“Mom’s tomorrow?” he asks.
I glance at him. I don’t know what it’s like to have parents who are no longer married. My parents have been together so long I think of them as the same person sometimes, like an object someone stuck in a tree and the tree grew around it. Dislodging would be impossible.
“Yeah, bud. Mom’s tomorrow. Or, Grandpa Brock and Grandma Susan’s, anyway.”
“It would be nice if we could go back to that house mom had with the pool and the water slide,” Charlie says, looking out the window. “What happened to that house?”
I shake my head slowly, as if I don’t know. The truth is, it was a sort of halfway house. A place where Anna stayed after the treatment center, with a person who’d gone through treatment years ago and volunteered her home to people exiting. I saw the wisdom in Anna staying there, almost like stairs. Leaving Harmony and coming home would’ve been like jumping from the third stair onto ground level. She’d said she needed it to be gradual, and I agreed. I just didn’t realize she’d never be coming home again. Now she lives in an apartment, processing mortgage loans from her dining room table, and drives up to Sierra Grande every two weeks to have her kids at her parents’ house. She still doesn’t trust herself enough to be on her own with them. From what I’ve seen of her, maybe it’s time.
“She was just renting it, and the lease was up.” I detest the lies, but the kids aren’t ready to know about Anna. She’ll have to be the one to tell them.
“Too bad. It was a cool house.”
Charlie hasn’t said a lot about his mom or me. I wish I could crawl into his head and watch the thoughts pass. Maybe he feels more than he’s letting on. He was eight when Anna left. Old enough to remember. Old enough to absorb what it meant? I don’t know. I did everything in my power to cushion the blow.
I pull up outside the homestead. Charlie makes it inside before me. My mom is in the kitchen, pulling the casserole from the oven. It smells like my childhood.
“Hey, Mom.”
She looks over her shoulder as she slides the glass dish onto the range. “Hi, Warner. Smells good, doesn’t it?”
“Yes ma’am.”
“Why don’t you go invite Tenley to have dinner? I heard what happened the last time she tried to eat by herself in town. I’m worried the poor girl doesn’t have enough to keep her full out there in Wyatt’s place. She’d probably enjoy a home-cooked dinner. And it wouldn’t hurt her to put a little meat on those bones.”
Tenley’s body is about as perfect as it can be, but I keep that thought to myself. I pull my phone from my pocket. My mom reaches over, batting at the screen. “No,” she says.
I make a face. “You just told me to invite Tenley.”
“I saidgoinvite Tenley, not send her a text. Knock on her door and invite her to dinner like the big boy you are.” She winks at me and makes a clicking sound from the side of her mouth, then slips her hands from the oven mitts and walks from the room.
My mom is tough, and she’s never been a meddler. I was too young when I proposed to Anna, and looking back on it I’m almost positive everyone around me knew it. Maybe my mom should’ve said something then, but would it have even mattered? Probably not. I couldn’t see the forest, because all the trees were in my way. Perhaps that’s why she’s poking her nose in my business now. The mention of Tenley is absolutely my mom’s way of guiding me toward her.
I move through the house, checking on Charlie and saying hello to Peyton, who gives me little in the way of a real greeting, and head out the door. Pulling my ball cap low on my head, I take my truck over to Wyatt’s cabin.
Something acidic races across my stomach. Nerves? Is that what this is? I’ve seen Tenley every day, hell I even saw her already today and had a beer with her a couple hours ago. But inviting her to dinner at the homestead, with my kids, feels likemore.
And these nerves feel like more, too. Like excitement.
This is why I called Anna, even though she’s the last person on the planet I want to talk with.
Closure. Not all of it though. Not yet. But what I do have, is enough for right now.
I pull up and cut the engine. Tenley is sitting on the porch swing, but I don’t see her until I’m on the second step. She shifts, my attention is caught, and I halt. Her eyes are on me, cornflower blue reaching out to my light brown, and her face is excruciatingly gorgeous. She’s an actress, so of course she’s beautiful, but it’s not just that. It’s the layers underneath her skin. She’s funny, and she’s always game to learn. I can’t think of many people who’d shovel shit just to learn how to hold the shovel the right way.
“Did you forget something?” Tenley’s head tips to the side, her long hair fanning out. She tucks one knee up into her chest, but keeps her other foot on the floor. She pushes off, and the swing moves slowly.
“My mom told me to invite you to dinner.” That’s not what I meant to say. Or maybe I just wish I’d said something smoother. But how can I be smooth when I’m inviting her to dinner at my parents’ house with my two kids? Nowhere in that scenario is there room for anything even remotely romantic.
She smirks. “Your mom?”
“Yes, but in the interest of full disclosure, she’s not the only person who’d like you to be there.”
“Charlie, too, huh?” She grins, teasing.
I huff a laugh. “Yeah. Charlie.”
The swing slows and Tenley stands. She sails past me and into the cabin, stepping out a moment later with a jacket. “It gets chilly here at night.”
