“I don’t notice ifone womanis pretty or not, and suddenly that makes me gay?”
“No, no, no. But you’ve never brought a girl around, and you turn down all my offers to set you up. Youreallyliked the Spice Girls when you were little.”
“Show me anybody who doesn’t like them and I’ll show you a liar.” My hip digs into the counter, and I ignore her slapping fingers to scoop a spoonful of caramelized onions from the pan. They burn my tongue, but it’s worth it. “I like women.Love ’em,even.If you must know, I sleep withlotsof women, but they’re nobody I’d want to bring home.”
Okay, not entirely true. I sleep with very few women. Actually, make that past tense: I’ve slept with a few women, but none recently.
Her face falls. “Oh, Colt. I just want you to find somebody who will make you happy.”
“Yeah, well, when I findher,you’ll be the first to know.”
The hand still stroking my arm moves to slide around my waist, and she pulls her small body into mine until I hug her back. I know she isn’toldold, but she certainly feels more fragile than the sturdy farm mom I grew up hugging. And fuck, does that suck.
If there’s one thing I know, it’s that I want my mom to be happy. With my brother traveling the world and chasing his musical dreams, having kids is likely the last thing on his mind. I’d love to give Mom the grandkids she’s desperate to have, because she’d love the shit out of them. She’d be baking cookies every day and taking the kids to the zoo and doing all the things she would’ve loved to do with Beau and me, had she been in a position where she wasn’t struggling to make ends meet and essentially raising two kids alone, since Dad was on the road more often than not. I want that for her.
“You should bring Whit and Jonas for dinner next time.”
I pull back from the hug to give her a look. “Ma…”
“Not trying to meddle.” She holds her hands up in surrender. “But you love that boy of hers—the way you talk about him has made that clear. And I’m your mom, which means I like to meet the people in your life.”
“He’s a pretty cool kid,” I admit. “He made a comment about knowing his dad was going to flake out, and I remember being that kid. So I kind of felt…I don’t know,called,I guess, to take him under my wing then.”
“Colt…” Mom twists at the waist to face me. A knot tangles in my throat at the sight of her eyes watering. “I’m sorry you felt like you couldn’t rely on Dad.”
It’s not that Ifeltlike I couldn’t rely on him…that was the reality of the situation. Rodeos and cattle drives were his priority. I don’t know what Alex’s excuse is, but I do know how it feels to be a son without a present father.
And yet, I can’t bear the idea of making my mom feel guilty, so I immediately backpedal. “I didn’t mean it that way. I’m only saying that I know what it’s like to have a dad who isn’t always around—I know Dad was just working to support us. I like being there for Jonas.”
“He’s lucky to have you there.” She dabs at the inner corner of her eye with her tea towel, and a thin smile fractures her face. “Love you, bud. All I want is for you to be happy.”
“I’m happy, Ma.” Pulling her into another hug, I press a kiss to the top of her head. “It’s gonna take one hell of a woman to compete with you and Betty.”
Whit
Our car doors shut in sync, and I meet Jonas’s eyes in the rearview mirror. For once, things aren’t unbearably tense between us as we leave the therapist’s office. A complete one-eighty from this morning, when I would’ve had an easier time convincing him to saw off a finger than get in the car to drive to Sheridan.
If it weren’t for his plans with Colt tonight, we would’ve had to skip today’s session. There was no convincing him, and he’s officially too big for me to drag him anywhere kicking and screaming. I’m almost certain it makes me a shitty parent for holding the one thing he’s been anticipating all week over his head, but I did. I threatened, in no uncertain terms, to text Colt and cancel their video game night, and that got his ass in gear. Then I justified my shittiness by telling myself that he could always talk it out in therapy if he was that pissed off with me.
And it seems to have been the right move. For once, the pediatric therapist didn’t sigh and give me a hopeless smile when I took my place in a kid-sized chair opposite her. It always feels bonkers sitting in a tiny chair—barely big enough to fit one butt cheek—while her every sentence is laced with judgment, until I’ve reached a point where the heaviness feels as though it’ll buckle the chair legs beneath me.
Not today.
Instead, hopeful elation danced in her tight-lipped smile, and she flipped through scrawled notes. Knees sitting chest high in my tiny chair, I clasped my hands together and waited to hear about a revelation. A miraculous breakthrough.
“He told me about his new friend Colt,” she said.
I answered with, “Okay…”
That was it. He talked to her about horseback riding and cleaning horseshit out of stalls and Colt’s dog’s love for whipped cream. Not a word about how much he hates me, or about his shitty dad trying to buy his love, or about his sick grandma. In my mind, it all felt like money down the drain. Disguised as progress because this woman’s smart enough to know that eventually I’ll stop paying for my kid to sit in silence week after week.
Over one hundred dollars, plus the hours taken away from my job to bring him to the appointment, all so he could talk about how much he loves Colt.
Frustrated, I snipped something about Jonas never wanting to talk to her about anything that actually matters.
“That’s where you’re wrong,” she said gently. “It all matters. Right now, what’s most important is he’s starting to trust me enough to talk. And not just about anything—about something positive. For a kid who’s been carrying as much weight as he has, sharing a bright spot is progress. It’s finding a crack in a wall we’ve been chipping away at for months. From here, we can start building more connections. But it starts with trust, and today, he showed me he’s capable of that.”
Those words were the first rays of sun after a storm.
