It's All Relative(159)

Millie was feeling seventy-five again. Her hip had healed, and almost all trace of her clumsy tumble was gone. She felt like she could go down to the senior center, find a charming, distinguished gentleman, preferably with a head full of hair and all his original teeth, and spend the afternoon square dancing. She’d considered it too, except that her heart wasn’t feeling quite as healthy.

Her ticker was still physically fine, that wasn’t the problem. No, her heart’s issues were all emotional, and all centered around her family. Sometimes she swore that the lot of them were going to drive her into the grave. Worrying about them was surely aging her by the second.

Her son, Nate, was struggling with impatience. He wanted to talk with Kai about his true paternity. He wanted to sit down with him and explain why they’d lied to him for so long. And he wanted to beg Kai’s forgiveness for withholding the truth. Millie still thought it was pointless to tell Kai, but Nate wouldn’t let it go. And the longer Kai remained ignorant, the harder it was on him.

Nate had even admitted that he was becoming distant with Kai, and he hated it. “I can’t stand it, Mom. I just want to talk to him about this…secret looming over us, but he doesn’t know yet. I can’t talk to him about what I really want to talk about…so I shut down, and don’t talk to him about anything. He must wonder why I’m so distant... I hate this.”

Nate admitted that he hated himself for being cold to Kai, but each time he talked to him, Kai was still oblivious. Frustrated, confused, and disappointed at his own weakness, Nate’s anger towards Mason’s procrastination was showing itself as bluntness towards Kai.

Millie had had several long conversations with him, and most of them ended with, “He loves you, Nate. You are the only father he’s ever known, and in the end, love will win out over everything else. I’m sure, given enough time, he’ll eventually understand.”

But even though Millie spoke those words to her son, she wasn’t sure if they were true or not. Well, she knew Kai loved his father, yes, but she wasn’t sure if he would understand Nate’s behavior or motives once the truth was revealed. Yet another reason Kai should never know. Why put that strife in a loving relationship, if it didn’t need to be? Why cause irrelevant pain? But Nate believed in knowing the truth. It was one of the things that made him great at his job. And now that he felt Kai was old enough to be able to handle the truth, he wanted…no, he needed, Kai to know it.

Even if that meant telling him himself.

The longer Kai stayed away, the longer Nate didn’t have to look at him, the easier it was for him to gain the necessary courage to break his son’s heart. Nate told her repeatedly that he didn’t think he could do it, that he didn’t think he could even form the words. But his impatience at Kai’s continued lack of knowledge was quickly wearing away the reluctance. Millie knew her son would have the strength soon, and she was positive that before the year ran out, he would finally tell Kai. And Kai’s entire view on his life would change.

Millie sighed as she went about clipping her herb garden. Tiny piles of chives rested in her palm, just enough for the baked potatoes Jessica Marie was cooking in the kitchen. The girl still diligently checked on her. Perhaps Millie’s tumble had made her feel guilty about not being around more. Millie tried to assure her the care wasn’t necessary, she was a grown woman after all, but Harper blood flowed through the young woman’s veins too, and the need to nurture was a big part of that blood.

Filling a small bowl with the clippings, Millie moved on to some thyme for Kai. She’d been giving him whatever herbs were ready, telling him exactly how to prepare food with it, since she was sure he’d never been given proper instruction on how to create a meal. Not with that woman for a mother. Kai obliged her, listening raptly and asking the appropriate questions. Millie almost got the feeling that he was only interested in cooking to woo a woman, but then she dismissed the thought. He currently didn’t have anyone.

She’d gotten her hopes up when he’d started seeing that April girl. Surely a friend of Jessica’s would have been a good match for him. He was going to need a shoulder to cry on soon, a warm body to cuddle up with, when one of his two fathers finally confessed the truth to him. But alas, he’d broken it off with the girl. He’d explained to Millie over and over, since she’d kind of badgered him about it, that they just hadn’t been compatible. Millie had wanted to tell him that she had girl parts, he had boy parts, so, of course they were compatible, but she’d refrained.

Kai was a gentleman, and he wasn’t going to sleep with a girl purely because he needed the release. Millie respected that, and was immensely proud of him for his choice. Most men his age probably wouldn’t have made the same one. Millie wouldn’t push him into physical love, especially when he wasn’t aware of the upcoming heartache.

Finished with her preparation, Millie sealed the tiny bags she’d made for her grandson. For the hundredth time, she wished Kai would decide that he hated it here and move home. Not because she didn’t want him around—far from it, she immensely enjoyed his company—but because she didn’t want him to get hurt. And Mason admitting who he was to him was going to hurt. Maybe if he went home, maybe if Nate had to look him in the eyes again every day, he’d lose his nerves and never tell him. And that would be for the best.

Millie wasn’t sure about Kai’s mother though. Perhaps Leilani was cruel enough to spill the beans. But then again, regardless of what Millie thought of her, Leilani was a mother, and what mother wanted to cause her son harm? And Millie knew Kai was close to his mother; he talked with her daily. The woman obviously adored her son, no matter who his father was. No, Millie was pretty sure that the push to send Kai to Denver, to his biological father, had come from Nate.