Mother

Mother

They had quarreled, just as they had before. The mother was in tears. She was sad and distraught, and in need of connection. She was losing her daughter, as each day they grew further and further apart. 

     "I just want to help you dear, there's no need to push me away." said the mother. She reached out as if to hug her child, but the girl rejected it and backed away. She still wasn't content. "No, you listen! I'm a mom too! And I sure don't need mine telling me how to raise my own daughter!" yelled the girl. It's true, she had become a mother, but with no father for her child, and a mother she had never disagreed with the start of it all. They had quarreled, for as long as they could remember, and the mother hoped the birth of her grandchild could change that and save their relationship. Their love only became more distant when the girl's father had died. He was the rule of the house, and she would respond to him out of respect, unlike with her mother. This is how it had been for years, with each passing summer and winter, until he had died. Now it was only fights, and no conversation ended in smile. They had both shed a fair amount of tears through their conflicts, and both wanted to have a better relationship, but opposites never decided to attract. Maybe they never had a chance to. The mother was thirty-five, her daughter seventeen, and her daughter a new-born. They were young, and they never had a chance to make-up.

     "Here, if you think your way is always right, why don't you take her?! I'm going for a drive." said the daughter. "But what about her, what happens when she wakes up hungry?" "You deal with it, you'll know what to do. You always do." She began to cry and ran out the door. She had always been reckless, and her mother had hoped she would calm down with a child to bear, but that chance never came. She would die that night, car crash on a highway. It wasn't her fault, the other driver was drunk. The mother didn't care, she still thought it was reckless, not that the girl was driving, but that the mother had let this all happen. Her own carelessness, her stubbornness, her way of always believing she was right it what had killed her daughter. She'd never be able to get over overcome this loss, but she had a new duty as a grandmother. Maybe this was her chance to be the mother she wasn't ready to be before. She was determined to make sure that while her own daughter had died, this daughter would grow up and follow the right footsteps.
     Still would still manage thing her way, still believe she was always right, and stayed stubborn with her granddaughter. They would quarrel, all summer and winter, year after year, but hadn't she always?