“Did you get good sleep?”I asked him.
“Dad bought me one of those hybrid mattresses.It’s theshhhh-oot.”
I bumped him with my shoulder and teased, “It’s the shoot?”
“Cussing isn’t such a bad thing, Mom,” Liam informed me.“Dad and his buds do it all the time.”
My eyes cut to his father.
Darius cracked an egg into a bowl, shrugged and agreed, “Itisn’t.”
“A gentleman doesn’t curse,” I declared.
Father looked to son, son looked to father, and they bustedout laughing.
Oh Lord.
We’d had an equilibrium, with one authority…me.
Now I was outnumbered.
“Are you two going to make a habit of ganging up on me?”Iasked.
“Absolutely,” Liam answered.
“Not on any important stuff, sweetheart,” Darius assured.
“I think cursing is important.”
Darius seemed perplexed.
He sounded it too, when he asked, “Really?”
“Maybe we should talk about this when the boy is not inattendance,” I suggested sweetly.
Okay, not sweetly.
Fake sweetly.
“You’re still not gonna change my mind.I don’t buy thatshit that swearing shows a lack of intelligence,” Darius retorted.“It justdemonstrates another way the establishment tries to control your behavior bymaking random shit wrong, like words.”
“Or sex,” Liam put in.
Darius nodded.“Or sex.”
It felt like my eyes had bugged out of my head.
“We’re definitely talking aboutthiswhen the boyis not in attendance,” I decreed.
“We’ve had the talk, baby,” Darius replied.“A couple ofyears ago.He’s got condoms.”
I made a cacking noise then my foreheadthunkedon the stainless-steel counter because I couldn’t hold it up anymore.
Though, it must be said, I was relieved they’d had the talk.I hadn’t done it yet because I was committed to the task of avoiding it likethe plague.Not smart for a woman who’d been a teenage mom but cut me someslack.That stuff wasn’t easy.
And anyway, I’d been secretly hoping my dad or Tony hadstepped in.
Fortunately, Liam’s own father did.
