“Okay, yeah,” I said, dreading talking with Janine, although if she was the receptionist who’d greeted me, she seemed like a very nice older lady.
I made my way out of W. Stan’s office and found Janine waiting for me, folder in hand. “Lucas, let’s sit over here and talk about things, shall we?”
I’d met some of Stick’s less-desirable friends (yes, Stick had friends even less desirable than a reformed Oxy addict and college dropout), but they didn’t hold a candle to the gentle but definitely strong-arm tactics of a high-priced law firm and dear, old Janine.
I walked out of their offices feeling great about the chance that Andy would always be looked after by a member of his family in a legal sense.
And totally fucked on how I was going to pay for those assurances.
* * *
“You look good, Mom,”I said to my mother, honestly meaning it. She looked better than I’d seen her since I’d come home from California.
“I feel good, Lucas,” she said. She smiled tentatively, like this well-being could be snatched away at any moment.
She probably thought that was why I was visiting her in the rehab center—to snatch it all away and remind her of the real world awaiting her. The world that had gotten so hard for her that she’d needed to escape. Through chemicals.
No way was I judging…not with my recent past. I totally got it—the escape, by any means necessary.
“You know, one day at a time, and all that,” she said, almost embarrassed. Then she sat up a little bit straighter, owning it. “But it’s working. It’s really working this time.”
“That’s great, Mom.” I believed her. I probably shouldn’t have, as I’d been down this road with her before. But there seemed to be something more hopeful in her this time.
Or maybe I just wanted to believe this time was different? Whatever. I took it.
I looked around the place. It was your typical visiting room in a rehab center. The middle-of-the-road kind that’s paid for by your job’s health insurance. Not one of those beautiful places with views of the ocean or rolling hills to look at as you contemplate your demons. We sat on a comfortable but worn-looking brown leather couch. The place reeked of smoke. Apparently this was one of the places where the inmates could smoke.
“How’s Andy? Is he…um…with you?”
“Not with me today, no. They wouldn’t have let him in, and I didn’t want him out waiting in the hall or anything.”
“No. I mean, he’s…you’re…still in the apartment with him?”
Jesus, had she thought I’d bail on him? Or did she think my being off Oxy was precarious enough that a backslide was on the horizon? It wasn’t. I’d been clean six months and was being vigilant about keeping it that way.
“Yeah, Mom. We’re doing good, Andy and me. I get him to school and pick him up. We do dinner and I get him to bed. Then Mrs. Jankowski comes over while I work at night.”
She nodded like she’d expected nothing less, but her eyes still held some skepticism. “And the job? It’s still going okay?”
I nodded. “Yeah, really good. Frank gave me a custom tiling job as a special project. If he likes it, I’ll get more of them.”
She got a faraway look in her eyes and a sad smile crossed her face. I’d seen pictures, and Linda Kade had been a looker in her day (as much as any son can say his mother was a hottie), but my father’s death, Andy’s asshole father, several jobs, and the ever-tempting drugs had all taken a toll on her.
She looked ten years older than her forty-three years.
“That’s great, Lucas. Your father would be proud of you. Tiling, that is.”
She needed to clarify, because there hadn’t been a lot of reason lately for my dead father to be proud of me.
But life had given me a second chance, and I was grabbing that motherfucker by both horns.
This could have been me, sitting here like she was. So, so fucking easily. I’d glossed over the details of my Oxy use with Lily that day in her dorm room. The day we’d first slept together. I hadn’t told her about all the awful shit that I’d gone through just to get off the stuff. And it was by the sheer grace of God, or the universe, or whatever, that I hadn’t already turned to other stuff by the time I realized I needed to get clean so that Andy would have at least one person in his life who wasn’t totally fucked.
But it wasn’t me in here. It was my mom, and she seemed to be getting the help she needed.
“And no one’s been around? Asking questions about why you’re there with Andy?”
I debated on how much to tell her, but she’d have to sign whatever papers W. Stan Lansing put together, so it might as well be now. “Well, Andy mentioned to his teacher that you were on a trip and that I was living with him.”
