The House That Built Me

Chapter 2

A couple days passed and Willa had a hard time shaking the farmhouse from her mind. She had trouble falling asleep, her mind never shutting off from imagining all the ways she could make that place home for her and Jack. She even made silly mistakes and mixed up orders at work, something she hadn't had issues with since she started out as a waitress several years ago. The very thought of the farmhouse wouldn't leave her alone. She had never in her life felt such a strong pull to a place she had never been and it kind of freaked her out. She decided she needed to take a little break from Zillow, refocus her energy on what was right in front of her for a while.

Unfortunately for her, what was right in front of her was the weekly Friday night dinner at her parents' house. Eating dinner as a family was a given in the Taylor household. Growing up, Willa wouldn't even be allowed to attend an event of any kind, even to hang out with friends, if family dinner hadn't yet happened. As long as Willa was living in that house, family dinners were non-negotiable, even though she hated it with every fiber of her being. After Willa became pregnant at nineteen and decided to move out on her own, she thought she was free at last of family dinners until the Important Holidays, like Easter, Thanksgiving and Christmas, came around. She should've known that her mother wouldn't be okay with that; she honestly didn't know why she expected anything different. After initially moving out, her mother called her every single day asking Willa to come eat dinner with her and her father. She knew her mother didn't actually want to spend quality time with her. She just wanted to keep tabs on Willa, make sure she wasn't doing anything else to embarrass the family. Willa obviously didn't want any part of this. Nineteen long years she had spent appeasing her parents and she was thrilled to finally have space from them. She tried ignoring her mother's calls, texts, you name it, but Edith Taylor was relentless. Willa knew her mother wouldn't stop until she got what she wanted, so they eventually came to a compromise. Willa would come over one night a week for dinner, on Friday's; however, Willa told herself that if her mother tried to mess with that arrangement in any way, there would be no more family dinners.

So every Friday night for eight years, Willa had begrudgingly taken Jack to see his grandparents and eat dinner together. She had always made a point to not arrive early and not stay very long once dinner was over. Thankfully when Jack started talking, especially once he started going to school, he would end up taking over much of the actual conversation with Edith and Frederick. They enjoyed hearing his witty way of sharing about his experiences, and Willa could quietly bide her time until she and Jack went home. It sounded bad, she knew, when she explained it all to Jenna once about how much she dreaded going each week, but she also knew that laying low and interacting with her parents the least amount possible would keep them from getting into arguments.

Arguments amongst the Taylor's were almost always inevitable. The day Willa decided she was going to talk back to her parents, she never stopped. In her eyes, it was better to speak up for how she felt and what she wanted instead of letting her parents, especially her mother, walk all over her and make her choices for her. Keeping up appearances so everyone thought the Taylor's were a perfect family wasn't worth it to Willa, even if it strained her relationship with them. Although, choosing to be a single mom and not involve her son's "birth father" certainly helped put a damper on their family image, much to her parents' dismay.

Ultimately, she stayed quiet during dinners now for Jack's sake. She didn't want him to grow up resenting his grandparents if he didn't need to. They always treated him right, their rapport with him so much gentler than it had been with Willa when she was a child. Despite the resentment she felt towards her parents for how she was raised, Willa kept her feelings to herself when Jack was around. Just because she didn't have a great relationship with them didn't mean he couldn't.

That evening, Willa barely had time to run her and Jack home from her shift at the diner to change clothes before going to her parents' house. Once she parked her old Rav-4 in the parking lot outside her apartment building and had Jack out of his booster seat, she grabbed his hand and said "Let's go buddy! We're almost running late for Grandma and Grandpa's." She hurried him along, rushing as fast as she could with a seven-year-old to hold on to, until they reached their apartment. Luckily, they lived on the first floor and didn't have to run up and down stairs when they were in a hurry to get somewhere.