All Grown Up(67)

I shook my head. “It’s different, but not weird. He actually was out a few weeks ago to get an estimate on some work we need done at the house.”

“How’d that go?”

I smiled. “About as well as the last few years we were together. He said something that pissed me off, and I told him to get out.”

Ryan laughed. “He’s been calling me a lot lately.”

In my head, I thought, Of course he is. His toddler girlfriend moved to India, so he finally has some time to pay attention to his son. Ryan couldn’t possibly have time for two teenagers in his busy life.

But I swallowed my real thoughts and went with something supportive. “That’s good. I’m glad you two are making more of an effort to stay connected.”

He shrugged. “How would you feel toward Tom if he cheated on Eve?”

I knew what he was getting at. “I adore Tom. But I’d always be on Eve’s side, of course. Then again, Tom isn’t my father.”

He wrinkled up his napkin and tossed it on his empty plate. “He’s not seeing her anymore.”

I nodded. “I know. He told me.”

“Is…there any way you’d ever forgive him?”

Oh God. He might look like a grown man, but inside he was still my little boy who hated to see his parents broken up.

“You know what? I sort of have forgiven him. At least I’m moving on from it. I’m not going to lie, your father and I splitting up was hard on me. I think you know that. But now that I’m on the other side of it, I realize we would have wound up here no matter what. We were kids when we got married, and I have no regrets about the decisions I made because I got you out of it, and your father and I…we had some good years. But we grew apart as we grew up, and neither of us was happy for a long time. I blamed it on what he’d done, because it was easier at the time. But our relationship was in trouble long before he did what he did. In fact, the poor state of our marriage is probably one of the main reasons he turned to someone else.”

My son looked down. “I get it. It was stupid for me to even ask.”

I reached out and took his hand. “No, it wasn’t. It’s perfectly normal for a child to want his parents to be happily married.”

Ryan nodded. “That reminds me. What should I have said to Bella about her parents? I wasn’t sure if I should say anything, so I didn’t.”

“I think you can just give your condolences if you see her again. She talks about them a lot, and she’s okay with people mentioning it.”

“Crazy that she lost them both.” He shook his head. “And I’m sitting here selfishly asking if you and Dad might get back together. Puts things into perspective.”

“Yeah. But she seems do be doing well.”

My son smirked. “She looks well.”

I wrinkled my nose. My son assumed it was a general icky feeling a mom might get about her son checking out a girl.

He chuckled. “Yeah. Pretty sure my face would be the same if you were telling me some guy was hot.”

I winced inwardly. Pretty sure your face would be worse if I told you the guy I thought was hot was the brother of the girl you thought was hot.

***

That evening, I still hadn’t heard from Ford, and my text wasn’t showing as delivered yet. I was getting worried and reached out to Bella, albeit under false pretenses.

I knocked next door and she appeared in her uniform. “Hey.”

“Hey, Bella. Have you heard from your brother? Umm…I wanted to ask him to look at my sink again. He fixed it for me at the beginning of the summer.”

“Yeah. He’s in his room. Passed out, I think.”

I failed at hiding my surprise. “He’s home?”

She scooped her car keys off the kitchen counter. “Got home about an hour ago. Bombed off his ass. He was swaying. I’m surprised he made it up the stairs. I have to get to work, but feel free to wake him up. Although, I doubt he’s in a condition to fix anything.”

“Ummm. Okay. Thanks. Maybe I’ll just check on him and make sure he’s okay.”

She smiled. “Such a mom.”

I waited downstairs until she got into her car and pulled out of the driveway, and then I went up to Ford’s bedroom. Sure enough, he was out cold. Face down, his arms and legs splayed wide across the bed, he held his cell phone in one of his hands.

I walked over and whispered, “Ford?”

He didn’t budge so I slipped the cell from his hand and pressed the side button. Dead. Well, at least that made me feel better about why he hadn’t called. I walked over to the end table and plugged it in for him, then sat down on the edge of the bed and watched him sleep.

“Bad day, sweetheart?” I brushed a piece of his hair from his face. “You’ve been quiet since you went to Chicago. Probably hard to visit the building you and your dad worked on together, huh? A lot of memories.”

Of course he didn’t answer. After watching him sleep for a little bit, I took off his shoes, got a bottle of water and a couple of Tylenol from the bathroom, and left his hangover helper at his bedside.

I leaned down and kissed his cheek gently. I felt a tightening in my chest as I realized in a few days I wouldn’t be seeing him anymore. God, I’m not ready for this to be over.