Read Online I Hope You Dance by Beth Moran - Free Book Online

sneaky pastor’s wife had phoned Mum.
    I had been standing wrapped in a towel following a long shower when my bedroom door crashed open.
    â€œSeriously, Mum?”
    â€œSorry, Ruth. But I am too exasperated for formalities like privacy. I am reaching near dangerous levels of frustration and bewilderment. How can someone so impressively intelligent make such consistently stupid decisions?”
    I sighed. “Lois called.”
    â€œYES, LOIS CALLED!”
    â€œI can run my own life, Mum. Please back off before I flip out and stab you in your sleep one night with your Harrods letter opener. I’m somewhat unstable at the moment.”
    â€œPrecisely. You are all inside out and twisted up and out of time. You need help. Get dressed in your least hideous outfit, brush your hair and go and make some friends.”
    â€œJust stop it! Didn’t you hear me? I spent all afternoon doingwhat you wanted, making friends with Lois, talking to people. I am really tired. I’m having something to eat and then reading a book in bed.”
    Mum pointed her elegant finger at me. “You are not tired, my darling. You are bored, and lonely, and lost. No one can live without friends. You in particular need them to heal, and to grow, and to find yourself again. These women are good women. They will be those kinds of friends.”
    â€œI have friends.”
    â€œNo, you do not. You know what a true friend is, and that zero plus zero equals no friends.”
    â€œThat is rubbish! You have no idea who my friends were in Liverpool.” I grabbed another towel and started rubbing at my hair with it.
    â€œName one.”
    â€œLouisa.” I threw the towel on my bed and instead turned on my hairdryer to maximum power.
    â€œWork colleague.” Mum, refusing to take the hint, shouted over the noise.
    â€œSo? I can be friends with my colleagues. What about Susanna?” I gestured the appliance wildly.
    â€œHow often did you see them out of the office?”
    â€œAt least once a month.” So there , I muttered in my head.
    â€œAt a non-work-related do?” She reached down and flicked the dryer off at the socket. Silence.
    â€œHow many times have they texted since you left work? Phoned? Offered to help pack, dropped by with flowers or a box of chocolates to cheer you up, politely hinted that you need a haircut or given you a hug?” She banged her fist into my bedroom door, her point well and truly proven. “It is a horrible, heart-wrenching fact, but is still a true one. You have no friends, Ruth. And by golly how you need some!”
    One day, someday, hopefully before my hair is completely grey and I have lost the majority of my marbles, I will finally surrenderto the truth that my strange mother is always – one hundred per cent of the time – right. I hate it. But I love her. I got dressed in my least embarrassing clothes, brushed my hair and went.
    Â 
    Lois opened the front door. “Stop lingering on the doorstep, Ruth. I’m paranoid you’re judging the state of my garden.” She gestured behind her. “Come through – we’re in the back.”
    Lois led me through the house, past discarded transformer toys, piles of folded laundry and the reams of paraphernalia that affix themselves like barnacles to large families. The dining room contained a formal oak table barely visible underneath piles of papers, books, a dismantled computer and more clothes. At the far end a pair of French doors opened up onto a flagstone patio. Here stood another wooden table, this time laden with a Chinese take-away feast set around two silver candelabras. The rest of the garden consisted of a huge lawn, with a football goal at one end, an enormous tree with a tree house, a trampoline and a swing. Nearer to the patio was a sand pit, a saggy looking paddling pool and more of life’s clutter.
    Around the table sat four other women. I recognized one, Ana Luisa, the