I beg your pardon I never promised you a rose garden

 

Carol had heard enough out of Tyra wanting her to retire. She couldn't. Not right now. Especially, with the husband home.

No way did she want to let her daughters know how hard it was getting used to this truckdriver at home.  They might as well have been in quiet divorce mode. Now this didn't mean they'd actually get a divorce. They were cheap, and she did need his insurance even if she was already on Medicare. She needed to work to pay for it. Besides, they were nice to each other, even if she was very tired of his jokes that were never funny to begin with.

"Things are fine at the coffee shop." Wasn't like she was there every day, but if she wasn't a cashier, she was mending ways with the cook and his girl (who was supposed to be the manager while Millie was having morning sickness). But even the manager needed a day or two away from the Coffee Shop.

"We're just lucky your sister is going to give us a grandchild." Carol let slip. She didn't mean to put Tyra down, but she felt the girl was a little selfish. Deep down, it was a dream that Tyra and her significant other would start a family, but she knew it wouldn't happen, even in those dreams where she imagined having a baby for them.

Why was it that she was always having to take care of the baby in those dreams? Hell if she knew what these dreams meant.

Carol didn't apologize to Tyra. She meant to, but she couldn't. It felt to her these days she was being treated like the misled teenager, and Tyra was her overbearing mother. Still, the conversation kept her up at night. Tyra came back with nothing, and the flowers she had given her for Mother's Day were dying in the kitchen. It would have been nice to have gotten a gift card from Amazon or even Walmart, but she'd never suggest it.

Perhaps she was the worst mother. She couldn't think of their good times at the moment. She felt she was slumming in this old house that she knew he'd never think of leaving. He had too much junk that he couldn't live without. After a while, Carol had made it a competition. She got her own stuffies. Even rescued a few from thrifting. There was a whole room of them now. She took over Millie's room before her husband could.

What was Tyra expecting if she retired? Bedazzling her wardrobe.