“Sure.”
She put him on hold and answered the other line. “Hello?”
“Oh, is this Ann Weaver?”
The voice sounded familiar, but she couldn’t place it. “Yes.”
“Hi, Ann. This is Laura Bloom, Josh’s grandmother. Jack’s mom.”
“Oh yes, Mrs. Bloom. Hi, how are you?”I have your son on the other line. And by the way, I can’t stop thinking about him going down on me,she thought with a touch of hysteria, as if those words might actually pop out.
“Call me Laura, honey. I was calling to invite you to my daughter-in-law’s surprise party. She’s pregnant, and we’re so excited to be adding another one to the family.”
“Congratulations.” She paused. “But, Laura, I don’t know Julie or Dan that well outside of school and Josh.”
“I know, but since you’re so close to Jack, I thought it might be nice if all us girls had some time to ourselves.”
She swallowed a groan. “Th-that would be lovely. But my schedule is kind of full, especially with the school Halloween party, and I—”
“A lot of folks are busy this time of year. So I took that into account. The party isn’t until next month. On a Saturday. I’ll shoot you an invitation with the exact time and date. It would mean so much to Julie if you could be there.”
How to say no to that?
“Um, sure. Okay. Thanks for inviting me.”
“Wonderful!” Laura chatted a moment more, then hung up.
Ann realized she’d left Jack on hold. She hurried to catch the call. “Sorry. Are you there?”
“Fell asleep waiting, but yeah.”
She groaned. “That was your mother.” A perfect end to her less-than-stellar day.
“What?”
“She just invited me to Julie’s surprise party.”
“Oh. Are you going?”
“Yes. She guilted me into it.”
She didn’t get any sympathy from Jack. “Ha. She did the same to me. She’s a real piece of work, all right,” he teased. “Look, don’t worry about it. I can make some excuse to get you out of going.”
Ann felt worse, because he was being so nice. What had Julie done to deserve her indifference, anyway? Nothing. Ann loved Josh, so why not be supportive? “No, no. I want to go.”
“You do?”
“It’ll be fun. As long as your mother doesn’t grill me about you.”
“I’ll make sure she doesn’t. And I’ll be there, so I can protect you, my small, feeble lady.”
“Ha ha. Very funny.”
“I thought so.” She sensed him grin through the phone. “Anyway, I called to say hi, and to invite you to dinner with Dan, Julie and my folks on Thursday.”
“Good timing.”
“In light of Mom’s invite, I’d say so. You should come. My brother was a pain growing up, but he turned into an okay guy.”
