It's the Tear When She Cries

{1979}

"Mom?" Robin set her bag down on the dinning room table. "Mom?"

The TV was off in the living room. That stupid fish clock ticked it's tail behind Robin.

"Mom?"

Still no awnser.

Robin checked the living room and the den. Then the bathroom and all three bedrooms.

Her mom was nowhere.

In the kitchen, Robin went to grab a soda, when something on the refrigerator door caught her eye. It was a note in her mother's handwriting.

At first, Robin thought her mom had left to go to the store or something, but the note was longer than that, a full page of slanted cursive handwriting.

Dear John, Robin, and Ryan,

I wanted very much to make this work. I wanted to be a wife, to be a good mother. I used to be, once upon a time. Remember, Robin? Sometimes i wonder what ever happened to that woman.

You guys take care of yourself without me.

These past few years, Iv'e felt like an impostor in my own home. I don't feel like i belong here, and i don't know why. I don't know how to fix that.

Sometimes i think you're better off without me anyway. Remember that i love you.

Mom.

Robin gritted her teeth as she stared at the note tacked up on the refrigerator door with a plastic pineapple magnet as if it were a grocery list or something less important.

Tears blurred her vision, and she clenched her jaw harder.

Her mother left? For good?

Just like that?

Robin grabbed the telephone and dialed the number to reach her mother's office.

"This is Anita. Leave a message."

"Mom! How could you!" Robin screamed into the phone.

Robin slammed the phone against the receiver, the sobs taking over.

"Just, could you sit down for a second?" Ryan said, resting a hand gently against Robin's shoulder. Robin was only a year younger than her brother, Ryan, but she felt like Ryan was naive. How could he not be upset? Their mother had abandoned them! Did he not understand the impact this event would have on their family?

She whirled on him. "I don't want to sit down!"

He pulled back, put his hands up. "All right."

It'd been two hours since Robin came home and found her Mother's note. Since then, Robin had called her Mom's office six more times and gotten the machine.

And when her dad came home and read the note, instead of going into a rage he just nodded his head and disappeared into the den.

Robin hadn't seen him since.

What the hell was wrong with her parents? Were they aliens? Incapable of feeling emotion? Why wasn't her brother in tears? Why wasn't her dad angry? Why wasn't he slamming doors and throwing things? A normal husband would be stomping around the house in rage, but no, Robin's dad was probably in the den doodling pictures of Muskrats.

And her Mother...

Did she not care about her family? Had she not considered what leaving would do to them? She apparently didn't love her family enough to stick around.

When Robin was in elementary school, her mother was her hero. She wanted to spend every waking moment with her. And now, Robin could feel the distance widening.

"Robin?" Ryan said, taking his sisters hand in his. "Are you going to be okay?"

She shook her head, kept her eyes squeezed, tightly shut. "Just go," she muttered.

His hand slipped away. He walked to the door. "If you need me, I'll be at Tod's."

"Fine," She managed to say as his footsteps faded down the hallway.