Soaring (Magdalene #2)(133)

“Shut it, Charles!”

At that, knowing with brief but alarming experience it was time to take action, I stopped thinking about Lawrie, Robin, Mickey and Thanksgiving and rushed to the lounge.

* * * * *

“It’s all right.”

That came from Auden.

“I think it’s the bomb. Get it, Mom.”

That came from Olympia.

We were in the back den, gathered around the PC and I was showing them the dining room table I was considering purchasing from the New Hampshire furniture company.

When they replied to my email, I found they had a small showroom but none of those pieces, although lovely, were big enough for the space I had. And the one I’d seen on their site had been purchased and was unavailable.

Mostly, however, they did custom designs and builds and the one we were viewing was a build that the people who ordered it had reneged on.

If I wanted it, it would be all mine.

“It works. It’s perfect,” Pippa went on. “And you need to get something. Uncle Lawrie is coming and Thanksgiving is just around the corner.”

I had time but my girl was right. We weren’t going to eat Thanksgiving dinner sitting on the sectional.

“Okay, I’ll get it,” I decided.

“Great. Can I stop looking at furniture now?” Auden asked.

He wasn’t in a surly mood. He was just a boy who didn’t give a fig about dining room tables.

“No,” Pippa answered for me. “We need to look at couches. And Mom, you need to get hopping on the other guest bedroom and get a pullout for in here so Hart and Mercer don’t have to share a room.”

I was looking at her, thinking she was right. I had the desk and chair but there was vast amounts of space in that room that needed filling and the whole room needed decorating.

However, when she quit talking, I reminded her, “Sweets, I explained the boys might not be coming.”

“If they have a choice between Uncle Lawrie and Aunt Frosty, they’ll so be here,” she returned.

My kids called my brother’s wife “Aunt Frosty.”

It was funny.

But it wasn’t nice.

“Aunt Frosty isn’t nice,” I rebuked gently.

She didn’t look contrite. “It isn’t but it’s real.”

I couldn’t argue that.

I still didn’t want my daughter being mean.

“Sometimes we should be careful about calling them as we see them,” I advised. “And especially when Lawr, or if the boys, come. They may be at the beginning of going through something you know from experience is unpleasant, so let’s help them do that better than we got through it, shall we?”

That was when she looked contrite, licked her lips and rolled them together.

“I care less about the guest bedroom, couches and pullouts,” Auden put in. “So now can I stop looking at furniture?”

I rolled my chair slightly back so both kids, gathered around me, moved back too.

After I did this, I said, “Actually, I need you for another little bit to talk to you about something.”

They both donned expressions of wary.

I ignored that and launched in.

“A while ago, we had a discussion about me dating.”

“Yeah, and now you’re dating some Neanderthal,” Pippa declared. “We know.”

My back went straight as I fought a quick retort and instead asked, “How do you know?”

“Dad told us,” Auden answered and my eyes looked to him to see his expression was now carefully blank. “Said we should know in case we see you two in town.”

“And your father called Mickey a Neanderthal?” I queried, my voice thin.

Pippa looked out the window.

Auden shifted but held my gaze and said, “Yeah.”

I fought the itch that was covering every inch of my skin, screaming to get scratched, me doing that meaning I marched to my car, got in it, drove to Conrad’s and shrieked at him for being such a huge…f*cking…dick.

But that was the me he made me.

Now I was just me and he was not going to push me into going back.

“Mickey isn’t a Neanderthal,” I told them firmly. “Mickey is a good man who I’ve come to care about quite a bit. I enjoy spending time with him. He feels the same about me. This is something that we both feel is important and we’re both building on that. So since he’s important to me and you’re important to me, I’d like you to meet him.”

“Cool,” Pippa said casually.

I stared at her, shocked at her non-response.

Or, more precisely, her not negative one.

“You should make your pulled barbeque chicken when he comes over. With your homemade coleslaw,” Auden suggested.

I moved my stare to him.

Then I asked, “I…that’s it? Do you have questions? Anything you want to ask me about Mickey?”

“No, why?” Auden asked back.

“It’s about time,” Pip stated before I could answer my son. “You’ve always been pretty and those highlights kick butt. So it’s no surprise you hooked up. And it’s good you have somebody.”

Could it be this easy?

“Pippa, sweets, you should know, it’s that firefighter you saw that day on the street.”