Games of the Heart (The 'Burg #4)(146)
“Maybe, Rees, but I think you get that wouldn’t be fun for anybody,” No stated and he was right about that.
“No, what I get is that Mom is Mom and since you’re gonna be seventeen and all you can tell her to take a flying leap,” Rees returned.
“What’s goin’ on?” Mike asked and I looked to the hall to see him striding down it.
Layla took off his way.
Rees whirled to her Dad and instantly filled him in. “No’s decided that on his birthday next week, he’s goin’ out with his crew. This is because Mom has decided since Dusty’s here she’s gonna stick her nose in and she told No she wants to go out to dinner with us.”
I watched in fascination as Mike’s jaw got tight and a muscle jumped in his cheek. His eyes were unhappy. The whole thing was hot. It was also scary.
I moved to Fin and grabbed his forearm, starting, “We’ll just –”
Mike’s eyes sliced to me. “Don’t move,” he growled.
I stopped and dropped Fin’s arm, muttering, “Okey dokey.”
I didn’t do this because I was a wuss or anything. I did this because Mike’s demand we stay where we were had meaning. I suspected this meaning meant Fin and I were family, or at least I was, and during family discussions I didn’t absent myself.
Mike looked at his kids. “No, birthdays are family times.”
There it was. I was right.
Mike kept talking. “We’re doin’ what we always do. Goin’ out with family. That means you, your sister, her boyfriend, my woman, her friends who are visitin’ next week and me. You got a girl you wanna bring, you bring her. I get that you’d be conflicted. You love your Mom, you’re tryin’ to do right by Dusty. But your mother made a decision four years ago, she was invited to your birthday dinners and she refused to come. She doesn’t get to change her mind now. We’ve all moved on. You wanna be with your crew; you do it on the weekend. Your Mom wants to do something special with you; she finds her time to do that. When you’re out of high school and movin’ on, you can do what you want. We got a year and a half to be a family. We’re gonna take it.”
It was No’s turn for his jaw to go tight and a muscle to jump in his cheek and seeing it I got even more pissed at Audrey. No was an easygoing kid. He joked a lot, smiled a lot, teased a lot, laughed a lot. But it was clear he didn’t want to tell his Mom she wasn’t invited to his birthday dinner and that wasn’t on him. That was on Audrey.
She was such a cow.
Mike saw his son’s face and read it instantly. “I’ll speak with her,” he declared then swept the room with his eyes, stating, “No, Rees, in the kitchen. Dusty, Fin and I have had long days and we need dinner. You’re cookin’ it together.”
Seeing as the unhappy vibes were not gone, I wondered about this decision but I didn’t say anything since they weren’t my kids.
What I did do was follow Mike after he muttered, “I’m goin’ upstairs to change.”
Layla was at his heels, I was not far behind.
I hit the bedroom to see Mike throwing his blazer on the bed and he had his phone in his hand. His attention was to it and my attention was on my clothes all over the floor. I made a mental note to pick them up (eventually), when I heard him beeping buttons on his phone.
I closed him, Layla and me in by shutting the double doors as Mike turned to me and put the phone to his ear.
One look in his eyes and I knew he was not happy as in, at all.
“Audrey? Yeah, Mike,” he said into his phone. “I’m callin’ about No’s birthday.”
Oh boy, he was growling.
Mike went on growling, “No’s explained you’ve expressed the desire to go with us. It hasn’t escaped my notice that you’ve been makin’ an effort lately with the kids. No’s been tellin’ me their weekends with you are goin’ better and I appreciate your interest in Rees’s situation, emailin’ me schools you’ve looked into. You probably got it from the kids but should hear it from me that Dusty moved in on Friday. You understand I’ve moved on, you’ve said so yourself. Both the kids are tight with Dusty, we’re buildin’ somethin’ here, it’s good and Dusty and I are committed to keepin’ it good and makin’ it better. If you wanted us to have a different kind of separation and divorce, you could have made that decision any time in the last four years. You didn’t. Now it’s too late. You won’t be goin’ to dinner with us for No’s birthday.”
Mike paused, she might have said something but whatever it was didn’t take very long or Mike cut her off because he kept talking.
“If you’re learnin’ about yourself and tryin’ to be a better Mom, I suggest you take No and Reesee and do somethin’ special with them another time. I’ll also take this opportunity to make it clear that whatever you’re attemptin’ to do, it does not involve me or my time or the life I share with our children. As I’m sure you haven’t forgotten, I’ve extended that opportunity to you more than once the last four years and you refused to take advantage of it. I would have preferred that we get along and offer some family cohesiveness to our kids but you repeatedly declined. That offer is no longer open to you. So what I’m sayin’ to you is, I got home and Rees and No were fightin’ and upset because of this shit. And what I’m tellin’ you is, whatever you’re doin’, you need to think about the way it’ll affect our kids because they’re good kids. They care about all the players in this situation and they don’t want anyone hurt. To get wherever you wanna be in your life and with them, don’t make them anxious, upset, force them to play games or to make difficult decisions where someone will have to eat shit. Because in that kind of scenario, the people eatin’ shit will be our kids. And I’ll not have that. Are we clear?”