He could have easily hidden the fact Saylor lived with him for months if not a year since no one came out to visit him.
But the consequences of his mother finding out after the fact wouldn’t be worth it.
“We didn’t get too deep,” he said.
He knew her family life was stressful. She stayed with her grandmother when she was in town, not her parents.
She talked to her grandmother a few times this past week, but her mother only on Christmas day and it was brief.
He’d find out what her family knew about her location when she got here.
“Do you think she’ll change her mind?”
“I hope not,” he said. “But not much I can do about it if she does.”
“Please.” His mother waved her hand. “None of my kids give up if they want something bad enough. I can see it on your face you do.”
There was no hiding anything from her. “I do. But I’m going to give her the time to come to that on her own. She’s got a lot of insecurities about things in life.”
His mother frowned. “That’s not good. I mean we all do to an extent, but if you’ve got to hold her hand on things, it’s not your favorite thing to do.”
He laughed. “It has more to do with her health.”
“Tell me about it. You had a friend in college who was a diabetic, right?”
His mother never forgot a thing. “I did. Damon. I think the fact I knew so much helped. She kept waiting for me to make some negative comment about the devices she wore on her body. When she tested her blood sugar or had to stop to make a correction to her pump.”
Even when she changed her pump and sensor, he asked her to show him how or if she needed a hand.
“You wouldn’t. You probably asked thoughtful questions. You’re the most thoughtful of my kids though you want no one to know that.”
Again, Aileen Carlisle knew her children well. “I did. I asked things to understand and I could see how much she appreciated it.”
The look in her eyes when he joked about gummy bears or worms and then picked them both up.
He ate them with her when she needed them, and she’d giggle.
He wasn’t even trying to be funny but just grabbing one since the tin was open.
“Do you have any concerns over it?”
“With what? Her being a diabetic? Nope. No one would know looking at her.”
Unless they saw the two devices she wore. Even then, they weren’t that noticeable to him.
He was no idiot. Every time they got naked, she watched to see if his eyes landed on them on her body.
He glanced and moved on just like he would have any other part of her body.
That is what it was to him. Just a part of her body.
A mechanical pancreas was how he thought of it.
“And if anyone knew, you wouldn’t care.”
“Exactly.”
“Tell me what you feel for her,” his mother asked.
