Hold On (The 'Burg #6)(52)

“Well…” I didn’t know where to begin.

When I didn’t speak further, my kid looked more curious, so I threw it out there.

“I had a not-so-happy chat with your dad not too long ago.”

Ethan’s eyes got big.

I kept giving it to him.

“I didn’t like what he said a whole lot, so I’m thinkin’ on things with him and Peggy. I know you like to spend time with them, but I’m gonna have to ask that you just talk to them on the phone for a while until your dad and me figure this out.”

“What’d he say?”

Shit.

Here we go.

Okay, he wanted to be grown up? I had to let him.

Starting now.

See? The suckage of my life never ended.

I turned fully to him, lifting a bent leg and putting it up on the couch. “Okay, he said that he and Peggy wanna see you more and that kinda freaked me. But when I told him we’d talk about it after I had some time to think about it, he said other things that weren’t real nice. Peggy wants you livin’ with them full-time, and obviously, I don’t want that. So your dad and me are gonna have to figure out some common ground while Peggy sorts her head out, because she’s not gonna get what she wants.”

There were not many reactions I would have guessed my son would have outside of being pissed this went down.

And I was right.

“Live with them all the time?” he asked, his cheeks getting red and his eyes starting to fire.

“That’s not gonna happen,” I promised firmly. “She just—”

“No, it’s not gonna happen,” he snapped, jumped off the couch and cried, “That’s crazy!”

“Ethan, kid, calm down, honey,” I said gently. “It’s not happening. You’re right. Okay?”

He leaned toward me and yelled, “That’s whacked!”

“Kid—”

He didn’t calm down.

He asked, “So, like, they wanna take me away from you and Gramma and…you?”

“Ethan, it’s not gonna happen,” I assured.

He stared at me.

“Baby, sit down, okay?” I asked gently. “We’re good. This is fine. You know I wouldn’t let anything happen to you that you don’t want. It’s gonna be okay. I’m just tellin’ my little man what’s been goin’ down. Now I need you to cool it and talk it through with me.”

He drew in a breath so big, his chest puffed up with it.

Then he sat down, eyes to the TV, and I gave him time.

Eventually, he looked at me.

“You know, I like him,” he said. “Dad. He’s okay. He can be funny. She’s, like, a really good cook. Tobias and Mary are all cute and do stupid stuff all the time that’s funny. But he’s, like…not Colt. Especially with Peggy. Do you know what I mean?”

Did I ever.

“He’s not Merry either,” Ethan went on. “But in a different way because I never saw Merry with a chick. But, you know, Merry’s funny funny, like he doesn’t try. And Dad’s weird funny because you can tell he’s tryin’. But the Colt stuff, it’s, you know, you can tell Peggy totally calls the shots. It’s weird and a little freaky. I mean, it should be like Colt and Feb or, you know, like Mike and Dusty. Like, he’s the dude and he’s a real dude, but he doesn’t walk all over her and she sure doesn’t walk all over him.” He focused intently on me. “Do you know what I mean?”

“I know what you mean,” I confirmed.

“It isn’t like I don’t like ’em. It’s just weird,” he told me.

“Yeah, I bet,” I agreed.

“But if I had a choice to be around a dude and his chick, it seems more right, the way it should be, bein’ around Colt and Feb or, you know, like, Cal and Vi. Even if Cal is totally badass, Vi still doesn’t let him walk all over her. Dad and Peggy, it’s just…” He shook his head. “Freaky.”

I loved this. I loved all of it, even Ethan laying it out that I needed to look after myself. I loved it so completely, it made me want to get up and shout at the top of my lungs.

I wanted to do that because this one conversation proved that somehow, against the odds, those odds mostly created by me, I’d still managed to raise my son right.

“This is good,” he declared. “I could use a break. Dad asked if I wanted to spend next weekend with them and I was kinda wishin’ I could say no. I’m gonna say no.”

Well, that was a big honkin’ relief.

“Okay, Ethan, I’m glad this works for you, because if you say no, he’ll eventually come to me and then I’m gonna say no for you for a while. Are you good with that?” I asked.

He looked intently at me. “Yeah. And you want, you can tell them I don’t wanna spend more time there and definitely I don’t wanna live with them. He can’t, like, walk into my life when I’m almost grown up and do stuff like that.” He cocked his head and kept talking while studying me, offering, “If you don’t wanna say that to him, I will.”

“How about you keep things cool between you and your dad and let me do the talking for now? That work for you?”

He nodded but said, “If I gotta say it, Mom, I will.”