Free Dunkin and Donuts by Daralyse Lyons Page B

my family is a good thing. I smile at his naiveté then jump in the shower. Nothing short of a miracle will keep my mother from criticizing my appearance, but I decide to at least make more of an effort than usual today.
    For Christ sakes, the woman may have cancer . Then, again, she does enjoy criticizing me more than anything else. It gives her life purpose. The Shayla project. Her daughter, the fixer-upper. Without me to jab at what would she do with herself? Perhaps, I should make less of an effort and give her plenty of material to work with—the more she can focus on what’s wrong with me, the less likely she’ll be to obsess about her own problems. But, my mother is an accomplished multi-tasker. Surely, she can obsess about me and herself simultaneously? I opt for the former approach—dressing with care, opting for a skirt instead of jeans and a pretty white camisole top that my mother bought for me.
    When I ring the doorbell, my mom flings open the door and gives me a once-over.
    “I’m not often wrong,” she says. “But, I was very wrong about that top. It doesn’t suit you at all. So unflattering. I always seem to forget about your boxy proportions. Oh, well, at least, for once, you’re not wearing those dreadful jeans. And your eyebrows are a lot less severe than they were the last time we saw you. Come on in. Where’s Dunkin? Please tell me you two haven’t split up.”
    “Hi, Mom.” I kiss her on the cheek. “He’s about five minutes behind me.”
    Then, my mother does something completely out of character. She wraps me up in her tiny little arms and holds me close to her. I swear, she actually inhales the scent of me, like a mother with a newborn baby.
    “I love you, Shayla sweetheart,” she says. “You really can be quite a lovely girl you know.”
    “I love you too, Mom.”
    As Dad rounds the corner and sees us hugging, he is understandably perplexed. Mom and I aren’t the most affectionate pair.
    “What’s this? Who’s dying?” He is joking, but my mother bristles and I feel her tensing in my arms.
    She lets go of me, shaking off his words, and whatever motherly impulses possessed her to hug me and says, “Can’t I be proud of Shayla? For once, our daughter doesn’t look like a hobo. Besides, she finally has a boyfriend.”
    As if on cue, Dunkin pulls into the driveway and gives a little hello honk. The three of us turn in tandem and wave at him. Dad puts an arm around my shoulder as I nestle into his neck.
    “How is my most beautiful daughter today?”
    “You mean your only daughter.”
    “That I know about.” He chuckles.
    I laugh a loud, unfeminine guffaw and my mother clucks disapprovingly at me. I can’t help it. The joke was funny. My dad is anything but a playa and the thought of him having any “baby momma dramas” is enough to set me convulsing with laughter. But, I bite back the impulse to cackle too obnoxiously. After all, my mother may be dying of cancer. I owe it to her to be more somber. With my luck, I’ll probably be one of those people who, overcome by grief and ill-equipped to deal with it, laughs at a funeral.
    “Hey,” Dunkin says as he arrives at my parents’ door.
    Snapping out of my reverie, I give him a kiss hello, my dad shakes his hand, and Mom does some antiquated European thing which involves a hug and air kisses.
    “Oh, Dunkin, don’t you look handsome,” she coos.
    He does indeed, in a pair of stonewashed jeans and black button-down shirt. She whisks him away—presumably back toward the dining room to parade him around to my brothers and their fiancées.
    “So,” Dad says. “There’s something up with your mother. Care to tell me what it is?”
    “What makes you think I know?”
    “Because you knew about the abortion,” he says.
    “ You knew about that?” I ask incredulously. About eight or nine months ago, my mother confided in me that she had accidentally gotten pregnant and gotten an abortion. She’d sworn me to secrecy at