Elena's phone buzzed halfway through dessert, an unfamiliar number, no name attached. She almost let it go to voicemail, except something about the timing, Thanksgiving evening, a number she didn't recognize, made her step away from the noise of the dining room and answer it in the relative quiet of the hallway.
"Hello?"
Silence on the other end, just long enough that she almost hung up, before a voice she hadn't heard in over a year spoke, careful and hesitant.
"Elena. It's your mom."
Her stomach dropped. She hadn't spoken to her mother in fourteen months, not since the last conversation had ended the way most of their conversations ended, in careful, controlled distance neither of them knew how to bridge.
"Mom." She kept her voice low, aware of the laughter and clattering dishes jus
