Chapter 3

                                    

                                          
" The sunrise, of course, doesn't care if we watch it or not. It will keep on being beautiful, even if no one bothers to look at it."
                          
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Taylor 
                          
Taylor woke up with a headache the next morning and tried to remember how she got it. What the hell happened last night?  Did she drink too much? She glanced around and saw on the clock on the wall that it was 11 AM. It was insanely hot in the room. Summer finally started, apparently. July had been a relatively cold month, but as soon as August started, the temperatures had risen to 90 degrees. 
                          
Taylor hated warm weather. She wrestled herself out of the sweaty sheets and slid her thinnest bathrobe on. She headed out of her room and as soon as her eyes fell on Lilah's bedroom door, the events of last night came back to her. Lilah disappeared and I panicked and drank a lot. Then Lilah came back. Oh God, I met her birth mother. And then more alcohol, and crying, lots of crying... and—  Oh my God. Tom. 
                          
Taylor rushed toward her daughter's bedroom, almost dropping over her heels that were on the floor. Not a good sign either. She slammed the door open and breathed in relief when she saw Lilah sitting at her desk, drawing. 
                          
"Lilah," she mumbled, stumbling towards her daughter and pulling her into a hug. 
                          
"Mom! I'm sorry about last night," Lilah said, sitting straight up. "It was stupid, I shouldn't have done it."
                          
Taylor peppered her daughter's cheeks with kisses. She should be angry but she couldn't help herself. She knew Lilah didn't mean to hurt anyone. "No, you shouldn't have, but it's okay honey," she whispered in Lilah's dark curls. She broke the embrace and lingered behind her daughter, who had gone back to her drawing.
                          
"You— you understand that you can't contact that woman again, right?" Taylor said carefully, chewing on her bottom lip. "Just because she's your birth mother doesn't mean you're entitled to any contact with her, just like she's not entitled to any contact with you. She chose—" 
                          
"Yeah, yeah, she chose to give me up, I know," Lilah rolled her eyes. 
                          
"I'm sorry, sweetheart..." 
                          
Taylor didn't know what to say. She was scared that the tall woman who had been on her front porch last night would try to find a way into Lilah's life now she had met her. Lilah wasn't an impulsive child at all— her getting on that bus meant she had been thinking about this for a long time. Taylor knew Lilah wouldn't want to hurt her, but she had a feeling Lilah wouldn't give up so easily. She just didn't understand why Lilah wanted to get to know her birth mother— was it just curiosity or did she actually fall short of something in her life? Had Taylor failed to give her daughter everything she needed? 
                          
"I understand, Mom," Lilah smiled obligingly, sweet as she was. "By the way, Sheriff Tom just left and I think he slept here."
                          
Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. "Oh— okay," Taylor stammered. "Have you— Is he— I mean, uh, have you already eaten?"
                          
"No, not really. I thought, maybe we could go to Ed's?"
                          
Taylor sighed. "Li— I don't know."
                          
"Yeah, yeah, I know, you don't like eating out. But it's such a beautiful day, the weather is nice and I'm craving a cheeseburger. Please?"
                          
Lilah pouted and Taylor couldn't say no to that face. "Okay, but just this once."
                          
While she and her daughter made their way to the diner, Taylor tried to recall what exactly happened last night. The dialogue between her and Lilah's birth mother was very blurry and she had no memories of what happened afterward (thank God, since it possibly involved an one night stand with the douchy town sheriff). But one image that had remained on her mind despite the excessive alcohol consumption was the birth mother's face— her eyes were the exact same shade of green as Lilah's, but that wasn't the only thing that drew Taylor to the woman. It was her voice too, and that wary smile, and those cheekbones that looked as if they could cut something. Taylor remembered it all very clearly, and that concerned her.