped to be angry at someone who couldn’t argue back, and who hadn’t chosen to die after his only daughter hit twenty. But it was easier than the grief that constantly threatened to consume her.

Saskia clenched her fists as she watched Flynn run from the monkey bars to join another kid on the slide. At least she could finally get to know her grandson. Coco would get back together with Adrian soon, right? Saskia still couldn’t believe how on earth her daughter was twenty-five years old and still had none other than her mother to call once things got tough with the boyfriend Saskia had to tickle out of her she even had three years ago. Shortly after that conversation, Coco had announced to her she was pregnant. A fact she’d thought Saskia might need to know in the future.

Saskia stood up abruptly. They’d turn their relationship around. Put all the cards on the table and manage to finally make this mother-daughter thing work. She called Flynn five times before he heard and came bouncing back over. Together, they made their way back to the motorhome.

It was coming on fifteen years now. Saskia wished she could say it was finally showing, but to be fair, it had been showing for the past ten years at least. Every holiday they’d been on included a call to the ADAC or a stop at the Fiat garage. The black stripes along the back were fading and Saskia reminded herself yet again that she should really give this thing a make-over. The dirt was already beginning to replace the paint. And she wasn’t even sure the motor still worked.

Inside, Coco was furiously typing away on her phone when her mother opened the door.

Saskia picked Flynn off the ground and sat him inside. “Is that Adrian?” she asked, never one to hold her tongue. She pulled the muddy shoes off Flynn’s feet.

“No.” Coco switched off her phone and threw it onto the seat next to her. She crossed her arms in front of her chest. Then she sighed. She had to at least try to get along with her mother so long as they were tied to the same place. “I asked Leah whether she talked to him today,” she offered. “She’s a friend of mine. And they work together.”

“He hasn’t been in contact?”

Coco shook her head. “He won’t be.”

“Don’t be so dramatic. Of course he will. He can’t just kick you and his son out with nowhere to live and no job. No one does that.” Saskia ruffled Flynn’s hair, clearly hoping he was as lost in the book he’d found on the floor as he appeared to be.

“Adrian does.”

“So what did Leah say?”

“She hasn’t talked to him. Said he seemed in a shitty mood, so she didn’t really bother. And anyway, she doesn’t know about us. I just told her we’d had a bit of a fight, but nothing to worry about.”

“So? Are you worried about it?”

Coco shrugged, looking at her feet. “Worried he kicked me out for real? No. Worried he might want us back? Maybe.”

“So you guys won’t get back together?”

Coco shrugged again. This time she looked pointedly at Flynn. He was coming in handy as an excuse to end the conversation. She did want to be open with her mother. They really needed to be more honest if this living arrangement, for however long, was going to work. But how was she supposed to explain how she felt, if she didn’t even know how she felt? Leah had tried pushing her too just now, trying to get the gossip on what was up between the two of them. Their fight had probably already spread like wildfire around Adrian’s office. At least she didn’t have to deal with those consequences.

But Coco didn’t know how to answer all the questions. She felt numb, as though someone had stepped on her head. Not that she knew what that felt like. But it felt like she imagined it would feel like. Maybe tomorrow she could have a calm conversation with her mum. Apply for a new job. God, how she hated even thinking about being in an office again.

Coco was an artist. An artist that wasn’t being paid because she wasn’t selling any paintings. But her paintings were good, damnit. Someone somewhere had to see that, right? She’d just have to strut around Leipzig until someone noticed what a genius she was. And they’d fall to their knees and shower her with money, and she could finally move out of the motorhome. Something like that anyway. She really just wanted the last part. She wasn’t even sure her paintings were any good at all. Sometimes she hated them. But she couldn’t stop painting. And the only way she could continue was if someone paid her for it. So she had no choice but to believe in herself.

And what was the alternative? Get another of those office jobs that sucked the life out of her and tossed her empty shell in the corner? That was hardly what a providing single mother was supposed to be like. Flynn would go crazy, left to his own devices.

No, she wouldn’t look for a job just yet. She’d make her dream reality. Just like she’d told Adrian she would. She didn’t even want to imagine how hard he’d laugh if he heard she’d had to get a job again without even trying to make it as an artist. There was no way she was going to prove him right.

Saskia dropped the conversation, knowing full well that this wasn’t anything Flynn should be caught between. As he climbed inside, her phone rang in her purse. She grabbed it and pretended to look apologetic as she half-closed the door of the motorhome and answered it.

“Where are you?”

She bit her lip. Crap. “I’ll be there in a minute. Something came up.”

“Something?” Saskia heard the rolling of Nika’s eyes through the phone. Fair enough. It wasn’t the first time she’d forgotten about their bi-weekly meeting.

“Someone. My daughter. Coco called out of the blue, needing a place to stay with Flynn.”

“Oh shit. Fight with her boyfriend? That guy was always bad news.”

“You didn’t even know him.”

“Neither did you, but we looked into him, remember?”

Saskia did remember. They’d pieced together the puzzle one afternoon years ago. All the bits and pieces Coco had let drop when she’d talked to her. Plus, a lot of googling his name. It had been an interesting afternoon. Or rather, it had been fun laughing with someone and openly admitting what she really thought of this guy, instead of nodding her head in appreciation while grunting “mhm, seems nice, lovely… hair” or whatever the first thing that popped into her head had been. And Nika had done just the right amount of unfair judging of a guy she’d never met or seen or spoken to. Just because he was the boyfriend of her best friend’s daughter.

“So what happened? You can’t just leave me hanging here.”