I shrug. “She left her drunk, cheating husband. I figured you’d be her champion.”
Mom shakes her head, scoffing. “Patrick, you’re a good man who made one mistake. That’s not something to end a marriage over.”
I let out a breath, that’s what I believed too. “She didn’t end it over one mistake. She forgave me for that. It was the rest of it she couldn’t live with.”
Mom frowns, confused. “The… rest?”
I look down at my hands. It’s true. When IA showed me the footage… it felt like watching a stranger wearing my skin.
A man who wasn’t just drunk, he was gone. A man I honestly couldn’t remember being.
I swallow hard.
“Lore forgave the cheating,” I say quietly. “She couldn’t forgive the lying… or the drinking… or the way I kept breaking every promise I made her.”
Mom’s face softens, but she still doesn’t get it. Not really.
And for the first time, I realize how alone Lore must’ve felt with all of us. How hard she worked to keep peace between me and my own family. How much pressure she carried just to make sure everythinglookedokay.
I meet Mom’s eyes. “You don’t get to punish her, Mom. No matter what happens with us, she’s still the woman you called your daughter for six years. She loved you like one, too. And can you really say you would blame Chloe ifshewere in Lore’s place?”
Mom’s mouth flattens. Papers shuffle under her hands, her tell when she doesn’t want to face something.
“I suppose not,” she murmurs. “But Chloe would’ve come to me. She would’ve told me. Lorelie didn’t.”
I shake my head. “How could she? She was probably scared you’d react exactly the way you did.”
Mom freezes. Just for a second. But I see it, that hit of shame, coloring her cheeks.
She looks down again, smoothing the same piece of paper that doesn’t need smoothing.
“I… may have been too harsh,” she admits quietly. “When Lauren left Harvey, it threw me. Our family was already shaking. Then you and Lorelie…”
She trails off, sighing. “Your brother’s trying to win Lauren back while she’s living with another man, and I- ” Her hand flutters helplessly. “I guess I panicked. I didn’t want to lose another daughter.”
I stare at her, stunned.
Mom’s eyes lift to mine, and the remorse there is real.
“I shouldn’t have taken it out on Lorelie,” Mom says quietly. “That wasn’t fair to her. Or to you.”
My shoulders slump. I should’ve done this months ago.
I give her a small smile.
She exhales and shakes her head. “How was the appointment?”
“It was fine,” I say. “Milo’s just acting out because he misses… us. When we were a family.”
Mom’s eyes flick away. “I suppose I can relate to that.”
“Mom?” I lean forward a little. “Are you okay?”
She’s not someone who admits fault easily, ever, really and this version of her feels unfamiliar. Vulnerable in a way I’m not used to.
She fiddles with a pen, then asks in a small, hesitant voice, “Do you think I’m unreasonable?”
“What?” The question knocks the breath out of me.
