Moms are selfish like that

My mother grew up in a time when connection was optional. She had a computer that could be slipped into a pocket. It was possible to lose and had to be charged regularly. Archaic.
Connection is breathing to me. But my mom will go days without connection. She looks so peaceful. My peace is connection.
It frustrates me.
She’s so oblivious, so uninformed. I have to explain everything.
“I don’t understand you.”
“I don’t understand you either. I wasn’t born into connection like you were. It was new. Exciting. And dangerous. My generation learned to hold it at arms-length. Often we needed to put it away for our own health.”
“That’s weird.”
“You’re weird.”
“I’m normal!”
“You will be normal.”

She told me something that I found distressing when I was young.
“Everyone lies a little.”
“Not everyone.”
“I’m not talking about malicious lies. When connected people only share their best… they imagine what they’d like to be and believe along with everyone else that they are that ideal —— ”
“Oh, so only unconnected interactions are truthful. Surprise, surprise.”
She laughs.
“Definitely not! We’re always doing this. Hiding things, tricking others, tricking ourselves. Most lies are unconscious. I lie to you all the time.”
I did not like that. The thought that Mom would lie to me.
“Hey, I’d never lie to you intentionally.”
I nod.
“If you ever don’t trust me, say so, and we’ll talk it through. Okay?”
“Okay.”

We are running through the hangar. I clutch an overstuffed backpack. My mom clutches my hand, nearly drags me. She wears her fatigues and stripes.
“Where are we going.”
“You’re getting on that Osprey.”
“I am?”
“I’ll be on the next one.”
I jerk my hand out her’s.
“No!”
She stops with me.
“We don’t have time!”
“I don’t trust you!”
“Ma’am, we need to takeoff now.”
She removes the connection tab from behind her ear.
“There’s no time right now. I’ll explain later. I will. Please, baby, I need you to trust me.”
Her words are so calm. But I see. I see how wide her eyes are. I see the liquid bunching up on her lower eyelids, quivering on the precipice.
“Okay.”
“Okay.”

As we fly away, I see her sprinting back to the command center. Seventeen minutes later I watch as the base is destroyed by ordinance dropped from a combat satellite. Mom wasn’t on the next one.

I am taken to a ship far from the fighting. It’s filled with orphans, widows, and widowers. I stay in my bunk. Silent, without connection.
A woman brings me food I do not eat. She talks, but I do not listen. Then finally, one day, it bursts out.
“She betrayed me.”
“Who.”
“My mother. She said she’d never lie to me. I wanted to stay. I wanted to stay and she lied.”
“... I assume your mom couldn’t bear the thought of you not growing up into the woman she imagined in her head. She couldn't let go of that.”
“She never asked what I wanted.”
“Yeah, moms are selfish like that.”
“I hate her.”

That is my little lie.